"Okay, Prodán," I said, "I'll give it back, I'll give it back right away, but let me go already," and by now I was really scared because Big Prodán was the strongest kid in the neighborhood, after he was kicked out of school his dad sent him to do construction work, and he got even stronger doing that, he could beat up anyone and he wasn't scared of a soul, so anyway, Prodán then took his palms off my eyes, but as he did so he hooked one of his arms under my neck and pulled my head back, so I got hardly any air, and meanwhile with his other hand he reached down and took the pocketknife out of my hand. "I should beat you up good," he said, and then he let go of my neck, went around the bench, and stopped in front of me. This big boxlike knapsack hung from his shoulders, it looked like our school knapsacks only it was bigger, he took it off and put it on the edge of the bench next to my knapsack and meanwhile he wiped the knife on his pants to get the brick dust off. "Look what you did with it," he said, shaking his head. "I should beat the shit out of you," he said, but he didn't hit me, he just sat down beside me on the bench and said, "Okay, maybe I won't touch you this time, but if I find out again that you played cards with my kid brother, why then I'll knock your brains out, got that, this time I only want your money, so go ahead and empty your pockets," and I didn't say a thing back, no, I only shook my head because I knew full well I didn't have any money on me. Sure, I poked around in my pockets anyway, but I really didn't turn up a thing, and then I said to Big Prodán that I didn't have any money on me, but if I did, I'd give it to him, cross my heart, and if he waited a day, then maybe I could get my hands on some, even though I really didn't have any right now, but Prodán shook his head. "Don't go lying to me, Djata," and then he waved the pocketknife, signaling for me to get up from the bench, and he even showed me where to stand, there, in the middle of the path, and he said, "Now we'll see if you got a jingle and a jangle to you or not, so get to it, hop around a bit in one place," and he waved his hand for me to start, and he kept waving, up, down, up, down, but I really didn't have any money on me, so I could keep jumping up and down as much as I wanted, yes, I knew that nothing was about to jingle or jangle in my pockets, and Prodán must have known too, but he made me keep hopping for at least two more minutes, I was all hot and sweaty by the time he finally waved for me to stop, and he said, "All right, I can see you weren't lying, you can come sit down now."
"I can't stay," I said, shaking my head, "I've got to go home," but Prodán just gave another wave of his hand. "Fuckit, Djata, I said you can come sit down," and then he slammed his fist down on the bench, and so I sat down, but I didn't look at Prodán, no, instead I kept my eyes lowered, staring at the rips in my sneakers, waiting to see what would happen, and for a while Prodán didn't say a thing, but then he spoke after all. "Djata," he asked, "is it true you spent two years learning how to play the piano?" I thought I heard wrong, but I didn't ask him to repeat what he said, I just nodded, and I thought of my piano teacher and her reed cane, and how she sometimes hit my shoulders or my hands when I didn't hold myself like I was supposed to. I looked at Big Prodán and said, "It wasn't even a year, we had to sell our upright piano when they took my father away because we needed the money," but Prodán just slapped me on the back and said, "Fuckin hell, Djata, you studied piano playing for a year, so you gotta know it really well, so you'll teach me too, because the good summer weather will be here in a month, the weddings will be starting up, and by then I gotta learn, I really gotta know how."
"Impossible," I said, shaking my head, "one month is nothing, and anyway, it's not like I know anything anymore, even back then all I knew was 'The Flea Waltz,' but I didn't even know that properly," and right when I said that, I almost broke out laughing, I mean, Big Prodán had big, shovel-like hands, and his fists were all scratched up from laying bricks and fighting all the time, anyway, I tried sucking in my gut to keep from laughing. "Your hands are too big for piano playing," I said, but meanwhile the corners of my mouth kept wanting like hell to curl up, but I didn't want Prodán to sock me in the gut, and so I didn't laugh after all, no, I just said, "You need at least three years for the piano." Prodán smirked and said, "Stop kidding around, Djata, a guy can learn to ride a bike in three days, and anyway, it's not piano playing I'm after, where am I supposed to get a piano, hell no, I want you to teach me with this thing here" — and he hit his elbow hard against that big black bag he'd put down beside him on the bench just before—"with this fucking accordion," and again he hit his elbow against the bag, and then he took that bag by the strap and put it on his knees, he opened it up and removed an accordion that was all scrunched up. "Here it is," he said, "my father got it from somewhere, and now he wants to take me off construction work and send me to play music at weddings because he says there's a shitload of dough in that, and it's not like playing music is work anyway, so we can get rich real easy."
I looked at the accordion and didn't feel like laughing at all anymore. "You must be glad," I said, "because it's not too good for you doing construction," but Prodán just shook his head and said, "At first I was glad about this music thing, you can imagine, but the problem is, I don't hear the notes, I can't hear the difference no matter what, and today the teacher said I didn't practice and that I shouldn't go there anymore, even though he was teaching me in the first place only because we slipped him a little dough, you know, because when they kicked me out of school they took away my red cravat and ever since then I haven't been allowed to go to the Young Pioneers center, and that's where the accordion classes are at, and that's why you're gonna teach me now instead of him, unless you want me to beat your brains out, of course. And don't go teaching me chords, just show me how to move my fingers and show me when I have to press which button so I can get the sound out of it, I can learn that for sure, I'm really good with my hands, besides, I gotta learn, I gotta, you understand, huh, Djata?"
By the time he finished saying all this he was almost yelling, but not the way he shouted when making me jump up and down, no, it was different this time, not so loud, but a lot more scary, and I had no idea what to say, I just looked at that accordion, it was really big, with a whole lot of buttons and keys, and I knew that Prodán would put it in my hands in no time to have me play him a little something, play a tune, something entertaining, some nice wedding music, and then it would turn out I couldn't play, and Prodán wouldn't believe that I really couldn't, no, he'd think I was doing it on purpose because I didn't want to teach him, and then he'd beat me up really good, he'd use his brass knuckles on me, and I knew Prodán was waiting for me to say something already, but my heart was up in my throat, and I was still staring at the accordion, at those black folds on the part that can be pressed together, and the metal corners on the folds, and then I finally spoke after all. "Whew," I said, "this accordion is big, it's really big," that's just what I said, and I was surprised too at what I was saying. "It's a real adult-size instrument," I added, and Prodán nodded and said, "That it is," and he wanted to say something else too, but he cut himself short, he must have seen something because all of a sudden he brought his hand to his mouth so I'd keep quiet too, even though I didn't want to say anything anyway, but I slowly looked back because I wanted to see what made Prodán go quiet all of a sudden. Well, it was just old Miki on his way back from the spout, tapping out the path ahead of him with that white cane of his.