“What happened to you?” the man said, gesturing to Petar’s arm.
“Shattered humerus. Shrapnel still in there.” I felt bad that I’d never asked, but it had always seemed like he didn’t want to talk about it, and that I could understand.
The man changed the subject. “And what can I do for you today?” He squatted down when he spoke to me. “You want a driver’s license?”
“Ha ha,” said Petar, and the two men executed a combination handshake-hug. The man kissed Petar three times, the Orthodox way, and I winced. “Ana,” Petar said, “this is Srdjan.” An indisputably Serbian name. My heartbeat quickened. “An old friend from high school. Srdjan knew your parents.”
Srdjan was holding out his hand. “Yes,” he said. “I’m sorry to hear.”
“Go on then. Shake his hand.”
“I can help you,” Srdjan said. I put my hand in his. “I hear you need an American visa.”
I looked up at Petar, who nodded. I nodded, too.
“Well, luckily, I happen to produce absolutely foolproof visas,” Srdjan said, with a sweeping gesture at his workshop. “I even have the very same paper that the United States of America uses.” He rummaged through paper-filled cabinets. “How are you going to fly?”
“Probably through Germany,” Petar said. “I’m still working out the finer points.”
“Germany,” he said. “As long as you stay in the international terminal you’ll be fine.”
He flipped some levers on the printing equipment, and the machines hummed. “With this paper I can produce exact American replicas! I got it from an intern at the embassy—”
“She doesn’t need to know where you got it,” Petar said, predicting the course of the story.
“Tits”—Srdjan held his hands far out from his chest—“as big as honeydew melons, I shit you not.”
Petar chuckled uneasily, and Srdjan looked surprised to find worry in his friend’s face.
“What’s wrong with tits? She’s a girl. She’s going to have tits.”
“All right! Enough with the tits.”
“Fine,” Srdjan said. He looked down at me. “Didn’t know he was so sensitive.”
“What about a passport?”
“What do you mean? We’ll just staple it in her regular passport.”
“It got…lost,” Petar said.
“Well, you could apply for a new one.”
“Not enough time. Can’t you just make her one? Make her a German one!”
“Yeah, I’ll make a fake German passport and we’ll send a kid who doesn’t speak any German to Germany with it!” Srdjan raised the heel of his hand and smacked Petar in the forehead, then shot me a wink. “Look out—we’ve got a real genius on our hands!”
“All right, all right,” said Petar. “Make her one of ours then. Don’t you need to take her picture or something?”
“Indeed.” Srdjan adjusted a pair of photographer’s lights that looked like umbrellas, and I stood stoic against a white sheet while he snapped a picture.
“I’ll be back to pick it up Wednesday?” Petar handed him an envelope, and Srdjan fingered the flap and peeked inside. “I’ll bring the rest then.”
“Very well,” Srdjan said, and took a dramatic bow before walking us to the door and releasing us out into the daylight. “Ana.”
I turned back.
“Your parents. They were good.”
“Thanks.” I tried to think of something better to say, but Srdjan had already shut the door, the dead bolts clicking behind us.
—
Voices of my neighbors echoed in the stairwell as we climbed the stairs to my flat; the walls there had always been thin. Just as I’d been unsettled at the idea that my friends had been going to school without me, I was shocked to find people were still living out normal existences here in my building, that their lives had not stalled as mine had. Petar turned the extra key in the lock, but instead of smashing against the wall, the door stuck to the frame, and he forced it open with his good shoulder.
“Can you stay out here?” I said. He looked hurt but hung back anyway.
Inside, the room was dim and the air was stale. Cuts of sunlight slid between the blinds, revealing swirling columns of dust. The door to my parents’ bedroom was closed, and I left it that way and moved through the kitchen. A sour smell emanated from the refrigerator, and something small and shadowy ran alongside the baseboard and disappeared under the door of the pantry.