Fužine Blues Read online

  Flint was hit by a car five years back. Stone dead. Some time at night. He was comin’ back from a party, middle of the night. Middle of the road, he’d gone past the crossin’, stopped at a traffic island, instead of waitin’ he just went. Middle of the night. Hardly any traffic but he stepped straight in front of a car. Bang! Smashed into ’im. Middle of the night. Comin’ back from somewhere, some party, night. Flint was hit by a car five years back. BANG!

  Didn’t you know, Sandi died five years ago?

  “Hello, Mr Tričković, it’s Peter Sokič.” Silence. Silence, silence. “I was a friend of your son Robbi, ten years ago. We were in Amsterdam together...” Silence, like when the deaf and dumb are arguin’. “I was thinking about old times and decided to organise a get together of the old gang. But there’s a problem, as I haven’t seen most of ’em for ages, and I don’t have their phone numbers or addresses... I don’t really know what they’re doing, or anything.” Silence. “I thought, er, maybe you could give me his phone number?”

  Silence.

  Hey old man, Trič’s number. Please. Trič’s number is vitally important to me at the moment. Your son’s a real character. Always was a real character, unless he’s now become some cunt with a mobile and a wife and two kids and a Renault from work. But no, old man, your son’s not the fuckin’ type to do somethin’ like that. Maybe you’d like ’im to, old man, but don’t wish for somethin’ for your son that’d make the poor bugger sweat and all.

  Your son wasn’t hit by a car.

  No, it wouldn’t be possible, statistically like, Flint covered for the whole of the gang. That’s the kind of guy he was, that he took the whole thing on his shoulders instead of others.

  “Listen here, Peter Sokič,” says the old bloke. “Robi’s just got back from treatment, for the third time. I’m not giving his phone number to some pillock he was in Amsterdam with, capisce? The first and the second time he said he’d had enough, that he was going to stay away from the likes of you, but then after a month the same old shit again. Now he’s hidden away where you lot will never find him. The likes of you shouldn’t be allowed to happen, you should’ve been aborted after the third month. Take yourself and your lousy gear back to Shamsterdam, or just GO FUCK YOURSELF.”

  My jaw was on the floor. What, you think I’ve got anythin’ to do with it?

  Who the fuck do you think I am? The only drug for me’s always been a good drop of schnapps. I’ve always been one for parties, for women — not like those fuckin’ junkies just starin’ at the fuckin’ wall that Trič and I used to lay into. Life’s full of fuckin’ surprises, innit? That Trič should get mixed up with fuckin’ druggies. Don’t give me that. That’s too fuckin’ weird. I mean horse, that’s a real no-no, definitely not a heavy metal drug, not like rum and vodka. Did you know Flint got hit by a car five years back? BANG! and now this old feller’s fuckin’ with me, sayin’ I led his son astray. You fuckin’ Yugo cunt, you’re the one who should never have happened, you fucked-up bastard.

  Flint got hit by a car five years back. BANG!

  Trič? Trič. Do you remember? You remember this? Course you fuckin’ do. We were sittin’ in the Hunter. Fifteen years ago. Out back, behind the concrete plant holders, Zlato was asleep, the legendary tramp who hung around the Roman wall. He froze to death two years later in some hallway when he’d fallen asleep drunk under the stairs. None of the waiters dared wake ’im. Zlato was an institution. He could’ve taken off his ammunition belt and started to whack the tables with it. No respectable bar can afford that. So let’s leave ’im be, for god’s sake, let the poor bugger sleep, he ain’t doin’ no harm.

  We both sit there, sippin’ our beer. Late afternoon. In comes

  * * *

  At four, Zoki and I are back in Fužine. The last job today, no viewings this evening. No way. This evening — action. Fužine’s going to explode. Before the game I’ve got to go to Rusjanov. There’s some heavy money being laid down today. Mainly for Yugo. But I don’t feel bad about putting some cash down for Slovenia. Now we have Zahovič and Pavlin and Udovič, they’re not such a bad bet. If they were, I wouldn’t want to waste money just out of national pride. I’m not the type. But they have a realchance. I’m laying out five thousand. No, sod it, ten thousand. They’d better win. And it better be three-two!

  We ring a buzzer on the second floor. Zoki looks in a bad mood. His tie’s all creased, like he slept in it. But he probably didn’t. There’s no point saying anything to him. Though he could look a bit smarter, we’re on official business, stamping an invoice for fuck’s sake. The best part of the job, when you see money changing hands. An honest business. Honest business, good friends, all thanks to Fixed Properties Ltd.

  Mrs Erjavec answers the door, looking somewhat suspicious. Bloody hell, we already rang downstairs. What does she think, we’re going to rob her or something? I feel like saying BOO but I don’t know if she’d appreciate the joke.

  “My husband’s not here,” she says.

  “Don’t worry,” I say, “we’ll just sit quietly in the kitchen and the time will soon pass.”

  “Coffee?” she asks.

  “Please. We’ve just come from lunch.”

  Zoki looks in an even worse mood. The fucker went home to eat. I went for a pizza. My stomach’s going to feel heavy for a while. But it’s better than going home and seeing Mira and Manja in broad daylight. Not to mention that hound.

  As soon as we sit, before the woman puts the coffee on, the buzzer goes again. She goes to the door, we hear Galušić’s voice, then his wife’s. The Joe with the dough. All A-okay. Mrs Erjavec and her husband moved to Fužine just over a month ago, they sold their one-bedroom place in Koseze and bought this one. The Galušićs bought the Koseze flat, now they’re bringing the last instalment. They asked for a delay so they could get the money from a deposit account. There’s no problem reaching agreement if things hang together. If people are straight. It’s a pleasure working with people like the Galušićs, you shake hands on things and that’s it, there’s no need for pieces of paper. With these two, the Erjavecs, it’s a constant headache. They looked around here as if someone was going to attack them at any minute. Then, when they got the contract to look over, they took it home and brought it back covered in red ink. They didn’t change any of the clauses, for fuck’s sake, just the bleeding grammar! I don’t know what they do for a living. I think she’s a German teacher or something. I said to them, it’s okay with me, but you know this contract has to go to a notary for verification. That’s part of my job, to make sure that everything’s okay with the notary. Notary or not, she said, that sentence, as it’s written, simply doesn’t make any sense. I said, that’s how it has to be, Mrs Erjavec, that’s legal language, it’s hard for ordinary folk like us to understand. She just nodded and kept on: look, if we move this word here and change the case ending then the sentence suddenly makes perfect sense: to acquire title to own and possess on the day of signature of the contract of sale and payment of the whole amount. I really don’t know what’s wrong with and pay the whole purchase price. What simpleton couldn’t understand that. For fuck’s sake, it’s just a bleeding formality, we agreed that the flat would be handed over early and the last instalment a month later. Just so she can have the last word. I said: okay Mrs Erjavec, but if the notary has any problems with the contract, I’m not responsible. But no luck. I even prayed that the notary would go through it thoroughly for once and find some cock up. But she didn’t, just glanced at it from two metres away, as usual, waved her hand towards the secretaries and told them to stamp it. And charged us a fat eighteen thousand.

  “Hi,” says Galušić, plonking himself down next to me.

  “Would you like coffee, too?” asks Mrs E.

  “Please.”

  She starts rattling around with the caffetiere, can’t make Turkish like other people, while Galušić asks me how business is.

  “Not bad,” I say, “it’ll be even better towards the end of the summ
er. When parents start getting places for students. That’s when this business really takes off.”

  Zoki gives me a look but says nothing.

  “Terrible, isn’t it?” says Mrs E, coming over from the cooker and leaning against the wall. “That shooting the other day, it frightened me to death. It’s awful, shooting like that on the street.”

  Zoki and I exchange glances. Damn it, two such refined people move to Fužine and somebody starts firing off shots right on their doorstep. On their doorstep — well actually it was two blocks away. Such a respectable middle-class household for fuck’s sake, she has already made such a jungle in the kitchen with weeping figs that it smells like a florist’s when you go in to order a wreath. Plant holders on the window sill, too. And they’re shooting outside. Isn’t that just terrible?

  “Does that happen often round here?” she asks. “Now whenever I hear a firework going off I’m all on edge.”

  “They’re getting ready for the championship,” says Zoki, in a slightly better mood for a moment.

  “The European championship, Mrs Erjavec, prepare yourself, they’ll be going off all the time this evening.”

  “I know,” she replies, “but in Koseze I didn’t wonder every time whether it was a firework or a gun.”

  “But what about those kids in Koseze who attacked that man and fractured his skull?” says Galušić. “Do you think I’ve moved into a more respectable neighbourhood? And what about that shooting in the bar, the cards players... Only nobody heard that on the street.”

  “I know, it’s terrible,” says Mrs E. “Nowhere’s safe anymore.” Oh, you poor old thing.

  “That’s right,” says Zoki. “As for that bar in Šiška, even I knew what was happening there and I live in Fužine. Places like that are not for a lady like you, though. If you know where to avoid...”

  “What about that guy who chased after some kids to tell them to pay the waitress?” asks Galušić.

  “If you don’t know how to keep out of things that don’t concern you... Who gives a damn about some waitress, that guy got beaten up for two Cokes.”

  “When all’s said and done, this Fužine isn’t the place you made it out to be, Mr Ščinkovec,” says Mrs E, as if the conversation has stirred her up a bit and she’s now looking at me somehow accusingly. Fuck me, now she’s going to accuse me of something. Did I ever lie to her? Here’s some guy with cash in his hands, marks, and she looks at me as if I’ve dragged her down into the gutter.

  “Mrs Erjavec, I’ve lived in Fužine for sixteen years now,” I say authoritatively, as you need to do with such people. “I’ve been here right since the beginning. When they first built these flats. When Bosnians were still roasting pigs on spits here. And do you know how much shit I’ve had in all that time?” If she looks at me like that I don’t care what she thinks of my language, even if she passes out. Sod her. She’s already paid our commission. “None. Not once. My car was broken into sixteen years ago, but that wasn’t in Fužine, it was in Trnovo. You see, a smart neighbourhood. You know what property prices are like round there? Not once in Fužine.”

  It’s clear from her face that she bitterly regrets that her husband isn’t here so that she can bugger off out, I don’t know, to the shop for a few slices of ham, or somewhere, just so she can get away from these unpleasant types. Yeh, even Zoki’s looking a lot more cheerful than he was at the beginning. Thank god for that. He’s always allergic to any kind of slagging off of Fužine, and it seems he’s seen what I’m up to and wants to join in. He’s got something to say too.

  “I’ve also been here for sixteen years,” he says, “and you know what was the biggest load of shit I had to face? In fact, not really shit, more of a joke? Shall I tell you?”

  She doesn’t look very keen, but Galušić looks very much so. Galušić is really interested in hearing. Mrs E brings milk and sugar to the table, the coffee’s still brewing, and Zoki starts on his old story about the stairs. It doesn’t bother me that I’ve already heard it twenty times before. I know it’ll have the desired effect.

  “I come home one evening, about eleven o’clock,” says Zoki. “I live on the eleventh floor, you know, above us there are just some stairs up to the top. Nobody ever uses those stairs, you hardly ever see anybody, because they only go to the twelfth floor, just eight flats...”

  He carries on. I light a cigarette and watch Mrs E’s face. It’s one hell of a good story. Zoki comes home and sees three teenagers, two lads and a girl, sitting on the stairs smoking. Being a sociable type, he says hi. They just look at the floor, as if they’re feeling guilty about something. They say you’ve got nothing against us sitting here, have you mister, it’s freezing outside? It was winter. Zoki says, it’s okay, as long as there aren’t any needles left lying around again. And they say no way, of course not, drugs are a terrible thing. You’re smart kids, says Zoki, and goes into his flat.

  Then about half an hour later Zoki’s wife comes through the door. She’d been drinking coffee with one of the neighbours on the floor below and come home after him. Her eyes are like saucers, she looks really upset and she says th-there. Zoki looks where she’s pointing and sees.

  The girl and one of the lads are both naked as the day they were born. Their clothes are scattered all over the stairs. The other lad is sitting, fully dressed, leaning on the wall and watching the girl — and I mean, she can’t have been more than sixteen — suck the other guy’s cock. She’s kneeling on the concrete stairs giving him a blow job and her pussy is staring Zoki right in the face.

  What the fuck do you think you’re playing at, have you gone stark staring mad? screamed Zoki, if for no other reason than to make sure that his wife didn’t accuse him later of staring at the girl’s cunt. It’s amazing that he didn’t have a coronary.

  And those three just looked rather surprised, the girl just turned her head, and three pairs of eyes stared at Zoki and his wife, without a murmur.

  What now, what are you waiting for? yelled Zoki. Get out of my fucking sight!

  We’re not doing anything wrong, says the lad who’s sitting there starkers with a folded tracksuit under his arse, his hair long at the top, shaved at the sides.

  Out, shouted Zoki, although he didn’t move at all, he admitted himself he daren’t, the whole thing was too weird, god knows what would happen if he went for them — they’d change into werewolves or something.

  I’ve fucked here a hundred times and nothing’s happened, says the other one, who’s sitting there smoking. And the girl, who the whole time has just been showing her pussy and her big white eyes and saying nothing, says, or rather mumbles: me too, me too.

  It was hard just to get them to put their clothes on and leave. In the mean time Zoki had to send Fani inside, really because he didn’t want to show himself up in front of her. Basically, he was the more shocked not because ofwhat they were doing, god bless them, but because they didn’t seem to think they were doing anything wrong. As if it was him who was the strange one. These fucking youngsters. They’ve got no idea any more of what’s right and what isn’t. Where’s the fun in fucking about if you haven’t got the slightest idea that you shouldn’t. Fuck them. No, damn it, it seems they’re already fucking each other. They don’t need us except to feed them and provide for them and buy them fancy clothes. Zoki didn’t say the last bit, those are my comments.

  “My theory is that he was some kind of dealer,” says Zoki, “and she was sucking him off for drugs.” Another bleeding theory. It seems as if this story really keeps Zoki occupied, even when he’s not telling it. As if every night before going to sleep he chews it over, so that whenever he tells it again he’s got some new explanation.

  “Why do you think that the guy needs to do that?” I ask him.

  “If for no other reason, for satisfaction,” replies Zoki, “for the sense of power.”

  Uh-oh, no, no, that can’t be one of Zoki’s theories. That’s definitely from some doctor who’s got a column in some tabloid. Zok
i the philosopher? Zoki and his cars and washing machines, okay.

  “But you and your husband don’t have any children yet, do you?” I turned towards Mrs E, who seemed somehow excluded from the whole business, but who was staring and seemed on the verge of tears. But it’s not the worst thing you could hear, that kids like to do it on the stairs. It’d be worse if they were fighting.

  “Couldn’t happen to you on the second floor,” says Zoki, “there’s too much traffic.”

  “There aren’t any break-ins here either,” I reassure her. To be honest, when I see her like that, her bottom lip almost trembling, I feel a bit sorry. Maybe Zoki was overdoing it. Telling a story like that to a teacher of German. “You know,” I say, “neighbours here visit each other far too much, they’re always popping in for a coffee, burglars can never be sure when someone’s going to appear from somewhere.”

  “We had a daughter,” says Mrs Erjavec, “but she got involved with some drug addicts... that’s what the police said. Three years ago. Perhaps you read about it, it was in all the papers when she died.”

  Oh god. I look at Zoki and he stares back. You silly bastard, Zoki, you and your bleeding gob. I look at Mrs E. She’s actually holding up pretty well. That lip? It’s not really trembling when you look closely, at least not as much as you’d think. Maybe I was wrong before. I suddenly feel almost sorry for the woman. She can’t help being so prissy. It’s the way she was brought up. Her parents wrapped her in cotton wool, sent her when she was nursery school age to English lessons and violin, then Happy School and the Vega prize, then uni, where she was a good student, then a job waiting for her, then kiddies, and so it all goes around again... And then the daughter does a runner. What’s all this now? There’s a present for her under the Christmas tree. Oh, she just went out to give someone a blow job in return for a fix. She’ll be back soon. Life’ll be a bit more exciting now.