The Pear Field Read online

  ‘Do you really think so?’ Irakli asks in surprise.

  ‘I’m leaving,’ Lela says suddenly. ‘Leaving the school, I mean. But don’t tell anyone. There’s something I need to take care of, but once that’s done I’ll be off.’

  ‘Where are you going?’ Irakli asks resentfully.

  ‘I don’t know yet. Somewhere.’

  Irakli gets to his feet and looks at Lela as if he’s just been abandoned for the second time.

  ‘If you keep your mouth shut and give me a hand, I’ll take you with me,’ says Lela casually. ‘You don’t deserve it, but what can I do?’ Then, remembering what they’re there for, she says, ‘Go round to the other side of that hill and see if she’s buried round there. Find her and we find Sergo.’

  Irakli glances down at his wilting flowers, embarrassed to be taking Sergo such a pitiful offering.

  ‘Lela,’ says Irakli, ‘maybe you’ve remembered it wrong. Try and think. Maybe it wasn’t Neli Aivazova…’

  ‘I dunno. It was a woman, she was laughing and the headstone was black. And she looked a bit like Dali.’

  Irakli looks out over the cemetery, but nothing seems familiar.

  A dog comes winding its way through the gravestones, head hanging down, swaying its thin haunches. They stare in surprise to see a living creature moving with such nonchalance through this bleak setting.

  ‘Let’s go back to the school,’ says Lela. She turns, fixes the Titanic in her sights and plots their route out of the cemetery.

  Irakli looks at the gravestones. He leaves the flowers with Izabela Gegechkori, whose grave has no portrait, candle or offerings.

  ‘We didn’t find Sergo,’ he says dolefully.

  ‘No,’ says Lela.

  At the end of Kerch Street they bump into Vaska sitting on an open concrete pipe by the bus stop, smoking a cigarette.

  ‘Gimme a smoke,’ Lela asks.

  Vaska takes a full packet of cigarettes out of his pocket and holds it out to her.

  ‘Wow, check you out!’ she says.

  ‘Take a few,’ says Vaska, and looks at Irakli. ‘You didn’t go to America, then?’

  ‘No,’ says Irakli. ‘Who told you?’

  ‘Tiniko’s back. And she’s told Dali. Dali wants to give you a beating.’

  ‘Does she want to give his mum a beating too?’ says Lela. Vaska’s smile widens.

  Lela and Irakli walk on towards the school.

  ‘Did you see his bag?’ Irakli asks.

  Lela doesn’t remember seeing a bag.

  ‘So what?’

  ‘I think he’s off.’

  ‘Off where?’

  ‘Just off. Leaving.’

  Lela scoffs and spits to one side.

  ‘He can go, then.’

  ‘Lela, you won’t let them beat me, will you?’

  ‘If anyone’s going to beat you it’ll be me. Anyone else can mind their own business.’

  Irakli takes a drag on the cigarette and feels his head become pleasantly dizzy. As they approach the school gates, Lela imagines them walking into the yard, the children and teachers crowding around them and all the ensuing commotion. Irakli’s heart is in his mouth. Lela feels an unpleasant taste rise in her throat.

  ‘Just stay right next to me,’ she hisses at Irakli under her breath.

  When they reach the gates they see Kolya and a couple of other children running across the yard. The children notice Lela and Irakli but ignore them completely and sprint past.

  They walk into the yard and spot Levan. He too sees them but keeps running.

  They watch Pako and Stella come running from the direction of the playground. Pako is out in front, with Stella hurrying behind as best she can in flip-flops. They race towards the dinner hall, but when they see children streaming out towards them with Dali close behind, they turn and run back towards the playground.

  Pako shouts to Lela and Irakli, ‘Vano was in the trampoline room. He fell!’

  Pako’s eyes are as wide as those of the Mickey Mouse on his T-shirt.

  Irakli abandons all thoughts of America and races after the others.

  For a moment Lela just stands there, unable to move. Her whole body is suddenly weightless. She sits down on the bench between the spruce trees. Rests her head on the trunk. Closes her eyes. There in the darkness she sees Vaska’s face, and he’s smiling.

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  AUTHOR

  Nana Ekvtimishvili, born in 1978 in Tbilisi, Georgia, is a writer and film director. She studied screenwriting and drama at Potsdam-Babelsberg. In 2013, with her partner Simon Groß, she directed the feature film In Bloom, which premiered at the 63rd Berlinale, where it won the CICAE Award. It went on to win numerous awards at festivals in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Paris, Los Angeles and Sarajevo, and was also selected as Georgia’s entry for the 2013 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. The International Federation of Film Critics said it heralded a ‘rebirth for Georgian cinema’. Her latest film, My Happy Family, was released at the Sundance Film Festival in 2017. Published in 2015, The Pear Field is Ekvtimishvili’s first novel. It was awarded the Ilia State University prize for the best Georgian novel published in 2014-15; the Saba Literary Prize for best debut; and the Litera Prize, also for the best debut, given by the Writers’ House and the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport of Georgia. It has already been published in German and in Dutch to much critical acclaim.

  TRANSLATOR

  Elizabeth Heighway has worked as a translator from Georgian and French since 2010. She has translated a number of contemporary Georgian works, including Aka Morchiladze’s Journey to Karabakh and the anthology Contemporary Georgian Fiction, both published by Dalkey Archive Press.

  COPYRIGHT

  First published in Great Britain in 2020 by

  Peirene Press Ltd

  17 Cheverton Road

  London N19 3BB

  www.peirenepress.com

  First published in 2015 under the original Georgian-language title მსხლების მინდორი by ბაკურ სულაკაურის გამომცემლობა, Tbilisi, Georgia

  © Nana Ekvtimishvili 2015, 2018

  © Suhrkamp Verlag Berlin 2018

  All
rights reserved by and controlled through Suhrkamp Verlag Berlin

  English-language translation copyright © Elizabeth Heighway, 2020

  With special thanks to Sophie Lewis, who edited The Pear Field for Peirene Press

  Nana Ekvtimishvili asserts her moral right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not be resold, lent, hired or otherwise circulated without the express prior consent of the publisher.

  EISBN 978–1–908670–61–8

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Designed by Sacha Davison Lunt

  Cover image: Ryan Searle / Unsplash

  Typeset by Tetragon, London

  Printed and bound by TJ International, Padstow, Cornwall

  The book is published with the support of the Writers’ House of Georgia.