Nevena

“What happened to baka? Is she… dead?” I asked, using the Serbian word for grandmother. Me and my mom spoke a weird mixture of Serbian and English that sometimes only the two of us could understand.

My mom shook her head. “No, she’s not dead yet, knock on wood,” she said and she knocked on our wooden coffee table that we’ve had for forever, moving across America with us, from apartment to apartment. “But she’s very sick and there’s no one to take care of her.”

My mouth went dry, but my heard fluttered with excitement. “What does that mean?”

My mom sighed. She had long brown hair like mine, except hers wasn’t oily, same forehead as mine and thin mouth, but her nose wasn’t big – it was just the right size for her face and for the longest time Jessica convinced me that my mother must’ve gotten it done when she was younger and she wasn’t saying, but I knew my mother better than my friends did and I knew that that was simply not possible.

“I will have to go to Serbia for the summer to take care of her, until your aunt finishes the project she’s working on currently and takes over for me.”

“How long will that be?” I asked.

“Probably September,” said my mom. “So, you better pack because we will be leaving in two days.”

“I’m sorry… what?”

I felt like I was standing on a rug and someone just pulled it from underneath my legs.

“Well, you’re coming with me, Nevena,” said my mother, suddenly turning stern and Balkan in a matter of seconds. It really is a metamorphosis that everyone should witness at least once in their life. “Do you think I was going to let you be here all by yourself all summer? You’re only seventeen.”

“I will be eighteen in November,” I complained. “And you know I’m responsible enough.”

Mom was shaking her head, and I knew that for her the conversation was over. But I wasn’t going to roll over like a dog, especially since I had already invested some of my hard-earned money working part-time at the frozen yogurt shop in the shopping plaza around the corner ever since I turned sixteen in this summer.

“I don’t want to go,” I said. “Me and Rachel have tickets to see the Twins & the Sailing and you already said I could go so I bought my ticket.” There was also going to be a party at Jessica’s that all three of us were going to host, but I hadn’t yet told my mother about it and she didn’t need to know about it now. “What am I to do? Just let it go to waste?”

“You can re-sell the ticket and get your money back, Nevena,” said my mom. “I’m exhausted from the overnight shift still, but I have to go back to work in an hour and I’d really rather not fight.”

“But mom…”

“I said that’s enough!”

My eyes swelled with tears. This was my everyday life, living with my mother who was raised in the patriarchal spirit of all the ex-Yugoslavian states where freedom to do what you want and the option to be yourself was just not an option. You either conformed to society or you got ostracized. I looked around the small living room from our apartment and suddenly I hated everything. The icons of the Orthodox saints my mother still prayed to even though God didn’t seem to give her a single break, the surgical cleanliness of the place, and the damn lace doily underneath the TV – I hated all of it with such burning passion.

“No!” I screamed, and I turned around. My mom was almost in the kitchen at that point.

“What did you say to me?” she asked, her tone of voice getting dangerous. My mother never beat me even though she threatened to do so on many occasions but I always knew she wanted to because that’s how she was raised.

“I’m not going to Serbia,” I said, and I wiped my tears, facing her. “Not for the entire summer. You always do this!”

“You grandmother is sick, and as far as I know, I didn’t raise a monster,” said mom. “Where is your respect?”

“Ugh, you always do this!” I bellowed in frustration. “Because I want to live my own life, that doesn’t make me a bad person.”

“And no one is stopping you from living your life,” said my mom. “But as long as you are under my roof you will obey my rules.”

“No,” I said. “I’m not going.”

“I booked us two tickets for Sunday morning. You are coming with me and that’s final.”

“I’m not coming, and I am going to Griffin’s party tonight.” I said that with more confidence and conviction than I was actually feeling.

My mom seemed thrown off. “Who is Griffin?” she asked, but she composed herself pretty quickly. “In fact, it doesn’t even matter, because you’re not going.”

“Oh my God!” I screamed, and tears just rolled down my face silently and my entire body started shaking because of nerves. “Why did you even come to America in the first place, Marija, if you just wanted to live your life the same way they do in Serbia? Why didn’t you just stay there like everybody else you love, because you have no friends here, you have no social life outside of your three hundred jobs you always work, but never have enough money for anything – and now you’re trying to alienate even me, your own daughter, because you always need to have it your way! It’s no wonder you’re single and I don’t even know my father. It’s all your fault, because you probably suffocated him the same way you’re doing it to me until one day he said…”

Slap!

My right ear rang and my cheek burned. My mother slapped me across the face with such fury, that I have never experienced before from her in my entire life. I know I might’ve pushed it a bit too hard, but I’ve been letting these things churn in my stomach and my head for a long time and they finally decided to break free from me.

I held my cheek where my mother slapped me, and I looked at her eyes. I’ve never hated my mom more than I did in that moment, but something inside me thawed still when I saw how much pain her eyes held and the silent tears that rolled down her cheeks as she just stared down at me.

“No discussion,” she said, her voice barely giving the indication of a tremble. She wiped her face angrily. “The decision is final. You better start packing, because you’re spending the summer in Serbia with me taking care of your grandmother. And you aren’t allowed to go to the party tonight. If you didn’t throw a fit, I might’ve reconsidered… but now – I don’t think you deserve it.”

With that, she walked out of the living room and went into her room. I head the door lock. I turned around and walked to my room, slamming the door, but I didn’t lock it. I needed to come up with a plan, and fast, because there was no way I was going to miss the Twins & the Sailing.

I paced around my room, trying to calm my mind, and then I grabbed the phone and called Rachel. It rang forever until it stopped. My phone vibrated. It was a text from Rachel.

What’s happening? Why are you calling and not texting like a normal person?

I called her again, and this time she picked up on the third ring.

“Shit, your mother freaked out and is not letting you come to the party, am I right?” said Rachel instead of a greeting.

“No,” I said, and my voice cracked against my will. “It’s much worse, Rach. We’re leaving for Serbia in two days and won’t come back until September.”

“But we have tickets to the Twins & the Sailing on June 19th,” said Rachel immediately. “You can’t leave.”

“Tell that to my mom,” I said and I started crying. “She won’t budge.”

“Listen to me,” said Rachel. “We’re not doing what she says. Get a backpack ready with a few essentials, and when she goes to work, I will convince my mother to let me come pick you up with her car and then we will hide you in the shed in the backyard. My dad used to live there in the summers before him and mom got divorced, and even though my mom got the house, she doesn’t ever go anywhere near the shed. As long as you keep quiet, you can stay there until your mom leaves for Serbia.”

We talked for a few seconds more, and then we hung up and I started packing my backpack haphazardly, grabbing things like my hair brush, my shampoo for oily hair, extra clothes and stuff like that. I was in full panic mode, and I didn’t even notice the time slip me by, until the door to my door opened and my mom walked in, wearing her uniform and ready for work.

“What are you doing, Nevena?” she asked and my heart sank in my chest.