Undeva la Palilula Page #4

---

...a young pediatrician in Palilula,

the city with no kids.

I was taking care of the X-Rays machine

which wasn't really working for years.

But even if it worked,

I didn't know a thing about it.

...and those poor guys queued for X-Rays.

I can't write that to dad.

Telling me I poisoned him...

When I know it was Capra (Goat),

that stupid whore!

- Hello, patients!

- Good morning doctor, sir!

Patients, have you eaten?

No, we haven't!

Well... you see?

First you eat, then you can come.

You'll set the place on fire

with your bloody cigarettes!

- Thanks. I don't drink anymore.

- Just a little, for the coming of spring.

Keep it up, guys.

What's with this crap?

Pantelica's stuff. Trotsky said

he was mocking the working class.

That we should get a new X-ray machine.

But Pantelica wouldn't hear of it.

He claimed the machine was great,

it was man that was broken.

There, it broke.

Oh dear, oh dear. It broke...

Man, it stinks.

I'm a pediatrician.

What am I doing here?

Pantelica, God rest his soul,

had a theory. Children are bad luck.

When a child is born, an adult has to die.

Capra (Goat) used to come by.

The ugly whore.

She comes by all of us when we're drunk.

Barza keeps her in a shed.

You know her?

Some say she's his sister.

One day, she got pregnant.

Leana swore she saw her coming pregnant into

Pantelica's office, and going out all lean.

Pantelica then grew grumpy.

He wouldn't let anybody

in, he hardly came out.

Leana brought him food, her famous stews...

She swore she heard

squealing noises inside.

Or a baby crying.

Tall stories, you know. She was jealous.

But one day she stopped hearing it.

And we found Pantelica dead.

Mushroom poisoning.

But Leana swears it was

Capra's baby that did him in.

Pantelica ate it, and got sick on it.

Crap.

She called him "ogre".

What are you doing here?

- Have you eaten?

- Yes we have, doc.

Well... I haven't.

Come later, when I've eaten, too.

You're as strong as oxen.

Let's go.

Gogu used to visit me a lot.

He meant to educate me.

He had come to Palilula about five years before me.

He was said to be a very good doctor.

And handsome, too, on top of it.

Everyone loved him.

Only Virgil Cringasu,

Trotsky, the party secretary,

couldn't stand him. He said he

was an American, and he hated Americans.

I'm not American.

I'm a county boy, like you all.

True, he had been born in Burundi

or Ouagadougou or some such place,

but he had studied in this country

and had settled in Palilula.

He might have wished for

a better place, but that's that.

They've assigned me here.

There was a great commotion that day...

What the hell is that?

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes