Vita Nostra

  Even a short while ago she’d probably have said something to the secretary. She’d want to signify her presence with some simple words that resemble taillights: I am here because of this, and need that, and will be leaving at this time…

  The prolonged silence that ended only half an hour ago made her personality more somber than could be expected. Or, perhaps, it was not only about the silence?

  Portnov came out in fifteen minutes, not five. He nodded to the secretary and escorted Sasha along the corridor back up the staircase, and one more staircase into the hall; Kostya was sitting in the shadow of the enormous equestrian. There was absolutely no one else in the huge empty space. Even the guard’s glass booth was empty.

  “Go and work hard,” Portnov said, addressing Sasha but looking at Kostya. “You have a great deal of outstanding work to do, mountains of work, an entire ocean. If I were you, I wouldn’t waste precious time on any nonsense.”

  “Good bye,” Sasha said.

  Portnov glanced at her sharply over his glasses. He smirked and departed. Only then Sasha realized how exhausted she was. And how heavy was the bag on her shoulder. And how all she wanted to do was to lie down, close her eyes and think about nothing at all.

  She sat down on a granite pedestal next to Kostya and leaned back into the bronze hoof.

  “You know what I don’t get?” Kostya mused. “This thing, this horse, I mean, it wouldn’t fit into any door. Which means that first they made the statue, and then they built the school around it. How is that possible?”

  Sasha shrugged silently.

  “What did he want from you?” Kostya asked softly.

  Sasha took her new textbook out of her bag. It looked worse for the wear, bright-red, worn out.

  “What is it?” Kostya asked.

  Sasha opened the book. There was no introduction, no author’s name, no explanations. “Exercises, Stage One.”

  “That’s better,” Kostya noted. “At least, the words are familiar.”

  “Number One. Imagine a sphere, in which the exterior surface is red, and interior surface is white. Maintaining the continuity of the sphere, mentally distort the sphere so that the external surface is on the inside, and the internal on the outside…”

  “How?” Sasha asked helplessly.

  Kostya took the book out of her hands, glanced at the page, and gave the book back to her.

  “How is your head?”

  This question, with its precision and its double meaning, made her laugh despite her exhaustion:

  “My head does not hurt. Yeah. If that’s what you meant.”

  ***

  It was raining. Water sputtered in the drain pipes. Sasha went through her entire suitcase, realizing that she arrived at school in the summer, wearing jeans and a tee-shirt. The pile of clothes that Mom stuffed into her suitcase despite her loud protests, the pile that seemed so bulky and so unnecessary, was now not only essential, but almost too flimsy in the face of the approaching winter.

  A jacket. One thick woolen sweater, and one a bit lighter. A pair of woolen socks. A pair of tights to go over pantyhose. Despite the winterized windows, it was chilly and raw at the dorm: the hot water was turned off again. They washed themselves using basins and water heated up in a large pot in the kitchen. Laundry hung over cold radiator remained wet overnight and even longer.

  “Imagine two spheres, one with a larger diameter, the other smaller. Mentally place the first sphere inside the second ensuring that the diameters of both spheres do not change.”

  Doing these exercises was even worse that reading nonsensical paragraphs and memorizing gibberish. Portnov distributed the exercise books to Group A, then, a day later, to Group B. Besides that, each first year received a new textual module with a number “2” on its cover, and every day they had to read and memorize paragraphs. English, History, Philosophy—everything went down the tubes, and students were constantly running out of time. Only the gym class, where sweet Dima Dimych offered the first years basketball, volleyball and elements of dance aerobics instead of long distance races and qualifying standards, served as a ray of light shining through the granite wall of never-ending cramming.

  Sasha’s deadline, Saturday, was approaching without pity, and out of five exercises she’d barely managed two. Closing her eyes in the dark at nighttime, she watched all those spheres, spirals and tubes that refused to slip through the other ones, with a smaller diameter; the exercises made her eyes itchy and her throat sore.

  “Sasha, we’re sending the boys on a vodka run,” Oksana informed her on her way back from the kitchen. “Give me some money, and you can join us. You’re growing mossy here.”

  “I don’t drink vodka.”

  “Mix it with Pepsi then.”

  “Listen, I have five exercises due tomorrow, and I…”

  “All work and no play… You can pull an all-nighter. Come with us, at least you’ll get warm!”

  Sasha wavered.

  “Can I bring Kozhennikov?”

  “Sure! Just tell him to bring something to eat or drink. We’re going to be in the second floor kitchen, come on over!”

  Lisa sat at the desk in front of an open textbook, without blinking, staring at a point in space. Perhaps at this very moment she was turning imaginary spheres inside out.

  Or, perhaps, she was remembering something from the past. Sasha did not have the guts to speak with her since she’d regained her gift of speech.

  Kostya, exhausted and slightly under the weather, did not resist. His roommates, second years, left for a party of their own. In one of their side tables Kostya found a cheap can of anchovies in tomato sauce.

  “I’ll pay Zakhar back later,” Kostya promised, either to Sasha or to himself. “Let’s go.”

  The kitchen was smoky and even hot.

  “Group A has arrived!” Oksana shrieked, handing them two clean plastic cups. “Here’s to the eternal friendship between our groups, the first two letters of the alphabet!”

  Kostya drank half a glass of vodka and got so smashed that he requested more right away. The can of anchovies was immediately dissected with a rusty can opener and passed around: with an aluminum cafeteria spoon, students grabbed hold of the tiny lifeless fish in the depth of blood-red tomato sauce and plopped them onto thick slices of rye bread. The sauce spread in a bloody puddle; the can was passed further. Sasha and Kostya made themselves a couple of sandwiches and perched on a lukewarm radiator. Sasha found a bottle of Pepsi-Cola on the counter and added it to the vodka in her cup; the result was sweet and reasonably alcoholic.

  “I’m not sorry for my chance encounters, I just know that on one of these perfect days…” A guy from Group B was singing, his voice beautiful and poignant. Sasha remembered only his first name, Anton.

  She was tipsy.

  In the warm kitchen, with an anchovy in her teeth, in a cloud of cigarette smoke, she felt free. And therefore, happy.

  Kostya’s hand landed on her shoulder.

  “And all will return!“ A tuneless choir of female voices filled the room, “Everything will certainly return! And this world, and fine weather, and the circle of my friends!“

  Sasha hugged Kostya with all her might. Right now he was the most precious to her. More so than Mom. Because she was too old to hug Mom like that, and Kostya had strong arms and large hands, and his ribs could be felt through his sweater. Sasha thought of how only a year ago she’d dreamed of sitting like this, with a group of friends, next to a boy, and hugging him, and drinking out of a plastic cup, and singing, and laughing…

  “Guys!” somebody yelled bursting into the kitchen. “Hot water is back on in the showers!”

  The “guys” roared happily in response, like a crowd of fans at the stadium. Kostya leaned toward Sasha and kissed her on the lips. Sasha tried to elude him—at first, she thought it was unpleasant—but then gave in.

  And a minute later, she realized that she liked it.

  “Haven’t you ever kissed anyone before?!”
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  Sasha wanted to say that she was an ogre among normal girls, that she spent the golden years of her youth behind a writing desk, but couldn’t quite manage. Kostya knew how to kiss, he was perfectly normal, and even good-looking, not a loser like her…

  They stepped out of the kitchen. Kostya had the foresight to pour some vodka into the half-empty bottle of Pepsi, and now they could drink the sweet liquid straight out of the bottle.

  “And the crimson chimes of sunrise…” The song continued in the kitchen.

  Sasha had not noticed how they’d ended up in Kostya’s room. Zakhar and Lenny, their third roommate, were still out. Kostya lowered Sasha onto his bed, took a gulp from the bottle, sat down next to her and pulled off his sweater.

  “Let’s… I’ll lock the door from the outside. I mean, the inside. Come on!”

  They fell on the bed in a tight embrace. The bed springs groaned piteously.

  “Have you ever…?”

  Kostya was trying to undo Sasha’s bra, but the rotten little hooks clung to their loops.

  “What the…”

  Giving up, Kostya slid his hand underneath the elastic. Sasha arched her back, instinctively following a well-known scheme. Back in high school, her girlfriends convinced each other that in bed a woman was supposed to be passionate, and that meant to arch your back just like this…

  Kostya was unzipping Sasha’s jeans. It was terrifying and spellbinding. It was beautiful and appalling. A cold wind flew into the half-opened window. Kostya tugged on Sasha’s panties; abruptly, she twisted away and sat up.

  “Come on… Sasha…”

  She slid from under his skinny sweaty body. The enchantment of the evening was melting fast, the lightheadedness was now replaced with nausea. Kostya’s hands, suddenly very aggressive, pulled the white cotton panties off of her, and at that moment Sasha leaned over the side of the bed and vomited a handful of gold coins.

  ***

  “Did I tell you how important this was? Did I give you a warning?”

  “I tried,” Sasha said staring at a half-circle scratch on the desk. “I tried. But I…”

  “You owed me five exercises. You barely managed two. That’s less than half!”

  “I tried my best…”

  “You tried your best? You drank like a horse, and you spread your legs in bed!”

  Sasha raised her eyes. Her cheeks, pale just a second ago, now became burning hot, the skin about to burst.

  “That’s not true. Why are you speaking like that to me?”

  “Because you deserve it, Samokhina. Because you are a little bitch who has a great talent and is flushing it down the toilet. I refuse to deal with you. Now you’re Farit Kozhennikov’s responsibility, you’re his charge, and his responsibility.

  Sasha closed her eyes for a second. She thought of Lisa. “I don’t ask for the impossible.”

  “Wait,” she said, trying to stay calm. “I will do seven exercises by next Saturday.”

  “Ten. Including the first two. Numbers one through twelve.”

  Sasha stared at him. Portnov stared back, as usual over his glasses.

  “Ten…” she whispered. “Ten…”

  “And you will polish the first two. Numbers one through twelve. And every day—a paragraph from the basic textbook.”

  Sasha was silent. She no longer cared.

  ***

  The first thing she did after leaving the school building was to call Mom. She didn’t really know why. She just needed to make sure everything was all right at home, and she needed to hear Mom’s voice. Immediately.

  Darkness fell, the rain stopped, then started again. The wind twisted her umbrella inside out. Sasha fixed the warped spokes, shook the water off her boots and her umbrella, and stepped into the warmth of the post office, filled with yellow light and the smell of sealing wax. A couple of people stood in line for long distance calls. Sasha sat down in a corner to wait.

  Today she missed three blocks—Philosophy, History and P.E.—the entire schedule, with the exception of Specialty. Everywhere she looked, she saw derisive sneers and meaningful glances, as if everyone knew in minute detail about all the pathetic and hilarious things that had happened last night in Kostya’s room.

  And she simply could not face Kostya. She felt humiliated and ashamed, and she had absolutely no idea how her life was supposed to go on. How was she going to deal with him on a daily basis?

  The line stalled; a woman in the long distance booth kept talking, nodding, agreeing and laughing into the receiver. Sasha watched her through the dark glass; the woman seemed happy, the illusory telephone connection, wires and cables did not seem to bother her, and only the person on the other end of the line, the one she listened to and probably loved, was real to her.

  A week remained until Saturday, her deadline for the one-on-one session. Ten exercises… Unfeasible. “I will not ask for the impossible,” Kozhennikov said. He lied.

  She took her textbook out of her bag, opened to the same first page and began Exercise number three:

  “Without using projection and hidden mirrors, envision a non-transparent rectangular parallelepiped so that four of its panes are clearly visible. Mentally distort the parallelepiped so that…”

  The woman finally left the long-distance booth, her place taken by an old man with gray mustache. The connection was lousy, and the old man was slightly deaf; he kept yelling something about the two hundred roubles that somebody’s nephew owed somebody else, and Sasha could not picture any parallelepiped: not a parcel post, not a package of pasta, not even an ordinary brick.

  “Exercise number five: in succession, repeat Exercises one through four, avoiding pauses or any interruptions. Exercise number six…”

  Sasha saw Kostya’s face, with its lower lip sticking out like a rim of a pitcher. How revolting that whole thing was, how stupid and disgusting… And those anchovies in tomato sauce… The gold coins were smeared in red, as if covered in blood; Sasha crawled on the floor in her underwear, picking up the coins, overcome by nausea because of that stupid vodka and Pepsi mixture…

  A general assembly was scheduled for tomorrow in the assembly hall after the fourth block. There would be no way out of this, she’d have to go with everyone else, and bear the suggestive looks, the laughter, and deal with Kostya’s presence…

  “Miss, are you asleep? Are you planning on making that phone call?”

  Snapping out of her trance, Sasha bolted to the phone booth and picked up the still warm receiver. Beep… another beep… one beep after another.

  “The person you are trying to reach is not responding.”

  Sasha checked the time. Half past seven. Mom should have been home by now.

  She sat back down. The hour hand on the round clock above the door very slowly approached eight. Sasha read a section from the second textbook. Steel axles and chipped gears rotated inside her head, grinding together. The person she was trying to reach was not responding; somewhere, in an empty flat, the telephone kept on ringing.

  “Miss, post office closes at eight.”

  “Please try dialing again.”

  “There is no answer. Perhaps they went to the theatre?”

  Sasha walked out into the rain and darkness. Two rows of buildings on Sacco and Vanzetti Street hovered over her: empty balconies, peeling plaster, glistening cobblestones. Naked linden trees. Of course, Mom and Valentin could be at the theatre. Or at a party… And it was absolutely nothing terrible that Mom was not home when, out of the blue, Sasha felt like calling her…

  She walked along the edge of the sidewalk, umbrella hanging by her side. Raindrops beat on her hood. Fallen leaves turned slimy and musty, losing all their poetic beauty. Water flowed between the stones in the pavement.

  A car drove by toward the center of town, a Zhiguli stained by moist dirt. The yellow hands of the headlights snatched the tree trunks and walls for a split second, reflected like flames in each cobblestone, drowned in the darkness, and disappeared. Darkness fell ag
ain, and only occasional lit windows and distant streetlights illuminated the road for Sasha.

  A gust of wind made the nearest linden tree shake and toss raindrops and its last few leaves on the ground. Sasha shivered and pulled her hood further down on her head. For some reason, she thought of that warm starry night when Lisa flew out of the window. Why did she think of that? Maybe the sensation was similar… The same gust of wind, as if something dark flew over the sky. Sasha thought that, in its despair and helplessness, Lisa’s “suicide” was analogous to her and Kostya’s “love…”

  “Good evening, Sasha.”

  She turned her head. A second ago she was alone in the street.

  “Why aren’t you using an umbrella? Is it some sort of a new fad with young people—soaking down to their bones?”

  It took Sasha a few seconds to recognize the man. Nikolay Valerievich, a very tall man with a hump, long gray hair tumbling from under his hat, stood next to her, wearing a dark coat and carrying a large black umbrella.

  “Hello,” she said, more nervous than polite.

  “You must be freezing. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

  ***

  She’d never been in this restaurant before, even though she passed it a few times and even noticed the sign. The restaurant was definitely not geared toward students; Sasha’s wet jacket was removed by a cloakroom attendant in a black sports coat. A fire burned in the room separated from the common area with heavy drapes, and Sasha immediately held out her hands, red from the cold.

  “Will you have anything to eat?”

  “Just coffee…”

  “Perhaps, a sandwich?”

  “Well…”

  “Caviar, salmon, ham?”

  “Ham,” Sasha chose, thinking ham might be cheaper.

  Nikolay Valerievich moved his shoulders. The gesture was typical for him; Sasha couldn’t stop thinking that his hump makes him uncomfortable, as if something was folded awkwardly, rolled up, and crumpled on his back, under his jacket,.

  “Sasha, tell me about your parents.”

  She did not expect this question. Actually, she had no idea what to expect.