The novel ‘A Woman between Two Men’, with an Albanian-American Theme, is authored by Carrie Hooper and Skifter Këllici
To be sure, the police had pursued Kreshnik that night a few months earlier but had not recognized him. Now, however, the circumstances had changed. It was not pouring rain; there was no stream or forest in the vicinity where Kreshnik could cover his tracks so the dogs would not spot them. Nor was there a bridge he could hide under. A car followed him relentlessly from behind, and there may have been more cars and motorcycles. Helicopters may have been sent to catch him. It wasn’t like that night outside the restaurant when the police had beaten him and Ralph Kallagan had let him go after a few hours. Now other officers, perhaps led by Ralph Kallagan, would catch him. But this time, they would not put him in a cell for a few hours, but for a few years. He could barely hold back a scream.
“What do I do now?” he mumbled.
Officer Eric Torres and three other policemen were in the car that followed Kreshnik at a distance. The two officers in the back pointed at the motorcycle.
“Keep your eyes on that motorcycle,” commanded Officer Torres. “It looks black, just as the gas station attendant described it.”
“I can’t see it very well,” said the driver.
“Look to your right.”
“Ah, yes! I see it.”
“Drive as fast as you can.”
The driver sped up while the vehicles in front of him made way for him.
Kreshnik felt chilled for he knew without a doubt that a police car was following him. He turned the motorcycle into a narrow, deserted street, went up onto a sidewalk, then through an alley that led to a flower garden. Once in the garden, he hid the motorcycle as best he could among some tall bushes. Then he ran across the alley and found himself near Bigsby Knoll Park. He ran so fast his legs burned. Once inside the park, he crouched behind a bush. His eyes aflame, he looked toward the street where he had left the motorcycle, took out his revolver, and waited. At that moment, the police car stopped at the intersection beyond which Kreshnik had left the motorcycle.
Officer Torres motioned for the two officers behind the driver to search the left side of the road while he and the driver went on the opposite side where Kreshnik had hidden the motorcycle, and where he himself was hiding. The two officers bent down, crossed the alley, and went into the garden. They saw the faint glow of the predawn light.
They searched the bushes and found what appeared to be a rear wheel of a motorcycle. Tense and with revolvers raised, they pushed aside the branches and made their way forward. They found the motorcycle but not the suspect who drove it.
“The gas station attendant was right about a motorcyclist in a black leather jacket,” said Torres, quietly. “That must be the motorcycle he was driving. It’s black just like the attendant said. But where is the driver hiding?”
With those words, he motioned for the other officer to go to the left side of the park while he himself went to the right. Although the officers were a considerable distance from Kreshnik, he could still make out snippets of their conversation from his hiding place in the brushwood. He held his breath with terror. The officers were coming closer. He held back a cough and a sneeze since sounds like that would betray him. But something else almost gave him away. Again, it was his own fault.
Unbeknownst to him, he started to shake when his cell phone rang. He had forgotten to turn it off. He screwed up his face and nearly cried out with fright. He quickly took his phone out of his inner jacket pocket, turned it off, and put it back in his pocket.
Torres heard something. He held his breath, froze, and turned his head in the direction of the soft, sharp sound.
Kreshnik kept his eyes on the policemen. He crouched even lower, lay on his stomach, and rolled in the grass. He wanted to get as far away as possible from his hiding place.
Torres pointed his gun at the leaves and remained tense for a few seconds. He could not make out Kreshnik, who had gotten to his knees, but after picking his way through the brushwood, he was behind him.
As if sensing danger, Torres quickly turned his head. Kreshnik saw his whitish face, his eyes wide with fright, and his lips nearly trembling as he raised the barrel of his gun. Torres turned his head but could not avoid being hit in the temple. He felt a trickle of blood down his left ear and cheek. Torres’ gun dropped out of his hand.
Although he was in shock, he hurried toward Kreshnik. The two fought until they fell. Kreshnik briefly recalled the fight with the person who had stolen Mary’s bag. Torres and Kreshnik got to their feet and continued their skirmish. Then, Kreshnik hit Torres in the forehead with the barrel of his gun. He groaned and fell to the ground.
Once again, Kreshnik pointed his gun at Torres, now unarmed and exhausted. He was in a fog, but he saw the cruel glow of the gun’s metal in the faint lantern light of the garden. The barrel swayed to and fro. Torres could make out a silhouette with a beard and a mustache. It was the robber. His face darkened, and he gasped, terrified. His lips trembled.
Torres hung his head and waited for death to come. His eyes nearly burst from their sockets when he saw the robber blink and noticed tears in his eyes. Kreshnik lowered his revolver and looked first in one direction, then the other as if he feared someone would kill him. He retreated, threw his gun, and fled.
The officer on the other side of the park heard someone groan but could not tell who it was. He ran toward the sound. When he reached the brushwood, he squinted and saw officer Torres sprawled out on the ground in shock. The officer went to him, knelt in front of him, and took his head in his hands. He was shocked when he saw the cut on Torres’s forehead and the blood running down his face.
“How are you feeling, Eric?” he asked.
“Get the robber!” Torres muttered.
“Where did he go?”
Torres just shook his head, gasped, and screwed up his mouth in pain.
The policeman jumped up and looked around, not sure where to go. Then he picked up his radio and announced, “A robber shot Torres in the forehead. He is probably still in the area. Hurry to the other side of the park. He may have run there.”
In the meantime, Kreshnik ran as fast as he could. Sometimes he hid behind a tree trunk, sometimes in the bushes. He managed to find his way out of the park and came to a road. He looked around and did not see anyone following him. So he pulled himself together and walked in a carefree manner. He saw a few people who had gotten up early for work, and in the distance, he saw a minivan. His eyes lit up, and he ran toward it cautiously.
There were two men in the minivan. One sat in the driver’s seat. They kept their eyes on the road. The driver, tense and anxious, looked at his watch. It was 3:15.
“Nik should have been here by now,” he said to the second man. “Something must have happened to him. He hasn’t even called us.”
“We can’t stay here much longer. You can only park here for a limited time,” said the second man. “We’ve been waiting a half hour.”
“That’s right,” said the first man. “The police will get suspicious even if we drive around and come back here.”
Suddenly, the second man’s cell phone rang. He answered it immediately. It was Max Cooper. It was the third time he had called, and he sounded frightened.
“Nik hasn’t gotten there yet?” he asked.
“No, Max. Maybe something unexpected happened,” said the second man.
“He did something stupid, the nitwit. He took a child to a small-town clinic.”
“Thank God that’s all it was!”
“Well, where is he then?!” shouted Max. “God forbid, the police caught him!”
While they were talking, the driver saw someone running toward the van.
“You see that young man in the black leather jacket?” he said to the second man. “Isn’t that Nik?”
“It is indeed,” he said. “He’s coming, Max!”
“Really?!” Max exclaimed. “On a motorcycle?”
“No, on foot.”
“It sounds like the police were after him,” said Max.
Completely exhausted, Kreshnik approached the minivan.
“Calm down, Boss,” said the second man. “He’s here.”
“Finally,” murmured Max. “Now it’s off to Los Angeles!”
Kreshnik drooled as he got into the van. The faces of the other two men lit up with happiness. Max, too, was relieved and threw himself in Dolores’ plump arms. She had awakened and had heard the terrifying conversation.
The next day at around noon, Mary asked Wilma if they could go somewhere to talk. She felt she needed to tell her about her meeting with Kreshnik. They agreed to meet at a cafe and would go to work from there.
Wilma listened to Mary without interrupting her. She found her story shocking. Mary told Wilma everything except that Kreshnik was a drug trafficker. To be sure, they had been friends for years. Mary had told Wilma about her two or three other flings. She had also told her her impressions of Kreshnik based on her conversations with him at the hospital. Afterwards, she had taken Wilma’s advice to go out with Charlie. But she could not tell Wilma that one thing. Wilma was the wife of Ralph Kallagan, a police officer for whom the law came first. That’s why his superiors respected him. He would punish Kreshnik severely. Without a doubt, his name appeared somewhere in Ralph’s files.
“I think it’s time to leave Kreshnik and focus on your life with Charlie,” said Wilma, searching Mary out.
“When we parted, I noticed his lip was trembling,” said Mary.
“Nonsense! After a few weeks, when we go to the beach again, I bet we’ll see him with another girl. He’s still a spring chicken.”
“I told him I hoped he’d find another girl. I also made it clear he needs to forget me once and for all since I am engaged to Charlie.”
“God protected you, Mary. If you hadn’t gotten engaged to Charlie, what would have happened between you and Nik?”
Wilma’s question surprised Mary.
If Nik had not told Mary the terrifying truth about his work, if he had lied to her, she would have gotten to know him better. She did not want to think about what might have happened next. Instead, she said, “We talked on the beach. Caught up in the moment, I might simply have flirted with him although I think I’m at an age when I shouldn’t do such things. You never know what might happen in such cases.”
Wilma remained silent but suspected her cousin had not told her everything. On her way to the hospital, Mary again thought about the words “for good”, this time spoken by Wilma.
Is it really for good, a voice deep inside her seemed to whisper. One could amputate a gangrenous limb, but how could one erase the impressions of this or that person? The mind imprinted and revived them. How could one get rid of them? (Continues)
Click here for Part-1, Part-2, Part-3, Part-4, Part-5, Part-6, Part-7, Part-8, Part-9, Part-10, Part-11, Part-12, Part-13, Part-14, Part-15, Part-16, Part-17, Part-18, Part-19,
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About the Authors
Carrie Hooper was born and raised in Elmira, New York. She has been blind since birth. She received a B.A. in vocal performance from Mansfield University, Mansfield, Pennsylvania. She went on to receive an M.A. in German and an M.A. in vocal performance from the State University of New York at Buffalo. After completing her studies, she spent a year at the Royal University College of Music in Stockholm, Sweden as a Fulbright scholar. Carrie currently lives in Elmira, New York. She taught German, Italian, and Romanian at Elmira College. She has a passion for foreign languages and in addition to the languages mentioned above, she is also proficient in Swedish, Spanish, and Albanian. Music also plays an important role in Carrie’s life. She teaches voice and piano lessons, gives vocal concerts, plays the piano and organ at a church, and sings in a community chorus. Carrie not only loves music and languages, but also enjoys poetry. She has published three books: “Piktura në fjalë” (“Word Paintings”), a bilingual collection of poetry (Albanian-English), “My Life in My Words”, and “Away from Home.” She has also translated texts from Albanian and Romanian to English.
Skifter Këllici was born in Tirana, Albania and received a diploma in history and literature from the University of Tirana. He worked as a journalist, scholar, and sportscaster on radio and television. He is the author of several novels and nonfiction books, including the children’s books, “Memories of the Old Neighborhood” and “In the Footsteps” as well as the historical novels, “Assassination in Paris”, “The Murderer with the White Hands”, and “September Disaster.” He wrote the screenplay for “In the Footsteps” which won a special prize at the International Children’s Film Festival in Giffoni, Italy in 1979. He has lived in Boston, Massachusetts since 1999.
[The book ‘Disastrous September is being reproduced in episodes with the consent of the author]
