Houses of cards, bricks stacked on bricks, sand surrounding clay I wouldn’t call it a mud hut. In the distance, a picturesque city, wires tangled from pole to pole, unfinished apartment blocks, as if taxation were theft. Carpets everywhere, as if they could, and even a carpet on the ceiling without a lamp. Women stroll in groups as if someone were about to attack and rob them. A dark corridor, a natural and carefully developed haste, memorized down to the smallest detail, every shard of crumbling wall, even the hinge of a nonexistent door falling off. A hooded figure staggers, flees, hides; a dozen holes per square meter are visible. He waves something and uses it to prop himself up, blood from his pant leg on his hands and from under his belt. He bursts into what was once a room, sits behind the wall, listening. Silence and nothing, heavy breathing, saliva dripping down his chin to avoid making a sound. Thinking that maybe it hurts, maybe he feels sympathy, maybe he even missed something, and silence. A faint smile and the corners of his mouth turned up, he can barely see, the warmth, the silence in his head, silence. The image sharpens, a faint red cloud covers his eyes. I answer, and again, this time, there’s calm in his voice, and only the word “dealt with.”
Service in…