We Trade Our Night for Someone Else's Day by Ivana Bodrozic (books to read to improve english txt) 📗

with scissors and left in heaps of scraps. Then she froze, midroom, when she remembered her laptop. She couldn’t even tell where to turn to look for it. She’d left it on the bed, under the blanket, but the blankets were on the floor and the beds were laid bare. It was gone. She broke out in a cold sweat and was paralyzed by fear. Walking backwards, she slowly left the room. She closed and locked the door and then ran down to the front desk. Nobody was there; the only sound was the radio softly humming, shattering the silence.

“Hello!” she shouted nervously, leaning over the counter. No response.

“Hello!” she called even louder, and from the depth of the dark corners of the hotel appeared the receptionist-waiter.

“Yes, Miss, where’s the fire?” he asked with a prim smile.

“Somebody broke into my room and stole my laptop; all my things have been thrown all over the place; who went up there?” she blurted out in a single breath.

“What? Impossible.” The waiter shook his head, grinning, hyenalike, with his yellowed teeth.

“What do you mean, impossible? Go up yourself; it’s as if a bomb went off in there! Somebody must have heard!” By now she was yelling.

“Calm down, everything will be fine; we’ll resolve the misunderstanding. Slow down.” For a moment Nora went mute, and he continued. “Perhaps you misplaced something; you came in late last night, perhaps you don’t remember everything . . . and a small room can become messy in no time.” The expression on his face was a mask of concern.

“I’ll report this to the police. Please, I beg of you, don’t let anybody go up there; I want the inspector to see it. I now have lost everything I need to do my job; do you understand me?” She had the impression that he didn’t understand or was pretending not to. She dashed out of the hotel, running as fast as she could, and within two minutes she was out in front of the police station. Traffic had been blocked, and there was a crowd out in front. As she tried to push her way in, people were filming the uproar on their cell phones. She didn’t have a chance to figure out what was going on, but out of the corner of her eye she noticed a policeman and a local person, arguing.

“Where are you going?” A man in a uniform stood in front of her, scowling and serious; he’d been watching her ever since she came running across the street.

“Please let me in, I need to report a robbery,” she said in all seriousness, but the policeman didn’t seem to be taking her seriously.

“You’ll have to step away; apparently a protest without a permit is starting. Come back later.”

“How can I come back later, whatever could you mean, my things, my laptop, they’ve all been stolen.” She was on the verge of tears. The policeman slipped his arm through hers and led her to the back of the building. At the back entrance he asked for her first and last name.

“Nora Kirin,” she answered, looking him straight in the eyes.

“Little Miss Kirin”—he leaned over to her ear—“if you go straight down there and then to the left, that’s where the inspector is, and he just came in; be careful to tell him everything that happened.” Then he paused, and added, even softer: “A laptop can be replaced. Other things not so easily, as you know so well.” Then he turned and walked away, leaving her alone in the hallway. Nora froze. She thought of her mother, all the police stations where she’d waited in the corridor for her, her mother’s face as they saw her out. She made her way to the inspector’s office. The door was open, and he was not alone. She recognized the coat, the little purse, the lace: Melania Gmaz was sitting across from him. Nora stepped closer to the door so she could hear what they were saying.

“He threatened him; I saw it with my own eyes,” Melania testified doggedly.

“He threatened the mayor,” repeated the inspector as he took notes. “And can you repeat what it was, exactly, that he said to him?”

“That he fucked his mother, and he told the Chinese man that he fucked his mother, too, and that he’d knock him flat and that the fish in the Danube would eat him. Which isn’t actually logical, is it.” This last comment was for herself.

“What isn’t logical?” he asked, confused.

“That he’d knock him flat and throw him into the Danube!” She shrugged and looked up, seeking help from above. She’d reported so many injustices and crimes by then that she knew there was little chance she’d be taken seriously, but after the murder of the mayor she knew she had to report what she’d seen. Ilinčić picking him up by the collar in the parking lot and threatening to kill him. She believed unwaveringly in the institution of civil duty—unlike Nora, who wised up that instant. She turned to the exit, realizing she’d been chased into a trap. Ever since her father had been killed, ever since her mother was never allowed to initiate an investigation, ever since, after nearly twenty years, she’d come home. She knew there was no way to handle this with kid gloves. She took a deep breath and steeled herself, this time, to deal with this differently. She took her cell phone from the back pocket of her pants, went into her contacts, and clicked on the letter M.

19.

Hey, Mama

hey, mama, what’s your son doing

hey, mama, who is there with him?

hey, mama, fear for his life?

hey, mama, he’s done wrong

now (fall 2010)

The barrier arm blocking access to the parking lot wasn’t lifting; he began honking nervously so the guard, who as usual wasn’t in his booth, would finally let him in to park by the national library in Belgrade. The morning light refracted from the crosses on the Church of Saint