East of the West Read Online Free PDF Page A

ledge and flip it in my hand. How calm your face, Nora, I want to say, how even your breaths. Teach me to breathe like you. To wave my palm and turn the raging surf to glass.
    Instead I call her name. Slowly, she limps over and eases down beside me. “I’ve never told you this,” I say. “We never buried Brother. That was a lie. We never took him off the rope. I’d heard rumors, stories from people in our mountain, of how when mothers recognized their gunned-down children the tsarists pulled them aside and shot them on the spot. And so I told Mother, ‘I beseech you in your daughters’ blood, keep walking. Don’t say a word.’ And Mother was so shocked then she stood before my brother and didn’t even reach to touch his feet. We walked right past.”
    I know that this will never be, but still I say, “Let’s go to Macedonia. Let’s find the grave. I’ll borrow a car.” I want to say more, but I don’t. She watches me. She takes my hand and now my hand, too, trembles with hers. I see in the apple the marks of Pavel’s teeth and, in the brown flesh, a tiny tooth. I show it to Nora and it takes her eyes a moment to recognize what it is they see. Or so I think.
    But then she nods without surprise, as if this is just what she expected. Isn’t it good to be so young, she wants to tell me, that you can lose a tooth and not even notice?

EAST OF THE WEST
    I t takes me thirty years, and the loss of those I love, to finally arrive in Beograd. Now I’m pacing outside my cousin’s apartment, flowers in one hand and a bar of chocolate in the other, rehearsing the simple question I want to ask her. A moment ago, a Serbian cabdriver spat on me and I take time to wipe the spot on my shirt. I count to eleven.
    Vera , I repeat once more in my head, will you marry me?
    •
    I first met Vera in the summer of 1970, when I was six. At that time my folks and I lived on the Bulgarian side of the river, in the village of Bulgarsko Selo, while she and her folks made home on the other bank, in Srbsko. A long time ago these two villages had been one—that of Staro Selo—but after the great wars Bulgaria had lost land and that land had been given to the Serbs. The river, splitting the village in two hamlets, had served as a boundary: what lay east of the river stayed in Bulgaria and what lay west belonged to Serbia.
    Because of the unusual predicament the two villages were in, our people had managed to secure permission from both countries to hold, once every five years, a major reunion, called the sbor . This was done officially so we wouldn’t forget our roots. In reality, though, the reunion was just another excuse for everyone to eat lots of grilled meat and drink lots of rakia . A man had to eat until he felt sick from eating and he had to drink until he no longer cared if he felt sick from eating. The summer of 1970, the reunion was going to be in Srbsko, which meant we had to cross the river first.
    •
    This is how we cross:
    Booming noise and balls of smoke above the water. Mihalaky is coming down the river on his boat. The boat is glorious. Not a boat really, but a raft with a motor. Mihalaky has taken the seat of an old Moskvich, the Russian car with the engine of a tank, and he has nailed that seat to the floor of the raft and upholstered the seat with goat skin. Hair out. Black and white spots, with brown. He sits on his throne, calm, terrible. He sucks on a pipe with an ebony mouthpiece and his long white hair flows behind him like a flag.
    On the banks are our people. Waiting. My father is holding a white lamb under one arm and on his shoulder he is balancing a demijohn of grape rakia . His shining eyes are fixed on the boat. He licks his lips. Beside him rests a wooden cask, stuffed with white cheese. My uncle is sitting on the cask, counting Bulgarian money.
    “I hope they have deutsche marks to sell,” he says.
    “They always do,” my father tells him.
    My mother is behind them, holding two sacks. One is full