In Lisičići news always arrives before the bus. When Enes got off at the crossroads above the lake, in a red Norwegian jacket with strips that glow in the dark and a watch like nobody in the village owned, the whole village already knew he was back, and he still did not know what everyone else knew. His mother held him for a long time, and then, without letting go, she told him in his ear what he had already read on the neighbors' faces: Džana had gotten married in May, to Zahir, the one who drove a truck for the quarry.
Zahir was fifteen years older than her, a quiet, broad-backed man who drove stone in a truck and trailer to the port of Ploče and back, and once a month farther, to Germany, for a week at a time. He had built a two-story house across from Bećir's trout farm and brought Džana into it, with a ring that, people said, had cost him half a truck. The next day Enes bought a used Golf and parked it under her balcony, windows open and music turned all the way up. On the third evening she came out onto the balcony. "I waited for you for a year, Enes," she said. "And you sent me pictures of salmon." "I sent you messages every night," he said. "Every other night," she said. "Then every seventh."
Out of spite he took a job with Bećir, at the trout farm. He had known trout since he was small, so Bećir, who believed only in work, gave him the keys to the storehouse in the very first week. Bećir's daughter Almasa kept the books and sold fish to the weekenders. She was loud, laughed out loud and never wore heels. Enes brought her Norwegian chocolate and stood with her beside the pools, always turned so that he could be seen from Džana's balcony. Almasa noticed it the first day and pretended she had not, because she liked him more than she dared admit.
Džana watched. She watched while she hung the laundry, while she watered the geraniums, while Zahir slept after a run. When Zahir left for Germany for ten days at the end of July, she sent Enes a message of three words: "Come tonight, orchard way." Enes looked at the screen for a long time. Then he went, and the kitchen door closed behind him quietly, as if someone had been oiling it for days.
In the nights that followed the Golf slept behind the orchard, where it could not be seen from the road but could be seen from the trout farm. In the mornings Enes came to work sleepless and silent and no longer stood beside the pools turned toward the balcony. Almasa noticed that before anything else. On the third night she could not sleep, went down to the pools to check the pump, and saw the headlights of the Golf go dark behind Zahir's plum trees.
In the morning she was waiting for him in the storehouse. "I know where you sleep," she said. Enes lied, then lied once more, then got angry, because it is easier to get angry than to lie a third time. "Stay out of it, Almasa. You are a good girl. Girls like that stay out of things." "Am I good to you only while she is watching?" she asked. He did not answer. He picked up the bucket of feed and went to the pools, and she stayed among the sacks, and that was when she decided something that would later weigh on her more than anything.
Zahir came back on Friday toward evening. As always, he left the truck at the wide spot by the bend and set off home on foot with a bag over his shoulder. Almasa was waiting for him at the bend. She told him everything, briefly, looking at the asphalt: while he hauled stone, his wife received guests, and the guest slept behind the plum trees. Zahir was silent for a long time. "If you lied," he said at last, "neither your father nor the village will forgive you." "I did not lie," she said. "That is why no one will forgive me."
On Saturday there was a village fair on the meadow by the lake, with roast lamb, an accordion and a tent where beer was poured. Enes was in high spirits and loud, and he was paying for the whole table with Norwegian money changed into marks. When Zahir came into the tent, Enes held out a glass to him. Zahir looked at it and put it back on the table. "I do not drink with you," he said, quietly enough that only half the tent heard him. The accordion stopped. "Tomorrow at six. At the old landing." Enes stood up. He could have lied, and everyone knew it. "I will come," he said, and in Lisičići that sounded like a confession.
That night he did not sleep. Before dawn he went into his mother's room, where she was awake anyway, and sat on the edge of the bed like a boy. "Forgive me, Mother," he said. "Forgive you for what?" "Everything. And if I am not back by noon, go to Bećir's and look after Almasa. She has no one but me." Hava looked at him the way she had looked at him when he was seven and lied that he had not been at the lake. "Almasa has a father and a trout farm, son," she said. "You are the one who has no one."
Mist lay over the lake, and there was no one on the landing but Zahir. He had nothing in his hands. Enes stopped two steps from him and let his arms drop. "Hit me," he said. "I will not defend myself." "I would not hit you if you paid me," said Zahir. "Then you would be the one the truck driver beat up, and the women would pity you for twenty years. Last night I asked her. She said she loves you. She said it to my face, in my own kitchen."
He turned toward the end of the landing. Out of the mist came Džana, in a coat, with a travel bag in her hand. She did not look at either of them. "I told her to wait for you here at six," said Zahir. "If you want her, take her. Today. To Norway, to Konjic, wherever you like. I will sign whatever needs signing. But you take her for the rest of your life, not until I come back from a run."
Enes looked at the bag. For a year he had thought Džana was all he wanted, and now, when she stood ten feet away from him with a bag in her hand, he could not take a single step. He was silent too long. Džana saw it before either of the men did. She set the bag down on the wet boards. Zahir picked it up, slung it over his shoulder and set off up the path toward the village without looking back. Džana stood a little longer, and then she followed him, one step behind, her head bowed.
On the road above the landing stood Almasa, out of breath, in the rubber boots from the trout farm. She had been running since half past five, because she was afraid of what she might find. Enes walked past her and stopped only once. "You told him," he said. He was not asking. "I did," she said. He nodded, as if someone had confirmed a bus timetable for him, and went home for his bag.
The noon bus to Sarajevo stopped at the crossroads. Hava put pita and two boiled eggs in a bag for him, the same as last year, and did not cry until the bus pulled away. Through the window Enes saw the trout farm and Almasa, who was throwing feed into a pool and did not raise her head. As soon as the trout farm disappeared behind the bend, his phone buzzed. A message from Džana: "Let me know when you land." He held it in his hand all the way to Konjic, neither answering nor deleting it.