A Swarm of Dust. Evald Flisar

which in that hot summer were unusually quiet. Sometimes he was lured far away, across the valley and into the hills on the eastern side, even straying onto the lowland. Now and then he sat on some rotting tree stump to rest and then he was driven on again aimlessly, he stopped by streams and watched them, he looked at the trees and touched their crusty trunks; sometimes he scared a hare out of the bushes, which went crashing into the woods, another time a whole column of deer passed by. He cooled down and quenched his thirst at forest springs. Whenever he came to the edge of the trees, he stopped and looked at the landscape before him, then turned and went back. He did not walk across fields, orchards or meadows, he kept to the woods where he was seen by no one, where he felt alone with the damp silence and the sappy smell of wood.

      During this wandering, the feeling of anxiety was not so intense, it became a deadness, a laziness of the arteries, a numbness of body and mind. Thoughts flowed idly through him, like the forest streams running among the dry grass. This numbness lasted quite some time, but now and then it was interrupted by sudden outbursts of sharp and unfamiliar feelings. Sometimes he was overwhelmed by an undermining fear and he did not know its source, nor did he even try to work it out, but rather succumbed to it with a trembling sense of enjoyment. Other times he was overcome by a shrill sense of joy. He would roll on the moss, run his hands over tree bark, hug their trunks, leap around and yell, and then chase the echo from the woods. But in a moment it all vanished, as in a whirlpool, and then everything flowed back to its former lethargy, to the dead decanting of thoughts, to the endless wandering through the woods.

      He always returned late at night. And every night he and his mother pleased each other. It usually lasted until morning, when she went into the village to work and he disappeared on his familiar paths. They barely spoke; sometimes they whispered as if afraid they might wake someone, but even that was rare. They were scared they might say something loud enough to break something, destroy it. The whole time they had the feeling that what they were doing was mysterious and that it could bear no voices, apart from the cries and gasps emitted during lovemaking.

      At night his spiritual lethargy was transformed into sharp sensations that had hitherto been alien to him. He still beat his mother, tormenting her more every night. When he heard her gasp with pain he felt a particular passion. It was not unlike that time when he and Pišta Baranja had killed the puppies that no one wanted. They were little fluffy balls, still blind, crawling over each other and squealing and shaking their snouts, and when he touched them he felt how warm the little creatures were and how their blood was pulsing just below their skin. When Pišta Baranja grabbed the first one by its leg and bashed it against a tree, he broke out in sweat and felt fixed to the ground. This was despair or something like it, a kind of fear at incomprehensible action, but the more the fear grew, the more another feeling grew alongside it that suppressed the fear. And when that feeling prevailed, he leapt on the little creatures, trembling, saliva dripping from his mouth, his eyes glassy, and he bashed one puppy against the tree for so long that he shattered its blind head and reduced its body to pulp. Then he put his hand into the bloody mass of flesh and groped it.

      Making love with his mother filled him with a similar feeling; he tortured her until she bled and the more she panted with desire, the stronger grew the wish to make her suffer as much as possible. So she no longer felt enjoyment, but a kind of torment. The wildness of their relationship grew from night to night. When by chance they saw each other during the day he looked at her glassy–eyed, feeling a tremulous fear of her, but at the same time an intense hatred. The whole time he was gripped with a desire to torture her. She stared at him with docile humility. The whole time she reminded him of those crawling puppies, tumbling over each other. When on occasion he was weary of rushing through the woods and lay down on the moss and closed his eyes, he saw her convulsive movements, her distorted face in the moonlight, he heard her cries, and all this swirled together inside him, creating strange images, fading away and then returning. And when he walked among the trees all that floated before his eyes were images of their coupling, every object reminded him of some shade of night and he was flooded with the desire to hit, to beat, to torment.

      One evening, he didn’t know how, he returned home before dark. The sun was going down behind the hill, but it was still quite light. In front of Baranja’s house he saw Emma walking to and fro. He realised she was hanging clothes on a line between two pine trees. On the bench in front of the house was a wooden tub and she had just finished doing the washing. He saw her look at him as soon as he emerged from the trees and the whole time she watched him as he continued towards home. He was about to go inside when he heard her calling him. He stopped, but then moved quickly forward. ‘Janek!’ she called again, louder this time. ‘Come here, something’s happened to your mother.’ He was struck as if by lightning. He looked up, towards her, his legs took him in her direction, but something held him back. Emma wiped her hands on her apron and then kept beckoning with her finger. Her face bore a mysterious expression.

      ‘Come,’ she said and disappeared round the corner, then up into the woods. He followed her. His every vein was taut, and confused feelings flowed through him. When they got to the edge of the woods at the top of the slope she whispered to him to go quietly, and without meaning to he began to put his feet down without making a sound. Emma stopped behind some dense acacias and gestured to him again, then she pointed through the bushes. He came closer.

      Behind the thorns and brambles, around a large white hornbeam was a bed of moss. His mother was kneeling there, smoothing her creased skirt. Then she buttoned up her blouse. Beside her stood a tall, thin farmer, fastening his trousers. It was Geder. His mother picked up the basket that was leaning against the hornbeam and looked at Geder, but said nothing. They both turned and left, Geder to the left, towards the nearby road, his mother towards the gypsy settlement. Long after the rustle of her steps faded, Janek remained staring at the tree and the moss beneath it. The only feeling that gripped him at that moment was contempt for Geder, for he was certain that the man had not beaten his mother and so she would not be satisfied. Her words came back to him: you must beat me … then it is better …

      Geder did it just like that, as if mother meant nothing to him? Just like that? The past, from which he’d been cut off for so long, assailed him and he slumped to the ground, seething with memories. Images appeared and vanished. He saw how once, in those other places, in school, he had stolen a large piece of bread from some farmer’s girl, how he had flown home with this bread, where his mother was ill and there was nothing to eat, and his father and sister were ignoring her; he saw how he fell to his knees beside her bed and shoved the dried up bread into her hand and said: bread, mother, bread … eat it.. And he remembered how he felt when he sat in the corner and watched his mother chewing the bread and looking at him with bright eyes. It was like a strange trembling, a yelling within him. And before him danced the priest, the one here … do you love your mother, he asked … Love, love … He broke into a sweat, he realised he felt something different towards his mother than he had before and he was overcome with torment at the memories. It all seethed inside him. The sense of confusion was so strong that he could not see clearly. He got up again and the contempt for Geder reappeared, for he should have beaten her, otherwise she was not happy. And mother must be happy. He felt tears running down his cheeks. Mother … he sobbed inside. He would always beat her, he would always yield to her, he would always do what she wanted.

      Through his tears he saw Emma crouching beside him, looking at him in fright. But there was also a kind of mockery in her eyes. ‘Janek,’ she said, ‘didn’t you know? They’ve been doing it for ages. Will you tell your father?’ Amazement grew within him. Emma talked on; he didn’t quite know what she was saying, but some of her words struck him sharply. ‘If they can, so can we … I’d like to … do you want to, Janek, my husband’s away … Janek … do you want to … ?’

      ‘You don’t understand!’ he yelled, startling her. He saw her wide open eyes, he saw her timidly withdraw. He was filled with confusion, it stirred within him, disintegrated. He was thrown upwards, and then down into the woods, where it was already getting dark …

      That night he was wild like never before. He bit his mother’s breasts and shoulder, drawing blood. Then at the end he whispered: ‘Was it good, mother? Was it good?’

      ‘Yes, son,’ she whispered, stroking him.