Fingers Pointing Somewhere Else by Daniela Fischerova & Neil Bermel

Author:Daniela Fischerova & Neil Bermel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Catbird Press
Published: 2000-12-26T16:00:00+00:00

It was almost midnight when Eva finally settled into a hot bath and poured herself a large glass of vodka. For a while she hesitated about calling her brother, but then the vodka took matters in hand, and Eva picked up the receiver right in the tub.

“Listen up, brother,” she said without greeting him, “Malšov’s off our necks. He’s not going up on the roof this year. No way.”

She took a swig. “Surprise, surprise. Mr. Šefl doesn’t have the wood. What a coincidence. And know who made this magic happen? Guess!”

“Well?” came his expressionless voice from afar. It did not have not much interest in it.

“We’re greenhorns, Iša. Two babbling bunglers. It’s useless, we can’t compete.”

“What are you talking about, Eva?”

“What? Don’t you mean who?”

She poured herself some more vodka and turned the hot water on. She had to raise her voice to drown out the noise from the faucet.

“Our omniscient mother, of course. She’s got our number, don’t you think?”

“Eva, can’t we talk about this another time? It’s midnight.”

“As if I don’t know what time it is! I’ve been on the road from stupid Malšov for ages! And know what the funniest part of it is? That Dad thinks Mother is on his side. As always. So I’m the pesky troublemaker again.”

“You know, it’s—”

“‘You know’? What’s that supposed to mean: ‘you know’?”

The bathroom was full of steam. Eva waved her hands violently so she could at least see the wall.

“You know how to make a duck perform, Iša? I do. But unfortunately I learned a bit too late. It’s the secret of our family. The clown on stage says: Fly, duck! And presto, the duck actually flies! Then the clown growls: Sit, duck! And bonk, at that moment the duck sits right on its bottom.”

She could hear her brother yawn. It irritated her.

“The trick is that the duck simply does what it wants. The clown observes every movement it makes and a fraction of a second later gives it the appropriate command. It’s not the clown making the duck perform, but the other way around!”

“So what?”

“So, our mother is the duck. Dad’s the performing clown.”

“Eva, I get up at four-thirty.”

“The joke is that they’re a blissfully happy couple. But they didn’t pass their magic down to us. I’ve had three divorces, and your marriage is a bucket of tepid water.”

“Look, do we have to discuss this tonight?”

“No! Of course not!”

The mixture of relief and annoyance at today’s absurd pilgrimage flooded into Eva’s blood like some weird sort of fuel.

“In our house we don’t discuss anything. Night or day. In our house everyone sees only what he wants to see. For Christ’s sake, don’t be blind! Remember how you ran away from home?”

She knew she was heading for trouble, but it was too late to apply the brakes. What she was doing was disgraceful — one of her many disgracefully truthful deeds — but rage got the better of her.

“We didn’t discuss that either, did we. Why waste words on it.

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.