Isakâs life, and left. To Grandma he said you sleep, Iâm fine. Iâve been fine for some time now . She was sleepless until the day he died. To Mom he said thereâs no one left. Just the two of us and the darkness . And then he died. Mom closed his eyes and wrote the words down on a box of laxatives. I was at the seaside at the time, with my auntie Lola, Grandmaâs sister. I marked the date in the calendar with a little cross. So people would know my grandpa had died. Actually, no, I did it so theyâd know I knew my grandpa was dead.
That day Auntie Lola baked some cakes, put a plateful in front ofme, sat down across from me, and placing her elbows on the table said eat up, little man . I ate, scared she was going to tell me Grandpa had died. I didnât know how I was supposed to react. Was I supposed to stop eating cakes, burst into tears, ask how he died, shake my head, and say tsk-tsk-tsk like I saw Granny Matija from Punta doing the time I peeked out from the pantry, or was I supposed to do something else, something I didnât even know about. Iâm only six years old and donât have any experience with the rituals of death. I ate a plateful of cakes and got a tummy ache. I climbed into bed, the blinds were down so it looked like it was dark. I flew a plane through the darkness. I didnât do the brmm brmm brmm because the plane was supersonic so you couldnât hear it, but eavesdropped on what Auntie Lola told the neighbors gathered in the kitchen with their gifts of coffee, bottles of rakia, and something else I couldnât see. The good Signore Fran suffered so, may God rest his soul , said Ante Pudin. Heâs at peace now, but who knows what awaits the rest of us , said Uncle Kruno, a retired admiral. The little one might as well be an orphan now; parents today, God save us. Whatever he learned, he learned from his grandpa , said Auntie Lola. My tummy still hurt. I shut my eyes tight, farted, and fell asleep.
Seven days later, Mom and Grandma arrived from Sarajevo, head to toe in black. I pretended this was normal. They pretended it was too. I was scared Mom was going to start talking about it so kept out of her way. I knew Grandma wouldnât say anything. She wasnât one for starting conversation; sheâd leave it up to me and then join in. It was likeshe kept quiet about things I didnât want to talk or hear about. There was nothing to say about Grandpaâs death, just as thereâs nothing to say about anyoneâs death. I had no idea death was a widespread occurrence, that grown-ups talked about it all the time.
Between thunderclaps of his rasping asthmatic cough, Grandpa would every morning repeat sweet, sweet death and Grandma would say zip it Franjo, Iâll go before you do , and so it went every day. I thought other people didnât go on like this, just the two of them, that they were special people because they were my grandma and grandpa, and that everyone else was just a puppet in a puppet theater. When Grandpa died it turned out Grandma was a pretender. I thought she should be ashamed of herself because sheâd done something bad. Sheâd said she would go before him, but now he was dead. You donât really die of your own choosing, but it does have something to do with you, so you shouldnât say youâre going to die before someone else if youâre not. Later on I forgot about Grandmaâs shame. Probably because it didnât seem like she was ashamed.
Once we went to visit Auntie Mina in Dubrovnik. Mom said I donât know if the little fella knows . I was playing with the garden gnomes and making like I didnât hear anything. Auntie Mina looked at me in silence. She wouldâve loved to ask me if I knew about my grandpaâs death, but didnât dare. You donât ask kids those kinds of questions. The poor old boy peed his soul out , Mom told Auntie Mina. The hospital botched the treatment