|
The Stables
I’m sitting with Nanny in front of The Stables watching his face glow with an aura: this is a reborn soul and this morning is the morning after he repeatedly shot and murdered Ranko Rubeži?. I don't think I know the man anymore as he now belongs to world I don't have a password for. Both of us are well aware we're meeting for the last time: he’s on the way to turn himself in, I’m turning my family and myself to the mercy of untold, yet to be written. By watching Capote, the movie that ships Seymour Hoffman straight into the acting Hall of Fame, I realize I need to know how it went, so I reconstruct from my recollection, the most questionable of all the buildings materials.
‘I’m looking at Dutch like I’m looking at you, George, straight in the eye: he’s not there – lights are on but nobody at home. And I know nothing’s gonna change until I put this motherfucker out of misery, my misery. Nanny I need this, Nanny I must have that! Just the other day he goes again, my ribs hurt, Nanny, I can barely sleep at night. Then sleep during the day, motherfucker, and without your fuckin’ hand grenade, sleep like a man! Yesterday he goes besides himself, threatening to execute me on the spot unless I rub his balls. I’m trying to inject some sense in him, Dutch, man, what's fuckin’ wrong with you, you don’t have any balls left anyway, unless you count the freakin' grenade shell as one. This ain’t your freakin’ Belgium where you blow to pieces a handful of Russian or Jewish stinkers and it’s all quiet on the Western front – you picked the wrong place and time to retire ballsless sans dignity. How’s this for French, motherfucker!’
People at The Stables get this type of news quickly: almost everyone is staring at us openly or sideways. ‘It’s not Dutch I know.’ Nanny and I don't exactly go long way yet we share the mutual respect and some treacherous friends. ‘Dutch, you cannot be serious! I am serious like a heart attack, Nanny, so you better hurry up, my balls are itching. He is losing it yet he’s dissecting every move I make. So I emote to calm him down, take the edge off. I catch him with his pants half way down, shoot him in his fuckin’ balls, rub this, motherfucker. Funny, right before the bullet hits, his face freezes in disbelief and slimy freakin' fear.' Nanny jumps up, hugs me, ‘Have to go now, thanks for listening. Come and visit me... I forget you're gone too. Best of luck, show the fuckers what we’re made of.’
The aura vanishes, gets replaced with febrile tensity. ‘Listen, Nanny, if you ever drop deep there find Nole Panther, he’ll take care of you. Otherwise stay away from him – he’s a psycho, in a good way though. Best of luck to you.’ We hug each other again, kiss three times: for God, country, and ourselves. I watch Nanny get in his obsidian black Fiat 132 taxi parked in front my umber metallic Peugeot 505 feeling uncorked commiseration.
Years later, as I’m still trying to show myself what I’m made of let alone anybody else, an email arrives from where I arrive but I don’t recognize the sender. Weird. Two minutes pass until I get it: the birth name of Nole Panther. That's a new one, Nole doesn't send letters emails even less. ‘Dear friend George, I hope this letter finds you in good health and in high spirits, as it finds me writing it. I am out of CZ for a year now, released on good behavior and mild manners. I am working now, thanks to you, at your friend Pavle’s race car shop. I am mounting tires, cleaning floors, learning mechanics. I am very happy here, and I could not have a better boss than Pavle. I am going steady now for the last six months. Bojana is a good girl from a good family. She is a little bit weird but I like her a lot. And who is not weird these days. Not you and me, I mean, but most other people are.
A friend of yours approaches me in CZ asking for a small favor, which I am honored to oblige. Joca Ajkula gives him hard time, like he does to almost everybody else, asking him to rub his balls – can you believe that!? If I am not mistaken, it is the late Dutch’s benchmark. How can you rub somebody’s balls if he has none? Or very petite, which is French for small, ha. So I go and talk to Ajkula, and I tell him, listen, man, your behavior is bad, and He strikes with the utmost vengeance those like you. Stop doing it. He starts laughing as if I am telling him a joke. Which irritates me a bit, so this time I make it clear: not only that He strikes bastards like you with the utmost vengeance, but He names me the executioner of His will. I am telling you, George, his name should be Snowman not Shark: he melts on the spot. Then he starts bullshitting me, mixing it, and such. I don't care what you do Ajkula, just leave Nanny alone. Do you understand? He finally gets it.
Now the bad news. Nanny gets out two months ago, finds himself a girl, and as they walk down the Topli?in Venac yesterday, a guy on Kawasaki pulls right behind them and shoots Nanny in the back with an Uzi. Your friend is dead, George, and I am sorry to break the news to you, but someone has to. I find quite appropriate to attend the funeral in your name. It is on Wednesday. By the way, as I ask around, nobody knows anything but everybody has a theory. I will keep you up to date. Your friend Novica Petkovi?.’
George Djuric flew through rally racing, street fighting, chess, and anti-psychiatry as if they weren’t there. In the aftermath, all that was left was writing. He published a critically acclaimed collection of short stories, a book read like the gospel by his Yugoslav peers, The Metaphysical Stories.
Djuric is infatuated with the fictional alchemy that is thick as amber and capable of indelibly inscribing on the face of the 21st century. He lives in the desert near Palm Springs, CA.
Winner of the 2014 Cardinal Sins’ Nonfiction Contest.
His stories were published in Hobart (Print), Serving House: a Journal of Literary Arts (April and October 2013), FictionWeek Literary Review, Inwood Indiana (Print), Extract(s) (Print), Pure Slush, Meat for Tea: The Valley Review, Every Writer’s Resource, Brautigan Free Press, Xavier Review Press, The Bangalore Review, Fresh Literary Magazine’s Printed Anthology, Los Angeles Review of LA, Grey Sparrow Journal, Independent Ink Magazine, The Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, The Fat City Review, In Other Words: Merida Literary Magazine, Busk Journal, TheNewerYork’s Electric Encyclopedia of Experimental Literature, BareBack Magazine, Anastomoo, Commonline Journal, Gloom Cupboard, Extracts, BRICKrhetoric, Danse Macabre, Euphony, South Jersey Underground, The Intentional, Former People Journal, Empty Mirror, Confingo, and Mad Hatter’s Review.
Email: George Djuric
Return to Table of Contents
|
