

White City Wordsmiths

Volume II

WHITE CITY WORDSMITHS: VOLUME II  
The Second Anthology of Prose and Poetry

Anthology © 2016

All rights reserved in all media. All of the works in this anthology belong to the respective artists, who are the copyright holders for their individual works.

No part of this publication may be used or reproduced in any form or by any means, including but not limited to scanning, photocopy, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without written permission of the copyright holder, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews, and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

This is an anthology of several pieces of fiction. All names, characters, locales, and incidents are products of several authors' imaginations and any resemblance to actual people, places or events is coincidental or fictionalized.

This work is non-profit.

This anthology is a product of the White City Wordsmiths creative writing workshop, an initiative of the Balkan Writers Project.

Contact: contact@balkanwritersproject.com

Head of project:  
Nathan William Meyer

Editorial team:  
Vera Novković

Jelena Petrović

Irena Raičević

Nevena Todorović

Katarina Šotić

Cover and book design by:  
Katarina Šotić

Print and bind:  
Štamparija Srpski Gutenberg

White City  
Wordsmiths Volume II

THE SECOND ANTHOLOGY  
OF PROSE AND POETRY
TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD 3

2 AM 7

The Wall 10

lovestory 12

The Beholder 15

*** 20

In a Land of Blooming Flowers 26

Oh, How the Mighty Have Fallen 34

 FUBAR (Fucked up beyond all recognition) 44

forever 46

 Dead Again (The Last Testament of Why) 51

It's So Easy Loving You 57

*** 58

*** 62

*** 64

*** 65

*** 67

*** 68

*** 69

*** 70

*** 73

*** 77

*** 78

*** 79

Too Close to the Sun 83

 Who Ate the Master's Cake 84

*** 85

Body of Work 91

Be a Friend 94

Our Kind 98

*** 100

*** 102

*** 104

*** 107

It's in Her Eyes 112

The Disappearance Of 117

as yet untitled 128

stop 130

21st century haiku 132

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 133

About the Head of Project 134

#  FOREWORD

On a winter night in early 2015, a group of students began meeting at the American Corner in Belgrade to participate in a newly formed creative writing workshop. Stories and poems were shared, their strengths praised and weaknesses exposed, as these aspiring writers strove to improve their abilities. They brought their skills and energy together to produce an impressive anthology of original voices telling original stories. The great success of the workshop ensured a chance for talented young people to continue on this creative path in the future.

A year later, the White City Wordsmiths creative workshop marches on with even more vigor and more momentum than before. With the release of this second anthology, these inspired poets and storytellers got an opportunity to showcase their unique ideas and raw talent yet again.

This collection of stories is more than a book. It is a collection of literary dreams. It is a demonstration of how these writers can unflinchingly share their works with an international audience. It is an artistic signpost marking where they are now and indicating the road still ahead. It is covers, pages, ink, but it is also an unlocked treasure chest filled with the worlds of their imaginations that we can enter, marvel at, and explore.

Over the last two years, it has been a true privilege to work with this team of wordsmiths and be a fellow traveler on their literary journey - a journey which, I have no doubt, has no end in sight.

Nathan William Meyer

English Language Fellow

(Serbia, 2014-2016)

GORDANA SRETENOVIĆ

Reader. Writer. Travel junkie. Amateur wine taster. Coffee enthusiast. Certified Kerouac worshipper. Freelance bad horror film guru. Kral Majales aficionado. Aspiring William Blake expert. Future crazy cat lady.

#  2 AM

Just be naked when I come,

Your plane leaves tomorrow anyway

I'm so high I think I might love you

so pour us some wine and don't ask why

there's black under my eyes.

Just digest me with your kisses,

You won't be here tomorrow anyway.

You and I have an expiration date,

Somewhere between the time zones

between PDT and CET,

between the UCT/GMT -7 and +1

In the corridors of a dark gay club

where our tall, pretty friends were making out

you told me you might even fall for me

if we could stay on the same continent.

Don't.

Don't say "let's be more than friends"

and "don't let society ruin you"

and "it's not about you or your body,

you didn't have to get those tattoos to prove a point"

Just let my brain melt and let the lines swerve

And don't say I'm just a little girl, like your manly 32

is better than my age.

I told you

how the end of 24 was the worst time of my life,

and that you'll leave tomorrow and I'm not allowed to feel.

So just be naked when I come,

Your plane leaves tomorrow anyway.

Reading the inscriptions on my back

and ancient symbols on yours,

I'm so high I think I might even love you

but I'll never say it.

I am not allowed.

#  The Wall

I am here, looking at the wall

While behind me, he is with another woman

Covertly touching her hand

and I pretend I don't see.

I am here, gazing at the wall

While behind me

He is whispering secrets in her ear,

and I pretend I don't hear.

I am here, staring at the wall

While behind me,

He is stealing kisses from her,

and I pretend I don't feel.

I am here, glaring at the wall

While behind me his friends feel sorry for what we used to be,

And mine tell me to drink it all away

and I pretend I don't care.

Still lingering here

Pretending I don't see.

The people are gone

and the wall is staring back at me.

#  lovestory

damn

how hot is our special Saturday night,

sitting on your messy bed and watching you

scrunch the 27th sheet of paper

with your poignant stanzas written on the debris

with your sixth glass of bourbon

with the madness growing inside of you.

with the inferno in your eyes.

but

is it sexy when I smoke 13 cigarettes in your apartment

when I spill coffee on your bed

when I mess up your kitchen while burning my notebooks

when I write bad poetry

just so I don't have to inhale the fumes of your frustration?

I don't know why I asked.

I don't even care, I'm just being nice.

no

you and me did not look like this in my imagination either

but your ashtray is big enough for both of us

and your mess of a bed is not made for one

and we are both mad and worship Kerouac and Camus

we are both damned

we are both deeply flawed.

we are perfect for each other.

LUKA NOVKOVIĆ

Organic synthesist by day, explorer of imaginary universes by night. His wizard's robe used to be white, but multicoloured stains, rips and scorch marks changed that a long time ago. Scientific journals in his bag are crammed between tomes of magic. In a nutshell? An alchemist.

Also loves winter, eating until he can barely stand (sweets especially), laughing out loud and sizzling guitar solos.

#  The Beholder

OK, STOP. Stop. STOP! There you go, good man. Stop and think for a second. Who are you? Where are you? What are you doing? Think! Ok, ok, I'm thinking. I am... I am... My name is... Shit, what's my name?! Can't remember now. What else? I know! I know what I am! I'm scared. Idiot, of course you're scared. But this is different. I wasn't scared before. I mean, I was, but not all the time. I wasn't jumpy, but you could scare me if you burst out of a dark corner screaming. My friend (I had a friend? I still do. What's his name? Her name? Not important.) did that to me once; I leapt like 5 feet backwards and landed on my ass. We (We? Who's we?) all laughed about it later (When was that?). This isn't it. This is like... this is like...

This is like a movie soundtrack. I know. Like when you're watching a horror flick, and the eerie music starts to build up, and you just know that something very, very bad is about to happen, and all of your muscles clench, your breathing nearly stops, and the music keeps going, a bit louder now, it's gonna happen, any second now, the heroes suspect nothing, but you, you know, and it makes it all the more terrifying. It's like the danger is not on the screen, but in the same room as you are, looming over you. And then, the music stops. Hell breaks loose. The monster is in the open, the killer swings his ax and people are dead. Or worse. But the tension is broken, it's time for action, fight or flight. Yes, yes, just like that, but the music never stops. There's no release. The monster is always there. Like it's, like it's... feeding on my fear, and can't get enough of it. But it... doesn't care really. I know it. It's just there, watching me. Or trying to watch me. No more watching. I put a stop to that. Your name? Don't know. Next question.

Where are you? Where am I? This... this looks like my house. Yes, it's my house! I'm in the lobby.

Great, at least you got that right. What are you doing? What am I doing? I'm waiting for the... for the... ummmm... for the cops! The cops are going to come! But... Ok, stop. But why are... No! Don't... They are going to come because... Because I... oh, my God, what have I...

Hold it! Stop right there! Not now. Now is not a good time for that. You're not ready yet. You need to go through it slowly. Remember when it all started? No. No, I don't. I... Yes you do. You are a surgeon. A good one. You saved lives. You lost lives, too, but that's just how it is. Remember now? Yes. Yes. I remember. But I... You never really wanted to be a surgeon. Yeah, too bad. I don't know what I wanted, but... It wasn't medicine. But when both your parents are esteemed doctors, and you lack the ability to stand up for yourself, you get into med school, you realize that you have a steady hand and a good memory, you graduate, finish a specialty, land a job at a good clinic, and then you don't get to think about much else. I was miserable, wasn't I? Yes. Yes, you were. At the end of the day, a bottle waited for you in your office. The lives were celebrated, the deaths drowned. You lived on.

Until yesterday. I still don't... It was a bad day. A major highway accident. Oh, yes... You lost three. Two women and a kid. A nine-year old boy. They all had one chance, and it was you. And you screwed up. No, I didn't, it was... Don't try to cover it up. You know it's your fault. You were too cocky at first, took risks you shouldn't have, and then, when the first woman died, the one with the... The sternal fracture. Let's not mince words here, her chest was practically split open. She could have survived, though, but you messed up. I didn't mean to... You got scared then, too scared, and you... I tried to play it safe. And I lost. Correct. You lost the kid too. And then, sore loser that you are, you got angry and operated on the last one half-blind with rage. I couldn't just... I know, you couldn't just take a break, the hospital was swamped, and anybody who had ever held a scalpel had their arms bloody to the elbows. The result didn't surprise anyone. Do I have to remember this? Yes, you do. Because after that long day, after ten grueling hours in the O.R., ten stinking hours of disappointment and failure, you went to your office, and you poured yourself a drink. Two drinks. Three. Then you stopped counting. You were still angry. I hated myself. You hated everything. You emptied glass after glass until there was no booze left. That didn't help your situation. So you... I smashed the glass against the table. You cut your palm, deep. It hurt. Damn right it did. You scrambled for the bandages and... And I saw it.

And it saw me.

Right. You remember. The eye. Staring at me from my palm. I passed out. You woke up a couple of hours later, your right hand throbbing. It hurt like hell. But the gash was almost closed. You thought it was all a bad dream, a hallucination induced by stress, fatigue and alcohol. But it was still there. I felt it wriggling inside my hand, a slimy ball stuck in my palm. And then... And then the wound opened again. The eye was still there. Pale grey iris, with an orange ring around it. Kayser-Fleischer ring. Copper poisoning. Narrow pupil. It wasn't blinking. You screamed. You panicked. I had to stop it. It was looking at me and I had to stop it. So you bandaged it. It didn't close like a normal eye would. I felt the bandage scraping it. It hurt. It did. I couldn't call for anybody. Nobody would help me. They would... I don't know what they would do, but... You were too scared. WHO WOULDN'T BE?! Calm down. I'm just a storyteller here. Walking you down memory lane. Who are you? I'm you, stupid. Oh. The part of you that's still in control. Trying to bring the rest of you up to speed.

I know what's next. I tried to kill it. You tried to cut it out. You gave up after you made the first incision. My hand was trembling... With fear this time... and the blade grazed it. It hurt so much. Too much. I tried it again, with painkillers. They didn't help. So I tried to sew it up. That didn't work out. The lids wouldn't close. Dammit, they wouldn't close! I had nothing to work with. I could barely close my fist. So you bandaged it again and ran home.

You tiptoed through the hospital, full of patients surrounded by their loved ones, people sleeping in the waiting rooms, dozing off in the hallways... We ran out of rooms pretty quickly... watching TV as more reports about the accident flooded in, even in the middle of the night. In your hand you felt... Squirming, slithering, rolling around... Trying to see. Yes, but I couldn't let it. And then you saw... They all had...

Yeah. They had eyes too. On their legs. On their wrists. Their foreheads. Their hands. Chest. Stomach. Dog bites, failed suicide, car crash, chemical burns, stabbing... Sick eyes, dead eyes, blind eyes, eyes leaking tears and pus... Looking at me. All of them looking at me. So I... So you ran. With eyes from every corner following your every move.

You got home. It was late. Claire was already in bed. You called earlier in the day to tell her not to wait up for you. You got in. And I went to check on her. She was sleeping naked. She always loved sleeping that way. Not that you ever minded. I leaned in to kiss her... And she opened her eye to look at you. The eye in her belly. Where your son grew peacefully for nine months but wouldn't come out without the help of a scalpel. It was so... so white. So big. So... uncaring. Not like her eyes at all. Her eyes were warm and gentle, and sometimes sad. This thing was... cold. And dry. You choked back a scream. And then you did the only thing you could do to help her. You bound and gagged her. Oh, God... And then you cut it out. How did I... With a kitchen knife. No. You always kept your knives sharp. Comes with the job, I guess. I... I... It didn't hurt at all. It didn't hurt you, you mean. She seemed like she was in a lot of pain. But you knew she would be. Oh, God, Claire... I'm so sorry. I had to do it. I'm sorry... And then...

Michael. Yeah, the boy walked in. Must've heard something. His eyes so wide, his mouth gaping in shock. I grabbed him in my arms. And then he looked at you. The top of his head looked at me. Where the swing hit him three years ago. Five stitches. I did them myself. And now an eye was there. A large brown eye, with a little pool of blood at the lower part of the iris. Hyphema. That's right. So what did you do? I... I... I couldn't take it anymore. I... don't know. I'll tell you. No, please. Please don't. You lost it. You swung him into the wall. No. He screamed. No. But you kept swinging. No. No. Yes. Again and again. No, please, no. Stop. A crack. A crunch. Then a thump. Then a sticky sound. Noooooooo... Remember what you did next? No, I don't want to, I just want to... You tried to cut off your hand. To stop the watching, to stop it all... You bound your forearm, took a cleaver and you swung. I blacked out from the pain. But I did it. It's gone. No more... Really? Gone? Are you sure? What's that sound? That's the cops at the door. Grab the cleaver. And the knife. How did they... The neighbors must've heard Michael. You knew this would happen. No, I didn't... Yes, you did. That's why you're here. You're waiting for them. They have eyes too. They need help. Everybody does. The eyes are everywhere.

***

A door unlocks, and a weary policeman enters his little flat. He's shivering, and the keys slip through his trembling fingers and fall to the floor with a clatter.

"Damn it!"

He picks up the keys and slides one into the lock, turning it twice. He looks across the room, squinting in the late morning light. He stumbles to the window and closes the shutters.

"I need a drink."

A few moments later, a glass of whiskey in his hand, he slumps into an old chair. A generous gulp burns down his insides, warming him up and nesting comfortably in the pit of his stomach.

"Joe's gone."

He says it aloud and freezes for a second, disoriented. Like it only became real now that he had said it, and it left him dazed. Joe's gone. He's almost completely alone now. No wife. No kids. No more friends. Joe was the last one. His partner, the last of the "old crew". It's not fair, Joe was a tough old bird, he was supposed to retire next month and enjoy the next couple of decades in well-deserved peace, drinking beer, reading the papers and complaining how the world today makes no sense. They've been through so much together. Through hell and high water, it was him, Joe, Mark and Noel. All gone now, except for him, and he was the least likely survivor. Mark had brains. But brains can't help you when a 10 ton truck smashes into your car because the truck's driver has been behind the wheel for more than 15 hours and couldn't tell the difference between a speed gauge and a clock. Noel was the marksman. Best in the district, 7 years straight. They all owed Deadeye Noel their lives since that supermarket robbery went horribly wrong a couple of years ago. They would have left the building in body bags, if it hadn't been for him. You can't shoot lung cancer, though, so Noel went down coughing out little bloody bits. And then there was Joe.

He scratches himself absent-mindedly. His scars are itching. Old wounds opening again.

Joe, the heart of the gang. He and his Barbara took care of all of them. Those two venerable lovebirds sat by his hospital bed through the entire recovery period when he had his heart surgery. If any of the old crew got lonely, they could drop by for dinner at any time. Barbara made delicious spaghetti. No more of that now. Almost everyone left him.

And what did he have? He wasn't smart like Mark, or a sharpshooter like Noel, and he was certainly not as wise and kind and steadfast as Joe. The only thing he had was his friends, and his peace. Peace with the world, with himself, what he was, what he had, what he knew. He could feel when someone else felt the same thing. He would look at a person, and the person would look back, and the instant their gazes met, they both knew they shared the same secret tranquility. It wasn't much, but he never wanted much, and many people don't even have that. That's what kept him alive and kicking all these years. That's what pulled him through. It's the only thing that's left.

And all because of that "possible domestic violence" call from the concerned neighbors. They got it, of course, the old crew. Or "senile patrol", as the youngsters called them. He hated it, but Joe would just smirk and wink at the upstarts. The two of them were always handed down calls like this one. Nobody wanted to deal with drunken husbands, hysterical wives and crying children at 4 AM, so they sent them, the old good-for-nothing geezers. And they went. Nice house. Lights out, dead silence. Should have known right then and there that something was wrong. Family fights are never quiet. He knocked, shouted, full procedure. Nobody answered. Repeat. Zero response. Joe thought he heard something inside and put his ear to the door.

A heavy blade burst through the wood and buried itself in his partner's skull. He leapt backwards and fumbled for his gun. He will never forget the look on Joe's face in that moment. A look of mild surprise, just before his eyes rolled back and he slumped against the door.

He doesn't want to remember anymore, but the images flood his mind.

Door crashing open. A man stumbling out, covered in blood. Knife glinting in the streetlight. Screaming. A bloody stump flailing. Gun in his hands bucking and roaring. The screamer falling, a red blossom opening in his chest. Two. Three. Blood, sprays of blood. Headshot. Then another. A hit to the gut. He keeps shooting the twitching corpse. More blood. The dry clicking of an empty gun. Muffled shouting from somewhere far away. His head is swimming. There's a red veil over his eyes. He reloads and enters the house. The coppery smell hits him like a brick wall and he recoils for a second. Bloody footprints everywhere. A woman torn open across a four-poster bed. The stench of gore hanging heavy in the air, choking him. He feels bile rising in his throat. There's a little body beneath a dark red smear on the wall, blood and brain-matter dripping on the floor. Blood is on the floor, on the walls, in his nose, in his mouth, in his lungs, choking, drowning, blood, blood, blood, bloodbloodblood...

He shuts his eyes, breathes in deeply and feels his own smell, a combination of his worn uniform soaked in sweat and his fading cologne. He desperately needs a shower. They wouldn't just let him go home, he had statements to give, reports to write, questionings to endure. All without Joe's reassuring grin to help him through it. He puts the glass away and walks out of the room. In a couple of seconds, the air of his small bathroom starts filling with steam as the faucet unleashes a torrent of hot water. He undresses, and his eyes fall upon a nearby mirror.

He fingers the long gash from an old injury on his stomach, a souvenir from a back-alley stabbing he barely survived 20 years ago. Joe pulled him out of that one too. The puckered edges of the wound shudder and it yawns open to reveal an eye the size of a fist, sickly yellow and glossy with cataract, staring at its own reflection. That was his first one.

"Joe's gone," he says.

Another pair of lids parts on his shoulder, where a young punk at that supermarket shot him. The pupil narrows, and then a bloodshot blue eye turns its gaze from the ceiling to the side, rolling in its socket to look at the mirror.

"He's dead."

It knows already, but he needed to say it. It doesn't care.

"There's just you now."

For a moment he thinks it winked at him, but that was unlikely. There was never any response. It just watched. On his chest, his heart surgery scar itches. And then it's gaping wide, milky whiteness beneath it rolling around blindly.

He's lucky because he knows. Unlike all those thousands and millions of people who think they are alone. And all the while, they have no idea what's sleeping beneath their skin, and how to let it see. To accept it. It doesn't take much. Some pain, yes, but nothing valuable is ever gained without at least a little bit of pain.

He feels a tingling sensation on his cheek. A tiny new eye, its pupil so wide it's almost completely black, flutters open in his left cheek where he cut himself while shaving.

His lips widen into a smile.

"You're beautiful," he whispers.

He knows that it doesn't care. It never did.

It's just watching.

ANICA MARKOVIĆ

Some say that she was born in a hole in the ground in a land

they call the Shire,

and that she was Gandalf's first choice to carry

the ring to Mordor.

All we know is, she loves strawberries.

#  In a Land of Blooming Flowers

ONCE UPON A SEASON, in a land of blooming flowers, there was a lonely being with thorns and petals closed.

Ulunda lived in a land called Laide, a place wide and long, immeasurable by her small roots. Three of the borders were beyond her reach and she had only ever seen one. In the east, where the Suns would rise each morning, for in Laide the Suns were shining every day, she knew a wide sea. She dreamt of the worlds across, of the West and the North and the South. She did not belong. Misunderstood, hurt, neglected, she lived, loved only once and very briefly, when she was too young to be different.

Laide was a land of simple pleasures and delight, led by the High Council which consisted of the most beautiful flowers in the country. Every week they would gather under the great Nomo tree, drinking mead and resolving the important state issues. Drinking was necessary. The spirits brought their spirits up.

The flowers lived in harmony with all the other beings in Laide. The fairies occupied the underground, feeding through the tree roots, for the light was harmful to their beautiful sensitive eyes. All crawlers worked for the flowers, who were considered of higher status. They were happy though, they were fulfilling their purpose and were being fed and groomed in return. The most valuable creatures for the flowers were the nui. Hairy, fat and furry, they spent their days buzzing through the air above the flowers' heads. Their spindly wings barely kept their bodies in the air, but they somehow managed to make it seem easy. For some reason the nui spent three months of every year grounded, sleeping in small holes dug by fairies, resting. Then, on the 24th day of the third month of every year the nui would rise from their slumber and take flight - a magnificent sight to behold.

Ulunda started out as dust within a seed, amorphous. Even then, expectations were high, to be the smartest, most beautiful and brightest. When she sprouted from the ground short, light green, with gentle leaves, shut, she was ordinary. In Laide, where grown flowers live in bloom every month of every year, the buds are born closed, waiting for their light to define their lives. Those born orange were optimistic and cheerful, easy to manipulate and heavy sleepers at night. The green ones were grounded, down to earth and modest. Red lived as passionate lovers, binge drinkers and troublemakers. Blues were elegant, poised and smart, but somehow came across as stuck-up. The most special of them all were the pink flowers. Born one in every few generations, not only were they rare, but also died young. Precious and nurturing, they loved unconditionally, but they withered in youth because their greatest virtue - love for all creatures - was their greatest downfall. They were susceptible to words and small, superficial acts of kindness, simply to be torn apart by the dark reality. Too late would they realize that for others giving love and taking it away was easy.

As newborns, buds were kept and raised together, belonging to everyone, a public property and concern. It was so they would get more love, they said. It was to take better care of them, they all said. So childhood was peaceful, unburdened and lively. Ulunda entered the respectful age of unfolding surrounded by friends, Nesse, Gil and Aikanaro being the closest to her. On the day of the nuis' first flight of the year almost everyone blossomed. It was the most serene sight Ulunda's eyes had ever beheld. Nesse shone purple - as expected of the adventurous one; Gil became golden and Aikanaro blossomed into a magnificent crimson flower. Ulunda, nothing. A day had passed, the rest bloomed. Ulunda, nothing.

As their flowers opened, all the children moved out of their group confinement to live with their parents. Gil and Aikanaro were loved a little bit more than Nesse. They were beautiful, Nesse was just good enough. As for Ulunda, she became a thorn in her parents' side. They expected her to be something other than a disgrace. She apparently could not manage it.

In a single day, the group home they had shared became a solitary. Keeping you all together to share the love, they said. Only if you bloom, they forgot to say. The truth was, this was an easier way for parents to let go of those who did not succeed. They never had to go through the trouble of throwing the failures out, they simply never took them in. She was left without an owner. Not long afterwards, those who created her seed focused all their obsessive and oppressive energy on her brother, Mith, a month younger, lazy gray being, their first real child. She stayed undefined, unsorted.

Time passed slowly. She remained alone, abandoned, but still a burden to everyone. She wanted to fight the problem, fight it, but she had no one to fight by her side. She soon learned that she wasn't the only one born this way. There had been others before her. After they had failed at blossoming, they were equally quickly branded and isolated until death found them. No one could survive without their flower. It was the heart, the source of energy and a way to feed on the Suns' light.

The long lone hours were filled with reading. The records in the great abandoned underground library were scarce about the likes of her. At first, friends visited her, Nesse most often, until the day she started smelling of rot. That day, she knew, was the beginning of the long decay. Pain coursed through her ‒ where it gathered, her skin exploded in small mud coloured patches. In those places thorns began to form, covering her thin body. Her kind did not grow thorns. What was she? Anxiety took over at night, but it was guilt that most ate at her, leaving her hollow. Maybe she didn't try hard enough? There were moments of despair when she had tried to scrape those disgusting growths off, change herself, be normal, and so she hurt her body. It bled, but the pain was nothing compared to the pain of being a failure.

Ulunda grew, afraid of stepping outside, being seen, scrutinized, despised. One of the rare days of the year, when she did play outside in the East forest, in the comfort and solace that nature brought her, she met a group of colourful, adolescent flowers. They could not hide their disgust at noticing her, and she once again knew the feeling of being unwanted, as if even looking at her was detrimental. However, in the bouquet, she recognized two faces, her childhood friends, Gil and Nesse. They dared not meet her weak eyes not used to daylight. In the bunch she also recognized Aikanaro, the overly promiscuous ex friend who pretended not to know her. Ulunda could not help but stare at them, forcing Nesse and Gil to look her way. Their eyes were overwhelmed with guilt, having stopped visiting her a long time ago. They pitied her, in the most self-centered way possible ‒ as if she were an inconvenience. Still, they endured seeing her, focusing all their efforts on seeming calm and content and not giving their true feelings away. Parents always said not to frown because it's not the prettiest look on a flower. But, unaccustomed to the nuances of nonverbal cues and the cultural norms of society, Ulunda misread the looks which differed from the nasty ones she was used to. In the absence of hate in their eyes, she decided to interpret it as warmth and love.

To be clear, Ulunda never believed in it all - destiny, stars, karma, the Gods. Not that she denied their existence, just the way they were presented. They would punish those who strayed, but then she was punished at birth, branded without even a chance to err. However, she felt that the encounter in the forest meant something and that she was supposed to realize there were still flowers to whom she mattered. Someone must have been trying to tell her the time for change was upon her.

After getting the Council's permission to leave her lonesome home, and only because there was no law to force her to stay there, Ulunda made an effort to live among others and fit in. Not dwelling on the fact that she spent months isolated by means unjust and cruel which They falsely called her own choice, she sought out Gil and Nesse, her friends. Unwillingly, they let her follow them around, few steps behind, chills down their stems whenever they were close enough to smell her. Whenever she walked with them, everyone seemed to steer clear. The plants, the crawlers and flowers all kept away. Being the way she was, Ulunda was at the bottom of this irony of a harmonious and hierarchical society. The fear in the seasoned flowers triggered hatred towards the branded one. The younger flowers though saw it all as a joke. Laughter can sometimes be more cruel than silence. Ohh no, Ulu soiled herself again, they would hush when she passed by. Noo, she is perpetually soiled, someone would add. They laughed. She laughed as well. Their jokes must be funny when everyone is laughing. Maybe if she laughs as well they'll let her hear some of them once.

Anyhow, from a state of isolation, with great effort and endurance, she managed to become an ordinary sight. Her mind was so genuine and innocent that it didn't need much to be happy. Nesse and Gil's gang came to accept Ulunda as a follower, someone who was simply always there. Somewhere. Pretending came easier with practice. On the generation's first birthday Gil told her she had a gift for her. The birthday of every flower was the day of their bloom. Ulunda never had a birthday. She was never born. That day Gil let Ulu sit with them. Then she unexpectedly touched her - quickly, barely, feeling dirty. Shock shook everyone present, but at least it seemed she was not contagious. That made it easier. Ulunda did not immediately appreciate the kind gesture, as she called it. She was ashamed that her best friend had to suffer the feel of her rough skin. Apologies. Later, at home, alone, she cried clear cold dew of joy. That day Gil got all of Nesse's presents. She had won the bet.

With more and more people around her, Ulunda's body started changing and shortly she became a flower of a healthier green hue, slimmer stalk with a dash of sparkle around her still closed petals. The body stopped being her body when one day she shed the thorns and was left only with pale scars as reminders. The positive environment she lived in changed her, or was it her perception of the environment. She could not have known.

As the color of her petals began to deepen so did the interest in her. Suddenly, more and more beings wanted to look at her, inspect her, but their looks seared her skin. It hurt her to think of how her decay made no one pay attention, therefore she did not dwell on it. Her return to life and the evident recovery concerned everyone and that was important. She found it satisfying, being needed and being cared for, although, expectations brought fear of failure yet again. The reason for the treatment she was receiving was the hint of pink sparkle she now bore around her bud. The High Council made her the topic of many meetings, encouraging the community to accept her and ease her into the bloom which was expected shortly. And so she was sweet-talked into comfort, encouraged by drinks and gently pushed further and further. Her petals slowly parted more and more. These generations had never seen a pink bloom and were waiting impatiently, growing her as if in an incubator. Ulunda hoped, prayed for something wondrous to happen because she needed this, to please everyone, to be liked by everyone, to be validated.

On the night of the summer solstice her petals finally began opening; painfully, slowly, too slowly. An array of beings gathered around her to watch the unexpected recovery, the healing of a pink flower. She was just a late bloomer apparently. Her body morphed, drastically changing as her flower uncurled slowly. Too slowly. Is this the right feeling? Should becoming pretty hurt so much? Pang after pang, after pang, like punches on her skin ‒ she could not deflect them. Her petals grew further apart, slowly, unbearably dry. Pang, after pang, after pang. Her body withered. Her petals fell further apart. Her body wilted. Thinner and longer, in the fleeting moment of bloom, before her petals detached from her body, she glowed pink. A disappointing dash of pink and then nothing. A former flower, in dust, in parts. A waste of time.

She should have tried harder.

In the far end of the garden, sitting in a soiled, upholstered wheelchair, arms bound, she opens her eyes. She screams, but the words refuse to leave her misshapen mouth. She has long lost the ability to produce sounds. She could not help her. White coats walking around. She could not help herself. Everywhere around her, flowers were blooming. Still, she could not help herself. She was a dud.

VERA NOVKOVIĆ

Out of time, out of place, out of sight, out of mind.

On the outside, looking in.

Constantly trying to get around to writing that novel.

Also, would you mind if I did experiments on you?

#  Oh, How the Mighty Have Fallen

YOU WAKE UP. Kick away the covers. Something moans to your left and you turn to find out it's a woman. You don't know her. It doesn't matter. A low grumble rattles your stomach, once again reminding you that you can now be hungry. And hungover. The hungover part bothers you more.

You saunter over to the bathroom, not bothering to be quiet. After all, the woman in the next room probably wanted to fuck the image of the big, bad, handsome man you used to be. Not the pot-bellied wreck you are now. Might as well make the noises to go with the motions.

The mirror – your worst enemy for a while now – stares back with bloodshot blue eyes. Once, they were piercing. X-Ray. Soon, you're gonna have to count yourself lucky if no cataracts pop up in there, somewhere. The glasses you wear are now no longer fake.

Alcohol was a quite the discovery. It had had no effect on you before, and so you couldn't understand the fascination. But now? Now it's the only way to remember what flying used to feel like. Of course, you're still strong. A real hunk of a man. However, your tolerance to any kind of substance, or lack thereof, is appalling. Or, at least, it had been, at first. You're a veteran now. Finally something to be good at again.

She had stayed with you. For a while, at least, right after they passed The Normalization Bill. She guided you through the chemical treatments, the first hundred or so shots of the glowy green stuff. She stuck with you through the pain, the vomiting, the withdrawal – because it had been withdrawal, only no one could warn you, because, you know, losing your superpowers isn't exactly your everyday addiction-cleansing process – the first ten attempts at saving the world as a puny human being, and the consequential beat-ups, the first time you tried to beat her up. The last time you talked. The last time you saw her. Or, at least, the last time she knew you'd seen her.

Being a stalker when you're not a superhero is a lot easier, it turns out. Expensive, though. The trips to-and-from Washington alone cost a small fortune.

She remarried, of course. She chose the next contestant. Only, back when you were normal – flying, x-raying the bad guys to better punch their lights out, the whole shebang – the contest was nonexistent. There was just you. On top of the world. With her.

The comedown from the universe's biggest ego-trip had been a hard one, to say the least. They assigned you a therapist to soften the blow, but really. There were no words that could help you lift up the Empire State Building. Like you could. Before. When you weren't just human. The funny thing is, now that you couldn't use the fact that you'd saved the world a couple hundred times in lieu of any actual character, you actually had time to learn about your own personality.

It didn't take you long to discover there was very little personality to learn about.

You are the most boring person on the planet. The universe, maybe. And you couldn't get away with it anymore. Not even with her.

Of course, it hadn't been an overnight, slamming-the-door type of thing. The pair of you – along with the rest of the world, so very understanding in the beginning – had been so deeply entrenched in the oh-so-in-love act by then, the first problems hadn't surfaced until almost a year after the people you used to protect decided you weren't needed anymore.

The two of you decided to travel, for a while. See the world without the usual catastrophe factored in. But that got very old, very quickly, seeing as how, now that you actually had to buy plane-tickets, wait in lines, deal with jet-lag – of all things – it all seemed like a bit too costly for so few benefits.

After reality hit you hard enough to make you drop your romanticized notion of globe-trotting, you got your old job at the news agency, slid right back into your role as the phlegmatic reporter of questionable intelligence.

The beginning of the end was painfully cliché, true to your generic identity: someone would say something. It would be true. You would lose your shit. Occasionally, there would be a rather painful reminder that you were not the strongest in any room, anymore. The former superhero would take the day off, thinking she'd never find out, the big-shot, always-on-assignment news-woman she was now. And she hadn't, for a long while. Or maybe she had, but couldn't care less? It seems like the more valid option, these days.

In any case, soon enough, you would find yourself sitting at a bar, instead of behind a desk, a glass of whatever was strongest replacing your pen. Not that you are much of a writer. Even your employment has been a sham all along, apparently – your former "secret identity" never an actual secret. Your job was a publicity stunt.

Everyone has always known.

Except, you know, you.

Still, there's plenty of time to find out about all the other things you are not good at. But not an eternity of it, because, amongst all the other wondrous perks to being only human is the one you try so very hard not to think about. The big one.

Also known as death.

You try not to think about that.

Another lovely d-word that had been in store for you was divorce. Also known as the very last time you'd made the headlines. "Not perfect after all!" they read, all red and blue, so bright on the yellow paper – a combination you could bet was intentional, "The super-couple is no more!"

She had been all civil about it, for her part. Understanding. Kind, even. You... Well, you just tried to reenact the first time you'd killed a man, only instead of retreating from the planet to contemplate, you'd found your wisdom in the bottom of a whiskey bottle at the closest dive. The show has been on every night since. On the day she'd officially become someone else's damsel in distress, you didn't even bother leaving your stool in the morning.

Thinking that the bastards on top of the food chain pushed The Normalization Act just to get back at you for making them seem impotent through all those years of saving their world usually seemed like too much of a stretch. Still, one could never be sure. Blaming your demise on backroom politics had been the obvious choice, but the speed with which the people had switched from adoring you to calling you a public menace had been fucking astonishing. Could they have paid off an entire country? You suppose it doesn't even matter. Mr. President has stolen your life. And some other nameless asshole has stolen your wife. You'd chuckle at that.

And then choke on it.

You spit out the bile from the back of your throat and contemplate drowning in the sink for a few seconds before washing your face, instead. The glasses slide down your nose when you put them on, so you slam them back, almost breaking the expensive horn rim. One of the last gifts she'd bought you. You drank away all the other ones.

Suddenly, you realize that the light snoring from the other room stopped a while ago. The woman now stands in the doorframe, giving you what you assume is meant to be an alluring look, but all you see is a lecherous sneer. Maybe it's because of how worn-down she looks, stretch-marks crisscrossing her hips and somewhat prominent belly, her breasts sagging under a stained camisole, just enough to emphasize exactly how past her prime she is. Her teeth are bad. Somehow, that makes everything so much worse. But you know none of that's the actual issue. No.

Even though the hair color's right. The eyes, too. Full lips, just like you remember. But not full enough. The random stranger is still very pointedly not her.

She says something, and the voice is raspier than it should be, the words are wrong, everything is wrong. You shut her up in the easiest way available. She resists a bit, but you persist, even though your collective morning breath is making your insides twist. After several seconds of what was more a grapple than a kiss, you break off as a wave of nausea sends you hurtling towards the toilet.

The next five minutes pass in awkward-doesn't-even-begin-to-cover-it silence, interrupted only by the sound of you dredging up and spitting out leftover bile. You managed to disgust her into silence. Thankfully.

When you finally look up, the stained copy of a woman is no longer there. You hear her shuffling through the bedroom, probably hunting for her clothes, so she can flee. You try to convince yourself that the brief pang of regret you feel has to do with what just happened, but you know it's actually because the previous night occurred at all. Just like it always is.

They are all so wrong.

You stand in the doorway as she gets dressed, her motions jerky and her face a mask of disappointment. You can't find it in yourself to apologize. After all, you'd both made your choice. Serves her right for thinking she could bask in your former glory.

Finally, after what seems like hours of shameful waiting, the woman leaves. At least she had the good sense not to try and talk to you again.

You stumble back to bed, hitting the messy sheets with a groan. It's the weekend, you remember. Weekend means you can sleep it off.

Wish you could sleep life off.

But then, there's dreams. Dreams of soaring through the skies, tall buildings nothing but specks below you. Dreams of beat-up bad guys. Dreams of saving people.

Dreams of saving her.

That's also when you lose it all. She falls from your hands into the streets below, and all you can do is watch, suspended in that moment of perfect failure.

Sharp laughter cuts through your despair, jerking you back to awareness, and all of a sudden you're not in bed anymore. You're not even at home.

Well, not technically. It's your home away from home, the run-down dive on the other side of town from where you work. Gotta keep up appearances, even if nobody else cares anymore. Besides, you don't really have the money for any decent liquor in the quantities required, and this place is cheap. Trying to drink on account of your former fame had been quite the lesson to learn. Nobody recognized you. Or if they did, they didn't give a shit. And you can't burn through their bar with your heat-vision anymore to teach them otherwise. You're a nobody now.

They make sure you never forget it.

The dive had been almost empty when you first came in, with two other middle-aged men staring at their glasses, looking almost as miserable as you feel, so you can't really place the laughter for a few seconds. Then, another volley of giggling hits you and you turn to see four women – no, not women, girls – sitting at a table, completely absorbed in their gossip and their jokes and other normal people things. You can't see very well, but you can't mistake the carelessness in their voices for anything other than tipsy youth, either.

Suddenly, you want to hide. Curl into a ball and disappear, so they won't see the ruin occupying your stool. Another person being right about you all along is more than you can deal with at the moment. But of course, luck is not on your side.

It's never on your side.

One of the girls glances your way, her gaze almost passing over you, before realizing what she's seeing and grinning broadly. Like she's just won the lottery. She calls out to her friends and now they're all staring at you. You wonder if they always look this stupid. Then, something dawns on them. They stumble over to where you're sitting, and drape themselves over you, all of them talking and laughing at the same time, a parody of what your fans used to be like.

Still, you can't help but wonder which one might be willing to do more than just talk.

"Can you believe we barely recognized you?" The girl who saw you first – and your likeliest prospect for tonight, apparently – screeches in your ear, as if she isn't standing barely an inch away. "You, uh... you look... different," she adds tentatively. The others jump to agree with her and, soon, there's a cacophony of excited voices surrounding you again.

You start wishing for a hearing impediment.

Then, the same girl flips out her phone, camera at the ready. They crowd around you, their lips grotesquely puckered, and they force you to look up at the lens. "Smile~!" They chirp, the shutter clicks and it's done, there's an actual picture, someone took a picture with you.

Someone wanted to take a picture with you.

You barely have time to get your hopes up before they burst into another fit of laughter and unlatch themselves from you, already headed for the exit.

"Hashtag old-but-not-gold" is the last thing you can hear before they're gone, and it almost does you in, right then and there.

You push away from the bar, the stool clattering to the floor, rage welling up in your gut. You might not be gold, but you sure as hell can still... still... Half-formed ideas of things that could put you in jail flash through your muddled brain as you get out onto the street, but they're already too far away for you to reach. So you shout after them, spit flying, words barely coherent. They look at you, but only to chortle at how pitiful you are, before turning away again and disappearing down the street. They'll probably forget you in the next minute or so.

They always do.

JELENA PETROVIĆ

I find myself to be a place.

A place 'where the actual and the imaginary meet'. A place where I go to listen to metal music, the only one that helps me find peace. Where I go to read books and breathe (both of which I do painfully slowly). Where I go to 'sit down and bleed out' on the paper and maybe get a chance to write something down.

I am made of fire and water. Also, my birthday is in December.

#  FUBAR (Fucked up beyond all recognition)

Despite everything,

I know I'm just cannon fodder for you.

Despite everything,

I know the only place I belong is by your side.

Despite everything,

I am mute when you start making promises.

I am blind when you fail to keep them.

I am deaf when you lie.

Despite everything,

Your body is my base camp.

Your hands are my hideaway.

Your mind is my ammo dump.

Your goodbye is a gun to my head.

For all that, I'm alone again.

Despite everything, I'm still thinking of you.

#  forever

should I stop?

should I stay?

should I listen to you?

should silence be my savior

and solitude my peace?

are these talks supposed to be

this strict and short?

am I supposed to enjoy this?

should I go

run away

and never look back?

you say:

"how cliché.

I never thought you would

say such a thing,

let alone really consider it."

well

how well do you think you know me?

I think we both know the answer.

and again you speak

with a mouthful of advice:

"if you really decide to go,

go someplace nice

and far away, too.

I wouldn't want to be meeting you

in our places

four years down the road

lingering, triggering."

should silence be my savior,

I ask you again.

should I really say nothing

after all the things you said?

"go all out,"

is that a threat?

"but please without a tinge of regret.

this could be a goodbye, I bet,

only you're a gambler

and you haven't paid your debt."

yet.

funny you should say that.

and I thought you couldn't understand me.

how silly of me.

and again you speak

with a mouthful of advice:

"if you really decide to say anything,

say something nice

and look away, too.

I wouldn't want to remember you

by a rescheduled heartbreak."

should I cry?

should I mourn?

should I fall apart?

should I offer my condolences

or wish you best of luck?

are these talks supposed to be

this cold and unappreciative?

are you supposed to enjoy this?

should I laugh

out of spite

till my heart bleeds out?

you say:

"how cliché.

I never thought you would say such a thing.

I took you for an empath.

but if you really decide to laugh,

laugh out loud

and not out of spite

so that I can hear you, too

four years down the road."

should I say I love you?

should I say a prayer?

should love, oh God,

be my death wish

or should I still

hold on to my hate

until I can no longer

sense anything else?

you say:

"how cliché.

I never took you for a coward.

but if you really decide to die,

die in my dream,

so that I don't have to love you

another four years down the road."

#  Dead Again (The Last Testament of Why)

'Why?' is a very frequently asked question.

Systematical, logical, clinical, ethereal.

Also seems to lead nowhere. No one ever grants us the answer.

Why do we keep asking it? Are we hung up

on the idea of dependence?

However critical a case, it's always the same -

it's almost a sickness, a malady of vicious circles that people seem to love, to cling to.

Repeatedly. Incurably.

WHY?! WHY? Why? Why. why-

It's an obligation. It's an incantation.

Bury my coffin deep and set my cradle on fire. There's only water in between.

I know what you're thinking:

'She keeps asking why and none of the questions get answered.'

WHY? Why? Why. why-

It's a responsibility. It's a hymn.

Why do I get stabbed in the back just as I start believing?

The back, the front, it's not a thing of choosing, but of quantity.

As long as you keep the blood flowing... The water... flowing.

'Oh dear God. Every time. Please get it already. How do you not see it coming? It's your fault.'

Some swim, some sink. Most sing, the rest scream. We all sit here waiting for retribution. Waiting for fire. Keep the blood flowing.

'Déjà heard, my friend.'

You wear the truth on your sleeve and yet you seem to enjoy lying to me. There's only water in between. It keeps everything silent... Dormant.

'Time flies when you're having fun and I don't have much of it left.'

Why? Why. why-

It's a duty. It's a promise.

Keep it.

Why. why-

It's a need. It's a dead end.

'Time heals all wounds. I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens, but it is never gone.'

Seriously? That's all you have?

'Seriously? You need more?'

When all is taken away from you, the easiest and at the same time the hardest thing to do is to ask why.

why-

It's a compulsion. It's eating me up inside.

I must. We should.

Why do we do it?

We know it will lead nowhere new, nowhere safe, nowhere familiar, nowhere near cessation. Yet we keep on doing it, unfaltering in our self-destructive needs.

Why do we keep asking it?

Let us burn until we know all the answers.

Even though there's nothing left, we seek closure, we seek an explanation. Isn't the fact that there's nothing left closure enough?

No... No. There's only water in between.

'Life is but a dream for the dead.'

Tired yet?

JOVANA IVETIĆ

Oh, yes I am wise,

But it's wisdom born of pain.

Yes, I've paid the price,

But look how much I gained.

If I have to, I can do anything!

I am strong,

I am invincible,

I am woman!

Born in 1992; presently living all around the world; fairly optimistic. Life motto: Dreams DO come true; you just need to try hard enough.

#  It's So Easy Loving You

I WAS SO EXCITED to finally be wasting my first humble salary from my first official job. When they told us it was going to be on Friday, I cancelled all my Friday evening plans and rescheduled my plans to the following:

· finish work at 5.20 PM the latest,

· leave the building before 5.40 PM,

· reach the nearest Women's Secret,

· and get that sexy underwear you had noticed at the beginning of the month.

I was lucky enough not to have too much work towards the end of the shift so I cleaned up my desk, rushed to the toilet before my other colleagues could outrun me, and left the offices at 5.29 PM.

The white lace panties and bra were safely placed in my paper bag. Having left the underwear store I headed towards the most fragrant shop in the centre. Three strawberry scented candles will be just perfect. He loves those. I'll bring some chocolate, too. It's good that we didn't meet on Wednesday. My hair was not at its best that day. Today is a perfect day. This evening is going to be magnificent. This night will be amazing.

It doesn't matter that I have to be at my parents' home tomorrow before 9.00 AM. Usual family breakfast, then Saturday shopping for the greenery as my father calls all the healthy foods. I'll make it. I'll be at their place exactly at 8.55 AM. Will and I really should see each other. I miss him. It's been a whole week.

I reached my apartment at 7.45 PM, threw off my business clothes and jumped into the shower. In less than ten minutes the whole room smelled of my strawberry shower cream.

Before diving into my wardrobe in search of an adequate dress for that night, I texted him:

I'm leaving the apartment in less than 20 mins. Will be there before 9.

When I returned the scissors I used to cut off the price tags from my sexy underwear to the drawer, my phone let out a beep.

Sorry, Beth, some friends are dropping by. I can't make it tonight.

***

It was a long, hot summer day when a gorgeous blonde walked past a new bar at the city quay. Three more girls of the similar age giggled around her.

Neither too old a girl, nor too young. Not too tall, not too short. Her hair was sun-kissed, all the way to her shoulder blades. Her legs, bronzed by the summer sun at a Spanish beach, lightly stepped over the boiling pavement, stretching under a decent, but still provocatively short white dress to her perfect little brown platform shoes. She used her arms to explain something to her friends. The dark maroon on her fingernails matched the colour on her toes.

He noticed all that.

Oh, gosh, she's perfect!

"Hey, Will, what are you doing!?" Ben yelled after his friend but it seemed as if he did not hear him.

In a few wide steps William stood in front of the group of girls blocking their way on the pedestrian path. All four of them halted. The hands with the maroon fingernails froze mid-air.

"Hi, girls," William spoke confidently, "Fancy a drink?"

"We are already going for a drink," replied Jessica instantaneously. "At the other end of the quay."

"But you probably have time for one more, with us?" He looked at the girl in the white dress and was met by her eyes that bore the colour of an old maple leaf.

"No. Friends are waiting for us," Jessica was stern.

"What about later?"

"We're rollerblading later," replied Anna.

"Okay, as you wish," William decided to play tactically. "If you tire yourselves to exhaustion, my friends and I will be here." He pointed at the table where all six of his friends were sitting at and observing the situation. "And we'll be more than willing to treat you with some refreshments."

He ended the conversation with a direct and piercing look at the girl with the maroon fingernails who could not help smiling briefly but reassuringly.

Now I should only wait, thought William, returning to his friends' table.

After the third hour dragged by lazily, the seven healthy looking men began to think the girls would never arrive.

"They lied," commented Ian between gulps of his beer. "They never intended to rollerblade. It was just a freshly-thought-up excuse."

"I doubt it," said Ben. "They would have said if they didn't want to come. At least that nervy one."

"In that case, let's hope they won't avoid us on their afternoon route."

Fortunately for the men, the girls had no intention of missing their rollerblading session that Saturday, despite the fact they were going out that night and that it would take them much more time to get ready. When the men heard the sound of rubber wheels on concrete, they all straightened up from their deck chairs by the river. The girls slowed down just for a little while William was again the first to speak.

"The refreshments will be here before you take those hot wheels off," he said approaching the girls who had no other option but to stop. The other men joined and helped their friend persuade the ladies to stay.

Not much later the girls realised they had made no mistake in joining these guys. They weren't pushy, just talking in a relaxed manner over lemonades and beers. Jokes were told on both sides, experiences shared and phone numbers exchanged discreetly. Maroon fingernails scratched over a Samsung screen typing in Will's contact details.

Later that night, while she was having an amazing time with the girls in a city club, Elizabeth received a "warning" on her phone:

Hey, Beth, don't talk to too many guys there, please. ;)

She laughed along with the rhythm of the song and took another cocktail.

The very next morning, while she was sipping her ten o'clock morning coffee, her phone let out a scream. Damn it, she had drunk too many of those tasty, colourful concoctions! Again!

How was the night?

Rather excellent. Yours?

Quite boring. My telly and I ate popcorn and watched some American football. What are you up for tonight?

Family time until dinner. You?

Can I also say 'family time' if I'm cooking for my couch and myself only?

Ahaha... No. That's pariah time. :P :D

You're cruel. Wanna brighten my day and meet after the family dinner?

Girls were planning some coffee-chat. To discuss the night and stuff.

I'm sure guys will be willing to help you with the discussion. Where are you meeting?

Soon enough, a blonde with maroon fingernails and a tall, handsome, wide shouldered, dark haired thirty-year-old were noticed to be frequenting bars, pubs and clubs together.

Holding her by the hand tightly, William took her everywhere, presented her to his friends and acquaintances, even to his colleagues. He did not want to rush by introducing her to his parents. That would be too thoughtless. Marion and Rod would have to wait just a couple more weeks.

Elizabeth felt somehow relaxed. For the first time in her life she felt all the strength and power of a man's arm around her waist, over her shoulders. Never before had she had that feeling of being protected and supported. She had been independent for quite some time, but sometimes she felt so exhausted that she needed a strict voice telling her calm down; don't do anything, I will. William was the first boyfriend she had that with.

She was so proud when walking around the city with Will. Was it because of his rather athletic build all the passer-by girls envied her for? Was it his height?

Yes. He was at least two inches taller than her when she had her highest heels on. She felt safe and after every evening or afternoon spent with him, she wanted to spend another one.

Her friends accepted him, too. It didn't take him too much time or charm to mesmerise all her girl friends. As for the guys, they were a little suspicious about Will's innermost intentions, but a few bottles of beer and football talk surmounted the two sides.

His friends adored her. Not because of her looks. She could not be classified as a beauty everyone looked up to. It was her overall presence that enthralled all the people in the company. She was young, educated, polite and modest, but not in that old fashioned manner, but in a way that simply captivated your attention and made you like her.

She talked with such ease with everyone in her surroundings, never letting anyone be neither bored nor neglected. She asked the right questions, discussed current affairs, and knew how to listen and provide advice. It wasn't difficult to grow fond of her in less than an hour.

***

"What's your biggest dream, Beth?" William asked while they were sitting on his balcony, laid back in deck chairs, sipping cocktails he prepared, holding hands and watching all the hues of orange falling over the city.

"Well..." she saw a pigeon flying off building in distance, "I'm quite satisfied now with my job, salary and the lifestyle I've had over the past couple of months. But..."

"But what?" He lifted her hand so that he could observe her perfect fingers ending in neatly shaped pink nails.

"I don't feel like I've done everything I want to. I want to see the world before I settle down."

"Well, that's too broad when you say it like that. What parts of the world?"

"The whole world. The Middle East, Africa, New Zealand, everything..."

"Wow! When do you think you'll manage all that, darling?" William sipped his cocktail.

"In my lifetime," Elizabeth replied confidently.

"But when? When do you plan to work and earn money for all that?"

"I will work and travel."

William put his glass down. "Anyway, you can't see all the world in a year or two."

"Of course not," Elizabeth took another sip of her orange-yellowish cocktail. "It will probably take me eight or nine years, or more..."

"What do you mean? You want to traverse the world until you die?"

She did not notice that the tone of his voice changed, or that he turned towards her nervously.

"Oh, that would be an ideal life if I could stop aging now, but since I cannot, I will have to be quick."

William felt a spasm in his stomach. "Nine years is quick for you?"

"Ahah, yes, I'm only 24, right?"

"And what about your family?" he asked.

"They're perfectly fine with that. And they support me."

She did not realise that William was speaking of another family. Their family.

***

They returned to his apartment after a beautiful evening out. William's good friend got a son and invited a bunch of people to celebrate in the local pub. It was the third of Will's friends who got around to creating a family.

The party was interesting, both modern and traditional, with all the old customs and a number of drunk future godfathers. The evening had to be finished before eleven because most of the guests were supposed to work the next morning. Elizabeth decided to spend the night at William's place because his apartment was closer to her office.

First she intended to remove her makeup and just sleep, but she couldn't resist his hands on her hips and over her shoulder blades, or could she reject his lips that pierced all her mental barriers.

"How do you manage to keep that perfume throughout the whole day? I can feel it even when you're not around," he said in between their breaths.

"It's in your head, kid." Elizabeth replied smiling.

She ripped off his blue plaid shirt while he helped her squeeze out of her purple dress.

"You're in my head, Bell," he stopped for a moment and took her face in his hands bringing their eyes to the same level. "I want you. I want you everywhere with me..."

She let what she hoped would be a careless laugh. "You're drunk, Will."

"Yes, I am. But not with that bloody whiskey. I'm drunk with you."

Her eyes widened in surprise. She did not expect that. That outburst of emotions. They'd been together for... For how long? A month and a half? No, he must have gulped down more than half a bottle.

Elizabeth responded to his touches without a word.

***

Bell, dear, I'm making dinner tonight.

I'm sorry. I can't make it. We'll be staying in the office until 8.

You can drop by later.

Sorry, Will. Should've told me earlier. Allan is taking me straight home and I have to rest for tomorrow's presentation.

You and your work...

I told you you have to let me know at least a day earlier during the working days.

OK. I'll pick you up after work. Allan can go straight home.

"You're not fair," said William when he pulled over in front of Elizabeth's building. "I wanted to spend an evening with you so much."

"I believe you did," she turned towards him and placed her fingers on his cheek, "but you also know the nature of my work. You knew about this presentation I have to give tomorrow, didn't you?"

William nodded in reply. "But I got a day off today. You know how rarely that happens?"

"I know, but today there was nothing I could do to leave the office earlier."

He remained silent for a second and then said: "Have you ever thought of changing, or leaving your job?"

She was surprised and taken aback by the comment but replied immediately. "Of course not."

"But why? I can earn enough for both of us. You could do something from home, just to have some income you could use for your globe sightseeing..."

"No, Will, it's not all about the money. I love my job."

"More than you love me?"

She prevented herself from choking. She had never told him she loved him, she thought, and almost transformed that thought into words, but realized on time it was better she did not. The only smart thing she could manage at that moment was a brief negation. Although later, up in her apartment she knew she had lied.

"But, that's nothing unusual, love." Allan told her the next day while they were enjoying a great lunch since their presentation had gone better than planned. "Your relationship is not even two months old. You can't love him more than anything else, especially not more than your job."

"I know. But why do I feel bad about that?" Elizabeth played with her fork.

"You don't feel bad. You feel sorry. Let me tell you something ‒ he's not the guy for you, Liza..."

"But!" she started to rebel.

Allan raised his finger and silenced her. "Listen to me carefully – he is not the right man for you. He is way too traditional. Can't you see that? He intends to marry you by the end of the year."

"No way!" Elizabeth froze. "You said it yourself – we haven't even reached the second month!"

"That's not important to him. He is sure you're right for him and he doesn't want to wait. His parents probably got him when they were your age. Or even younger. He's brought up to think it's the only right way. He is seriously convinced that it is. I'm telling you again ‒ you should leave him before he fathers you an unwanted child in order to keep you by his side."

Elizabeth dropped the fork. "Dear Lord, Allan, what are you saying? Nonsense! What children! What marriage! He's young, too. I'm sure he's just a little more possessive and selfish than the average guy."

"Okay. We'll wait and see."

***

William and Elizabeth returned to her apartment after a calm evening with his friend and his girlfriend. They had gone for dinner after an exhausting week and before what was about to be a long and pleasant weekend full of rest and relaxation.

Will organised a trip to a spa centre near the city. She would probably be unable to afford it herself, but his pay, as he had said it once, was high enough to ensure that both of them have a luxurious treatment during the whole two days.

Saturday was perfect – morning yoga, then swimming pool, then massages, one after another; then herbal masks, sauna, and swimming again. Sex that night was one of the best Elizabeth had ever experienced.

On Sunday morning she was more than certain that Will wanted the same things as her – enjoy life together while they can. Time spent with him was perfect. Why spoil that just for some doubts relating to the distant future?

Distant for her, at least.

During their last meal in the spa centre, Elizabeth mentioned there was a slight possibility that her company might move her to Europe, Norway to be more precise.

"When?" asked William.

"I dunno. Probably February," replied Elizabeth lightly. She scrutinised his moves and saw nothing but a spasm in his arm. He proceeded in a quiet manner so she took that as a good sign. "If they don't, I'll start looking for a job that will take me somewhere."

"You've just started working for this company. Don't you think it too hasty to quit when not even half a year has passed?"

"Well, you may be right, but I really want to travel, more and more every day. And these working hours don't allow me so."

***

"All she does is keep babbling about her trip around the world! All the time!"

"She can't be serious, Will."

"But she is, Ben, I assure you." William poured down a whiskey. "Whenever we talk about... Whenever we talk about anything relating to the future, it's about her changing her job; or finding a job somewhere else; or simply leaving the island."

"Have you ever tried making it clear to her that you want something more?" asked Ben.

"Well, isn't that obvious?!" William gulped down another glass. "I am thirty. She is twenty-four. She's... She's educated, intelligent, has that bloody job... She's good looking, kind, she gets on well with everyone she should be getting on well with. What more on Earth could she wish for!?"

"Okay, let me put this straight to you – she's twenty-four, she got her first job a month ago, she's gorgeous... I'm just stating the facts." Ben added when William jerked from his bar stool. "She's beautiful, full of energy, and she wants to travel the world in the next eight to ten years. Bro, she's not the girl for you then."

"But she is! She's everything I need!"

"She's everything every man needs."

William shot down another whiskey. "Watch how you talk about my girlfriend!"

***

Avoiding from his side came before they reached their third monthly anniversary. They began seeing each other thrice a week, then twice, and then only on the weekends.

Elizabeth noticed something was wrong, but whenever they saw each other, William acted as if everything was perfectly fine and stable. Therefore, she decided to ignore the little worm of doubt in her ear.

Maybe he finally realised he should relax and let me live the way I want, she mused one evening after he texted her he was prevented from visiting her that evening. Maybe he'd found some new hobbies, new friends, and decided to lay back a little and stop planning his future in such excruciating detail. She wanted neither marriage, nor children, she was sure. She wanted no family now. She wanted to experience the world. She couldn't do that during her studies, therefore she will do that now. And no guy will prevent her from doing so.

Nobody will take away her dreams.

Of course she wanted a family. Elizabeth could clearly picture a family of four sitting together in a wide green garden, enjoying the family dinner she had prepared

But all that was in the future. In the future presently too distant to be mused on and discussed. Especially with a guy whom she barely knew. Because she couldn't get to know him entirely in less than three months. Okay, let's say two months, since he'd started avoiding her recently.

He seemed unreliable. He'd never even mentioned a proposal. Her friend Anna must have been wrong when she kept repeating that Will intended to put an engagement ring on her hand on New Year's Eve and the other one with the first snowflakes.

Yes, Anna must be wrong. They were overthinking it. All of the girls. William was a good guy, but he was not that serious. Yes, he was thirty, but modern men married even later.

Why couldn't she relax right now and simply ask Will next time they see each other what was wrong?

***

Pick me at 7.30, will you, pls? O:)

Will :*

"Aren't you going to climb up?" Elizabeth asked when William stopped in front of her building leaving the car engine running.

"Well... No... I'm meeting some friends. We're going to a club," replied William in a seemingly cold voice. He was actually burning with fury.

"You're what?" Elizabeth stared in disbelief.

"Going clubbing."

"It's Friday..."

"Yup. Perfect day for clubbing."

Elizabeth paused for a moment. She thought of the scented candles up there in her apartment, of the hot bath she had set up that very morning so that she did not have to bother with petty details tonight, so that they could have more time for each other. They hadn't had sex for over a week. She missed it. And he probably missed it, too. He should be missing it.

And now he was simply going to a club, with his mates, doing... stuff... with those... women.

She was furious.

"Wishing you a wonderful time, then," she said, and made a grimace which looked nothing like a smile should, and slammed the door of his car.

The next morning, she had her breakfast and went shopping with the girls. She decided to refrain from talking about Will. She did not want to stain that wonderful morning (and afternoon) with that idiot.

However, when they'd decided to treat themselves to chocolate cake, she got a text.

So sorry for yesterday. May I call you, please? O:)

I'm with the girls now.

And later?

Caleb will call me to finish some paperwork.

Of course, she had nothing arranged with her colleague, but she wanted to make William jealous. Childish, yes, but she had an overwhelming urge to do that.

Okay. I'll drop by around 5.

She didn't reply. Instead, she smiled in satisfaction, returned her phone to the bottommost part of her bag and re-joined the conversation with the girls.

Elizabeth made sure she looked impeccable in her bathrobe for his arrival. She wanted to appear irresistible, but was determined not to let herself fall for anything he might say to her.

When the doorbell rang, she sipped some more of the red wine she'd bought earlier that day to embolden herself a little and then headed towards the hall.

Having opened the door, she noticed the change of expression of his face. From worried and distressed, it transformed in a second to a stare full of desire.

She turned on her heel, letting him in. Though she was stepping confidently, her inside was trembling in fear that she would give in to him.

He shut the door and followed her. Elizabeth took her wine glass and stood by the French window in the right corner of the living room. Her eyes were not set on him, but on the city on the other side of the window.

"It was just a night out with the guys. Nothing special," he finally uttered.

"I did not complain, did I?" replied Elizabeth as coldly as possible.

"It was shit." He approached her and took her by the hand that held the wine glass. He felt her body shake and grow sensitive and fragile. He knew he could still play that card.

Elizabeth, on the other hand, hated the chemistry that still existed between them. Goddamit, I'm acting as if I were an animal simply wishing to satisfy my needs!

He enveloped her fingers with his and slid his other hand under her arm, to her waist, slowly but confidently finding the right spot between her ribs. If he hadn't taken the glass from her hand, she would definitely have decorated her parquet with burgundy red.

"I so badly wish we had spent the whole night together," he said between breaths. Her skin grew cold, and then scorching hot.

"Get away from me," she said, knowing it was just a waste of oxygen. The next moment, her chest was on his, her back pressed tightly to the wall, his tongue piercing her lips...

***

"But he said everything was fine, perfectly fine!" Elizabeth talked to Allan while he was giving her a lift home, since William had not replied to her message. "I don't get it anymore at all!"

"I've told you a thousand... No, a billion times that you should get rid of that bastard! You've been so tense over the last couple of weeks!"

"It hasn't affected my work, I hope."

"No, it hasn't. But it may in the future. Please, for your own sake, end that absurd relationship. It can't be just about sex! I mean, you have to converse from time to time. Maybe there are no topics to talk about anymore. Has that ever occurred to you?"

After that passionate night, William hadn't called. Again. Elizabeth had received an invitation from his (and her) friend Ryan, whom she played tennis with from time to time, since he proved to be the only person she knew that could play good tennis against her. It was his birthday and the house party was going to be one of the best the suburb had ever seen.

William hadn't even rung to arrange when they would meet and go to the happening together. It was rather strange. And the invitation card clearly said Beth, please, join us no matter what. The party will be the best you've ever seen.

Still, Elizabeth decided to go; expecting, obviously, that William would be at the party, too.

William did not attend the birthday party of one of his best friends. Nobody knew where he was. Everyone thought he would come with Elizabeth. She was so embarrassed when they asked her about him, that she lied and said he would be coming very soon.

"What did he tell you?" she asked Ryan.

"He just confirmed he would be here as soon as he finished with his work. You didn't come together?"

"No, he... He just told me to go and he would be joining later," Elizabeth said and then directed the topic to some other things.

However, the whole situation was awkward. Elizabeth felt weird. But she had no time to dwell on it. She was always surrounded by people, his friends mostly, people who had been her friends for three months already. They talked with no barriers typical of strangers. She enjoyed her time with them, and they with her. Time passed so quickly that the party was over before she realized William had never arrived.

One of the girls Elizabeth spent most of her time with, telling jokes and making fun of Ryan and his age, invited her for a sleepover, since the following day was Saturday and neither of them had any special obligations to fulfil. Kristane was William's good friend whom he had grown up with.

When Elizabeth woke the next morning, she could already catch the wafting scent of the omelette Kristane was making in the kitchen. She got up, helped herself to some water and proceeded to the bathroom. The two girls sat out on the balcony protected from the November cold by thick glass. I gotta get myself one of these, thought Elizabeth, savouring her meal with all her senses.

She wasn't even on her third bite when the telephone rang. Kristane jumped to fetch it and after only a Hi there, passed the phone over to Elizabeth with a puzzled expression on her face, mouthing 'Will' with her lips.

"Yes?" said Elizabeth.

"Be ready in half an hour. I'm taking you home," he ordered.

Controlling the shocked part of herself that wanted to yell at him, she replied emotionlessly: "You can get here in half a minute if you wish. I will be ready in an hour earliest."

"As you wish," he said, fuming with rage.

She hung up and returned the phone to Kristane. "What could be wrong with him?" She asked.

"The only thing that comes to mind is that he isn't used to not being in charge all the time. When it comes to relationships, of course," said Kristane, who had known William for seven years.

"You mean receiving orders instead of shooting them out like a drill sergeant?"

"Something of the sort."

William really arrived in less than fifteen minutes and Elizabeth did her best to prolong her makeup application and dressing up, so, in the end, he waited for her for a whole hour and five minutes. Elizabeth thanked Kristane for putting her up for the night and for the rich breakfast and headed towards the stairs with William behind her back. Although he pretended quite professionally that everything was perfectly fine in front of his friend, Elizabeth could feel his blood boiling inside his veins.

He did not speak in the car and she decided to be as persistent as him. But when they entered her apartment, it just burst out of him:

"What on Earth do you think you're doing?!" he yelled, loud enough to be heard in the adjacent block of flats.

Elizabeth blinked and responded in a rather calm manner: "Taking off my shoes. You should do the same. I vacuumed the floors just..."

"Be serious, Elizabeth!"

She straightened and approached him: "Don't yell at me! That's the first thing. And the second would be – tell me what the problem is. I don't have time to play Hangman."

"Why did you go to that party?"

"I was invited," she replied, a little confused.

"I was the one invited!"

"I have my invitation here," she took it out of her purse, "and it clearly has my name on it." She pushed it into his hand.

He beheld the invitation and re-read its three lines as if they were a highly important part of a rich uncle's will.

"Ryan is my friend, which means that I was the invited one. He counted you in because you are my girlfriend."

"I don't get this, William. And the invitation has my name solely, right? You probably received another one with yours."

"You shouldn't have gone without me, Elizabeth! That was idiotic! You must've looked ridiculous!"

"On the contrary, William, I had a whale of a time!" she raised her tone despite the fact that she always tended to speak in a rational manner. "All of us spent an amazing night out celebrating! It was you who was idiotic! You just didn't appear! You hadn't even called me to talk the thing through!"

"I couldn't come."

"There's no excuse for not joining your best friend's birthday, William," Elizabeth lowered her voice. "Something is happening. That is, something has been happening for a while. What is it, William?"

He looked at her, then at his feet, then at a painting on the beige wall in front of him, took a deep breath and commenced: "Listen, Beth, my wife should sit at home, do whatever you women do ‒ beautician, hairdresser, shopping and stuff. But she should have nothing to do with my friends."

Elizabeth stood motionlessly. She was thinking about what he had just said and calculating who was the less intelligent of the two. Was it him, who actually pronounced such a sentence? Or was it her, who had wasted her time with a guy who could express such a thought?

She stepped back and inhaled, preparing to tell him off once and for all, but in the next second that word popped up in front of her.

He said 'wife'. He called her his 'wife'? So, Allan was right, in a way. He is serious with her.

Unexpectedly, Elizabeth felt sorry for him. Instead of yelling, she exhaled and said quietly: "You're jealous," and giggled shortly. "Oh, dear, Will, those are your friends, for God's sake," she fell back into her sofa.

Seeing her confident smile, he couldn't help giving up his anger. He sat next to her and placed her on his lap.

"You're mine, Bell, just, only and solely mine," he said almost aggressively before he pressed his lips to hers.

***

"But you didn't solve the problem, Liza!" Allan said disappointedly over his smoked ham in the company restaurant.

"Yes, we did," she took another bite of her chicken breast. "Everything's fine now."

"No, it's not. You'll realise it the next time he sees you with a guy."

"Come on, Al," Elizabeth put down her glass.

"I am telling you now, and you'll see that I'm right very soon. His next issue will be with your job and the sole fact that you have it. I can just bet he will want you to quit your job."

"I'd never do that. And he wouldn't demand such a thing! It's prehistoric!"

"Wait and see."

***

Towards the middle of December, Elizabeth was more and more confident about her job. Her presentations progressed from exceedingly good to excellent, her ideas and solutions were carefully listened to by all the important higher-ups and those in charge of finances and finalising all the projects.

On the day of the first snow in the city, having just returned from lunch with colleagues from the same department, Elizabeth noticed a wide, midnight blue envelope the size of a notebook on her desk. It was neither sealed, nor glued, and nothing was written on it. She took three pieces of paper out of it and got down to reading.

Two-month training in Oslo. The line she returned to after reading each and every paragraph of the letter.

It's happening, thought Elizabeth. My dreams are coming true.

She immediately rang Allan to tell him. And then Anna, Jessica, Caleb... And then...

She didn't call William.

***

Okay, now is the time to say it, ran through Elizabeth's mind when she lay on her back on her side of the bed. William was breathing heavily, so she waited until he calmed down and placed his heavy arm over her belly. It was almost four o'clock in the morning. Lovely. Oh, she's so going to miss these nights.

Maybe she should wait until tomorrow? Yes, that would be best. He would get upset now. Morning is the wisest part of the day, they say. She'd do that in the morning.

Having started the day the way they ended the previous one, Elizabeth was sitting in her thin lilac nightgown, while William was slicing bacon and frying it with some cheese and vegetables.

"Hey, Will, you remember the job in Norway I mentioned to you back in September?" She finally uttered, somewhat hiding behind her glass of milk.

"Yeah?" he replied, unconscious of what she said.

"I got it."

Silence. Only the oil sizzling in the frying pan was disturbing the room's peace.

"What?" he turned to her with the knife in his hand.

Elizabeth froze in a second. "I got the job. They're promoting me after the holidays."

She could see his chest heaving. "What does that mean?"

"Well, it means I'll be moving to Oslo for some time."

She expected it, although she did not believe he would actually do it, but William smashed the nearby bottle of freshly squeezed juice into the nearest wall. "Damn it, Bell!"

"I can't see why you're making such a fuss of it, Will. Everything will be fine. I'm just moving a couple of kilometres eastward."

"A couple of kilometres?! A couple! It's more than two thousand kilometres! What are we going to do?!"

Somehow, probably because of Allan, and Anna, and all the other people in her surroundings, she knew something like this would happen, inevitably. Why had she been so stupid so as not to foresee it herself?

"Listen, William, we are not husband and wife. We've been together for less than four months..." she decided to say everything straight and clear.

"Do I mean anything to you? Don't you like life with me?" He yelled again.

She wanted to say both yes and no, but then he asked the next question.

"Don't you love me at all?"

Elizabeth paused for a minute. Her head was burning, her thoughts and brains boiling up. She had to solve this now. She should have solved it when he told her what his wife was and wasn't supposed to do.

"In some way, I do," she responded. "I love you, William. But I love me more."

He looked as if an avalanche had showered him with rocks.

"You and your bloody career," he slurred, stabbing his fingernails into the wooden counter behind his back.

"Do you love me, William?"

"Of course! It's so easy loving you, Bell," he crouched next to her. "You're what men call a perfect girl. Why can't you simply be satisfied with what you have, right now, right here?"

Never before had she felt so sorry for him. How could she have been, why had she been so stupid, so cruel, to both of them? To him especially? He had never been a match for her. Allan kept telling her that all the time. And the girls, too. Why had she been so persistent to keep this relationship working?

It hadn't only been the sex. She knew she wasn't that superficial. William was a good man. But she wasn't the right woman for him.

Maybe he wasn't good enough for her?

Or she wasn't being fair...

No.

She won't blame herself.

She wants more. She has always wanted more. And she will get more out of life.

She won't put her goals aside. Not for anyone. Not for the person who persists in his outdated views.

Elizabeth left the apartment feeling relieved.

She gave her girlfriends a ring, inviting them all to her place for a prolonged talk with cookies and coffee, after which they would go for some Christmas shopping. The following day she would invite Allan to help her organise everything for Norway.

May the packing begin!

JANA ŽIVANOVIĆ

A girl running down Knez Mihajlova street and waving at the bus driver. That's me - an eternal dreamer, an optimist, an ex-violinist, a present writer, book reviewer, a graduate student, a future teacher of the English language. Social chameleon and stage lover. An eternal dreamer eternally late. A chatterbox, a Facebook addict, Harry Potter fan, and lover of salsa dancing. I love kids, people, pizza, pancakes, pink and the smell of busy summer air in the heart of noisy Belgrade.

#  Too Close to the Sun

REQUIEM PLAYS IN THE DISTANCE. She can hear his long, soft fingers moving across the keys of the piano just like they used to draw a line from her belly. Over her ribs. "Don't you dare...", he whispers over her shoulder. Or is she just imagining that? Too late. Her left foot is in the air, her right heel smoothly gliding off the edge of the roof. To join him. Into the light.

#  Who Ate the Master's Cake

POLICE STATION, 5 AM, room 66.

Flashbacks... Street, house, no number. Hall. Wine. Buffet. Handcuffs. Police station.

"So, you have no idea who's responsible for this?" The logy officer peered at him, breathing heavily.

"No," the young man sighed, wiping his nose.

"Right, then. Keep him in the cell." Another officer appeared, shoving the man behind the bars. "You're gonna tweet, birdy!"

"Seems the lil' pussy ain't gonna say much", concluded the former. "Dunno what to do with him." He pulled out a drawer from the cupboard with torture tools. "Pliers? Won't do. Cables? Hmm. We need somethin' stronger. Hey, mate, what would the Master do?"

"A shot or two would do, but you don't want to kill 'im straightaway."

"It's not me, I don't give a fuck. It's about... you know... you know who."

"You're a bigger pussy than this son of a bitch. Gimme the stick."

***

The young man was let out of the cell and was sitting before the officer. The lamp was too bright, shining right into his eyes, blinding him, and lighting up the purple circles all over his face where he had been beaten. Mother's patches on his shirt had already been torn. He coughed up blood and moaned. He felt pain in every single bone of his doddered body. They did a good job with the batons.

"You still say you ate no cake?"

"I didn't, I swear!" he cried. The nightstick prodded his ribs.

"Untie his hands and take him back to the cell."

"But, my mother..."

"Shut up, you slob! Cute little bastard. What, mummy forgot to give ya a breast, ha? Was time fo' dinner, ha? And ya what - yum on the cake? You chose the wrong cake, little boy, know that? The wrong one, son."

RRRING!

"Police!"

"Please... help... a girl... she... raped", a voice spoke discontinuously in panic.

"Ma'am, we've got a serious crime on our hands here... No patrol can come right now..." He hung up.

"What's goin' on?" Asked the other officer.

"What do ya think happened? Some little whore got it all over her pussy!" He said scornfully.

"What're ya lookin' at? No more cake for you, sorry. So, tell me your story. How did you do it and why the hell?"

RRRING!

"Police!"

"Officer, there's been a traffic accident involving a van and a car. Seems the van driver was quite drunk. Five victims, three deaths, one small chi--"

"Your car crashes are none of my business. Later, if time allows."

"Where were we, my dear boy - oh, yes..."

RRRING!

"Police!" The officer answered the phone, annoyed.

"Sir, it's urgent..." the voice screamed. "A dead body in the river. We called an ambulance..."

"Then, why are you callin' me?!"

"He's dressed... We think it's a suicide."

"You think?! Listen to me, boy, I've got a serious criminal here and you're callin' me 'cause you think it's a suicide. I don't deal with hypothetical shit. I deal with facts. And I've already wasted five minutes on you."

The officer got up from his chair and staggered to the young man, getting up in his face.

"Look, son, you must've done something, otherwise you wouldn't be here. Don't make us make you spit out that bloody cake."

"But, I didn't..." the young man cried like a baby. His face was contorted with pain and bathed with tears and slobber. His weak body was shaking and rocking back and forth.

"To the cell!" the officer yelled. "That was obviously not enough. Try to be harsher!" he ordered to his colleague.

RRRING! RRRING! RRRING! RRRING!

The officer reached the phone cable, took the pliers and cut it. He slouched back in his chair and took a cigar out of his case. He closed his eyes and inhaled. He breathed out, smoke coming out of his nostrils. He held the cigar between his teeth, rolled the sleeves of his light blue shirt and went to the sink. He turned the tap on and let the water run. The hairs on his hands clung together under the stream. The mirror above the tap reflected a weary, half-bald man.

"An abandoned 2-day-old baby has been found this morning in..." He turned off the radio.

"Motherfuckers everywhere", he muttered over the cigar, wiping his hands with a towel and treading on a cockroach that loudly cracked before it turned into a big black stain on the floor.

"Mate, wanna eat something? Maybe he's too hungry to speak. It's been a while since he ate the cake, after all. Look at this bug - finger-lickin' good!"

The young man's left eye was swollen and almost shut. His body was as red as a rose picked at its prime and then trodden. He could no longer stand, but staggered left and right and finally fell ‒ never to get up again.

Two dark shadows appeared in front of the police station. A strong foot in a patent-leather shoe approached the door. He banged on the door with his gun.

The officers were lounging in their chairs, hands crossed over their bellies, those little hills going up and down in the rhythm of their snoring. The leftovers of greasy pie were scattered all over the table. The door crashed on the floor.

"Put your hands up in the air!" The two officers woke up with a start and wiped slaver off their mouths. They were facing the floor. "You're convicted of stealing a pound of pastry from the bakery. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. Take them to the car."

The portrait of the Master smiling haughtily hung on the wall in the empty room. Under the golden frame lay the young man's corpse.

IRENA RAIČEVIĆ

Is the sum of her experiences. Good, bad, any... She gathers them all passionately and hopes to have a valuable collection when she grows up.

Some of those experiences were:

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre by B. Traven,

Trip \- an anthology of American beat poetry,

The God of Small Things by A. Roy,

The Cyclist Conspiracy by S. Basara,

The Unbearable Lightness of Being by M. Kundera,

and everything by Amélie Nothomb.

#  Body of Work

I Affliction

This world, it's dying

Decadent, desperate

People passing by

delirious

Oblivious to everything...

Contemplation

leads to condemnation

We are all

just

slipping away...

Everything is disappearing

Is there nothing left to say?

II Inflammation

Feeling stuck

In this buzz of thoughts

images and words...

Can't seem to find

a single verse

Lying in bed

while the clock's incessantly

Tick-tick-ticking, I'm

picking my scabs and

licking my wounds...

But all that's cliché

There is nothing left to say.

III Decomposition

I cut myself from the inside

Inside, I tear myself up...

Biting off big, juicy

chunks

of my own flesh

Devouring them

with gusto

until I kill myself...

Choking

on more than I can chew

Inside

There's nothing left.

#  Be a Friend

What do you want

He said

Let me in

I said

With my hair wet

And my eyes wet

And my voice dry

I need

A shelter

From the storm

Where I can smoke

Shut out the sounds

Just sit

In silence

Let me in

I said

Be a friend

I said

And the door closed

And the lock clicked

And my heart sank.

DUŠICA BRADONJIĆ

treading water 87% of the time

lives in a blue neighborhood

speaks in quotes and lyrics

falls in love with words

belongs to the rain

unknowable

Turning pages patiently

In search of meanings

-W.S. Merwin.

#  Our Kind

THE ROOM WAS DIMLY LIT and, while a faint glow came through the open window, darkness still smothered the air. It gave off the feeling of an ancient study. Mainly because every inch of the room was covered in books ‒ volumes of all possible sizes, shapes and colors, some clearly old, first edition, musty and loved, and others new, with their spines yet unbroken, stacked on bookshelves, on the tables and chairs. All of them showed the tell-tale signs of being collected with care, kept with caution, read, not just loved but adored. Ellie sat in the armchair, legs dangling from the side, head bent over a volume in her lap, her hair creating a dark, wavy curtain over the sides of her face. She was focusing on a poem she'd read before, one of her favorites, but this time she was stuck on a passage, and couldn't go through it.

There is something horrible about a flower;

This, broken in my hand, is one of those

He threw it in just now; it will not live another hour;

There are thousands more; you do not miss a rose.

With a sigh, she closed the book. She wasn't focused, she knew, and that was partly to blame, but it wasn't all that was happening. Something about this poem unsettled her; she couldn't wrap her head around the reason why or even what it was, exactly. That final verse crept into her mind, burrowed itself in and refused to leave, like a particularly annoying parasite.

She put the book on a nearby table, grabbed a pack, lit a cigarette and started walking towards the bedroom, with a slow gait, taking deep breaths and savoring each inhale of the cigarette smoke. Once again, she felt empty. It seemed to her that it was the prevalent feeling of her life, that emptiness. It never went away, not truly. She passed a mirror and glanced over her figure in the reflection. She was wearing black panties with a plain top, and a blank look on her face. She was pleased by what she saw, but that pleasure was oddly distant, as if looking at a picture of a stranger. She generally liked the way she looked. Her legs could have been slimmer and her belly flatter, but she wasn't obsessing over it. Boys certainly didn't object to her looks. There I go again, she sighed. I need a drink.

A little while later, she emerged from the bathroom, showered and with her make-up done. She settled on a short floral print dress that matched her favorite shoes, but in no way matched her mood. Dark lipstick and eyeliner completed the look. A beautiful disaster, wasn't that the phrase? She disappeared through the apartment door, heels clicking on the stone floor. She supposed she could have called up some of her very few friends and seen if any one of them fancied a drink, instead of going on her own. She had never been a particularly social person, and the vast majority of people couldn't handle her. She knew she could be a bit much – the unexpected highs and lows. The way she could get lost in her own head and gloss over conversations or the way she could forget to call for an entire month. She couldn't handle it all just the same. While it didn't make for many friends, she did manage to scrape a few, but tonight, she wasn't in the mood for how much effort it took to put up the usual front. Tonight she wanted to dance and drink until someone was hot enough and interesting enough to dance with, or take home. Loneliness had begun to eat away at her and the all-encompassing silence of her apartment had started to feel like a heavy woolen blanket pulled over her head, making it difficult to breathe.

She was standing in the foyer, the chilly air slipping through the old cast iron door biting at her legs clad in thin stockings that were just fucking useless. She hesitated for a moment, before taking a decisive step towards the building door. How she wished she could have stayed in, curled up with a book, to live vicariously through someone else's problems and forget her own. But the voice in the back of her mind had become too loud, the shadows too elongated and hostile. She needed to find a better a way to drown it all out. Escapism had always been her only salvation and faith.

She started walking, hoping that the crisp October air might make her feel better. The streets were oddly empty and she felt as though she were in a vacuum, separated from the rest of the world; the silence pressed down on her, making her short of breath and panicky. The prevalent mood from the past few days had continued and, now, instead of feeling better, she felt even worse, alone, in this abandoned street, while cold seeped into her bones. Why the hell did I think this would be a good idea? She should've just taken a bath and maybe a sleeping pill or two. Let this dreadful day come to an end a few hours too early and saved herself the trouble. Her hands began shaking. It wasn't really that cold, but this night transformed into another one, from a long time ago.

***

Whenever she thought about it, she was always certain that it was her very first memory. It's hard to pick out the image that truly represents the beginning. Most of them are just jumbled up fragments, cut-out snapshots that had somehow come to be organized into a giant black canvas. Sometimes she wondered whether she was anything more than an impression left by her childhood or if she'd somehow fought her way free of it, growing larger than the confining edges of the frame. The thing is, it wasn't even that long ago. Time had passed, certainly, but she hadn't even been that little. She didn't know why she had no earlier recollections; perhaps it was a way for her young heart and mind to protect her from the memories, a self-preservation mechanism established from a tender age.

It was night. Late, very late and they were outside, walking drowsily down an abandoned street, not unlike this one. A woman was holding the tiny hands of her two little girls, walking aimlessly back and forth to pass the time. They were wearing pajamas, with winter coats over them, their tiny frames shaking uncontrollably. Both with cold and fear. They didn't speak, and there was nothing to be said. Reassurances and empty promises no longer worked. The true details faded with time, but her imagination filled in the blanks. She could almost see her mother now, young, but aged, tired, her shoulders hunched, weighed down by the cold, sleeplessness, stress and the overwhelming helplessness of her situation. It wasn't just one night, though. That much she can remember. It was almost every night. Because, their father would come home, angry and drunk, and made to feel powerful by exerting power over others. He would yell, his facial features contorted with rage, threaten, smash plates against the walls and call them worthless, for hours on end. So the only thing left to do was to get out of the house and walk around for long enough for him to calm down and fall asleep. She cannot even remember the particular fights and arguments and humiliations anymore. They've all blended into one over the years. They were also all pointless. You've seen one, you've seen them all. But, it's not quite so simple when you're the one on the receiving end, dreading each night, trying to find a way to go about your daily life pretending everything was fine. Oh, we had homework? I completely forgot. No, it's not lying torn up at the bottom of the trash can. No, I lost my phone, it wasn't smashed against a wall. The red circles beneath my eyes? Oh, I just couldn't fall asleep. No, it wasn't because I cried through another night.

Pretending had become all they did. Pretending one of the girls hadn't lost patches of hair due to stress at the age of nine, or pretending their mother hadn't become reliant on benzodiazepines and lost her ability to fall asleep without them. Pretending to have any idea what a family is supposed to look like, or what home should feel like.

They had tried running away, a few times. But they were always forced to return. She can remember that too. He had that effect, their father. Everyone, everyone who didn't know him thought he was the perfect father, the perfect husband. All they saw was how hard he worked, how friendly he was with everyone, always quick to lend a hand or tell a joke. What are you talking about, look at him! Everyone could only wish him for a son-in-law. Go back home and appreciate what you've got. One time, they had spent several months at their grandparents' house. They left with nothing but the clothes they were wearing, in the middle of a school day. She can still remember the black trash bag that contained all of their clothing leaning against a wall at that house, days after, when he was made to send them their belongings. It was hard not looking at that bag and feeling like trash yourself.

***

She stopped in the middle of the street, and wiped a stray tear staining her cheek. She looked around, surprised at where she had found herself. Lost in thought, her feet mechanically took her to a bar she hadn't planned on going to. She wanted a place where no one knew her and this was the exact opposite. However, distraction is what she was in dire need of, so it would have to do.

There was a mirror by the entrance, and she quickly fixed smudgy mascara and gave herself a once-over, smiling sadly. She looked so put together, it was borderline absurd. What a lie appearances can be. Her eyes flickered over the bare chairs and she frowned. She is all for empty bars at last call, but not before the night had even started. Sitting at a bar, when there are so few people there, you might as well wear a giant neon sign saying "Please disturb!"

She made her way towards the bar, where exactly the person she didn't want to see was, ordered a drink and sat on a bar stool. She downed a shot in a flash before ordering another one. He just stood there, looking at her. Every time he did that, she got the distinct feeling that he could see right through her, peel away the layers she applied each morning along with her make-up, as if her careful façade would crumble under scrutiny of his observant gaze. For some reason, that bothered her enormously. She got the urge to hide her face with her hands, like a child. His eyes focused on her so intently, that for a second she thought he had X-ray vision. Or could read minds.

"Can I maybe get another one, huh?" she spoke, enunciating the words.

"Sure thing, Ellie," he nodded. "You okay?"

"You know me, just peachy," she said with a brilliant smile that didn't reach her eyes. Which he caught, of course. He wasn't an idiot, as much as she liked to pretend he was.

He poured two shots, but slid only one to her, and placed a glass of club soda next to it. Looking back up at her, he was met with a raised eyebrow. "C'mon", he chuckled. "It's a slow night and I'm hoping you'll stay awhile. I was bored," he added, smiling sheepishly. "And if you keep up the pace, I'll be the one who has to scrape you off the floor, so there's that."

"Oh, Zeke, is that why you think I'm here, for your entertainment?"

"Totally. Look at you, you're the embodiment of fun."

She chuckled, and looked at him. Really looked, maybe for the first time. He was sort of handsome, that much she noticed, but not her typical handsome. Tall, sure, dark hair, cute, but nothing special. Not someone she would have picked on an ordinary night. She usually went for the dumb, pretty ones. Ones too dim-witted to realize she was using them, and not the other way around. Maybe that's why she liked him, despite herself. It felt safe. She knew she wouldn't ever go for him.

He held up the other shot glass to her. She laughed briefly, rolled her eyes and clinked her glass against his. He flashed a smile in return.

He did have a great smile, though. Goofy, and unexpected. All teeth and eyes crinkling. The kind of smile that held nothing back. It made hers feel a little more genuine.

"You wanna talk about it?"

"Have I ever?"

"You could, though. I'm a great listener. But I won't push, okay?" He made his way to leave, continue doing his job, she supposed, but she grabbed his arm, instantly and without any forethought.

"Can you just keep talking to me?"

With a kind of a sad smile, he said, "Yeah."

***

He made her cocktails, one after another, all the while chatting her up. He usually made mean cocktails, but these were practically virgin, with just enough alcohol in them that she wouldn't call him on it. He was covertly taking care of her, and she wasn't sure whether she was annoyed by it or appreciative. Probably the latter, given the fact that she didn't speak up.

She never would have guessed it, but somehow, unexpectedly, she was having fun and the dreaded return home made her stay until last call. Even though she felt good at the moment and the company managed to keep the darkness at bay, she wasn't a fool: she knew what would happen the moment she was alone. It's not like this is my first time. And she wasn't even drunk enough to fall asleep the moment she curled up in bed, without torturous hours of tossing and turning that usually ensued after such days when she was unable to outrun her thoughts.

Zeke asked her to wait so he could walk her home. They lived close by and he was adamant about not letting her go by herself. They were walking together, talking on end, when one of her highs came over her and she got the urge to fly, to soar, to dissolve into the air. She grabbed his arm, pulled him after her and broke into a run. She was stumbling a little, but the wind was clearing her alcohol-hazed mind, and she felt tipsy, content and at ease and she was laughing and it was contagious. He followed suit without hesitation, and for a second she thought he was the kind of guy who would follow her anywhere.

"You know what you are, Ellie? You're a fucking hurricane," he said a little breathlessly, shaking his head, with a wicked grin plastered on his face, once they had stopped.

"What's so great about them?"

"I don't know. But some people spend their whole lives chasing them."

She thought about it for a second and realized that, in a way, he was right. That's exactly what she was. A hurricane. A giant fucking mess. It somehow didn't bother her that he knew this about her. Then she thought how she didn't know anything about him. What startled her was the realization that she wanted to know. "How come you're a bartender, Zeke?" she said, once they had fallen into step again, the sound of laughter still lingering in the air.

"Are you asking me if this is what I wanted to be when I grew up?"

She chuckled, "Sure."

"Fuck no. But it's ok, it's a fun job. I mean, it's a job. But I totally wanted to be an astronaut as a kid. "

"Astronaut? Lemme guess: Daddy bought you a telescope and you spent every night staring up at the sky, learning the names of constellations instead of spying on your neighbors like normal kids do?" she said mockingly, but the joke was half-hearted. She couldn't help but imagine him as a child, in a blue bedroom, comic book characters on his pajamas, staying up, looking at the stars. For some reason, she felt a happy sort of ache. But, something in his expression had changed.

"Nah, no telescope, no dad. I grew up in the foster system."

"Oh?" Her voice was barely a whisper.

"Yeah. It was kinda bad. I moved around like crazy, never stayed in one family for too long. A couple were okay but most of them were terrible foster parents. The typical story, you know, hate the children but want the money." He sighed, "They still sent me back, though not without a few...souvenirs."

She was almost scared to ask, but knew it would drive her crazy if she didn't. "What do you mean?"

"Well," he hesitated. "Like this."

He rolled up his sleeve, exposing his forearm. It was almost too dark to see, but under the glow of a nearby streetlight, his forearm had turned into a relief, showing a jumble of small circles and her heart sank. Cigarette burns, she realized.

She took his hand and squeezed it lightly. "So, what happened?"

"I ran away. I was sixteen and had nowhere to go, but... I don't know, I guess I just didn't want to take it anymore. I slept in parks and crashed on couches, worked every odd job I could find, but I was on my own, you know. No one was yelling at me, or beating me up anymore. It's funny, sometimes I think I was overreacting, like I built it up in my mind, made it worse than it actually was. There are all these kids who've had it so bad, who've been..."

"It doesn't change anything," she interrupted him. "Pain is pain, there is no point in comparing it. You get what you get, and you try your best to live through it. You try to be okay."

They stood there for moment, looking at each other in silence with their fingers still intertwined, before they re-commenced walking home, the memory of laughter and hurricanes burned away. They said their goodbyes at her building's entry, and she stumbled to bed with a heavy heart. Her mind was roaming with all that this new information entailed, struggling to reform the Zeke she knew, the one with the right words on his lips and a quick smile, into this brand new Zeke. In the span of an hour, he had gone from being known, predictable and unimportant to her, to someone entirely different. Someone who understood.

***

That night, the dreams came again. Ellie was standing on a river bank, staring across. Her sister was there, on the other side. The wind was howling, pulling her hair in every which direction. She called her name, but wasn't heard over the clap of thunder. Then the little girl turned toward Ellie and smiled a smile as bright as a thousand burning suns. Everything stilled and brightened in an instant. It was like color leaked into a cruel, black and white world. Then the clouds rolled over, and her expression changed to panic. Ellie yelled her name, she wanted to get to her, to keep her safe and protected but there wasn't a way for her to cross the river. A man was walking toward her, roses crushed beneath his boot soles trailing in his wake, his posture angry, manic. The little girl screamed as the cigarette he held kept finding its way into her skin.

All of a sudden, he froze and his face changed from anger to confusion, to alarm. She was looking at him, and a cruel smile played about her lips. Their eyes locked, and hers held a world of hatred and pleasure mixing together. His hands moved to his neck, frantically grabbing, as if trying to remove something, his eyes bulging, begging for help. Everything fell silent, like the world held its breath, waiting to see what was going to happen next. Horrible, choked-off sounds reached Ellie as he was struggling to inhale, and she realized what was happening. She stood frozen, unable to move. Her mind kept screaming at her to do something, to move, to call an ambulance, to make it stop, but her body refused to listen. She was too weak to do anything. She had always been too weak.

Ellie opened her eyes, and her pillow was wet. A weight pressed on her chest, so tight it felt as if her lungs were on fire, and she couldn't catch a breath. For what seemed like forever, she was caught in that moment again, while silent tears slid down the sides of her face. She didn't even know who she was crying for. For her sister, and the secret they kept? For their mother, and the way she slowly faded away, until she was nothing but an impression on sand to be washed away by the touch of wind and water? For Zeke, who, just like her, had never had a childhood, but unlike her, didn't let it cripple him? Or perhaps for herself, finally allowing herself a moment of weakness, of mourning for all she had lost, or was never been given the chance to have, the way she hadn't allowed herself to feel weak ever since that last time she stood frozen with fear.

The buzzer sounded, jolting her free of her daze. Zeke's voice was on the other side, asking if he could come up. "I figured you'd be hungover, so I brought you some coffee. Also food." She could hear him smiling into the receiver, and it made her lips upturn into a weak smile. She buzzed him in and went to the bathroom to splash cold water on her face before he came up. Her eyes caught on the reflection in the mirror. She took a deep breath and smiled hesitantly. She looked like hell, pale, with red splotches and eyes swollen, but the look in them wasn't a mortal one anymore. It was hopeful.

NIKOLA RADENKOVIĆ

Dreamer. Optimist. Free spirit.

Enjoys the profound silence and tranquility of the night. Loves breaking conventions. Never ever ever gives up.

Motto: One man can change the world.

Grateful for: Friends and family.

Life goal: Make people happy.

#  It's in Her Eyes

THEY SAY THE BEST WAY to unwind is by going for a stroll in the park and that was exactly what he needed. A nice, quiet place to clear his thoughts and recuperate as much as he could. He slowly exited his apartment and struggled a bit with the outdated lock, which put up a great fight but finally succumbed after he had hit it a few times. The hallway was filled with the foul stench of something rotten which declared war on his nostrils. He clenched his nose with his left hand as hard as he could but it was futile. His eyes started to tear up and bulge while his face rapidly turned red. He rushed towards the building exit as if his life depended on it and made it just in time not to faint.

The cool air outside proved effective. He took a few short breaths to regain his footing and headed towards the park. The night had started its reign with the occasional breeze taking yellow leaves for a dance in the moonlight. He lived in a narrow street with trees planted on one side, and a long row of old apartment buildings originating from sometime around the Great War on the other. Even though it was a one-way street located in a quiet part of town, it still had a lot of traffic during the day. With a school just around the corner, the street was usually full of children running restlessly down the sidewalk. But right now it was completely silent. No cars, no people, not even a dog or a cat roaming around. Although he was all alone and midnight was close at hand, the street gave off a strange but friendly glow that made him feel at ease. After a few minutes of his sloth-like walk he finally reached his destination.

The park had a fence of tall and thick bushes and shrubs planted along its edges. Near the west entrance there once stood an abandoned house which was hit during the bombing. About three years ago, it was demolished and a playground with a couple of seesaws, swings and other children's favorites was built there. He stood at the entrance for a few minutes, as if hypnotized.

Different images started popping up before his eyes. A slim girl with dark curly hair and a pale face appeared in front of him. His heart started beating faster and faster as if it wanted to break out of his chest, his hands began shaking and his whole body trembled. The collage in his mind transformed into vivid memories. Everything around him started spinning as if he was in the middle of a vortex, pulling him deeper and deeper.

Suddenly, it was no longer night and the sun emerged on the horizon. The park was now crowded with people and their children running around, shouting and playing. A couple of impatient horn blasts sounded from a nearby roundabout. A woman rushed behind him, shouting on her mobile phone. An elderly man tapped his dark brown wooden cane while sluggishly entering the park.

The girl was still standing in front of him.

Her glossy hair looked beautiful dancing in the wind. Her green eyes perfectly matched her pale face. She had a white summer dress on. He blushed, overwhelmed with joy. She smiled and lowered her head. Then she looked up straight into his eyes and swayed around him. He remembered the days spent with her, the days spent in her arms. The passionate kisses after a couple of glasses of his finest red wine in her artsy apartment tucked in the city's historic district, away from all the hustle and bustle; the never-ending walks down the beach in the sunset with the birds flying over them, the water splashing against their feet and Greek music drifting from a distance; his hand going through her perfectly groomed hair; the dinner in the grapevine garden of his favourite Italian restaurant; their embrace as they lay in the silence of a mountain cottage, never wanting to let go. He was floating on air.

As he reached for her hand, she disappeared. In the blink of an eye darkness descended, and the park was once again quiet and deserted. He was puzzled. Frantically he looked everywhere, but couldn't find her. He dashed inside the park, and ran around shouting her name in a frenzy. Only an occasional gust of a warm wind replied.

When he had almost lost all hope of seeing her, he caught a glimpse of her standing on a sidewalk down the street. He sighed with relief as he saw her crossing the road.

Then, a car appeared out of nowhere.

She bounced off the windscreen and landed on the pavement. The car just sped away. He shouted and ran towards her as fast as he could. He could see her body lying in the road, covered in swollen red bruises. Disfiguring gashes on her face made her almost unrecognizable. Upon reaching her, he froze in horror. Her right eye was half-closed while her left eye was bleeding and firmly locked on him. Her white dress was torn and dozens of colourful glass fragments were embedded in her silky skin like meticulously crafted embroidery.

He dropped to his knees next to her and started crying.

Once again he felt like he was being pulled downwards by a vortex. His head was spinning and he felt dizzy. White light flashed before his eyes. It took him a couple of seconds to come to his senses.

Everything was quiet and the moon was high in the sky.

He was still standing at the park entrance.

Cold wind started blowing.

He shook his head, sighed and turned away, heading back home. The wind started picking up so he upgraded his sloth-like walk to a brisk pace. After a couple of minutes, he was in front of his apartment. He opened the door with ease and went inside just as thunder crashed in the distance.

"Whoa, in the nick of time!", he smiled while closing the window.

He rearranged the thin red curtain which got a bit messed up by the wind. Then he took off his sneakers and put them on a stand next to the door. He slumped onto a sofa next to the bed and turned on the TV.

"Crazy weather this evening!", he said and turned towards the bed.

The bloody eye was firmly locked on him.

KATARINA ŠOTIĆ

A girl in a city in a country in the world.

A life begun with a bolt of lightning.

A sight you have never seen before.

#  The Disappearance Of

I KILLED A MAN TODAY.

I killed many a man today.

"Fuck."

The smooth edge of the sink is hard and cold. A tighter grip on it and my fingers could easily blend in with the fancy porcelain, blue streaks included. I don't think it's very clean. It is filled with rings, little circles and dots of faded water drops and spit, gray and old, dry, cracked. Wish the rest of the toilets could match them. But they don't, they are not dank or filthy, because this is a respectable establishment, the facilities are regularly cleaned and appropriately shiny, lemon and bleach, squeaky, gleaming. As is the mirror.

Hell on the senses, hell in the eyes.

Close them. My work officially has a body count. I wonder what my parents would say. Good job, honey, way to go! Always knew something would become of you! Soon you'll be at the top of the ladder! Yeah, I'm going to become the smallest and flashiest triangle, the one at the very top of the pyramid presenting the food-chain. Predator and killer. Might as well prepare to have my name printed out in books like that. They're also going to put it on a shiny plastic rectangle painted gold and a nine-to-five ex-beggar with a limp and a lisp, leering at everyone, is going to be drilling it into the polished mahogany door, drilling it into my skull, drilling it into the night, drilling, drilling, drilling away.

So, it's a good thing I didn't get that glass door I wanted.

It's trendy, what can I say. These days and these decades one gets a plaque, a golden coin, and a party invitation for killing a man. Go, me! Finally some recognition, that's what I'm talking about. Now, remember, and make sure you don't forget, don't mix up the clothes for the day! Indeed, they're gifting, giving, bestowing decorations and commendations upon me, it's an important day and I must look proper. Have to make sure I wear that one coat I bought for special occasions and then left to rot because special occasions never happened, there's nothing special in breathing and opening eyes and saying words when people want background noise to their own soliloquies. It's in the very back of the closet with other clothes of the same caliber, same thread, it's like they are one and the same, an untouched and priceless entity, coveted and then renounced once obtained.

Oh, and comb your hair thoroughly.

Yeah. That's what mom would say, has said about a thousand and fifty-eight times. Dad would just gruffly congratulate his finally successful offspring and disappear behind the papers, mumbling about his times and his achievements into the drooping edges of his grayed moustache and only the hottest of topics and giant news headlines and piano transport ads would hear him. But, he would also find time to agree, so fuck killing men, don't come dressed like the homeless to a formal-dress evening, that's what's important! Impress them with your outfit, your impeccable taste, show you're disinterested and above it all. What if they film you or take pictures for the papers, what will people think when they see your clothes are creased, old, or dirty?!

Hope I threw away the shirt with the stains.

Also, can't help but wonder who the hell would need that much impressing, but I guess that's right, right? Better to dress up a killer than to dress down the military funding and cut our losses, cut it clean, go cold turkey, run away. If I'm already representing at least one Ministry, at least one breakthrough, at least one winner, I have to be certain I'll project a suitable picture, you know. It's just easier to get that one good shot, shoulders up, turn just a bit to the left, and a professional smile, pearly whites, look straight at the lenses, focus on the one dot in the middle and make love to the camera. Oohhs and aahhs, NC-17, explicit content, salivating.

I have no memory of how to make love to anything.

Buck up and think cheese, otherwise I'll have to listen to them later when they deliberately tell me again, over and over again, how something went wrong, chattering and murmurs, unusual that so many factors weren't accounted for, accusations and praises. Also, that colour just doesn't become you, where the hell did you buy that god-awful suit. But I seriously don't want to make love to the camera, thank you for offering, it sounds a bit disgusting, I'm sorry to say. The photographers with voices verging on post helium huffing tones tell me I've got to do it like that, though? That's some bullshit advice right then and there, please step away from me and get that flashlight out of my sight. Would you really want to see me giving the camera a sexy face? It's somewhere between a stroke and constipation, vein bulge, the damn eyes hollow and reflecting, sharp tipped teeth bared, fangs at the ready, shark.

Another crack and widening of lips.

"Stop smiling."

I told you.

On the other hand, I think it's a nice expression for a killer, you know. Always reassuring to see one can groom oneself to fit the frame. Take a deep breath and step away from the bright camera crew. It's time to bolster the defenses, cheer myself further on, have to get through it all. Give me a gee, give me an oh, go go go go go! Chant it now, high tone and low, today is actually all about victory and no one will even dare think of not shaking my hand! There isn't a single person without a welcoming smile, it's a rare opportunity to willingly invite a murderer into your home, into your office, into your country, the visa secure forever, cannot afford me going back to whence thee came. The security and the special unit will continue with their conspiratory smiles, slap my back, good job today, clasp my hands, when are you hitting the major rank, bump my hips, offer a drink, bump, bump, bump, how about we continue this somewhere more private.

But the toilet is not a good place for that.

Flirting and kissing doesn't really become me either, though, just like that shitty white suit. It's been years since it was last fashionable. Cannot get anyone to sleep with when I smile without it reaching my eyes, as fucking poetry puts it. And, really, it's in the eyes, you know? The camera sees it and it doesn't love you, the lieutenant sees it and now certainly doesn't want you. Why stare into the two circles of colour and not-colour when the abyss likes to stare back? I don't know how to explain it to either of them, well, not like the camera really cares, to hell with those added five pounds as well, but it's not my fault that I look and see and oversee and stare and gaze without a thought. I mean, there's no harm in their void.

It's these eyes that have witnessed a lot of shit, not me in particular.

And this particular me, sir, wants to find the right table, the right chair with long back and covered in shiny satin, so there's no need for that guiding hand of yours. I will have you know, I have a fine-ass brain; I get to block some of my shit even while I'm sober, but the empty circles aren't that forgiving and the abyss oozes outside, pours over the lower eyelid, capsizes over the short lashes, clumps, chunks, knots, all black. They've got the image of the globe printed on them, rivers without flowing water, mountains with craters burnt into them. Moments of choking, bitter mud and murky bubbles, no way to relate to the acidic fire in the throat and the burn in the nose, but the eyes still know. They hold the still frames of the darkness of the first kisses, the closeness of glasses, jamming up the dull bone under the eyebrow, over the cheek, smudged, black brown 2-in-1 eyeliner, pencil.

I should get my eyesight checked soon.

So, I get to forget the gold sparkle of cheap beer I shared with friends on Friday nights, hot breath creating shapes, clouds, boats, fat circles, with heavy cigarette smoke in front of me, and I don't have to remember their faces, hopes or disappointments, fucking thank you, brain. No need to store up the patches of gray skies, enveloping fog with ghostly sun, best friend crying as she moves her luggage to the line, fat burgers with lettuce falling out on the side, ex pulling out their phone and checking for notifications, red LED flash means no coverage, filling out the monthly quota, press enter and send, unplug, mother mouthing her favourite song as the singer's death is shown on national news, white sheet for false modesty, the colour of lines on the road, engine revving up a storm, eardrum inferno, torn up bodies, stains and dislocated limbs, no bodies, dust, ash and concrete and steel rods, roods, hometown and hellhole, everything became a hole.

Sigh, sigh, sigh and hope all breath can leave at once, vacuum up my lungs, stasis, silence, sibilants ad nauseum. Shhhh.

"Count to ten."

Yeah, yeah. Is there any need for that, though? The podium is filled with people, officials, this is a fancy party after all, and the medals are clinking on my chest, so I can count them, I suppose. They're the only pretty things here besides the name cards, embellished and etched, cursive. Masses are navigating the stupid seating arrangement, rushing to grab a spot, knock over the ornate napkin swans and elephants in the room. The spoons and forks outshine the medals, and a fist clenches inside my chest even though I can see my fingers relaxed on the tablecloth. Have to sit down to avoid being alive in this moment, speakers bathed in warm artificial light, microphone echo, got to look away and try to remember how to pray.

Never knew further than hallowed be thy name.

The drone of formalities sinks the speech into oblivion, stopping time, ticking backwards, no go. There's a pause button on. And it's a real pause button, not like those shitty old ones when you press it and the picture still repeats itself for half a millisecond, two, jerking the actors and the background just a little, missing only a beat, Macarena. I'm talking about the crisp-clean pause of high-definition proportions, pixels all lined up, sound permanently muted, not even the tiny buzz of white noise to disturb it. Good. Bad at the same time. The display on the platform was never longer, never more filled with pictures and lists of deeds and efforts, drowned in scorching artificial light. Who gets to go first, the victor or the guilty? Do I get to disappear?

Because I killed a man and got invited to a party.

Festivities notwithstanding, it was difficult getting out of bed today. And it has been difficult for a lot of months. That's not a fucking metaphor, I'm serious. No strength to lift up my duvet and push myself on my hands and raise my head. It's the same expression, same day, same town, same voices, summer, autumn, winter. Monotony, my best friend and murderer. Every day is another number on the wall calendar, and the pictures all look the same, landscape after landscape, there is no need to turn it over or to try doing better. Do one simple thing and suddenly it's September. Mind empty, opened eyes, breathe and speak some noise. To learn a second language well, you're supposed to think in it, but I don't think I think at all. There's the same fog from outside permeating my brain, the cavernous expanse between studded ears, it wormed inside while I was blurring the edges of hours, counting away the minutes, without pause.

Five, seven, thirteen.

A day is a day is a day is a day, there's no difference between a Monday and a Friday, a funeral day and my birthday, end in a y, and cry out why. I wish to sleep it all away in the discrepancy between two worlds, the tranquility of sleep and suffocation of being awake, in the empty space between the stars, the nanometers between electrons and protons, the void, gap, chasm, the blankness of not caring, shrugging shoulders, not knowing how to feel anymore, what to feel, and when. School your expression, copy and paste it from what you've known to show, examine and employ. And I can feel it at times, the stone, the wall, the barrier dense and tense and looming, not threatening, just waiting between me and me. The growing not-need, the opposite of want, of desire, the sucking of air, a whoosh of a strong wind dwindling down, giving up, white flag. If the globe stopped twirling around, I would stop right with it and fall into blissful silence. Not this silence here, this hellish pause on the floor, the podium, the concert hall rented out for one afternoon, the one minute of silence, deafening, screaming, louder than the streets of the metropolis at speeding rush hours, honking horns, pay the toll.

I never drove the Highway on my own.

The atmosphere won't let me sit still, occasional clapping and crying, cacophony, my muscles ache from phantom movement and pain, shoulders flexing, the suit unworn, pressed, stretched, starched, scratching. My skin itches from sweat, like there's oil all over my face, yellow, sticky oil, dripping under my ears onto the collar. It's too tight, if I swallow I feel I might suffocate in the silky fabrics around it. The stench of live bodies envelops me, the hall, the state, clear beads of perspiration letting off poisonous gas, or so I'd wish for all of us. Hilarity would ensue, trust me, the papers would have a field day and then my parents could have themselves a dead hero, but a hero who expired for the cause, and then pretend not to hear the extended family brood out me as an anti-national, coward, immigrant, illegal, alien.

"It's all you."

True, it is all me. It's all about me. It's the set phrases and short lines, zero paragraphs, learnt off by heart, thanks and acknowledgements. What an act, what a performance, you nailed that, good job, me. Bright faces charmed by my repertoire shine brighter than the light bulbs and burn me more. Dear audience, no need for all of you to just run and flock around me with rounds of screaming applause, my insides are like a mutiny of bees in a just-kicked hive, stinging my intestines and stomach and spine, worming up to burst out, out and be gone. If they fucking find you and sting you, you'll all be wishing you didn't come to compliment me on my achievements, killing list, killing spree.

Merely numbers in a research.

The calm outside is boiling inside, and beneath my nails is smoldering rage, tap, a storm waiting for the darkest hour to crack with the first resounding flash of lightning, free, as I push more and more emptiness into it, it turns against me and drains me. And I wish I knew more and I want to understand what is around me, what is inside me, what is me. Standing on the inside, seeing myself on the outside, perception screwed, fisheye, judging and trying to find traces of who I am, or who I used to be before I became this today, yesterday. I find no proof of anything and no clues for anything, the way is lost, the crows ate all of the crumbs. There's no way back, the party, the award ceremony, the laurels do not help.

I get only a name and another coin and a fancy paper and a list of achievements.

Called out and bowed again. Staring into the 130 gram sheet, glorified napkin, bullshit, the whiteness reappears on my knuckles and I blend into what's written down about me. Because, sometimes, I revisit those fragments of memories, of void, in my retinas, cornea watering and optical disk swiveling wildly, as I replay the innumerable repressed, depressed moments time and time again, for hours and years and know only the things I don't know. I get surprised at myself, at my supposed self, the changes in my body as I laugh, as I write, as I walk, as I think – I see five, seven, thirteen different people, made, remade, destroyed, built anew. It's a brand new show at every rerun. And I have to ask myself, question, question, and I have to remind myself, no answer.

Why have I done the things I have done?

Strangling the long neck of my own glass I realise the parameters of my actions don't fit with what I'm used to, the numbers are smudged and the machine malfunctions on the inside, electricity ungrounded and causing mayhem and melting of wires, blowing a fuse, pop, fizzle, out. My experiences make me and break me and mend me, they mix and match, weld, harmonize my data and status, and yet, I know I am nothing more and nothing less than a killer. A specific blend of missed chances, wrong opportunities and adrenaline-rushed decisions. Shaking hands with the officials starts off the feast, but no one can stop the colonel's additional speech, grinning and nodding, background noise time. But, it's a mistake, it's all a fucking mistake, sir, for I am a label under a label under a label, skills and work experience, executioner.

And I wish to disappear, perish, evaporate, no more, eviscerate.

I fear watching, listening, remembering, seeing more, so it's time to greet the general and the marshal, pick up another gaudy coin, get the new title, fatherly smile and a warm hand on a padded shoulder. Even though I'm not even a soldier, sir, this really wasn't necessary, it doesn't matter, the scientists' inputs can always be the change that wins us a war, look pleased, smile, abyss stare and all, thank you.

I killed a man today. Many a man. Again. Today.

"Yesterday. Tomorrow."

Clink.

NEVENA TODOROVIĆ

23, spent childhood in Libya and Syria, and has loved exploring the world ever since. Now a student at the University of Belgrade and a writer (if writing poems that end up at the bottom of desk drawers counts). Hoping to traverse the globe over and across, and write some more along the way.

#  as yet untitled

Yes, I am a stain.

But I'll fade away!

Untangle me from your hair, wash me off your face,

spit me out of your mouth, brush me off your pillow,

and flush me

Down

the drain

It's easy, soon you'll forget.

And I'll sink!

I'm

Good

At

Sinking.

#  stop

It takes a while for it to build up

– the bile –

that sits in your throat and stomach,

making you spit up any

remaining doubts you may have had

about

how the world goes 'round

or whether it still does at all.

It makes you sick –

Sicker even than that time mom put

cold presses on your forehead,

eyes full of tenderness and worry;

The sickest you've ever been.

You'll keep it down... at first.

But it gets kinda tough to swallow;

There's only so much violence you can handle

before you're choking on the chunks;

Cruelty won't go down easy

until you purge yourself clean and empty

Purge yourself

numb.

#  21st century haiku

we're all equals in

our pursuit of happiness

detonating Earth.

# ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

White City Wordsmiths would like to express our boundless gratitude for the kindness and support of all those who have made the realization of this book possible.

Many thanks to the English Language Fellows Program (a US Department of State public diplomacy initiative) and the American Embassy in Belgrade for their great help and encouragement.

Also, a big thank you to The American Corner in Belgrade for permitting us to use their premises for our creative writing workshop sessions, and for assisting us in securing a venue for our book-promoting event.

Last but not least, we would like to thank Nathan William Meyer for his guidance and creative support, and, of course, to the writers themselves, whose editorial work and writing prowess have made this book a worthwhile endeavor.

Thank you all.

#  About the Head of Project

  Nathan William Meyer was raised in California and holds undergraduate and graduate English degrees from CSU Fresno and East Bay. His international education is extensive and includes studying in London, language courses throughout Europe and Latin America, and CELTA training in Prague. In 2010 he began a three-year odyssey working as a photojournalist documenting minority and human rights abuse in Southeast Asia and published numerous international affairs articles on conflicting minerals and natural resources issues. As an international educator he has taught EFL at a private academy in Turkey, lectured EAP at a Sino-American partnership campus in China, and is currently an English Language Fellow lecturing at the University of Belgrade.

 Rose Kennedy

 Gerard Way

 Charlotte Mew, In Nunhead Cemetery

