Zoe finally turns to me. “We goin’?” she asks. Only then does she, for the first time, actually look at me. From the side, with a questioning, observant glint in her eye.
“Yeah,” I respond. And I laugh out loud, involuntarily.
Zoe laughs after me. It’s always, I admit, nice to hear her laugh.
“Okay,” she nods. “Then let’s go.”
We open our doors and step outside.
Part III
Once Upon a Time
Neon Blues
by Dejan Stojiljković
Translated by Rachael Daum
The Manjež
I leaned over the terrace railing and puked into the hanging flowerpot. I wiped my mouth with my tie, called the waiter and ordered another double vinjak, Serbia’s national treasure, created as the Communist version of cognac for the working class.
“Disgusting!” the woman at the next table spat at me. I turned to her with a polite nod and showed her that she could suck it.
My double vinjak arrived as my phone rang.
“Mr. Malavrazić?” came a hoarse voice. Hoarse from age, the bottle, or maybe throat cancer, I couldn’t be sure.
“That’s me,” I said, sipping my drink.
“Could you spare a few minutes to discuss a case?”
“Depends on how much time you’re asking for…” Now my voice was hoarse. Vinjak, of course.
“I know you’re busy, but you have to be interested in this.”
“I don’t have to do anything, sir.”
“Ma’am.”
“Ma’am?”
“Ljudmila Hajji Pešić.” Ah. Her husband’s family had completed their hajj, the Orthodox pilgrimage to the grave of Christ in Jerusalem.
“Your services were recommended to me.”
“By whom?”
“Your grandfather.”
“My grandfather?”
“You’re the grandson of Arsenije Malavrazić, correct?”
“I am.”
“Well…”
“Ma’am, my grandfather has been dead a long time. It would be difficult for you to get a recommendation from him. Unless you’re St. Pete’s secretary?”
“It’d be easiest if I explained everything in person.”
“All right.”
“The Manjež. Tonight at nine.”
The line went dead and a mysterious rhythm pulsed from my phone’s earpiece. Every beep was another question I asked myself: Who is this woman? How does she know my grandfather? And how could a long-dead fart recommend… me?
My head hurt from the mystery. I ordered another double vinjak.
I went to the Gusan for lunch. It was a good watering hole run by my friend Ernest. It was in the same area where a small, wild village had been founded long ago, where scum like me used to live.
That’s where I found Uncle Ljuba, a native of the southern Serbian town Niš, who was solidly in his fifties.
“Malavrazić, I’ve had it up to here with you,” he grumbled as he rolled his tobacco. “Didn’t we agree that you’d finish that job for me?”
“What job?”
“The one you didn’t finish.”
“Didn’t we say Wednesday?”
“Today is Wednesday.”
We munched on ćevapi with cheese. The best in Belgrade. We washed them down with a few beers. I made sure not to overdo it since it wouldn’t look good to be too drunk in front of a potential client. Just enough to warm me up.
Then a guy walked in and stomped up to our table. He had a big head covered in bad tattoos.
I looked at him, trying to remember where I knew him from. I thought I knew him from somewhere, but it goes like that sometimes — he could have been a taxi driver, a friend from my time in the army, someone I owed money…
“Did you touch my wife’s ass?” he asked.
“Sure I did,” I said. “What do you want? For me to do it again?”
The offended spouse came in. She didn’t do anything for me. Black hair, middle-aged, small tits, and her ass was… well. I wouldn’t have been able to miss it.
“Yes, that’s him, that’s the maniac!” she cried. “Fuck you!”
“Look at you,” I said. “I wouldn’t fuck you for a barrel of vinjak.”
He grabbed me by the throat. “I’ll fuck you up!”
I lifted my coat and showed him the weapon tucked into my belt. Without hesitation, he and his wife headed straight for the door.
“Still got jealous husbands on your tail?” Ljuba asked, like he actually cared.
“That one wasn’t jealous, just stupid.”
“Jealous, stupid… it’s all the same. It was one of those guys who got you thrown off the police force.”
“Ah, happy memories… Hey, Jelena!” I called to the waitress. “Get me and Ljuba another beer.”
That’s right. They threw me off the police force.
Not because I’d been an alcoholic, not because I’d been irresponsible or disrespectful… Not even because I’d spoken out about the old government, or that I’d called the old head of police a horse’s ass. No, they booted me because I’d fucked the deputy mayor’s wife.
I’d have real problems if I’d banged the actual mayor’s wife. But the deputy mayor? Can you imagine what a loser he was if I’d screwed his wife?
My old lady was no help. “If you’re…” she said. “I knew that your dick would fuck you over for good. Even when we were married you couldn’t keep it in your pants. I can only imagine how it is now that you’re fucking divorced.”
“Come on, don’t be like that…”
“Oh, now that you’ve smartened up so much? Been to your dad’s recently? What’s he doing?”
“The fuck do you care?”
That’s usually how our conversations ended.
Well, what more was there to say? My ex-wife was a minister of culture, and I was an inspector without a job. In Serbia. In transitioning Belgrade. Basically, a bum. A loser. Or just another asshole drunk on the nonstop hunt for cash.
I paid my bill and headed to the Manjež.
In the kafana the waiters eyed me suspiciously. As though I’d come to inspect their heating or steal their silverware. I politely asked for Hajji Pešić, and a waiter pointed me to a table in the corner.
A woman getting up there in years was seated, a proper lady, with her hair done like Jackie Kennedy, a five-hundred-euro manicure, and jewelry that could buy a building in the fanciest part of town. Beside her was another woman, an old lady in a wheelchair.
I cautiously made my way up to them and opened my mouth to introduce myself, but Hajji Pešić just tapped ash from her long cigarette into the ashtray and said, “Sit, Malavrazić.”
I planted my ass on the chair across from her.
“Drink?” she asked.
“Sure.”
As my double vinjak arrived, she decided to introduce the old woman: “This is my mother, Jefimija Dugalić.”
“A pleasure, madam,” I said.
She smiled cynically at that. Mean old hag.
“You look like him,” said Hajji Pešić.
“Like who?”
“Your grandfather.”
“You knew him?”
“No. But my mother did.”
The old lady nodded.
“That’s… nice.” I didn’t know what else to say.
Hajji Pešić pushed a folder across the table to me. It was old, battered, and on the front was written, Police Administration Belgrade.