They are Trying to Break Your Heart by David Savill

Author:David Savill
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781408865774
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2015-12-19T09:01:08+00:00

Sarajevo

Vesna’s hair isn’t long any more. It is cut into a plum-red bob so neat it looks like a wig. From beneath this wig, someone, who occasionally resembles the girl Marko knew, is talking about the burgeoning travel industry in Bosnia, how the company she works for isn’t really a travel company, but a department of the government’s tourist board. Eco-tourism. Heritage tourism. And something to do with combatting the work of illegal logging companies.

They are in the café opposite her work. Over Vesna’s head in a slick suit and leather gloves, Justin Timberlake dances across a widescreen TV. The sound on the television has been turned down, and the stereo behind the bar plays a Dino Merlin track. Nothing about any of this seems to quite fit together. He doesn’t know what he expected by surprising Vesna, but perhaps he had imagined she would be more – surprised. Instead, Vesna greeted Marko like a man she hadn’t seen in a few months. Someone who had been on a long holiday, not a ghost of ten years. She hugged him, and held him at arm’s length like a relative who remarks how much a child has grown, her beaming greeting more for the benefit of her colleagues than any expression of true feeling. This is Marko! Marko from Stovnik! As if they had only just been talking about him.

In the café, Marko expects the stiff smile to loosen, but Vesna keeps it up.

‘I really hoped I would see you,’ she is saying. ‘But I couldn’t come and I lost your parents’ phone numbers and then we had all these things going on at work.’

She divides a tiramisu cake with a small fork. Marko pours another packet of sugar into his coffee. She is just like the others. Acting as if Kemal’s resurrection and death were nothing remarkable at all.

‘You still have a sweet tooth?’ she asks.

‘It’s good to be back in a country where they make proper Bosnian coffee.’

‘But you’re drinking latte,’ she says. ‘And in England they only drink tea, right?’

Marko asks her if she has been there.

‘Are you kidding?’ She pulls a face. ‘I’d love to go to England. When are you going to invite me? The only time I get to travel is with work. Which isn’t so bad. Italy, Turkey, mainly our neighbours. But I still love Italy.’ She stops and looks at her fingernails. ‘Am I complaining? I shouldn’t be complaining. I have a great job.’

‘Where else have you been to?’

‘Hmm?’

‘With your job?’

‘Oh, I don’t know – not so many places. It’s only if there’s some marketing work. I try to get myself those gigs.’

‘Just Europe?’

She presses down on the sponge with her fork. ‘Yes, just Europe. But who gives a shit, right? Wow. Marko.’

When she shakes her head, the straightened bob doesn’t appear to move.

‘I like my job.’

‘What do you do?’

He tells her about the security company. About working as a doorman. How he began to employ his own doormen. He is about to

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.