Masha Shukovich

“If you throw a good thing in the water, the water will bring it back to you.”

Serbian proverb

We are not human, but we are people. Most of you have forgotten this.

We have watched your kind since you first crawled out of our depths: tiny-lunged, secreting mucilage, finespun. And beautiful. We have observed, in what you might call fascination, the subtle swellings of your viscera, the gradual lengthening of your spine, the near vanishing of your tail, and the rapid expansion of your alveoli as they formed what you now call your lungs.

We watched you become human. That is the most exact definition of love that we can claim to have experienced since the inception of what you have dubbed the Universe. We have gazed upon you through the eyes of rivers, streams, ponds, lakes, seas, and oceans since you first emerged into life. We have observed your attempts to build homes and palaces, temples and prisons, to create cultures and establish rules and laws. We made ourselves evanescent and unobtrusive yet always present, if in no other way, then in the form of rain, snow, vapor, and dew. We’ve seen you construct ditches, canals, fountains, pools, bridges, aqueducts, pipelines, dams, and human-made lakes with nothing but your conduits of stone, brick, concrete, and lead. And our lifeforce. We’ve watched you wage endless wars, buy and sell each other like trinkets, and hurt your own kin in countless, terrible ways, all in the name of progress or whichever gods you’ve chosen to worship. We’ve noticed your penchant for violence and futile accumulation of wealth, and your commitment to the destruction of all things, including yourselves. And yet we’ve never averted our gaze away from you, however misguided you’ve become. Instead, we’ve embraced your dead where they fell in battles, and we welcomed them into our depths when you gave them to us, their bodies burnt to ashes, laid out in intricately carved boats, wrapped in silk, naked, mutilated, whole. We’ve taken your living, too, both when it was necessary and when it wasn’t, and guided them gently to the lands of the dead. Since the beginning, we’ve been a part of you and formed the basis of your cells: your vacuoles, your digestive juices, your urine, your perspiration, your reproductive discharge, your blood. We’ve quenched your thirst, cleansed your bodies, boiled your food and medicine, delivered your goods, and carried your waste. We’ve received all you’ve given us: your prayers, your irreverence, your sacrifices, your abuse. In turn, we’ve gifted you your crops, electricity, and industry, inspired your art and music, and shown you ways to move swiftly and hungrily across great distances. We’ve even birthed your first gods.

We’ve given you Life. We’ve given you Death. We’ve given you all the stories you will ever know. Nothing you’ve done thus far has surprised us, not even when you forgot that we are people, too. The ability to forget is what makes you human. Water remembers everything. And yet, and yet, when we catch a glimpse of your remembering, it makes us pay attention in a whole new way: a hopeful one, if Water can be said to contain hope.

And what we are now noticing, feeling, observing is something strange and unexpected even to us, in the dead of the night, in a place for the moment obscured by darkness and hidden from the human gaze where the serpentine bodies of two rivers meet, their watery mouths open and gaping like those of the fish they still carry in their bowels. This place has had many names over the centuries, but you now call it Belgrade. These braided rivers can no longer recall their true names but are content to be called Sava and Danube. We have no name for this odd occurrence we are now privy to, but your kind might dub it magic, or lunacy, or both. Whatever words you may choose to define it, to most of you it would seem peculiar but otherwise insignificant. Not to us. We know the seeds of change when we see them.

This is what we’re seeing now: a slight human figure, suspended somewhere between childhood and full maturity, black unruly hair cascading down its smooth back, its brown body naked and covered with goosebumps, its round cheeks streaked silver with tears, the right arm struggling to cover its small, sharp-nippled breasts and hide them from any watchful eyes. And what is it that the figure is clutching in its left hand? It’s some sort of offering: a chipped crystal bowl filled to the brim with sweet plum preserves.

We hear bare feet slipping and squelching in the mud, knees buckling, teeth chattering, sobs rattling the slender body, its heart a desperate trapped bird. We perceive a voice frozen soundless in the throat, a generous mouth thinned by determination and dread, ears pricked and listening, thighs bearing reddish marks in places where the spiny edges of swaying reeds have pierced the soft skin. We know when the figure has awkwardly slid across the muck and into the liquid doorway of our body, frigid waves swallowing it to the waist, by its breathing turned into shuddering gasps of shock. We feel a gentle thud when the crystal bowl, now free of the figure’s tight grip, has reached our bottom, the golden plum preserves swirling like moonlight made solid, sweetness calling to us from a place of honeyed remembrance. And we respond, eagerly, in all the river voices known to us: the wind caressing long-haired willows, the aching cry of a marsh bird, the howling of stray dogs, the splashing of silver-skinned fish, the Moon.

We say: Yes, little human, we will bring your offering and your pleas to those you wish to receive them. We will speak to the old gods on your behalf.

Chapter 1: VIDA

“A name is a sign.” Latin proverb

September 26, 1998, Belgrade, Yugoslavia

In the news: Data sent from the Galileo probe indicates that Jupiter’s moon Europa has a liquid ocean under a thick crust of ice. The presence of water suggests that Europa may be able to support life (NASA).

We don’t know each other yet, and to be honest, I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m probably screwing this up royally, but I must do something. The only tool for fighting despair I know is taking action, and talking to you while I gather the courage to do what I must do qualifies as action, I think.

And if you do exist and are listening and have the power to grant the wishes of a crackpot mortal like me, there are a few things you need to know before you can make up your mind about me and what I’m asking of you:

1. My Name is Vida. I used to hate my name, but I don’t anymore.

2. I was born in Yugoslavia, so I’m Yugoslavian, but I’m also Serbian, because everyone here has at least two national identities. And now that another war is coming, who knows what we will all be called once it’s over.

3. I am eighteen going on nineteen and I’ve never been kissed.

4. Everyone says I look like the spitting image of my father Zoran, but that may be because most people only look as deep as the color of hair, eyes, and skin, and don’t care about much else. My father’s features are so dark, people have nicknamed him Crni, just like his ancestor on his father’s side, Black Đorđe, the hero of the first Serbian uprising against the Turks. As a young girl, I wished I looked more like my beautiful mother Nada, with her almond-shaped eyes, slender, wise fingers, and hair like a cloak made of heavy brown silk. But she hasn’t been well for a very long time, my mother. She stopped speaking when my baby brother died and she hasn’t said a word, to me or to anyone else, in nine years. She hardly ever leaves her bed; curled up in it she resembles a sleeping child who got lost in a dream. I still remember the mother I once had: the storyteller, the singer of old songs, the kitchen witch who taught me how to turn everyday ingredients into magic. The only one who loved me, protected me, and made me feel like I belonged. It’s hard for me to remember my Mama like that, now. Remembering what we’ve lost can sometimes hurt more than the loss itself.

5. When my father is in a good mood, he, like so many fathers in Serbia, graciously addresses me as sine moj, my son, like he has given me a gift of great value that I, by the sheer misfortune of having been born a female, am unworthy of. Maybe that’s why words like “boy” and “girl” now hold little meaning for me. I am both and neither, but I keep my tongue behind my teeth and never share this state of uncertainty with anyone. If growing up in Yugoslavia has taught me anything, it’s that being undecided is a dangerous thing to be and the only real difference between men and women isn’t at all about what’s between their legs. It’s about power.

6. Baba Zora, my father’s mother and my only living grandparent, hates me and the air I breathe. I have yet to figure out why. I suspect it may have something to do with my father marrying a girl of Romani blood and me being my mother’s daughter. Not a day passes that my grandmother doesn’t remind anyone willing to listen that they should never tell secrets to women, befriend cops, or do business with Cigani. But, from what I’ve seen, Baba Zora rarely heeds her own warnings.

7. I smell colors, hear shapes, see music, and taste names. I’m not entirely sure that I’m human.

8. In my head, I hear voices. They tell me things no one else knows. When I was little, I was afraid of them, but now I can’t imagine swimming through life without them. They function like a sixth sense, and in Yugoslavia someone like me needs one just to stay alive.

9. I’ve been in love with my best friend, Despot, since the age of seven. He is oblivious to that fact. He is about to flee to America, on a green card he miraculously got through the Diversity lottery, because being an 18-year-old boy in Yugoslavia right now is like dancing with Death.

10. People around me don’t seem to notice, but I know that everything is alive and has a spirit: chairs, letter openers, saltshakers, soil, irises, walnuts, shoes, washing machines, thimbles, sweet paprika, flowerpots with a hole in the bottom, moon, spatulas, water. Especially water.

11. I like rivers, doorways, silence, news I can trust, Converse shoes, holy basil, stories, lists, and the number 13. My favorite thing in the world, after my Mama and Despot, is cooking.

12. The most important thing you need to know, the reason why I’m here, speaking to you through my mind because I seem to have lost the ability to use my voice, is that my mother is dying. When she first fell into bed nine years ago, my father held her in his arms and cried and brought to her bedside a litany of doctors who failed to find any physical cause for her ailment. Then he raged, and roared like a stabbed beast, and broke things, and shook my mother’s gaunt shoulders until her teeth rattled like dried beans in a bladder and her unfocused eyes rolled in her head like marbles. At last, he gave up on this wife he must have loved once and joined his mother in her bitter indifference, and I became my mother’s only caretaker. For nine years, I’ve been cooking her meals every day and spoon-feeding her, like she did for me when I was little. And, up until now, she would accept whatever food I made for her like a silent, obedient infant. But it’s been three days since my Mama has eaten or drunk anything, even a crumb of bread or a drop of water. Whatever I’ve tried to push past her pursed lips and into her unwilling mouth has met the solid wall of her clenched teeth. I don’t know what happened three days ago. I’ve been racking my brain, and I still can’t fathom what I (or someone else, but who?) might have done to cause this sudden change and make my mother refuse all food and drink for the first time in nine years. But what I do know is that there is no more time left. You may point out, like Baba Zora has done many times and not kindly, that my mother hasn’t really been alive for the past nine years anyway. But how can I just sit there, watching whatever life is left in her slowly drain out of her body as she starves to death?

13. There is nothing under the sun and the moon that I won’t do to save my mother’s life. This includes imploring you for help, in the dead of the night, whoever and wherever you are, and giving you my offering, as humble as it may be. I am hoping with every cell of my being that you do exist, and can hear me, and still give a damn about the likes of me. I am about to lose Despot, yes, but at least I know that he’ll have a life in New Orleans, a good life, even if it’s 9,131 kilometers away from me.

I can’t lose my Mama too. Not now. Not yet. Please. I’ll do anything. So here I am, standing naked at this crossroads of rivers, terrified out of my mind, holding a bowl of plum slatko I made just for you, the way I was told my mother’s mother used to prepare it. Here I am, casting away my father’s mother’s dire warnings and her Christian ways, abandoning reason itself, and calling to the old gods. I’m sorry for being such a babbling, blubbering mess and for getting my tears into your offering. I hope that you don’t mind and that you’ll still accept it. I won’t say amen, because I don’t think that works for the gods like you, the gods that came first, so I will say thank you instead. For everything. For listening. You may not exist, but right now, you are all I’ve got.

FROM VIDA’S COOKBOOK:

Plum slatko to honor all visitors, no matter what they’re bringing

Every guest is welcome in a Serbian home and offered slatko, sugary preserves made with plums or other fruits that sweetens even the bitterest of days and the worst of destinies. It is a great way to turn a foe into a friend; a little sweetness goes a long way.

A spoonful of slatko must always be chased down by a glass of ice-cold water. Don’t forget to serve water with slatko; one needs the other to express itself fully.

To make the best slatko, you should always talk to the plums first, the way you would to children: the honey in them will recognize the honey in your voice and will rush to the surface to greet you. If you look closely, you will notice that some of the plums you just spoke to have cried tears of joy: they will appear along the edges and around the stalk in the form of little golden droplets. Once you see them, you will know that the plums have indeed heard you and have agreed to be cooked with sugar and made even sweeter in the process. It’s important that you ask first before taking; that is the way of making all things friendlier.

Ingredients:

- 1 kg friendly plums

- 1 kg sugar

- Lemon juice (the sunnier the lemon smells, the better)

- Vanilla

- A handful of rose petals (especially important if you’re hiding any bitterness under your tongue)

As with any other recipe, it’s always good to compliment your ingredients. Like people, plums will be sweeter and more fragrant if praised than if scolded. Save your swear words for battle; they have no place in the kitchen and have been known to poison the food and make the eater sick. The words you use as you prepare slatko must be soft and round, like plums. Once tasted, they will banish all ill will and fear, which are one and the same.

Note to the cook, especially one who is curious and suffers from lack of fear: If you decide to dispense with modernity altogether and make plum slatko just right, the way babas used to make it in the old days, you must use limewater, which is a highly toxic substance.If you are new to cooking, do not attempt to use it; the price you will end up paying for perfect slatko may turn out to be higher than you bargained for. But if you know what you’re doing, and you follow all the old secrets of wise babas to a T, and only nod politely at Death without ever calling her name out loud, you may be surprised when your next visitor turns out to be a god. Now, if this happens, do not be afraid. If a god has agreed to come and see you, it means that you have something that they need that no one else can give them. And when it comes to dealings with gods, every little advantage you can scrape up can mean the difference between Life and Death, either for you or for those you love more than life itself.