Batlava Lake by Adam Mars-Jones

Author:Adam Mars-Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Fitzcarraldo Editions
Published: 2021-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

Big ask even for a lingo merchant, champion interpreter, getting all that into sodding Albanian! Challenge even for the sort who orders food in restaurants anywhere in the world, has the locals going gaga over his accent and his vo-cab-u-lary.

Most of the chogies scattered right away. They sloped off. Shuffled, hobbled. But one stayed put – the one who’d reached for the meat on the barbecue, who kept on eating. Just kept on filling his face. Picked up paper plates from the ground where they’d been dropped when Micky pulled the trigger on the flamethrower. He didn’t care about buns – just grabbed the meat from inside and stuffed it into his mouth. I couldn’t tell whether he was looking past us or not seeing us at all. He coughed and spluttered as he chewed but managed to keep it down. The buns ended up on the ground.

The other chogies had rags wrapped round their feet, but this one had shoes, matching pair and everything. He was wearing red footie trainers, dirty and faded, nothing fancy – the sort of thing kids want at Christmas, and are the best thing ever, till getting towards Easter time. When I looked again, they were too small for him, not childsized but maybe junior-sized. Shoes that someone had, that someone didn’t need any more.

You have to be getting on a bit these days to remember when people didn’t much care about gym shoes – daps we called them.

He’d opened up the front of the shoes to make room for his toes. I didn’t notice at first because he was wearing brown socks, or maybe dirty bandages, could be crusted with old blood. Not a neat job opening up the shoes, not cut with a knife. Maybe just torn. My guess is, if these chogies had come across a knife in their travels there was a mean bastard on the other end of it. Not offering them the handle.

When there was nothing left to eat he looked down at his paper plate and then threw it away. It sailed towards us – like a frisbee, it flew just like a frisbee. Then it skittered off to the side at the last moment. As frisbees also do. I don’t know if it was aimed at us. Perhaps it was. We all watched it land, and then he moved. Stumbled off after the rest. He moved more freely than the others, so perhaps it wasn’t old blood after all, just brown socks. He was the only one of the bunch who looked as if he might have been able to fight if he had to, so maybe he was their protector. Maybe he needed to keep his strength up. Throwing away the buns – he was going all out for protein.

We felt a bit flat after the chogies had finally gone. Understatement! Even the Saps didn’t feel so clever about winning the forfeit. The chogies had pissed on their parade. We were sorry for them, no question, but we were also pissed off with them for coming our way in the first place.

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