TE17 Mysterious Montenegro

Catherine the Great and the Small

My cousins kissme, wipe their cheekswithone hand andmine with the other. At least four sandpapery palms brush my face and I have not even begun to cry. My ill-tempered granny and I are the only ones not crying.

“Your mother died in the hospital,” they tell me.

“Your father looked for you,” they say, “he waited for you and just now left for the hospital, he had to go without you.” “I told him to go without you,” Granny says crossly. “Enough of dragging you around hospitals.”

“Alone in a hospital room, such a shame.” They all sigh.

Dad and I are supposed to feel a little shame. At the time, people died in their own beds. But this husband hadn’t even considered bringing his young wife home. And look at me, I’m making a fool of myself, twitching and wiggling around on stage at the May Day Festival, imitating a black singer no less, while my mother succumbs to a fatal disease. “Don’tworry.” Now they, like, consoleme and strokemy bristly hair. “She had no idea she was alone, that’s what the doctors said.” “She’s blessed now in the kingdom of heaven,” says Marijeta’s mother and smiles through her tears. “And you, child, just let the dead bury the dead.” “All of you are just babbling,” says Granny, agitated. “No one knows a thing. The doctors don’t know and neither do the 63