Every Day, Every Hour

But

if every day,

every hour

you feel that you are destined for me …

oh my love, oh my own,

all that fire endures in me still,

in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten

– Pablo Neruda

‘IT’S HARD TO believe.’

‘What is?’

‘That I’m here.’

‘Why?’

‘After so many years.’

‘It’s nice.’

‘Like sleeping in your own bed after a long trip.’

‘I know.’

‘Like tasting something you haven’t tasted since childhood.’

‘Those round, white lollipops.’

‘With the picture in the middle.’

‘And the coloured border.’

A waterfall of memories. A small hotel room in the heat of summer. Pine trees that grant rescuing shade. Too much light. When you’ve got secrets. When you don’t want to be disturbed. When any other person is one person too many. When you feel more at ease at dusk. When you can touch every corner of the room from the bed.

‘Hardly anything has changed here.’

‘You think?’

‘I can still picture you.’

‘But without grey hair and without a walking stick.’

‘How are you?’

‘The nightmares hardly come anymore.’

‘That’s good.’

‘Yes.’

‘Why are you smiling?’

‘Because I can still picture you as well.’

A beautiful young woman. At the reception desk. In a tight, dark blue dress. Flat white sandals. Two big suitcases. A white handbag. Fingers full of rings. Long, curly hair. Unruly. It gets in her eyes. She keeps blowing it away. Blue-white earrings. A narrow face. Full lips. A wide nose. Big, dark eyes. Impatient hands. An elegant watch.

‘I forgot about my work.’

‘When?’

‘When you came into the lobby.’

‘When?’

‘Back then. Don’t you remember?’

‘I don’t need to remember.’

‘And seeing you is …’

‘… like a dream.’

‘… like Christmas.’

‘And Easter.’

‘And birthdays.’

‘And the first day of spring.’

‘All together.’

…

Their bodies next to each other. Sweaty. Tired. Hungry. Insatiable. Happy. On damp sheets. A hand on the stomach. A fingernail on an upper arm. Mouth on breast. Leg over hip. His green eyes.

‘Have you thought of me?’

‘How many times, my love, did I love you without seeing you, and perhaps without memory, / without recognising your glance, without beholding you.’

‘I’d almost forgotten.’

‘What?’

‘You and your Neruda.’

‘I imagined …’

‘What?’

‘Life with you.’

‘…’

‘Forever and ever.’

‘And?’

‘It was full of wonder.’

The tiny hotel room. Like a whole universe. Like a whole life. Without borders. Endless. Infinite. Like the depths of the ocean. Unexplored. Full of secrets. Frightening. Irresistible. Fascinating. Like the number of stars in the sky. Unknown. Unsettling. Indestructible. Immortal.

‘How is your daughter?’

‘I have two.’

‘Congratulations.’

‘Thank you.’

‘No, I thank you.’

‘What for?’

‘Just because.’

‘Why?’

‘Forget it.’

‘I don’t want to forget.’

‘Have it your way.’

‘Do you have children?’

‘A son.’

‘How old?’

‘Seventeen.’

‘Seventeen?’

‘Yes.’

‘I wonder …’

‘What?’

‘So, a son.’

‘Yes.’

‘I …’

… love you only you always you my whole life long you are my breath my heartbeat you are infinite in me you are the sea that I see and the fish that I catch you have lured into my net you are my day and my night and the asphalt under my shoes and the tie around my neck and the skin on my body and the bones beneath my skin and my boat and my breakfast and my wine and my friends and my morning coffee and my paintings and my paintings and my wife in my heart and my wife my wife my wife my wife …

‘I’ve got to go now.’

‘Please don’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘It’s cruel.’

‘What is?’

‘To come, and then to go.’

‘I have no choice.’

‘A person always has a choice.’

‘It’s ironic that you would say that.’

‘I was weak.’

‘Yes, you were.’

‘I’ve never got over it.’

‘Tough luck.’

‘I’ve never stopped loving you.’

‘I believe you.’

‘I want you to stay here.’

‘It’s too late.’

‘Who has ever loved as we do?’

Once upon a time there was a little hotel by the sea, sheltered by pines from the cold north wind. Its southern wall tasted of salt and heat even in winter. Big windows and balcony doors reflected the waves. The sea wrapped itself around the small pebble beach like the night sky filled with stars. Where everything began. And there they lived, happily ever after. Where everything should end.

‘Look, the clouds!’

‘Do you remember?’

‘And do you?’

Chapter 1

LUKA ENTERS THE world with a soft, half-hearted cry then grows quiet as he feels water sluice over his skin. The year is 1959, in Makarska, a small, peaceful harbour town in Croatia. Anka, the midwife, is also a neighbour, so it didn’t take her long to respond to the expectant father’s panicked calls. She checks three times to make sure the baby is healthy and in good shape, and thinks, What an unusual child. She shakes her head gently. What will become of him, this baby who’s as quiet and thoughtful as if he were eighty years old and had already seen the world? And yet, he’s as blind as a kitten. Luka’s exhausted mother, Antica, asks anxiously if everything’s all right with the baby because he’s not crying anymore. The midwife composes herself, and tells the mother – with whom she’s drunk countless pints of strong Turkish coffee over the years – that everything’s just as it should be, that she just needs to recover, rest and gather strength for later, for her little son’s sake. ‘What a sturdy lad he is, we’ll be hearing about him someday,’ she says. The mother asks for her son. She wants to hold him. ‘He’s going to be called Luka,’ she says proudly and a little shyly. The midwife knows this already and nods agreement. ‘You can see at once that this here is a proper Luka,’ she says, placing the silent boy – whose eyes are wide open, as if they were his lone window onto the world – in his mother’s arms. A blind kitten, she thinks again. In a moment both of them fall asleep. Mother and son. It’s a warm November day. Windless and fair. A winter that is not yet winter.

Luka is three years old. His father, Zoran, takes him fishing for the first time. He has a small boat, which Luka calls his own. That always makes Zoran smile and wink at Luka’s mother. Then she smiles, too. The father takes Luka’s hand in his own and they go to the harbour. With his right hand, Luka holds tight to his father. In his left hand he carries a small bag that holds many coloured pencils and a sketchbook. Luka loves to paint and draw. He doesn’t go anywhere without this bag. Today he wants to fish more than anything. But also, to paint. On the way, they run into many people. On Kačić Square, everyone greets them, everyone knows them, everyone smiles at Luka and asks him what he’s got planned. Luka can hardly speak for pride. ‘Going fishing,’ he says, too loudly, and hides his art bag behind his back. People laugh. Some of them ask with exaggerated concern if such a very little boy should be allowed to go fishing. Luka wavers between fear that he might be forbidden to go and anger that anybody would dare question his father’s judgement. But his father just makes a serious face and squeezes Luka’s sweaty hand. Everything’s fine, no need for him to worry. They go farther. Then farther still. As they walk along the Riva, Luka walks closest to the sea and looks into the water. He greets every fish with a soft cry. And so they continue, all the way to the boat. It’s not a long distance for his father. But for a three-year-old, it’s a major expedition. His left hand already hurts. His bag is heavy. So many pencils! The little boat floats peacefully between other boats its size. MA 38. That’s the red licence number. Almost all the boats are white with a thin blue stripe around them. Or else they’re completely white. Luka can already spot his father’s boat. He’s already been on the boat a million times. Maybe more. He’s just never gone fishing. Luka loves the sea and the boat more than anything. ‘When I grow up, I’ll be a sailor,’ he says. Or a fisherman. His father steps lightly into the boat. He hoists Luka high above the water and sets him down next to him. The boat isn’t all that big, but it has a small cabin. Luka sits down. He watches his father as he expertly steers the boat out of the harbour. Luka will be like his father one day. They head out onto the open sea. Between the Saint Petar and Osejava peninsulas. In the distance, he can make out the stones of the Church of St Petar, the stones that remained after the earthquake. The earthquake was awful, the whole house had trembled, and Mum had cried, and Dad had taken them all to the basement, and it had lasted a long time, longer than anything Luka could think of, and he had been scared, very scared, but they had made it through all right, and nothing much had happened, except that his stuffed animals got all jumbled, Dad had seen to everything – and then his father turns off the motor. The boat drifts in the water. ‘What’s the name of that island over there?’ his father asks. Luka likes this game. He’s good at it. ‘Brač.’ Luka’s voice wavers, though he knows he’s got the right answer. ‘Good. And over there?’ ‘Far,’ Luka says quickly. His father smiles. ‘Yes, almost right. Hvar. That’s a hard word, sometimes I don’t pronounce it right myself.’ Luka grows pensive. He hopes he hasn’t ruined everything. But his father is holding a fishing rod. So everything’s okay. Luka swallows with excitement. He leans over the edge of the boat looking for fish, and calls out to them that they’d better hurry up and get ready, because he’s coming. He dips his little hand into the sea. ‘Here, here, little fishy,’ he whispers. Then he raises his glance and meets his father’s eyes. Today is the best day of my life, Luka thinks, and closes his eyes. Sea creatures nibble on his fingers.

While Luka’s hand teases fish in the sea, Dora enters the world with a cry so shrill that it makes Anka, the midwife, burst out laughing. It’s the delivery room of the Franciscan Cloister Hospital, the year is 1962. Such a strong, vigorous girl, Anka says. The exhausted mother, Helena, can say nothing. She can’t even smile. She can only think to herself that, at last, it’s over. Finally. It’s the first and last child she’ll have, she thinks. She closes her eyes and falls asleep. Dora’s loud cries don’t rouse her. The midwife marvels at the vitality of the tiny creature. She looks at her lovingly. She strokes her little head and her trembling little body. The midwife is old – though, of course, compared to this little creature, anyone is old – and has had much experience. She has delivered countless children. She’s seen them all. But this little girl! The baby’s tireless, deafening wails pierce her heart, with faultless aim. Not once do they miss their mark. No detour. Quiet tears fill the midwife’s eyes. She has no children of her own. She never married. Her fiancé died in the war. Shot by Italians. After that, there were no other men in her life. That’s how it was back then. And now, since the big earthquake in January, which left only the west wall of her cottage standing, she’s had to move in with her younger sister, and put up with her sister’s husband, who gets drunk too often, and likes to make jokes about her single life. Nasty, coarse jokes. She curls her index finger and touches the baby’s small round mouth with her knuckle. Surprised and distracted, the baby falls quiet. Her nearly blind eyes find the midwife, catch her gaze and hold it. She will be called Dora, but everybody knows that already.

Dora is two years old and a lively girl. Her mother says she’s a wild thing. Dora doesn’t understand why, not that it bothers her. Because her mother smiles when she says it. And her father sets her on his shoulders and runs around with her like he’s her horsey. ‘When Dora laughs, the whole city shakes,’ her mother says. At two, Dora talks like no other baby. As if she were five already. ‘And she understands everything, too,’ her mother says, not without pride. Dora can never have enough. She has to touch everything, see everything, go everywhere. In town, on Kalalarga Street, along the Riva, by the waterfront or on Kačić Square, she calls out to the people hurrying past, and the ones who stop, forgetting their hurry, smile at her uncertainly and curiously, and say hello or answer her questions. Dora is very sure-footed, she never falls, she never runs, she just walks very quickly. She takes big steps, and it can be strange, and sometimes even a little funny, to watch her speed along. Dora never jumps either. She steps down from a wall with one giant airborne stride. ‘Are you afraid?’ her mother asks. Dora avoids her mother’s gaze and doesn’t answer. And doesn’t jump.

Luka is five years old when he gets a sister. Her name is Ana and she’s tiny and cries a lot. His mother can barely get back on her feet, and his father works more than he used to, and Luka sees less and less of him, and he feels an overpowering urge to paint, the whole house fills up with his paintings. Now he goes to nursery school, even though his mother doesn’t work, and the other kids are sometimes so mean to him that he goes into the bathroom and cries and paints where nobody can see him, including Aunt Vera, who looks after all the children, but likes him best of all. She often runs her hand through his hair, gives him a warm smile or a wink and reads his favourite story aloud, over and over, even though the other children whine that the story is boring and that they already know it by heart. Really, though, Luka wishes he could stay in nursery school all day long and never go home, where his stupid little sister is always crying, and Mum’s always tired, and Dad isn’t there, and Luka is always on the verge of sobbing, though he stifles it and nobody notices. He’s unhappy all the same, and he wishes everything could be the way it used to be, when his father would take him fishing and they would go out on the boat and he would get to paint and catch fish and his father would ask him riddles that were funny and sometimes kind of tricky; like, for instance, if a white cow gives white milk, what kind of milk does a black cow give? Which obviously is not an easy question at all, but he knew all the answers. And sometimes they would stay out until after sundown, but they always, always had so much fun together.

Dora understands. Her mother speaks clearly and slowly and is sad, and Dora understands. But Dora isn’t sad that, at the age of two, she will have to start going to nursery school three times a week, because Mum has to start working again, and Dora doesn’t have grandparents nearby to look after her. Her grandparents live far, far away. Dora has visited them many times already. In a big city. ‘It’s the capital, pure and simple,’ Mum says, then Dad gets annoyed and corrects her. Belgrade is the capital, Zagreb is just a big city. The president lives in Belgrade. Mum murmurs something under her breath. Dora can tell she’s not happy. It’s not because of the president; everyone likes him, he’s always surrounded by children and flowers. It’s the city he lives in that Mum’s not happy about. So when she’s alone again with Mum, Dora tells her, We’ll drive to Grandma and Grandpa’s, in the capital. And Mum smiles and quickly looks over her shoulder. Zagreb. They had to drive a long time in the car to get there. So long that Dora fell asleep many times along the way. Dora remembers everything. Her head is full of pictures that speak, that have a scent, that sometimes also have a taste. And she can put it all into words. ‘What a memory the girl has!’ her mother says, as if she could scarcely believe it. ‘Like an elephant,’ her father agrees, marvelling. A peculiar child, some think, but don’t say. Dora gives the matter no thought. Sometimes she stands a long time in front of the mirror and stares at herself, at her face that is capable of changing so quickly, as if she had a hundred faces, she likes doing that. That’s the way she is. Every face she sees in the mirror is her. And she’s looking forward to meeting the children in nursery school, whom she doesn’t yet know. And she’s also looking forward to the toys. She’s not afraid. ‘For Dora, life is an adventure,’ her mother always says, raising her eyebrows, which looks really silly and makes Dora laugh. And Dad reads the paper.

Luka sees the new girl who’s just come in. She has black hair, long and wavy. And shiny. Like a fish’s bright scales. She’s small and thin and quick, and younger than all the other kids in nursery school, and he can’t take his eyes off her. The girl’s mother carries her bag, which has white and blue stripes. With a big yellow fish in the middle. He likes it a lot, this bag. Even though he doesn’t recognise the kind of fish. He has a black rucksack that he didn’t get to choose for himself, which he once attacked with scissors, hoping that he would then be given a new one, but that didn’t work, it just became even more horrible. Now the rucksack is ugly and damaged. So he stuffs it in a plastic bag and carries the bag around with him. And nobody notices. If only he had a cool bag like the new girl’s. Luka can see himself walking around with this superbag, with his paints and sketchbook inside it, admired and envied by everyone. Proudly he would cross Kačić Square, and slowly stride to the Marineta, where all the people would gather to look at him and his new superbag. Nobody would be able to take their eyes off him. Maybe then Mum would smile again and give Dad a kiss like she used to, and say his name softly, many times over, like she used to – Zoran, Zoran, Zoran, Luka can almost hear it – and then Dad would beam with pleasure and take Luka fishing with him. Yes, for sure he would, and then he’d give him really tough riddles, like, for example, if Mum and Dad are white, but their child is born in Africa, what colour skin will the kid have, which is a hard question, but that wouldn’t matter, because he’d know all the answers. If only he had a bag like that. Like the new girl’s. He can’t take his eyes off her!

Dora enters the nursery school room expectantly and looks around her. A tall boy is standing by the bookshelf, staring at her. This doesn’t faze her. She takes off her jacket. She doesn’t want Mum to help her as long as the tall boy is watching. Maybe that’s how it is in nursery school. Maybe one kid will always be standing around the whole day long staring at the other kids, maybe it’s some kind of cool game. Dora can hardly wait to get to play it. She wants to take her shoes off by herself, too. ‘What’s got into you, Dorrie?’ Mum wonders. Mum doesn’t get it. She doesn’t know that Dora is playing a really cool new game, and that the boy is staring Dora down, and that she’s supposed to be brave and stare right back at him if she wants to stay in the game, and she absolutely wants to be the one who gets to stand, immobile, by the shelf filled with picture books, staring everybody down, like he’s doing, oh yes, she wants that, no matter what. So Dora shakes her head and says nothing. Because her head suddenly starts to swim. It feels full and hollow and blown up like a balloon, and hot and light and fluttery and transparent. She closes her eyes. She has no shoe on her left foot. She sits on the floor as if she were in a trance. ‘What’s wrong with you, sweetie?’ her mother asks again. Dora looks at her. In a moment Mum will start crying. My sweetheart, my Dorrie!

Luka doesn’t move. He leans against the bookshelf and holds his breath. He’s afraid that if he relaxes his muscles and breathes, the bag will disappear. He fixates on the bag until it hurts, and his eyes begin tearing up. He counts: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven … and then the world around him melts away and he slides to the floor. Everything around him is quiet. Little by little he slips away. Like pictures in a book whose pages he slowly flips through.

Dora is the first to come to the side of the boy who fainted. She crouches beside him, tinier than tiny. Her eyes widen, until her face, paler than pale, seems to be nothing but eyes. She bends her head over the boy, and, before the woman who is now kneeling at the boy’s other side, raising his legs, can stop her or send her away, Dora kisses him, on his pale red mouth. ‘Dora!’ her mother calls out in shock. No time for pet names.

Luka hears a soft voice next to his face. ‘You are my sleeping beauty, only mine, wake up, my prince, you are my prince, only mine …’ Then other voices and words reach his ears, until, confused and weak, he opens his eyes and …

… she sees his eyes, opening slowly, his confused expression, his lips that move without making a sound …

… but he can say nothing, so he smiles faintly and …

… she smiles, too, and …

… he shakily raises his arm, stretches his hand towards her face, touches her long, black hair, and asks himself where the bag might have got to, wonders if maybe he could persuade her to give it to him, as a present, to cheer him up, and …

… she whispers once again very softly, so softly that only her lips move: ‘My prince, only mine.’

Chapter 2

‘DO YOU SEE it there, the really little one, like a scoop of ice cream?’

Dora points with her outstretched arm. A round lollipop sticks out between her sticky fingers. She points high up in the sky, and even though their heads are very close to each other, Luka can’t see the cloud scoop.

They’re stretched out on the roof of the cabin of his father’s boat, looking up at the clouds that a light summer breeze is nudging across the sky. It’s early afternoon and a stillness has fallen over the harbour. Every now and then a tourist passes. The locals are hiding out from the burning sun, their shutters drawn. Everyone seeks out the deepest shade and tries not to move. In heat like this, it’s sometimes hard just to breathe.

Only the tourists don’t seem to figure this out. They walk around all day without hats and end up in the emergency room. Luka knows this well. He sees them on the beach every morning, close to the Yellow House and near to where he earns his pocket money by renting out beach umbrellas. He’s nine years old. He’s good-looking. Dora says so, too. He’s let his hair grow, and it glints in the sun as if it were full of glitter. His skin, usually pale, has taken on a deep cocoa tone. At home, Luka often looks at his body in the mirror. He doesn’t like what he sees that much; he’s too skinny. But that will change soon, because in May he joined the water polo team. Every morning he gets up at seven, wolfs down a slice of bread, and runs to practice. Seagull, the club is called. His father used to play water polo there. A long time ago, of course. Before Luka was born. Mum saw him there and fell in love with him. All the girls fall in love with water polo players; it’s obvious why. They’re tall and strong and, basically, great guys. Better than football players. He’s happy about that. About the water and his friends and his muscles. If only it wasn’t all going to end in September. Stupid September! And Dora. He can’t think about that. About September and Dora in the same breath. He can’t. No way.

Dora comes to the beach every morning at the same time he does. Unless she has watched him at practice. She does that a lot. She lays her towel next to his folding chair, watches him paint, goes swimming with him when he takes a break, and stays till lunchtime. Then they leave together to go to their houses, stopping to buy an ice cream at the dairy if one of them has some money. The dairy is the only place in Makarska where you can get ice cream, and there’s always a queue. Dora always gets chocolate, of course – for her chocolate is the only flavour on earth – and he gets lemon, he likes the tart, bitter taste. It refreshes him, and it lingers so long on his tongue, sometimes even until after lunch. They part only at the last little crossing, where Dora runs up a steep, tiny hill and Luka makes a right turn, then two lefts. Since they’re hungry only when they’re together, at home they poke sullenly at their plates, push the food back and forth and gulp down whole mouthfuls without properly chewing them. Their mothers complain, wonder what’s wrong, get worried, tease them, shout at them, threaten, ask if they’re feeling well, lay their hands on their foreheads, look at them with concern, cook their favourite foods, despair and shrug their shoulders. Then the table is cleared and everyone goes back to their bedrooms to wait out the unbearable heat of the afternoon and to rest – which the kids ought to do, too.

Instead, Dora and Luka always sneak back outside, every day, all summer long, while their parents nap in their bedrooms. For them, napping would be a huge waste of the valuable time they have left to spend in each other’s company – as is any moment they don’t share together.

‘Do you see it or don’t you?’ Dora’s voice has already grown a little impatient. ‘You can’t say you see something if you don’t!’ She plays with her hair. Like she always does.

Luka keeps quiet. He’s thinking about September, and he doesn’t want to talk. He turns and looks at Dora beside him, observing her concentration as she watches the clouds. He’s done this for months. For years. If he were to go blind it wouldn’t matter, he already knows her face inside out.

‘It doesn’t count. The only clouds that count are the ones you’ve actually seen.’ She breathes excitedly and her eyelids start fluttering. ‘So, now what? If you don’t see it, I’ve won! Because you didn’t see the one before it either, even though it was so clear. It couldn’t have been anything but a flying coach with a pigeon on the roof. It was easy to see. But you didn’t see it …’ She gasps. After a little pause she asks quietly: ‘Or don’t you want to play with me anymore?’

A boat leaves the harbour. The motor drones loudly. The sea swells almost imperceptibly, but enough to gently rock Dora and Luka on the boat’s roof. Their bodies touch softly, separate, touch, separate, touch …

‘I see everything, I also saw the pigeon, I just want you to win. Otherwise you’re really sad, and I don’t like it.’

‘That’s not true.’

‘I don’t like it when you’re sad, I don’t like it at all.’

Luka is still lying on his side, watching Dora’s face. Don’t think about it, he tells himself, don’t think about the fact that this face will soon be gone.

Dora says nothing for a while. Then she sits up and clutches her knees.

‘I am not sad. That’s not true. I’m not sad when I don’t win. It’s mean to say something that isn’t true. Ask anyone you want. It’s mean to say something that totally isn’t true. Anyone will tell you, just ask them.’

She rests her forehead on her knees.

Luka can’t look at her any longer. His heart beats loudly and irregularly. He feels lightheaded. He sits up, too. He doesn’t dare to breathe. He closes his eyes and counts: one, two, three, four …

‘Stop that right now! Breathe! Or you’ll faint again!’

Dora shakes him so fiercely that he teeters and almost falls into the sea. He opens his eyes. Dora’s face is very near, her dark eyes as big as the two pizza plates he’d seen not long before, in a restaurant on the plaza. They were so big that the waiters could hardly carry them. They wobbled in their hands, and Luka had thought the pizzas might slide onto the floor. Unfortunately, that hadn’t happened.

‘Let’s go swimming,’ he says all of a sudden, and stands up. He jumps from the cabin roof to the gangplank, and from there to the shore. Without waiting for Dora, he takes long strides in the direction of Saint Petar. To the rock. Soon he hears her behind him. He smiles. She’s so light, like the clouds. A wonderful image forms in his head.

‘And I did see the cloud, but it wasn’t a scoop of ice cream, nothing that dumb. It was a football, with the air let out of it.’

It’s been four years since Dora came to nursery school for the first time and Luka fainted. It’s been four years since Dora and Luka became inseparable. Nobody seems surprised by their friendship. Nobody questions it. Everyone looks on with interest, because the town of Makarska has never seen anything like this before. But nobody laughs either. Even the other children don’t laugh. Not once. They play with Dora and Luka or they leave them alone. There’s something strange in the air when Dora and Luka are together. You can’t call it calm, and you can’t call it storm. It smells of mandarin oranges and roasted almonds, of the sea and fresh-baked cookies, and springtime. As if they were enveloped in a cloud. Some people say the cloud is turquoise, others that it’s orange. Domica, the old woman who sits in front of her house on the edge of the woods between the Riva and the beach, says the cloud is light blue, nearly as pale as the sky in summer. Then she nods knowingly and closes her half-blind eyes. Ever since Domica predicted the earthquake six years ago, the townspeople have been a little fearful of her, but they still come to her for advice. Especially young women in love.

For some reason, Luka’s and Dora’s parents also don’t find it un usual that a two-year-old and a five-year-old would become friends. And what friends! Now and then, seeing their children at play, they look at each other thoughtfully, as if remembering something best forgotten. On such occasions, you might catch them smiling distractedly, lost in a daydream. But they never raise an objection, and they do everything possible to let the children see each other every day, even outside of nursery school. And when Luka entered the classroom one day holding Dora’s bag, and she came in with his battered rucksack, hardly anyone noticed. And nobody thought to ask what had become of the old plastic bag.

Luka’s four-year-old sister, Ana, also wants to play with them or go places with them, which usually doesn’t suit Luka and Dora. But sometimes, especially in summer, during the long school holiday, Luka has to take her with him, his mother says so, he can’t get out of it. Then the three of them sit around his beach umbrella and throw stones into the sea, but Dora and Luka never, ever take her with them to visit their rock! The rock on the Saint Petar peninsula belongs only to them, to them alone, and a meddling sister or any other kid has no business there. That’s clear. Dora and Luka don’t even have to talk about it, don’t even need to exchange a conspiratorial glance, not even once. They will go with Ana to get ice cream. That’s okay. An ice cream cone, that’s nothing special. Or they’ll play ‘catch the ball’ with her in shallow water, or see who can find the thickest tree. Or share a drink, if they’re all thirsty. That’s fine. But the rock? Not a chance. And there’s something else that belongs only to the two of them as well: the clouds. The clouds above, in the sky that belongs to everyone.

Ana likes Dora. She wants Dora to be her friend. At nursery school, she’s already told everyone that Dora is, in fact, her best friend. Everyone is jealous of her. Everyone knows Dora. Even the ones she doesn’t know have heard about her. Dora is funny and tells great stories, it’s never boring when she’s around, she has an answer for everything. And she’s got her own bike, which is red and shiny and darts around in the sunshine like a giant flame. Ana wants one, too. When Ana tells Luka this, he just laughs and walks away, as if to say, nobody can be like Dora. Or ride a bike like Dora. Sometimes Ana thinks that Dora lives in a fairy tale, and that she’s a princess in disguise, only here among the rest of them on a visit. Ana loves fairy tales. Sometimes Dora reads stories to her; sometimes she tells them to her. Other times, she makes up new stories, and acts them out for her. Ana likes that best of all. Then Dora transforms herself into a damsel in distress, an evil queen, a fire-breathing dragon, a crying king, a brave prince, a good fairy, a wicked witch. One after the other. Or all of them at the same time. It’s more exciting than the movies. Yes, Ana likes Dora. Above all, because Dora shared a secret with her. She showed her how a person can make faces in a mirror and become anyone and anything. You could even make faces with no story attached, just because you felt like it: Dora calls this an ‘important exercise’. She collects film magazines and knows everything about all the actors. Some days, she lets Ana touch the pictures of the famous actors, but only briefly, fleetingly, while she counts to five. Ana is grateful to Dora, but thinks all the same that she’s too strict. What could happen? They’re just photographs! ‘I’ll be like that one day,’ Dora sometimes whispers, and Ana doesn’t exactly understand what she means: Will she be that pretty, that untouchable, that full of secrets, or that black-and-white?

Dora likes Ana, too. She’s Luka’s sister, after all, and Dora likes everything that she shares with Luka. It’s also obvious who matters more to him. Luka strung together the shell necklace for her – for Dora, and for no one else. Only Luka held Dora’s hand in a way that made her heart beat faster and her mouth water. Only with Luka does she share her favourite lollipop, the round, white kind, with the coloured border and the picture in the middle. She doesn’t find it disgusting to lick the lollipop after Luka has put it in his mouth. The same way that her mother doesn’t mind eating with Dora’s fork, or drinking from her glass. ‘That’s how mothers are,’ Mum would say, and smile. Dora asks herself why she feels the same way about Luka, even though she’s not his mother. She’s a hundred per cent not his mother. It would be truly weird for a mother to be younger than her child! One time, Dora even brushed her teeth with Luka’s toothbrush. Anyway, Dora would like to have a sister or a brother of her own. She would like to have someone soft and cuddly and adorable to play with. Her mum tells her she’d be better off with a dog or a cat. But Dora doesn’t want that. She’s a little afraid of cats. Just a very little, of course, because Dora really is afraid of nothing. Like that girl overseas somewhere she’d heard about, who felt completely fine, but was actually terribly sick. Doctors found out she had internal bleeding throughout her body, even though she had no symptoms. The difference, though, is that Dora isn’t sick. Not at all. She’s never been sick in her life. She’s simply fearless. ‘Pure and simple,’ her mother would say. Mum says that a lot: ‘pure and simple’. It’s practically a code word with her, an identifying mark – like the seven baby goats who can recognise their mother by her white foot. Dora thinks it’s hilarious how many times a day her mother says it – making big eyes and shaking her head for emphasis. Some days, Dora keeps a tally. Dora likes her mother. And Luka. But she’s aware that she likes them in different ways. Dora understood early on that there are different ways, and different kinds, of liking. Pure and simple.

And Luka likes Dora. He thinks everything about her is fantastic. He