Tiger Milk

by Stephanie de Velasco

  Jameelah puts her hands over Lukas’s eyes from behind, the same way Anna-Lena did at the planet recently.

  Salam, she says to Lukas.

  I’m pleased to see you both here, says Krap-Krüger when he spots us.

  Jameelah digs around in her rucksack, pulls out her apple sauce jar, and proudly places it on the table.

  As far as I’m concerned we can start right now, she says, but Krap-Krüger shakes his head.

  Unfortunately that won’t work, he says, lifting his pointer finger, the collection boxes have to be sealed.

  He pulls a bunch of metal containers out of the box on the ground, but in the end he is one short. Krap-Krüger is having a good day and says, okay you can use the jar. The scent wafting from his mouth smells once again like god’s rotten earth.

  Lukas stands behind the table.

  Aren’t you going to collect money, asks Jameelah.

  No, I’m staying here to pass out info, he says, but maybe later we can go to the pool?

  Sure, says Jameelah nodding like an idiot.

  Come on, I say and pull Jameelah with me, her apple sauce jar in her hand, we walk up and down Wilmersdorfer Strasse, up and down, up and down.

  We’re raising funds for the street kids of Guatemala, perhaps you can make a small donation, that’s how it goes the whole time. I’m bored, but I have to admit that Jameelah is good at getting people to part with their money. She makes up stories about Guatemala and the mountains there. The kids sniff glue because they’re starving. They get beaten by their fathers and flee into the jungle. I can see it all before my eyes, the mountains and the wild animals in the jungle and the luscious green of the trees.

  Everything is greener in Guatemala than here, greener and more luscious, says Jameelah, but also darker and more tragic, and as she says that she shakes the jar as if it’s some kind of Guatemalic folk instrument.

  Guatemalan, says Jameelah when we’re in the bathroom at the ice cream shop taking the bills and large coins out of the jar. We need the money because we want to buy Amir a Star Wars towel we saw at Kaufland.

  I mean, hey, we’re street kids, too, says Jameelah, we’re kids and the street is right out there and Krap-Krüger can’t prove we took anything, for all he knows we’re just bad at drumming up donations.

  We go back to the table and when Jameelah sees Lukas she starts shaking the leftover coins in the jar. Just as Krap-Krüger goes to take it from her, the bottom of the jar suddenly breaks and the coins fall to the ground jingling.

  Oh boy, says Krap-Krüger, you two are a handful.

  Wait, I’ll help, says Lukas squatting down beside Jameelah and together they gather up the coins.

  So, are we going to the pool now, I ask.

  Sure, says Lukas and he smiles and looks at me with his big Bambi eyes. I can see the pool in his eyes, the shimmering green lawn, his green towel and how it’s laid out on the lawn, and how he moves little by little toward Jameelah, but then just at the moment when she reaches out to touch his hair and kiss him he jumps up and gallops away, galloping off and disappearing forever in his green life.

  I know you can’t really see the shimmering green lawn in Bambi eyes, I know that only works with the last unicorn. It’s just a Fata Morgana, like a thirsty wanderer staggering across the desert sees.

  Oh man, says Jameelah when we’re heading home from the pool on the train, Lukas.

  What about him, I ask.

  Nothing, says Jameelah, he’s so sweet. The sweetest.

  So?

  What?

  So what’s up with you two, I ask.

  No idea, says Jameelah looking at the ground, nothing somehow.

  Maybe it’s something to do with his school, I say, Laura told me they don’t have sex education there until they’re fourteen. Maybe he only recently learned how everything works.

  No way!

  Seriously. They think rape means to ask someone for their phone number.

  Shut up, Jameelah says, Lukas isn’t that stupid.

  Then you just need to get together with him alone, I say, not at the pool or whatever, I mean, getting him to put sunscreen on is okay as a start, but not if that’s all that ever happens.

  But he likes me, I think.

  Of course he likes you, I say, but he’s a skittish forest creature, he’ll never come to you on his own, he’s the type you have to hunt, or better yet lay a trap for.

  Yeah, says Jameelah looking out the window, which is why I’m done.

  With what?

  I’m done practising.

  What are you talking about, I ask.

  Come on, you know.

  No, I have no idea.

  Yes, you do, says Jameelah with a conspiratorial look.

  Oh, that.

  I don’t want to practise anymore, she says, I want to go to bed with someone for real. For the first time, you know, Lukas and me.

  Yeah, me too, I say, I just don’t know who with.

  On the walk home I think about it seriously. What about the sweet guy at Tiergarten? It would probably be nice with him, and maybe everything would smell like Weleda, I try to imagine it but in the end I can’t imagine it with anyone except Nico.

  At home I notice I have a bad sunburn on my shoulders. I put on my pyjamas even though I’m not tired at all. Jessi is lying on the sofa with Mama watching Crimewatch. The sky has darkened and outside it’s starting to thunder and lightning as rain begins to smack onto the dry streets. I open the window in my room wide so I can smell the storm. My phone rings.

  Thank goodness you answered, says Jameelah sounding agitated, Jasna’s on the balcony and she says she’s going to jump.

  No, I think, this is just another one of Jameelah’s stories.

  Seriously, she really is standing on the railing of her balcony and unless a miracle happens she’s going to jump, there’s already an ambulance and a fire truck here.

  Quickly I pull a hoodie over my pyjamas and run out and head across the playground. The wet sand squishes beneath my Chucks. The farther I run the louder the sirens get and there’s cops and EMTs all over the place, the pavement in front of the building is jammed with people. Jameelah is standing in the street and waves me over to her, the hood of her jumper is pulled down over her face. I look up to the balcony but nobody’s there.

  She was there until a second ago, says Jameelah, Tarik locked her in their apartment but now she’s not letting anyone in. We all had to evacuate to the street because she threatened to blow the place up with the stove if anyone tried to come into the apartment.

  I want to answer but just then the door to the balcony opens. Jasna has her long hair pulled into a thick ponytail and it’s hanging over her chest all the way down to her hips like in a fairytale, like someone has just shouted for Rapunzel to let down her hair. Her hands claw the balcony handrail covered with henna tattoos, blood-red. All around us are uniformed men in the street, yellow, red, blue uniforms standing around smoking and waiting to see what Jasna’s next move will be.

  Like on TV, says Jameelah pointing at the firemen who have spread out one of those things you can jump onto and when I see it I get a lump in my throat in the exact spot where the scar from the tracheotomy is and I suck in a deep breath of air like I’m going to have to stay underwater for a long time.

  Amir, I say, where is Amir.

  Jameelah slowly lifts her arm like she’s underwater too and with her lips she starts to form some word but I turn and see Amir and Tarik and Selma and their mother on the pavement not far from us and I go over to them but somehow they’re actually really far away even though they are all standing right there nearby and it seems like an eternity before I reach then.

  Amir, I say but he doesn’t react, he just stares up at the balcony, Tarik, I say, but he doesn’t react either. Cautiously I touch his arm and when he turns to me I have to gulp again because I’ve never seen Tarik crying before, I didn’t even know he could.

  Kiddo, he says putting his arm around my sho
ulders, go home, go home as fast as you can but then Tarik’s mother throws her hand in front of her mouth and screams. I look up at the balcony and Jasna is sitting on the railing. It’s not as bad as it seems, I think breathing deeply, it’s just a bad movie, a porno with Rapunzel in the lead role. Now the men on the street, the firemen and EMTs and police, all seem to start to stretch toward the balcony. It’s easy to imagine since Jasna’s not wearing anything but her yellow bikini.

  Dragan where are you, where is my fiancé, Jasna shouts.

  Can someone find this Dragan, says a police officer to Tarik, where is this man?

  I think he’s at the gym, says Amir quietly, I saw him earlier with his duffel bag.

  Then you can at least try to talk to her, says one of the firemen to Jasna’s mother.

  She should get out of here I don’t want to talk to her, screams Jasna climbing back down from the railing, get out of here she screams and then she starts throwing all kinds of stuff down from the balcony, rubbish, the rack for drying clothes, Selma’s stroller, and everything lands one after the next on the street near us. Jasna’s mother sobs more loudly.

  Yeah, now you’re crying, screams Jasna, but first, first you drag me into this world and then you leave me all alone and now, now when I want to die you cry.

  Her mother shelters herself in Tarik’s arms and puts her hands on his broad shoulders and makes two fists and in one fist I can see a balled up white tissue. Always the tissues, I think, like tiny stuffed animals but for mothers, for sorrows, sad little stuffed animals made of tears, each with its own story.

  A man in a yellow vest shoves me aside. On his back it says Police Psychologist and beneath that a number.

  You don’t have to die, says the man, there’s always another way out, no matter what the problem.

  Jasna laughs.

  What do you know about my life doctor psycho?

  Suddenly Tarik steps forward.

  Then go ahead and jump, he shouts, jump you Serbian Chetnik whore.

  You can’t tell me what to do, screams Jasna back, you’re not my father.

  Your father, pah, says Tarik spitting on the ground.

  The rain picks up. The firemen tussle and form a circle and one of them opens an umbrella that says Bad Weather on it.

  That’s enough, says the man in the yellow vest to Tarik, how can you talk to your sister that way, this is not a situation for that sort of talk.

  That thing is not my sister, says Tarik looking straight at the man in the vest.

  I’ll kill all of you, I’ll kill all of you, screams Jasna and then she runs back into the apartment.

  One of the firemen puts out his arms and says everyone to the other side of the street, please move to the other side of the street and remain calm.

  Now the building is going to explode I bet, says Jameelah, she’s going to blow it up.

  Noura comes down the street toward us, I hear the steady hammering of her heels on the asphalt, I see the white nurse’s uniform sticking out from under her jacket.

  What’s going on here, she asks shaking Jameelah’s shoulders, what are you doing outside in the rain?

  Jameelah mumbles something but all I can do is stare at the building as muted screams issue from it. The place has transformed into a locked music box. The ballerina inside has momentarily escaped from the box and is now losing her mind. Somehow I can understand Jasna, it must be awful to be imprisoned inside a dark box and then every time somebody opens the box you get spun around to some stupid melody. It rains and it rains. The pyjamas under my hoodie are soaked right through to my skin though it dulls the burning pain on my shoulders and when Jasna comes back out onto the balcony and climbs up on the railing again I get goose bumps.

  Oh no, says Jameelah, she’s really going to do it now.

  Today is the last day of school and I pick up Jameelah and Amir as usual. Amir is in the hallway trying to get rid of another couple of journalists, there have been journalists standing around from morning until night since the whole situation with Jasna.

  Is it true that your sister was released from the hospital the day before yesterday, asks one of them. In his hands he has a notebook and he can’t wait to write something down in it.

  Amir nods glumly. He’s had another smacking. Right under his eye is a big round purple blotch that his mother must have put there with her fat gold ring.

  Your sister’s boyfriend told us that she was transported to a secret location in order to protect her from your family, is that true, asks the journalist.

  I don’t know, says Amir.

  Has she been in contact with you?

  No she hasn’t.

  You are her little brother, she doesn’t need to be afraid of you.

  Amir looks over at me for help.

  She only broke her leg, I say going over to stand next to him.

  I mean really, only broke her leg, says the woman standing behind the guy with the notebook, it was a cry for help you need to dig deeper, and when I don’t know how to answer her she says, of all people a young woman should … but I don’t hear what a young woman should because luckily Jameelah comes rumbling down the stairs.

  You’re annoying, she says to the two journalists, don’t you get it.

  I’m from the biggest paper in town, says the guy.

  Go interview some neo-Nazis, says Jameelah pulling Amir toward the exit.

  Amir’s eye doesn’t look good at all and since we have some time before school we stop at the convenience store and buy a Müller milk and go to the playground. We sit down in the play fort above the slide and smoke a cigarette. Amir holds the cold milk container against his shiner.

  In Germany it’s a crime to hit a child did you know that, says Jameelah.

  I’m not a child, says Amir.

  You are in the eyes of the law and if you hit a child in Germany you can be arrested for it.

  Even for a smack, I ask.

  I don’t know, but it’s the correct answer in any case.

  Correct answer to what, asks Amir.

  The German test, that was one of the questions.

  Test, I say, do we have a test today?

  Oh please no, says Amir.

  No, says Jameelah, I mean the test for German citizenship. You have to know everything about Germany, what the duties of the president are and what holiday do you wear a mask for and all sorts of stuff like that.

  I have no idea what she’s talking about.

  Why would you need to know that, says Amir.

  For whenever, in case we end up becoming Germans. I’ll be ready for the questions already, it’s smart.

  It’s moronic, says Amir.

  Jameelah looks at him angrily.

  What’s moronic about it?

  Nothing, says Amir, what are you trying to tell me? That I should press charges against my own mother or what?

  Man, it just popped into my head, says Jameelah, don’t get bent out of shape.

  Nobody says anything for a while.

  I didn’t mean it that way, says Jameelah at some point, you know that, right?

  It’s fine, says Amir.

  Come on, I say, we have to get going.

  When Frau Struck comes into the classroom with the report cards she looks the way she always does on the last day of school. She’s put pink lipstick on her thin lips and rouge on her face. To celebrate the day she also has on a dress, a white summer dress made out of linen, a typical teacher dress. The dress is so flimsy on the sides that you can see her cheap undershirt through it and because she’s not wearing a bra her breasts hang there like shrivelled water balloons. Her feet are in sandals and her toenails are painted, but no matter how much nail polish Struck uses her feet still look old, with cracks and scabby skin. Which we get put right in our faces on the last day of school, thanks ever so much.

  Frau Struck always smiles on the last day of school because she’s looking forward to summer break more than all of us put together and also she thinks we can’t fig
ure that out. She puts on a shitty dress, polishes her gnarled feet and acts all friendly, but up front on her lectern next to the report cards are her holiday books – a guidebook to South Africa and a teach-yourself-English crime novel.

  So what are you all doing this summer, Struck asks as she distributes the report cards.

  Fucking Frau Struck, says someone at the back quietly enough that you can’t tell who it was but loud enough for the entire class to hear.

  Everyone erupts with laughter. Struck gets red splotches all over and tears well up in her eyes. For a second I feel sorry for her but when she smacks my report card on the table and I see that she’s given me Fs in maths and biology that feeling is gone immediately. She should just go and disappear without a trace wherever it is she’s heading, abducted like a character in her stupid crime novel, that would be something, Struck abducted by the Taliban and nobody willing to pay the ransom.

  The first thing we do at the end of the school day is lock ourselves in the girls’ bathroom. We dump the milk out of the Müller container we bought that morning and pour in Mariacron brandy, maracuja juice and the last school cafeteria milk of the year and take turns sipping it and roll a cigarette.

  Did I tell you I’m getting my wisdom teeth out at the end of the summer, I say.

  Really, says Jameelah looking enviously at me, at the children’s hospital? It’s so nice there.

  Yeah.

  So what are we going to do for summer break?

  Not fuck Frau Struck, that’s for sure.

  Jameelah laughs.

  No, but how about permitting ourselves to be deflowered, she says, what do you say?

  I don’t know what she’s talking about.

  Lose our virginity, we’ll lose our virginity. We’ll find the nicest boys in the world and go to bed with them. I’m through practising.

  Good idea, I say and though I’d kind of forgotten about it, now that Jameelah brings it up it does seem like a good idea and it’s about time though she doesn’t need to talk in such a sophisticated way about it.