Fingers Pointing Somewhere Else by Daniela Fischerova, Neil Bermel Read Free Book Online

mother ironically asks me:
    â€œDo you love her so much you can’t spend even one day apart?”
    The question takes me by surprise. I don’t love Sasha at all! It would never occur to me to love Sasha! Everest loves Kilimanjaro with the insanity of pure frost, but it has nothing to do with Sasha and me. We are mere players — a finger pointing somewhere else. We are only representatives, even if I don’t know what of.

    A numb tension dogs me all day. I read a little, but made-up stories irritate me. I stuff myself with cookies. Finally, just before supper, I get an idea for the next act of our play.
    The exhausted Kilimanjaro is asleep in the cliff grotto. Everest sets out for the summit. He stands right below it. One more step and he could leave his thumbprint upon the very apex of the world. The lofty vacuum turns his blood to foam. Everest is alone like no one anywhere ever. He sits down on a ledge and takes out a piece of stationery. Beloved Kilimanjaro!
    The love letter is an utterly alien genre for me. Laboriously I hunt for sentences to borrow, cobbling them together into something exceedingly odd. I don’t believe what comes out of my pen. What I understand perfectly as a mute feeling is, when put into words, even thinner air than my Christmas Party.
    Kilimanjaro! It is high time the truth be told. Until today I did not know what love was! … They call me to supper, three times. Woodenly I stack line upon line. I love you. Meanwhile, thespinach on my plate is getting cold. Till I die I will love only you. The fourth time around, they hound me to supper.

    Next, I figure out how we can correspond properly this far above sea level. With the help of some string, of course! I run downstairs. Miss Zámsky is in the kitchen, curlers in her hair. I’m hopping with impatience, I’ve explained it to her so many times! I’m even shouting. Miss Zámsky wants to know why I don’t just hand her the letter. With a speed borne of exasperation I rattle it off again. Miss Zámsky asks: And what kind of game is it? Finally she throws up her hands and goes to wake Sasha up.
    I stand on the balcony, tying the string. Carefully I lower the letter. WRITE BACK IMMEDIATELY! Everest adds. I mope around upstairs, trying to hypnotize the twilight. Hurrah! Sasha’s hand sticks out from the rocky grotto. She attaches a note:
    â€œMy temperture’s allmost normal. My aunts going to the movies tomorow so if you want come over.”

    As if to spite me, the heat today is like a frying pan. The sun beats against the closed windows. The basement apartment is oppressive and stifling. Mr. Zámsky is asleep in a chair in the garden, and Sasha is sitting on her bed in a rumpled nightgown.
    â€œDo you still feel sick?”
    â€œUh-uh.”
    â€œStill have a temperature?”
    â€œM-hm.”
    Suddenly I don’t know what to say. I stand up and look around. Most of all I’d like to crawl right into playing, like a hand into a glove.
    â€œSo are we going to play? Like always?”
    â€œHey, could you bring me something to drink?”
    â€œI’ll bring it to you when we pretend.”
    â€œWhat do you mean, pretend? I’m dying of thirst!”
    â€œSo pretend like he’s coming back to free her from the snow.”
    Everest brings her warm lemonade in a plastic glass; even Miss Zámsky has had a plastic attack, only she doesn’t have a refrigerator. He finds Kilimanjaro sleeping. No, she’s frozen. Everest stands for a while, completely beside himself. Then he puts the glass aside and begins to massage the forearms of this victim of the Mountain.
    â€œKilimanjaro! Don’t die!” he whispers — today he’s not at all convincing.
    The victim opens one eye slightly: “Got the drink?”
    She gulps it down at once and wipes the spills off her nightgown.
    â€œYou know what you have to do!” she says, and freezes. Mount