Homunculus Read online

  And so I was separated from you again, imprisoned within the walls of my monstrosity. I withdrew into the bathroom, but you didn’t even notice I was gone. You were obsessed with your lover’s injury, dashing about around him; you called an ambulance and various friends, moved him from the stairs to the bed and pampered him there with devotion, while a whirlwind of jealousy raged inside me despite my best efforts to prevent it. Oh yes, he enjoyed the role of the wounded man, with you there to wait on him day and night, and now he could relish your velvet skin and culinary charms in equal measure. Meanwhile I suffered as the worm of envy gnawed at me and my heart crumbled, but it was all in vain – you were bound to be constantly by his side, and all because of my idiocy!

  I know I was a burden to you, Mother, even when I was still in your belly. That Party functionary who enjoyed your magnificent body night after night, my supposed father, shamelessly abandoned you when you told him you were pregnant. He kicked you out without a word, forgetting all the times he had crept between your legs and whispered sweet nothings about not being able to live without you. That power-hungry jerk, that selfish crawler, was petri­fied lest you impinge on his fucking career. The stinking bastard left you on the streets like a homeless, pregnant bitch.

  How your kind, elegant soul suffered because of that injustice! You had those heavy bags crammed with encyclopaedias, from A to Mai in one hand and Maj to Z in the other – four thick, heavy volumes on each side. You lugged them through the steep streets of the city all day and arrived home exhausted and bathed in sweat, still carrying the encyclopaedias, which you had to heave up the stairs of our block of flats, five floors up, and then down again, and up, and down again. But despite all your superhuman efforts, I wouldn’t let you rid yourself of me. Why didn’t I let you do it? We would have been happier, both of us. You would have enjoyed your life with your lover, or lovers, because, Mum, you’re the most attractive, sexiest woman I’ve ever met. From my earliest childhood, there was no overlooking the way men devoured you with their eyes, with all their male ganglia firing, the way they flashed seductive smiles at you, and the more daring ones, with one eyebrow raised, would venture on into the realm of allusions. But as soon as Mr Bold’s glance wandered down to me, his expression changed abruptly: the enchantment swiftly ebbed away, leaving a face full of unconcealed horror. I felt so ashamed at times like that, Mum, to have embarrassed you, to have humiliated you with my presence!

  I don’t understand why even now, so many years after the incident in the bathroom, I still get the stupid urge to cry again. For­give me, Mum, I know my crying is not like that of a normal human being, but I’ve never been normal. It’s not that I haven’t tried to live and to find meaning even where there is none. But it never worked. I wasn’t even able to kill Kyrie, although I planned everything meticulously, just as I did with your lover. The time: midnight, when all the patients, nurses and orderlies at the sanatorium were in bed and Kyrie was returning to her room after her last round. The place: a dark corridor, and I was waiting for her behind a toilet door. The weapon: a long screwdriver I stole from the garage where we had to wash Kyrie’s VW Golf as part of our ‘occupational therapy’.

  I forgot just one thing – that I’m so short. I needed ten centimetres more to be able to stab Kyrie with the screwdriver where I wanted to; in the heart. I also disregarded the fact that she was no walkover: Kyrie the Matron was a little surprised by my attack but in no way scared. With a quick, sure move that seemed part of a well-trained repertoire, she grabbed me by the wrist, whipped me around and pushed me to the floor. My lunge had only grazed her in the groin, and she managed to grab the broom that was leaning against the wall and brought the handle down on my face with all her might. I blacked out and all I felt was the warm blood splashing my face and filling my mouth. I only have a vague memory of what happened afterwards: the cops dragging me away and hitting me, an old doctor stitching the cuts on my face without anaesthetic and disfiguring me even more, if that’s possible, and a judge sneering: ‘You’ve got it coming to you now, midget, you’re up shit creek!’ If anyone had asked me if I had really been to a sanatorium and if people were really cured there, I wouldn’t have known what to say. I also have a fleeting memory of a supposed lawyer pretending to be my defence counsel and arguing that I was a victim of my circum­stances, which had made me a helpless multiplier of irrational violence, but I didn’t care any more. I just have to admit being a bit disappointed, Mum, that you didn’t come to the trial. But when they told me later that you were on holiday at the Borovets ski resort in Bulgaria – with your lover, what’s more – I was glad you were able to take a break from all the mess and problems I caused you. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank your lover for the present he sent me, although it only cost eight euros (that’s what it says on the box) and I did the jigsaw in just a few minutes. Twenty-piece jigsaws like that are for small kids.

  But don’t you worry, it’s not as bad here as you might expect. They call the place a Corrective Centre for Juveniles, although it reminds me more of a dungeon. Still, it’s not that grim. I’ve learnt that there are many boys here with stories like mine, lads much taller and better looking than me who are just as hapless. My cell here, unlike the ‘Damned Cell’, has a window with bars on it, but it is still a window. I can watch the weather through it and tell if it’s sunny or cloudy, raining or snowing, and every night I can watch the stars and count them idly as I chew my potatoes; there are always boiled potatoes for dinner. If I stand on tiptoe in the cell I can even see beyond the walls of the Centre and spot people and cars going down the street. I can even see the crowns of the trees: in leaf yesterday, and with bare branches today. They say our only task here is to kill time, but I have no problem with that. I could live here in this prison for years without getting bored. The days might seem long, but viewed in sequence they actually become shorter. I’m satisfied. The food is frugal but you can rely on it – three meals a day plus a morning snack. We have compulsory PE every morning in the courtyard. You know what they say, Mens sana in corpore sano. Perhaps I really will succeed in strengthening my body and building up some muscles, and maybe then I will improve on the inside, too...

  How long will I stay here? – until I’m nineteen. Then I’ll have to leave the place, but I’ll manage. I’ve actually heard that if I attack one of the guards I could get a few more years, and then be moved to a real prison. But don’t you worry. Now that you’re a safe distance away from my obnoxiousness it’s only fair that you now finally enjoy love and all those other little things that make one’s life fulfilled.

  Just imagine, Kyrie the Matron testified at the trial – ostensibly in my defence – that I had wanted to stab her with the screwdriver because my mother hadn’t given me enough warmth and affection. How despicable of her! She even mentioned my phoney father, that gutless Party functionary, as if he was the reason for you becoming unfeeling towards me. I was still in a daze from the thrashing the policemen had given me and the slapdash operation by the old doctor who first sewed my cuts without anaesthetic and only sprayed some kind of painkiller on my face afterwards; my mouth was numb and I could only mutter:

  ‘That’s not true, Matron.’

  She turned around towards me – tall, slim, and a little pale without her make-up.

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t understand a word of that,’ she said, and, turning back to the judge, she added: ‘Poor little blighter, I really do feel sorry for him.’

  I so longed to reply and slap the truth in her hypocritical mug, but I had been beaten black and blue; my ears were still ringing and my knees still shaking from the beating I’d been given, and all I was able to do in that abyss of pain was to spit. But, being so weak, I couldn’t even do that properly, so the spit just oozed over my contorted blue lips. That must have made me look particularly revolting because an awkward, nauseated silence descended on the courtroom, and the policeman standing beside me grabbed me under the arm forc
efully and squeamishly, the way a dog catcher nabs a mangy stray.

  I’m feeling a bit jaded, Mum. So much has happened recently. And I feel better here, on the inside. There’s peace and quiet, I’m hardly ever plagued by hallucinations or bad thoughts, I wake up rested, I do my PE and I have regular meals. You promise you’ll come and visit me? Don’t get me wrong, but there’s no need for you to come all that often. Your love warms me from afar. I just need to think of you: then I can smell your delicate perfume and am rapt, just like an ugly bumblebee is intoxicated by the queen rose. Your beautiful hologram is etched deep inside me, so wherever I am and wherever you fare, you will always be with me.

  This fairy tale should not be told near stagnant water

  Snakelet

  He found the snakelet at the very beginning of his solitary life, and now, after five years of living together, they had the same trust in each other as do close relatives. The snakelet ate out of his hand, went with him on walks through the forest – dozing in the pocket of his faded but still warm fur coat, or crawling along behind him when invigorated by the sun. On winter nights it slept long and peacefully, coiled up in a nest of twigs, leaves and moss he had made for it by the fire.

  The little snake was patterned and only four inches long, at most. It enjoyed climbing along his arm, hissing joyfully with its little tongue. And it loved to lie in wait for its prey – a hypnotized bug, perhaps – and weave its hunter’s dance around it.

  By the end of the second year, he had taught it to recognize his whistle. Now he was trying to teach it to distinguish the short, sharp whistle which meant ‘Come!’ from the long, protracted one which meant ‘I’m bringing you food,’ and the two whistles of equal length meaning ‘Lift yourself up!’ – at which the snakelet would raise its head and the upper third of its body and sway from side to side.

  He was happiest when it brought him his pipe. This difficult task, announced by one short and one long whistle, required the snakelet to perform several actions in sequence: to find the pipe, to pick it up with its little fangs, and to bring it to him. The snakelet would leave tiny, wet bite-marks on the stem of the pipe, and when the man lit his pipe and drew on it he felt he was imbibing a special tenderness.

  Yet, after five years of seclusion, loneliness began to oppress him. While absent-mindedly stroking the curvy body of the snakelet, he realized that the blame lay in himself. He might have been offended, because people might have been nasty and unfair to him, but he had no right to be angry with them for so long. How could he forget the beautiful days of his childhood and youth? How could he forget that he had once been loved and that he himself had offended others? He was only human too, after all.

  So he decided to return to the city. He put on his fur coat, slip­ped the snakelet into his pocket, and set off. As soon as he saw the first houses, he almost broke into a run.

  But when he came face to face with the city, he sensed that invisible barrier again – the one he had felt whenever, in his solitary years, he had descended from his cave into the city in search of food. The same sense of breathlessness came over him. The city was suffocating him.

  Already he was met by the astonished, derisive stares of the passers-by. His wild hair and shaggy beard, his tattered old coat, out of which his arms jutted like rusty spades, and his fearful reaction to any loud noise, made him stand out. In the eyes of the city he belonged to the class of beggars who come out at dusk to rummage through the garbage bins, glancing around nervously like hungry dogs.

  By the time he made it to the first café, he was shaking like a drunk. At the last moment, before going in, he thought to take the snakelet out of his pocket. It zipped across the pavement as fast as lightning and disappeared into a crack in the wall of the nearest house. There, in the stone crevice, it calmed down. Its friend’s disquiet had unsettled the little creature. Instinctively, it felt safe in the dark. It waited.

  In the café, the bar keeper and five or six guests – all men – were listening to a football match on the radio. The shrill, eunuch-like voice of the commentator, combined with the shouting and cursing of the sweaty men made him seek the furthest table. He sat huddled there on the chair, covering his ears with his broad hands, until the feel of his own skin gradually calmed him down.

  Only then did he notice the fellow at the next table. He was sitting away from the men with the radio and gazing peacefully out into the street. A pair of crutches rested against the chair beside him. Turning from the window, the fellow smiled and said, ‘Nice day today.’

  He went on talking in a lively, rambling way about the coming of spring, pollution in the cities, and the impossibility of true communication. It turned out that both men harboured the same bitterness and the same contempt for crowds.

  At first, our man just nodded in agreement, later tossing in the occasional ‘yes’, ‘that’s right’, and ‘I think so too’. But when the fellow moved on to the problem of friendship, he felt he needed to interrupt his monologue, ‘where can you find sincerity? People are selfish and care only for their own interests.’

  Unconsciously, the two men moved closer to each another. He was now resting his arms on the next table, while the like-minded fellow was leaning toward him. All of a sudden, our man exclaimed: ‘I’ve got something to show you – a true friend!’

  And as the fellow sent him an almost cheerful look of approval, our man gave a short, sharp whistle. The football fans by the radio turned and cast him angry glances.

  The snakelet did not respond. The man had never asked it to enter a room full of people before; he had taught it to be wary of them. It decided to stay in its hole.

  ‘Please hear me and come out!’ he begged. ‘Just this once!’ He whistled again, now with an air of desperation. His whistle brought a tirade of curses from the other men, and the bar keeper yelled: ‘Shut up, you dunce! Can’t you see we’re listening to the game?’

  The fellow from the next table scratched himself behind his ear. ‘Sorry, but I don’t understand,’ he said.

  Just then, the head of the snakelet appeared under the front door. Warmth filled his heart. ‘There he is!’ he whispered, ‘He’s coming.’

  But the very next instant, as if in slow motion, the curiosity on his neighbour’s face changed to revulsion and his hand grasped murderously for the crutch.

  This fairy tale is to be told during coffee breaks from Monday to Wednesday

  The Man with One Wing

  Once there was a man who had one wing. Unlike an angel’s wings, which grow out of its back, this man’s wing was in the place of his right arm, and unlike a bird’s it had a flexible elbow, which he rested on as he sat on a large rock and stared away into the distance as if looking out to sea: but there was no sea, only a hillside clearing with a few scattered trees.

  For the man with one wing, that summer was one of the most depressing of his life. He was haunted by a sense of emptiness and futility, a feeling heightened on those July afternoons by the stale, sour smell rising from the hot city, that sticky mass of cars and people constantly creeping like a foul treacle and defiling even the narrowest alleyways. The man with one wing sat on that rock halfway up Mount Vodno and looked into the sky, following a cloud that was forever changing shape, like every restless puff of vapour, and he thought: Just look at that cloud. It can do whatever it wants, while I...

  At that very moment, a bird came flying up. It was an eagle, as large as in fairy tales, and it obscured the sun and the restless cloud. The huge bird descended to within a yard of the man with one wing, hovering in the air, and looked straight at him.

  ‘What do you want of me?’ asked the man with one wing in the shadow of the eagle.

  It replied with a question: ‘Why are you still on the ground?’

  ‘Can’t you see I only have one wing? What can I do if I’m crippled like this? Without a right hand, I can’t even wank. But why have you come? D
id I call you?’

  ‘I’ve come to tell you something very important. You may not want to hear it, but that can’t be helped: I am your cousin.’

  ‘What?!’

  ‘All right, not a first cousin. Perhaps four or five times removed. But we are related. Our common relation, the Grey Eagle – that is your father, and a distant uncle of mine – once accidentally brushed your mother with his wing and she fell pregnant.’

  ‘Even if that’s true, what does it have to do with me now?’

  ‘You are the one in whom bird and man are united. Moreover, you are the only son of the Grey Eagle, and he is the king of the eagles. He is dying and asks me to bring you to him. He wants to see you.’

  And so the man with one wing climbed onto the eagle’s back and the huge bird bore him away. As fast as the wind it flew, swiftly passing mountains, lakes and rivers, and soon they reached a lofty mountain peak covered in snow. Here there was a large eyrie, with a throne in the middle and a white fireplace, whose flames burned with a strange light, white and pure. Despite the snow and ice all around, it was pleasantly warm inside the eyrie. This was the home of the Grey Eagle.