Klisura: One of my first trips in Bulgaria

It was late in January 2015. I zipped up my backpack with just a toothbrush and a shawl in it and left for the central station. I took the slow train to Karlovo, which proved to be a huge mistake. Bulgaria doesn’t have that many inhabitants but it surely has many train stations. We stopped everywhere, even in fields with just a pavement beside the tracks. No passengers getting off or boarding. A few hours later, we passed several long tunnels and I arrived in Klisura. A small town in Central Bulgaria. I wanted to walk to the vacation homes just outside the village and spend the night there. It was one of my first trips into the country. As the town is right beneath the mountains and the snow had started melting, the streets were full of water. My Nike shoes proved not to be water resistant and within seconds of leaving the train station, my feet were wet. The water was cold as ice and I realized how unprepared I was for this trip, even though it was just an overnight stay. As I walked towards the center, a woman who looked about 30 caught up to me. She had apparently been on the same train.

We talked and in my broken Bulgarian we agreed to have some tea in a local cafe. I had tea and she had vodka. She was from another town nearby and had come for a date, she would be spending the night in a vacation home as well. Her name was Petya and she had large earrings with dark purplish hair. She was a big woman yet attractive in a way. She kept laughing as I was with my socks on only and had put my shoes by the fireplace to dry. My socks were still spongy. She had at least three vodkas and said she would meet the guy in the same cafe. I asked the waitress if by any chance they sold shoes nearby, so I could at least enjoy the rest of my day. “No, not a chance” she said. I walked uphill and could walk across from the stream of melt water that came down from the mountains. My shoes still got wet and I was cold and tired. It was only one in the afternoon. When I got to the vacation park, I got the keys to a little house and directly put on new socks, then spent some time in the restaurant having tea. Eventually, as it was impossible to do any walking with wet shoes, I just took a hot shower and got into bed. I had exchanged numbers with Petya and she texted me that her guy was late. Eventually he would come, she thought.

I spent a couple of hours in bed, thinking about how my first winter in Bulgaria had been and how I had failed to bring some sturdy shoes. I thought about the time coming in this country and as often, I was overthinking if I’d made the right choice or not. It’s not always easy being in another country alone, it can be downright hard sometimes. It was the first time I was a bit sad but meanwhile I was cozy and comfortable. The curtains were wide open and I sat straight up in bed, looking outside the window towards the white mountains. The small heater right next to my bed was the single source of warmth in the entire home. Apart from that, there was an corner couch and a tv on the wall. There was also a scale right next to the couch. I got up and weighed myself, then directly got cold and slipped back into bed. I enjoyed the silence but felt a bit homesick as well. Eventually, I enjoyed the time spent in bed and I had to let go of the thought of always having to do something. Now that I couldn’t walk through the town or the hills, I still had to make the best of it. As the clouds passed by the window and I listened to the wind speeding past the corners of the little house, I fell into a deep sleep and woke up when it got dark. My shoes, that I’d placed by the heater, had dried up and I felt fresh to start moving again. I got dressed, locked the door behind me and walked towards the restaurant.

As I sat down and ordered a nice beer, I looked across the restaurant. Several couples, young and old. In the corner I saw the two lovebirds, Petya and her guy. I was glad he had come and I saw what looked like the start of their first kiss. When she saw me later on she winked and I nodded my head. I was the only one who was alone in the restaurant, as it was often. I was always satisfied in places alone and felt good observing and thinking. I looked into the fireplace and to the decorations on the wall. A small porcelain deer, some hunting trophies and even a gun. Because, as I said to myself, you’re only lonely if you feel that way. I enjoyed a quiet evening with good music, later some rakia and above all my dry shoes. What a joy was that.

Boyan's reflections

Boyan slowly dozed off by the fireplace. As his head dropped, he continuously shook awake again. He had drunk too much and this would disrupt his sleep. Apart from that, his night was pleasant. He had reflected on his ended marriage with Sylvia, the woman who left him for a more independent life. She had felt trapped like stuck with glue and wanted more adventure. Boyan was left with his inner voice and had days to fill, reflecting on the best parts of his life. As a pensioner, he had little to do but chop wood for the fireplace and stuck it next to the house in a neat pile. His father had taught him to master building a woodpile so he would be nice and warm through winter. “The trick is to lay the wood in the sun. If not possible, place it where it’s windy. Wind dries wood faster than the sun”, is what his dad would tell. Boyan had always loved to head into the forest but his wife Sylvia was never up for it. Exactly for that reason he didn’t understand what she went after in her current, more adventurous episode. Boyan thought she just got tired of him as he was not much of a talker. He strongly disliked discussing things as the weather or the latest gossip.

Boyan was a man of action rather than words. Spoken words do only so little. A man is no man when he makes promises but does not live up to them. Boyan wondered why Sylvia would never join him into the forest, so he could show her how to chop wood and later carve objects. Boyan looked at the wall and some artefacts he made still hang there, like nothing had changed. Boyan had wanted to burn them in the fireplace upon her leaving but he kept them to admire his own craftsmanship. Boyan was not exactly looking for another relationship, not even so much for companionship. He liked the calm mornings when he slowly sipped tea and made crossword puzzles. It was always Sylvia whom hit his newspaper whilst he held it up, she would even take a pen to cross through the puzzles he was solving. Rather annoying. “You’re such a bore. Why not cuddle in bed instead of this? Old bag!” she said jokingly. She was quite serious about it, as it turned out.

An uncomfortable feeling took over Boyan and he remembered how he never really loved Sylvia. He could imagine she felt she got the cold shoulder. From their wedding at the coast until the point she left, he had been too afraid to tell her his true feelings. He had never felt intimate with anyone and severely doubted the love for her that he vouched for at their wedding. Sylvia was a woman of traditions and permitted little space for imperfections. As the years passed, they had children, which Boyan felt forced into. Both of them thought it would bring them closer together. How Boyan had performed the act of lovemaking once more, he did not know. Boyan had always lived up to each and everyone’s expectations. As Sylvia had left, his soul cracked and Boyan felt broken for many months on end. Somehow, during his reflections, he had forgiven himself. He forgave Sylvia for leaving and himself for not being able to give her the love he had promised. Likewise, he forgave himself for being a loveless husband when their children grew up. Forced hugs and Sylvia’s wanting eyes just proved their children that something was not right. The spark had never been there, which tore Sylvia apart. She knew she had just one shot at starting the perfect family, at least so she felt.

Boyan had held his breath for at least ten seconds and let go again. These reflections did him much good but not when he was alone. When alone, the mind can turn into an enemy and start making trouble against you. It can be a friend first and at second it can quickly turn its back on you. It looks inside its every nook and finds matters to reflect on, not always positive. Fatalistic often. Every upside has a downside and still, Boyan had to live with himself and his restless mind. He had started breathing more deeply to feel more grounded, in an attempt to give his lost years a place in history. When the thoughts piled up again, he poured another glass of rakia and mumbled “cheers. Old bag that you are”. He started breathing consciously again and then, the phone rang. It was his son Artur, the only child he was still in touch with. The others either didn’t answer his calls or would pick up and make an end to it after just a few minutes. “How are you, son..” Boyan said as he exhaled. “I'm fine, thank you. I think I’m in love, dad. But I’m not sure. I think she loves me and I want to love her.. But how can I be sure I love her too?” Boyan had a sense of recognition and felt the doubt in Artur’s voice. “You’ll know it when you feel it, son. But first, you’ll have to love yourself. If you take the utmost care of you first and put yourself on place number one for a while, you’ll be able to love another soul. I know you have problems saying no but you have to ask yourself if you really want to get to know this girl. Son, you must not live up to everyone's expectation. Not your mother’s, as she could care less, and not to mine. Not to the girls’. Be the man you want yourself to be first.” “Dad, how can I be a man I want to be?”, Artur said. “I’ll tell you what I realized way too late. You pour yourself a glass, look at anything intensely, a blank wall for all I care. Then you let your thoughts race and do not interrupt them. In your silence, you’ll find answers. The right answers. If you make your unconsciousness conscious, you will not walk through life in a haze anymore. Only when you have buckets full of love for yourself, and these overflow when you take them from the well that is your mind, you can share the drink of love with another soul.” Boyan and Artur both realized that the lack of love for the self, led to the divorce. “The one expectation I do have from you, son, is that you give more love to you than I did to myself.”

© copyright 2017 - All Rights Reserved

#Shortstory

Marto and the trolley bus passenger

Marto passed the steering wheel through his thick sausage hands. His wedding ring suffocated his finger and seemed to symbolized his marriage that was figuratively gasping without air. He drove long shifts on the trolley bus and had little time to see his wife Irina. Marto was on his way to the trolley bus depot, it was his last ride after a long day. Now the trolley bus would derive from the original route, towards the depot, Marto opened the door of the driver cabin and screamed “final stop” to the five remaining passengers. “How should I get home now?” called a rude skater kid. “Why in the Lord’s name should I care, use your board man.” Passengers always got on Marto’s nerves and it led him to overeat during his breaks. This in combination with as little movement as humanly possible had made Marto a bald fat man. Irina, his curly haired wife, barely saw any reason to stay with him. Their combined meagre salary just made their ends meet.

As Marto rolled into the depot, he looked inside his rear mirrors and saw a woman that had not left the bus yet. “Wasn’t I clear enough at the last stop you duck?”, he screamed towards the slim woman with a fur coat. She wore a hat and little was visible of her face, especially from as far as Marto’s driver seat. “Get out, I have no patience for you”. The woman had been asleep and was now totally disoriented. All the doors opened and the freezing cold embraced her. Snow blew inside the trolley bus and as she looked through the window she saw many other buses, realizing she was in the depot. “Sorry, fell asleep” she said as she took her grocery bags and left the bus with a rather sad face. Marto felt some sympathy and asked “do you know where to go?”. The woman said “not really” and asked at what depot they were. “Zaharna fabrika”, he said. The woman sighed loudly, they both knew the area is not pleasant to walk around at night. The woman would get a cab, she said. Then Marto saw how beautiful the woman actually was and offered a ride with his own car. He felt bad letting a lady walk down the street alone at night. They both had to go southwest over the ring road anyway. Marto just did a short cleanup of his bus and rear-parked it next to the long fence.

As they both walked towards Marto’s beat-up Fiat Panda, the woman introduced herself as Diana. In the car, Diana took off her hat and it seemed she had red hair with a pony ending just above his eyebrows. In the dark car, few words were exchanged. As Marto sped up the runway towards the ring road, his summer tyres could not pull the weight of the little car and it got stuck in the icy snow. Marko put his foot down full throttle and the wheels spinned in an effort to get the car moving again. Little result. Other cars drove around them and Marto had to get out. He realized he’d have an appointment with friends of his wife Irina and as their relationship was already very tense, he knew he absolutely couldn’t miss it. He decided to push the car first while Diana was trying to drive it out of the snow they got in. Marto was already running late and decided to call his wife while using his foot to wipe loose snow under the front wheels. “You worthless hunk of garbage!” could be heard out of the phone from afar. Marto said he was stuck with another woman whom he would bring home. This had been the so-called straw that broke the camel’s bag and Irina, on the other side of the line, completely lost it. “You stay there with your metal piece of junk and that skank you dug op somewhere!” Marto was noticeably angry and threw his phone into the car through the rolled down. It was now Diana that felt sorry for Marto. One last time, one more push and the car jumped forward over the heap of ice they had gotten themselves into. Marto nearly bust his shoulder but his weight had really helped get the car out of its position.

As he crawled back behind the wheel, Marto stepped on it and thick fumes of exhaust polluted the white snow. “I’ve had it with her anyway, I was already thinking of leaving. I think we had the best part of our marriage by now” Marto said in a sad but also kind of relieved way. He then noticed Diana intensely staring at him, like she was closely staring at the freckle on his right cheek. Marto was well aware of his rather unappealing appearance but he was manly and his talk would always help him make friends and meet new people. Diana seemed to have fun with him and they kept laughing at each other’s silly jokes. As Marto left the ring road, Diana explained the way to her place. As they parked in front of the modern apartment building, Marto felt he had completely messed up with Irina, whom he was already completely out of love with. He thrusted his thick fingers through Diana’s hair, a bold move he would normally be scared to make. Diana was tightly holding her grocery bags and was seemingly charmed by the move. She invited Marto in for some herbal tea. Marto accepted the invitation, he was probably not welcome at home anyway at this point. When they entered the bright and spacious apartment, Diana didn’t mention the tea anymore and poured two glasses of chilled white wine. As they clung their glasses they looked each other in the eyes shyly. “Why did you offer me a ride?” Marto replied by saying “I saw an unloved woman and could not leave her in the cold night”. “What about you?” Marto asked. “Why did you invite me into your place?” “I saw an unloved man and could not leave him with a cold wife.” They both laughed and Marto slowly kissed her. Meanwhile Diana was pulling his finger to take of the tight ring. It didn’t move. They had some more wine and Diana took some hand soap, finally taking the tight grip from Marto’s finger. It felt like the tight grip on Marto’s life was instantly released as well.

© copyright 2017 - All Rights Reserved

#Shortstory