Fingers Pointing Somewhere Else by Daniela Fischerova, Neil Bermel

village; people here lived openly and out loud. This was, incidentally, what she had always dreamed of. Two of her marriages foundered on her attempt to turn their home into a brightly lit stage.
    â€œWell I’ll be! Young lady!” Mr. Å efl hollered. Eva could smell his brandy across the room. “What in God’s name brings youhere?”
    The noise in the kitchen stopped instantly. Everyone turned toward Eva. She had to summon all her strength even to cross the threshold.
    â€œGot something nice for us, young lady?”
    The woman with the bowl of dough was breathing heavily. The child ran its pencil over Eva’s ankle. The other five people looked her over with undisguised interest. The muscles around Eva’s mouth tightened.
    â€œI see I’ve come at a bad time,” she said too rapidly and, for some reason, a bit defensively. A speck of dirt had gotten behind her contact lens and now was not a good time to take it out. Just get it over with, she advised herself, and continued even more curtly.
    â€œDon’t worry, I don’t mean to bother you. I’m here on account of my father. You couldn’t have known, but he’s in serious shape. In the first place, he’s seventy, and in the second, he’s just had another heart attack.”
    I’m reasoning with him, I’m reasoning again! She felt a wave of despair. I sound like a Martian. I wanted to be simple and touching, I wanted to cry. The dust speck behind her lens made her scrunch her eyelid curiously. Her eye was suffering, like an oyster making a pearl. Eva took a deep breath.
    â€œMr. Å efl, you’re supposed to do that roof for my father.”
    She caught sight of his wife, a pair of chicken shears in her hand, listening inhospitably. The child was poking her in the leg with the pencil point.
    â€œMr. Å efl, it’s out of the question. Absolutely out of the question. I have to ask you not to take the job.”
    The silence in the room thickened. Everyone, even the child with the pencil, was staring at her blankly. Unintentionally she tensed her calves and fell to her knees. She had the unhappy feeling that it was a losing cause.
    â€œBut young lady,” Mr. Å efl said with surprise in his voice, “it’s all worked out, isn’t it? I thought you knew. Your mother was here about two weeks ago, and asked me to beg off the roof. Shecried, the poor thing, did she ever cry! She was afraid your dad wasn’t up to the work. That he’d insist on helping us and that it might kill him.”

    It was almost midnight when Eva finally settled into a hot bath and poured herself a large glass of vodka. For a while she hesitated about calling her brother, but then the vodka took matters in hand, and Eva picked up the receiver right in the tub.
    â€œListen up, brother,” she said without greeting him, “MalÅ¡ov’s off our necks. He’s not going up on the roof this year. No way.”
    She took a swig. “Surprise, surprise. Mr. Å efl doesn’t have the wood. What a coincidence. And know who made this magic happen? Guess!”
    â€œWell?” came his expressionless voice from afar. It did not have not much interest in it.
    â€œWe’re greenhorns, IÅ¡a. Two babbling bunglers. It’s useless, we can’t compete.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about, Eva?”
    â€œWhat? Don’t you mean who?”
    She poured herself some more vodka and turned the hot water on. She had to raise her voice to drown out the noise from the faucet.
    â€œOur omniscient mother, of course. She’s got our number, don’t you think?”
    â€œEva, can’t we talk about this another time? It’s midnight.”
    â€œAs if I don’t know what time it is! I’ve been on the road from stupid MalÅ¡ov for ages! And know what the funniest part of it is? That Dad thinks Mother is on his side. As always. So I’m the pesky troublemaker