Trafika Europe 12 - French Bon-Bons

BREATHING INTO MARBLE (novel excerpt) By ŞLaura Sintija ČCerniauskaiteė Translated from Lithuanian by Marija Marcinkute Isabel did not notice that the snow had melted. One morning, walking to Kurpiskiai, she saw that the roadside was blue with violets and her heart squeezed, as if she had overslept and missed something that she would never see again. ‘Look, Ilyusha, violets!’ she called to the boy trotting behind her. He muttered something without lifting his eyes. Ilya would often sink into a peculiar silence, as if a dome had been lowered down over him; a careless word would be enough to cause it. Sometimes they would not be able to put their finger on what it had been. But then, do what they may – caress, talk, cheat, charm him with the latest plastic lions, or ships, or promises, or with the smell of cake fresh from the oven – nothing would move him. There was no melting his silence, not even into anger. One Saturday Ilya dropped his coffee cup – a pale patch spread across the table and then across his trousers. He gazed at the damp spot as though enchanted but frowned as if in pain, as if the steaming coffee had been his own blood that had spilled out, an odd, pale, hot blood and that oddness was transformed suddenly 131