Date: Sun, 10 Oct 2004 23:15:56 -0700 (PDT) From: Thomas-Alexander Kind Subject: Mihai-07 'The truth is out there.!' And now here as well, as this is true and not all that long ago...or maybe too long ago.! No disclaimer, as the ones that hold the power do what they want anyhow. Everybody else does not need one. Storycode:M/b Mihai-07 Back from working 2 months in a far away place. Long scary flights again. Schiphol Airport again, one of my stepping stones in this world. My little car waiting for me. I am happy to be back. To have my feet on solid ground. To be only a few days travel away from the eastern edge of Europe, where I need to go. Want to go.! Lets go.! Driving for days. The car loaded with all kinds of things that I hoped would make the hastily rented apartment into something like a home. Well, my own place, anyhow. Leaving the craziness of the shared flat and carrying the promise to be able to have 'him' with me. It had been per chance, a find... someone had mentioned it to me. An apartment in the area I wanted to be in. Had spent the long days away dreaming about how things could be for us, Mihai and myself. Finally the dream was transforming itself into reality it seemed. The beginnings of a shared life.?! Crazy, like living in this town, but possible because of it. A newly renovated one bedroom place, on the ground floor in a smaller block, close to everything and 'clean'.! Refinished walls, floors and kitchen. A new bathroom with bathtub and warm water by the gallon.! So while still camping in the old flat, I fixed up the new one... making it a home for me and Mihai.! That small impish street boy. The hungry, dirty mouse I had grown so fond of. We had spent many evenings and nights together, before I had to go away and make some much needed money. I had traveled the old kings highway again, from the west to the east. Every stop for petrol another 600km closer to 'home'..? A few short nights in the usual hotels, but up and out with first light. Too many cigarettes, and not enough food. But I had to get there...fast.! And now,... now I needed to find him again and ask him to come with me. All my worries about him were back again. All the uncertainty about how it all would work. All the fear that I would not be able to keep it all 'under-cover'. I was sacred, I finally admitted to myself, was nervous about how to integrate him into the block, the other people in the house..? All a dangerous, at the very least, crazy thing to do. He was a street boy. I was a 'wealthy' foreign man.! An impossible situation, really. People in the block knew me by now. But that had been the moving part, the 'fixing-up' part, with workmen coming and going. Deliveries and somebody new attracts attention. Now I was going to sneak a mouse into the house. Without attracting attention.?! * Mihai had not been to the new place. I had not taken him, knowing I would be away for months before we could be together again. So I needed to find him. On the street. Hoping that this was the last time I would have to watch him walk away and not see him for months. I felt like a monster, leaving him. He laughed at my attempt to explain... and for the first time, he told me of his family. That he had a family, other than the boys that made up the little tribe at the corner of the downtown street, next to the café. That one of the boys, even smaller than him, was his brother.! It took half the night for him to tell me so that I could understand, that home was 2 rooms, up some stairs, past the toilet shed in the yard... in the middle of town. No heat, no windows, no running water other then the tap down the street. One mattress on the floor for 4 kids. But there was a mother and father,... an older brother who everybody was afraid of, but he was in jail for murder it seemed, so not a problem at the moment, one older sister who worked as a prostitute and was the mother of a little 5 year old... herself barely 19 or twenty. His twin-sister, his younger brother and the little boy. There also seemed to have been someone else, who had been sold. He, Mihai, had been 'rented out' to someone when he was younger, but he became sick... so this someone gave him back. He still smiled. I was horrified. His father was mainly drunk and not around much, providing nothing it seemed. His mother got a pension 'for having many kids'... the amount was a quarter of my monthly rent, and somehow managed to survive. But there was simply not enough of anything... so the boys, Mihai and younger brother Vasile, lived on the street. He smiled... when he told me that he used to steal the little candles from the church down the street, the ones people buy and light to ask for forgiveness or the fulfillment of prayers,... because they did not have electricity... of course.! He would go 'home' if necessary. I left him on the corner of the street to his house, he was very clear about me not meeting any of his family, with 10 bags of groceries and enough money for 3 months. And drove away crying. * It was not so hard to find him again...I guessed. I knew where to look, when to wander across the big square, who to ask. Word would get to him. So I arranged for him to come to our usual meeting place, the parking lot behind the old hotel, when it got dark. But I drove there with my heart in my throat,.. hoping he would remember,.. hoping he would turn up.! In the old flat we had traded smiles,.. I had washed him, fed him, clothed him and held him close at night. He had been happy, close...! But this was different. Just him and me. No one else.! So,... I smoked another cigarette, waiting... past the appointed hour. Loosing hope. Feeling dirty and tired from too many days on the road. The scraggly trees in the parking lot, the decaying fancy fronts of the houses on that little square. A dirty place, not so romantic, not so happy... and even less so now. Minutes dragging into a quarter of an hour, ... half an hour,... more.! Rough looking gipsy youths eyeing me from in front of the night-club across the lot. Suddenly the passenger door being opened,... a grubby hand covering the dome light,... and from within layers of dirty, unfamiliar clothes a small smiling face... a toothy grin... mumbled excuse and anxious words to leave now,... instantly.! No questions now.! My heart jumping, I wheel out of the lot, into the traffic and speeding... home.? Mihai chatters on ... I am being scolded for talking, asking the other street-boys. What I can make out, he had to leave a few of his 'friends' behind who were waiting for him to lead them to good food and a warm place. Hard choices for a little boy. He will see them again tomorrow,... and tell them ..what.? Mihai waves it off,.. he is a 'micul bandit' he will tell them...lies.!! Smiles at me with sparkling eyes. * Sneaking him into the apartment...no problem, the hallway lights are busted and the streetlamps are 15 watts and 500 yards apart.! Into the door,... locked.! I sigh, involuntarily,... and Mihai jumps into my arms. Locks his hands behind my neck...his legs around my waist. I shiver inside... is this real.? His face is close, he smells of street and Aurolac... but as he looks into my eyes and he pushes his lips against mine...I surrender.! For moments the world fades into the distance, muffled sounds and low lights. I am afraid,... afraid that I feel too much for this boy. My legs are wobbly,.. I almost stumble on my way to the bathroom... not from the 58 pounds of 13 year old boy in my arms,.. more from the realization that we may have a chance to walk on together,.. to somewhere else than we both have been before. As I undress him... a ritual of belonging between us, he seems so vulnerable I have to choke back tears. The 10 weeks have not been kind. There are scars that he does not want to talk about. There are tears he does not want me to see. Maybe you will let me heal you a little, Mihai. Maybe I will heal a little bit myself. He cocks his head and with a puzzled look and sinks into the bubbles, sighing contentedly. More in Mihai-08