They went outside and started walking quickly. It was already getting dark. Sirma hurried after them, annoyed, and wondered whether the weed hadn’t gotten to her at least a little this time. They stopped two blocks later and turned down a side street, there was a school a bit farther up and the kids were walking home in little groups. One lone chubby girl with a big backpack passed by them, the girl with the leather jacket shot out and grabbed her by the shoulder. Hey, she said softly, gimme your money. What money, the girl with the backpack mumbled. Sirma was stunned. She, too, had gotten jumped on the street, they’d demanded her money, and she, too, had instinctively answered with the same stupid and pointless answer: What money? This kind, the girl with the leather jacket said and shoved her prey up against the wall. She brought her face close to the girl’s and for an instant Sirma felt like she herself was up against the wall, she felt the other girl’s aggressive breath scalding her lips, then suddenly things turned around and now she was the girl with the leather jacket pressing her victim’s shoulders hard, she could do whatever she wanted to her, and in the next instant she came back to her real place, standing and watching, hypnotized by the sight, by the power and the aggression streaming from the girl in the leather jacket, she suddenly raised her knee and hit the fat girl in the stomach, she let out a little moan, then mumbled, c’mon, let me go, she was on the verge of tears, and Sirma suddenly hated her for that powerless sniveling, then her cousin went up to them and said softly, come on, give us the money and nothing will happen to you, come on, don’t beat her up, she’s a good girl and she’ll give us some cash, isn’t that right, and the girl finally reached into her pocket and thrust some rumpled bills in her hand, yeah, she really is a good girl, said her cousin’s friend, the other girl looked on helplessly as Chloë went through her pockets looking for more money, but there clearly wasn’t any more, look in her backpack, her friend ordered, Chloë rifled through the backpack nervously and hurriedly, there’s no wallet, she reported, I don’t have any more, that’s it, groaned the fat girl, but the blonde girl with the leather jacket kept holding her and repeating “oh, what a good girl” and suddenly she kissed her on the lips and laughed loudly, then she roughly spun her around and launched her up the street with a slap on the ass, come on already, what are you waiting for, her cousin hissed and pulled her into the street, her hand was warm and wet, the girl with the leather jacket appeared calmly from around the corner, she was still laughing, three fivers, said Chloë and hesitated for a moment, before adding, exactly even, she turned towards Sirma and handed her one of the bills, Sirma stared at the dirty, rumpled piece of paper, come on, take it, Chloë insisted, you’re in on it, too, right? her hand was shaking, whether from adrenaline or from fear that she had shown too much without knowing whether she could trust her, and Sirma realized that she had no choice, she reached out and took the bill, it was old, greasy from the hundreds, perhaps even thousands of fingers that had passed it around. Her cousin sighed. Keep mine, the girl with the leather jacket said, you need it more than I do. Are you sure, Chloë said, yeah, of course I’m sure. They went back to the café with the pool table and her cousin ordered three vodkas at the bar. Sirma drank hers in one gulp and earned a round of applause. She felt keyed-up, her skin was prickling. Do you do that a lot, she asked her cousin. Oh yeah, she said. You ought to see us at a club. You won’t believe how that chick can fight, she nodded towards her friend. She really is a witch or something, lemme tell you. She ripped out half of some girl’s hair. See, she pulled down the collar of her shirt and showed her red scratch marks. That’s from the last time we went clubbing, we got in a fight. But if anybody asks, I tell people some dude scratched me. The only problem is that weed is counterproductive for fighting, it makes you all mellow and stuff. Just look how nice we were tonight. Sirma started scraping her nails on the table her empty vodka glass was sitting on. One of the guys from the pool table, the better-looking one, sat down at their table and started making out with the third girl, whose name they still hadn’t bothered to tell her. All of a sudden she was sick of it all. I’ve got to go, she told her cousin. Really? Too bad, she replied. Call me some other time. Yeah, okay. Hey, Chloë was suddenly serious, what happened tonight stays between us, okay, we’re on the same team now, right? Absolutely, what, do you think I’m a squealer? No, no, of course now, it’s just that… Okay whatever, you get me, right? No worries. She got up and went towards the door. Even if she was a squealer, that greasy bill guaranteed her silence. She turned around and saw the other girl licking the guy’s ear, their eyes met and she winked at her. Sirma didn’t react. The boys at the raised table kept watching them indifferently, as if they didn’t exist at all for them. She opened up the glass door and stepped out into the dark, she quickly set out for home, but no matter how fast she walked, it still seemed too slow, as if her legs were sinking in some sticky swamp of disgust and euphoria, and she again entered the scene with the girl backed up against the wall, sometimes she was in her skin, sometimes she turned into the other girl, the attacker, and afterwards she melted down into nothing more than the touching of lips, into that unfathomable yet enchanting kiss of violence, she tried to blame her dazedness on the weed or the vodka, but she knew that wasn’t it at all, that physically she was totally sober, and that she was spellbound by what she had seen alone, now she was imagining her cousin and the girl with the leather jacket tearing out other girls’ hair, raking their faces with their nails, and then flying at each other, swinging their fists like boys, falling on the ground and, as they were fighting, they would suddenly start kissing in the noisy half-darkness, checkered by multi-colored lights, then again and again she would go back to the scene near the school, sometimes playing one role, sometimes the other, and that kept going until she finally fell into a pitch-dark, dreamless sleep. The next morning she woke up early for school, went to the kitchen, got herself a bowl of cereal, poured milk over it, and while she was waiting for it to soak in, she went over to the window and looked outside, down below there was a run-down playground with a few surrealistic jungle gyms and a dilapidated horse-shaped spring rider, all of a sudden she heard the blonde girl’s voice in her head saying clearly
Looks like Chopper’s gone horse-riding and she suddenly realized what it meant, her stomach clenched and her diaphragm jumped, she heaved over the table, over the bowl of cereal, but she didn’t have anything to throw up, only a stream of bitter stomach acid trickled into her mouth, she spit it into the sink and turned on the water.