The Illegal Kisser

The Illegal Kisser

an unimaginable dictatorship

Azem Deliu


GBP 11,60

Format: 13.5 x 21.5 cm
Number of Pages: 50
ISBN: 978-3-99048-857-7
Release Date: 18.10.2018
Deliu’s heart-wrenching yet thought-provoking story takes up an ever recurring theme: love. Only this time, we found ourselves in a world where love is portrayed as a menace, bringing trouble to humanity, with two striking categories: totalitarism and freedom.
1

The meeting was taking place at the office of the Party Committee of Morality. Apparently, someone was going to be assigned an important task.
The parliamentarian’s speech was not drawing his attention at all. He tried for a while to find the reason for this aloofness, but neither the wrinkles of the speaker, nor his determined facial expression, or his pale fingers coaxed him. He was explaining, in an unbearably cold way, the logic of a decision.
– Aren’t we all equal, comrades? – was what Comrade 34 heard right after he started to pay some attention to the speaker, even though without the proper lucidity. He tried to remember his first name, and when he realized that he was not able to, he returned to the question. “Aren’t we all equal?” As far as the question seemed a logical reasoning following something said before, his next thought, was that he did the right thing by not paying attention to the speech. And still, as if it was the only salvation, he started to build up phrases that, at least for him, would sound beautiful. “Logical reasoning is so disgusting!” ?he puffed.
The eyes were directed constantly to the parliamentarian, but he was not able to create even a single idea on what the other was saying.
The brink of detailed thinking had swallowed him completely and now he became a slave of his thoughts.
After all – he was reasoning to justify himself – aren’t all people like this? We are exclusively slaves of our thoughts. Perhaps someone thought about this before me? – he wondered.
His sight, but not his attention, was drawn by the deep wrinkles of the speaker, whose crystal-clear voice, was crashing almost noisily to the ears. An unexpected silence covered the office and, just for a second, it seemed suffocating to him. The parliamentarian’s voice surprisingly drew all his attention.
– Comrade 34, do you accept the privilege appointed to you by the Party?
The goose-flesh he felt right after, was so shocking, he felt it affected his nails too, let alone his body.
As if he was drunk and without any control he suddenly answered, loudly even:
– I do accept! Using this tone he wanted to kill the silent suspicions of his colleagues that he was elsewhere in his mind, or because he wanted, even though he was thinking the other way, to show willing loyalty and devotion, even through pronunciation.
The previous crisis of remembering his name was getting threateningly closer.
He was thinking about the same question again; “Aren’t we all equal?” And it was exactly because of building this equality idea among the people, that the lower functionaries of the state, simultaneously with the duty assignment and the loyalty oath, were assigned a number by which they would be called from then on. No one ever dared to call them by their previous name. When you were assigned the number, you were honoured by the Party. This was a big event followed by a family celebration. But, now, as he was still trying to remember his previous name, he didn’t feel like celebrating.
He had forgotten himself. This seemed so terrifying to him, that as he was walking outside the office, he nattered, fully disgusted. “Who the hell are you?”
A few minutes later he found himself asking one of the colleagues – a thin-faced guy with a beard – what was the duty assigned to him. The colleague, after a chuckle that maybe was trying to show his subtle superiority towards 34, said in an emphatic and ruthless way, the phrase that was present on the document that he had just approved: You are going to the Leader tomorrow, at 01:00 A.M. It seemed to him that his aloofness was going to give pleasure to the other, so he tried to restrain himself. He felt a mixture of terror and surprise.


2

With one bare foot and the other barely inside the shoe, he headed to the office. The vigor he used to plunge his hand in his pocket was interrupted by a small light on the ground that caught his attention. A meeting at 1:00 o’clock? – he asked himself right after He no longer payed attention to the light, which was probably just a luminous insect. Finally, he slipped his hand in the inner pocket of his coat to take out a cigarette, and only after he had realized that he was smoking, as if he had reached the climax, he dared to ask himself. “What do they need me for?” From the end of the narrow path one could barely notice a pale illumination that he thought was striking his eyes. Then he remembered that long ago, everyone had suggested him to check his eyes up but, who knows why, he was disgusted by doctors. But this time he was regretting his perseverance, although he knew that regret is something that belongs to the moment, while an opinion to eternity. He then transformed the question of “can regret change the opinion? into can the moment change eternity?”, and as if the question would escape, he answered immediately to it. “Eternity consists of moments, not mentioning that every moment is eternal.” But, he thought right after; “am I thinking that the moment and the eternity are the same thing?”
Deceiving himself with these clever-sounding thoughts, he found himself at the end of the path. It was difficult to determine if the light in the middle of the path was the colour of red or light blue. A kind of mild illumination was running in the air. He started to hurry. When he checked the watch, he understood that he had another fifteen minutes to fill with a walk and, after this, he needed to reach the office. Invited by the Leader to a very late meeting like this, nobody, especially him, would dare to be late.


3

Silence was suffocating. The office with its leather chairs, the cold windows, a big trapezium-shaped table in the middle and everything else inside seemed as it was rolled deep in the drooling of that ordinary night. It was even more ordinary than it seemed. The rain that once seemed like it was breaking monotony with that bickering splash on the glass, was actually only strengthening it. It seemed like one of those cases, maybe not that rare, when a child, rebelled to rage, walks to his parent to hit him hard but when gets close to him and understands his strength, suffices just by not hugging him; because the grimace of the elder with his gestures, wound his pride a lot.
The city didn’t care what was going to happen in this office and, apparently, not for the office itself either. It was going on with its life, careless, with a few cars, with plenty of nylon umbrellas and clothes placed messily on the sidewalks. Some wet, some protected from the things the sky tossed them. But, no one, with any type of umbrella, could ever protect himself from what the office was willing to offer.
It was exactly this office that was silent this time, without being noticed by anyone, that in a while was going to perform something not seen before. Apparently, the central power had decided to try if people loved him or feared him.
Because not even the most genuine love could stand this kind of humiliation. Nothing but fear could be the reason of the decision that was about to be made. It seemed strange, that a neglected office, from a state of silence playing with the boring musical notes of monotony, would change into the most popular place in the next weeks. It was like being hit out of nowhere. Who knows if someone, sadly disappointed, after throwing a glare and a look full of rancor, would say: Et tu Brutus?
But this phrase was impossible to be said in a place where the people didn’t know who Brutus used to be. Comrade 34 entered the office.



PART TWO


1

Under the white shine caused by the snowflakes, near the penitentiary building, you could hear a peasant chorus that, uniformly, as if it was an organized opera, was walking in silence. A well-known kind of silence. The mountain nearby, same as when it echoes the sound, it echoed the silence, that kind of dissimilar silence that was built by their steps.


2

He removed the right lapel of his light blue coat, ruffled his wet hair twice with his fingers and sat down. After the usual What are you drinking? – A Turkish coffee, Comrade 34 took out from the small pocket of the inner lapel the cigarette already rolled with the dry oak and lit it up. He sucked its cotton filter and puffed the smoke in the air. Once he saw the fog created right in front of his eyes, he wringed his eyebrows to have a more piercing look. He was searching something in the fog. Maybe love, as every stealthy thing in the world, was in search of vague corners to show up. Exactly right here, thought the detective, is where I’m going to catch him. He sipped the coffee quickly because an alarm was ringing in his pocket. This made him immediately remember the meeting where the Leader had given him besides the duty to investigate love and out of schedule dates, also the device that would measure the heart beatings in the whole area. The device detected higher heart beatings near a bar. He was sceptical to this signal given by the device because it usually used to detect abnormal heart beatings of old men giving up the ghost. However, he should do his job, so he punished himself right away for that previous hesitation. He read the address quickly and, after putting the emptied cup upside-down , he rushed to the door. In the same meeting, the Leader had ordered Emo, the twenty-year-old guy who was well-known for his rhetorical abilities, to create a beautiful speech about love between couples, which of course, didn’t mean the other types of love. When he approached the couple, he noticed that the alarm was signalling them. This time, the device did the trick. He was touched, but he shouldn’t let himself go. He smoothed out his beard with the left hand and, acting naturally, he approached the kiosk on the corner of the street and whispered, afraid that the seller might notice his emotional disorder.
“Give me the daily newspaper please!”


3

He entered the flat rashly with two loafs of bread for her, placing them in the shoe shelf. She was beautiful. It seemed to Sholokhov that during the entire walk, he had forgotten to take a look at her, because, even when he looked at her, he just glanced at her, turning back these damn eyes on that damn street. He was thinking about cameras, but, who knows why, he killed that thought immediately. He told her to get inside and wait for him. He didn’t tell this just to make it more exciting, he needed to go to the bathroom. He was knocked out when he returned to the room. Over her beautiful body, over her shaped arms, over her young and enviable breasts, over her flat belly was a tight woollen quilted jacket, handmade with some white stripes that looked like a seesaw. All this means that she had taken off her coat.
This could seem normal, but for him, having a girl in his room who has only a quilted jacked and a pair of trousers on, was the same as having her naked. He had always been fond of women, but never successful with them. Then he used to defend himself thinking that women are the odd part of the globe; they don’t like the boys following them, and follow the kind of boys that don’t even care about them.
But not only women. Everybody is like this, kept repeating to himself. Nevertheless, he still wasn’t sure of this idea. And he still insisted on the fact that a woman couldn’t have the same rights of a man. He wasn’t aware that the uncertainty and some strange embarrassment had made him whistle and, as one who would prefer to change an argument would do, he was looking all over the room but in her eyes.
He wanted to change argument. Which argument?
There was never an argument. He was afraid of the first time with her. He just didn’t like to have sex. He was afraid. Not only afraid, horrified actually. Just the idea that it could end like that, startled him. He didn’t want to think about the act? The idea that she was a good girl (the traditional way of thinking of a good girl, which meant shy) and thinking that no matter what, he couldn’t reach the “edge”, he calmed himself down. Sadly, she used the long void of the conversation to ask the fatal question.
– Ivan, aren’t you going to kiss me?
He went out of control. He hit the table with all his strength. The wood hurt his fingers when he hit it, but the sound it made had the wanted effect.
– Ivan, what is going on with you?
– Nothing, – he answered. Nothing, he repeated in a lower voice, as if he was in search of a soothing confirmation. He felt something in his stomach. A strange kind of feeling was shuffling the belly. Something wet was bothering him between his legs. It seemed to him that it was cooling him, as much as it was embarrassing him. It is said that it could be a sign of turning on. How come that the glass of water he had forgotten filled up since morning, dropped exactly in front of his legs?
And above all, how could a dropped glass of water turn you on? He resisted as much as he could. At a certain point, he couldn’t resist anymore.
With the same reaction he hit the table, he grabbed her particular shaped head, and kissed her. He kissed her! The enthusiasm was ineffable. Like an epic winner, he raised his fists in the air to celebrate the triumph. Fatal act. The eye (who knows which) noticed the time in the left hand: it was already 7:55:25 P.M. Damn it, he puffed. How could he forget the kissing time? Four minutes and 35 seconds diversion.
The happiness faded out straight away.


4

On Tuesday morning, the police broke into the yard of Sholokhov. They thought for a moment that, the doors that were rattling with a strange messiness were bumping because of the wind.
The mother was stirring the fire with the iron stick that had started to go out. They were so used to the sound of that rattling, that, if it didn’t do that usual “rang-rang” sound, wallowing the concrete floor with the iron latch, they would definitely feel that something was missing from their lives. That’s why on that cold and windy night, nobody thought it was the police and not the wind, who was rattling the iron doors.
A shout came from the corner of the yard.
– Police! Ivan Sholokhov, you are under arrest! – In that exact moment, one of the policeman moved his left foot in a rush, after which he found himself lying backwards on the concrete floor layered with ice due to the cold weather.
Ivan thought this was part of his arresting plan, but a loud laugh of his mother made him understand that in order to give that ridiculous effect, he didn’t move the foot rashly, but he slipped. And he didn’t lie backwards on the ice of the concrete as part of his arresting plan, but he had unbelievably fallen down. In this moment, he couldn’t resist laughing too, in such a way that seemed louder than the noise of the rattling iron door caused by the strong wind.


5

It was Friday. Therefore, three days after his arrest. The prisoners spent three days in a room and then, after they had the trial, they were sent to the dungeon. Even though the room was in awful conditions, it was not considered a prison. He never made resistance to the police, not even verbal. But still with a charge like this, nothing but death penalty would be the decision. However, he decided not to think even a little bit about it. After all, did it matter if he was dead or alive? What about these alive people, what vivid thing have they done so far? The guardians came into the room and took him by the arms.
They were two extremely ugly men and there was no need to look at them to understand that it has been at least two weeks since they shaved. It seemed that they didn’t wear a uniform (or was it their uniform); they were wearing some old and worn-out rugs that were hanging down to their knees. Plainly speaking, they seemed worse than the prisoners. He knew that they could and more likely would, give him the death penalty, but thinking about the shape of those rugs, was more interesting.
They walked for about five minutes through the dark hallway, until they reached the so-called courtroom. It was known that, the convicted person was imprisoned first and then prosecuted, even for small mistakes. Even though in Moralistia, the republic where nothing that could ruin the morality was allowed, one could never know what could be a small mistake. If you wanted to kiss your girlfriend (not the girl you had fallen in love with. This kind of love was forbidden. But the girl you had a relationship with.) So, if you wanted to kiss her, you needed to do this from 08:00 P.M. to 08:00 A.M. A few minutes out of the schedule would send you to jail. When he stopped thinking about this, they found themselves in front of the courtroom; the Long Live the Leader slogan over the door. Once in, he saw that on the wooden benches, situated on both sides of the room and in the line between them, wide enough just for one to pass, a bunch of people were sitting messily waiting for their trial. With a strange precision, exactly thirty-five seconds after Ivan’s entrance, all the people had made themselves comfortable on the benches and everyone was staring seriously at him. After a while, an eleven-year-old boy showed up in the room. He was ready to burst into laughter when they told him that this tyke was going to be his judge. However, no matter how despicable his laughter could be, it would not take off that cloth black dress dropping all over his young body, which time after time touched the ground. But this was the most important thing that ranked him above everyone else present: it represented the status of being a judge.
The republic of Moralistia had decided to have a special law. They were considered the most sincere and loyal people, and according to this, the job of the judge had to be done by children. He was a gloomy boy with a quite deep voice for his age. He talked with an undisputable confidence and precision and, without the need to hear him, his gestures made you believe that he was right. Time after time, when he thought that he didn’t sound persuasive, or at least, not as persuasive as needed, he used to wrinkle his forehead more and lift the childish skin of the painted eyebrows in order to make them look thicker. The trial was done, as he could guess from what was said continuously. Close to the mid-trial, even though unconcerned, his attention was drawn for a second by his abnormal voice. He asked himself who the prosecutor was here and why the judge proceeded the case. A man standing next to him,with red eyes and foolish irony, looking like one of those brain-washed people who tend to protect the world with their ideology, answered. The child was a judge and a prosecutor simultaneously.
“This is what happens with the trusted ones of the Party, and not with your kind, that breaks the rules of our existence just to seem more interesting”.
– Now, let’s put an end to the trial! – the child judge shouted confidently.
– Ivan Sholokhov, the defendant accused of committing a serious crime against the law of the Republic of Moralistia, you kissed your girlfriend, Rina A., four minutes and thirty-five seconds before the allowed schedule. Our Leader, unmistakeable as he is, has suggested that those who break this moral law, will receive a death penalty. Sholokhov, do you declare yourself guilty?”
Because he considered it unfair to face an eleven-year-old boy, he wasn’t paying attention. It was more interesting to pay attention to the worn-out and old rugs of the two guardians.
One of the guardians, in order to scratch his ear, moved one hand from backwards, placed it near his ear and, by moving it up and down, he realized the scratching process. Sholokhov, was staring at the worn-out rug this time, and who knows why, he liked it. He made some up-and-downs with his head too. Right after his trial, he couldn’t remember exactly what the judge said; he had a hazy memory. His brain was insisting that the judge said: “The defendant declared himself guilty,” but as far as he couldn’t remember saying anything, he wasn’t sure. The only thing he could remember precisely was the piercing snap when the judge, who was barely holding the gavel, shouted simultaneously with the strike; “Ivan Sholokhov, the court found you guilty for breaking the morality laws of our republic. Our people have paid attention, more than to anything else, to the clean moral and devotion. You’re sentenced to death!” He didn’t take it seriously.
It seemed like an odd dream, the kind of dream that wakes you up with a pain in the neck.
5 Stars
Fantastic - 19.10.2018
John Tober

This book is one of the best I have read. Dystopian literature at its best.

5 Stars
One of the best books - 18.10.2018
Liridon Miftaraj

Azem is one of the best modern writter

You might like this too :

The Illegal Kisser

Viktor Korobko

The Story of Life … and Not Just That

Book rating:
*mandatory fields