Sarajevo Marlboro by Miljenko Jergovic Page B

up.”
    â€œWe can’t leave yet,” replied his friend. “Don’t you remember, I’ve just ordered more drinks?”
    MiÅ¡o the Heart shuffled nervously in his chair as Zoka the Barman doled out the beers. A few sips later, yet another tram could be heard – seconds out! Once again MiÅ¡o the Heart put up his hands like a boxer. Everybody in the bar was watching, and they all laughed, even Velija the Footballer, who apparently hadn’t laughed since the cup match in 1951 when he poked out the eye of Pandurović from Poleter FC in the heat of the moment. It was obvious that everybody liked the washed-out boxer who had nothing left in the world except the memory of a bell. Just for that, MiÅ¡o was bought another beer.
    The next day he turned up at the Kvarner by himself. The regulars greeted him with looks of delight. Velija the Footballer clapped him on the shoulder. Zoka the Barman, who was wiping the glasses, called out, “Hey you, Heart-Attack, seen any more trams lately?”
    MiÅ¡o the Heart looked at the barman with mock horror and ordered a beer. When the first tram passed by, MiÅ¡o was ready for thebell, and so he just raised his middle finger, but the next one caught him by surprise. The more beer he drank the faster and more confident his reactions became. The regulars, who had deduced as much, kept on buying MiÅ¡o beers. His reflexes became part of the daily routine. Only Lojze the Professor doubted that a person could fail to get used to the trams within a few months.
    It hardly mattered in the end. As far as the Kvarner regulars were concerned, MiÅ¡o the Heart was like the cuckoo in a clock announcing each hour. On days when he didn’t show up at the bar, the others felt a kind of emptiness; it was as if they were missing out on something vital and important. Time slipped through your fingers when MiÅ¡o wasn’t around. Beer lost its flavor. You couldn’t even get drunk on brandy. Empty pockets and impermanence, not to mention the coming threat of war, these were the only certainties. And yet when MiÅ¡o the Heart turned up again the next day, his pals awaited the first tram with a sense of unbridled joy and optimism.
    On the sixth of April 1992, a notice was pinned to the window of the Kvarner announcing the death of Lojze the Professor, and there was also news of the first shells to be dropped on Jarčedole. That day the regulars talked more than they drank. With a clear head, Edo the Engineer, Velija the Footballer, Meho the Paratrooper, Mirso the Ballbearing and Stevo the Thief analyzed the political situation. Que sera, sera, it was decided. But Mato the Villain observed that Lojze the Professor would probably be the last of the boozers to die from cirrhosis in the traditional way. The others shrugged their shoulders.
    Just then MiÅ¡o the Heart walked through the door. He sat down at his usual table and lit a cigarette. “This match will last a hundred and one rounds,” he said through clenched teeth. “Geddit? I won’t be KO’d by trams or upper-cuts or your piss-taking. This is what’ll kill me!”
    He beat the left side of his chest three times and looked meaningfully at everybody present.
    â€œMiÅ¡o isn’t mad,” he went on. “And the heart doesn’t have biceps without reason. I know what you all think when I come down here. If you let me in the door again, it won’t be MiÅ¡o the Heart any more, but MiÅ¡o the Chetnik. Fuck you all! It’s only just occurred to you where you are and what’s going on, but while the soldiers were sharpening their knives, you fought to buy me drinks. Now it will be MiÅ¡o’s fault that you didn’t catch the last train out of here. Go on, smash my head – so you won’t have to think about it later. And fuck you all!”
    MiÅ¡o the Heart covered his face with his hands. The others were silent. Then Zoka the Barman mumbled