Invented Lives

by Andrea Goldsmith

  He shoved a bundle at her. ‘These need to be cleaned,’ he said.

  Briefly her old self revived, and she shoved them back at him.’ I will show you how to clean them,’ she said.

  His anger was quick to flare. This was a man unaccustomed to being opposed, but, like it or not, he was dependent on her — not for money, he seemed to have plenty of it, but for everything else. His English was so poor it would earn him no rewards in the Australian streets and shops, and, as a member of the Soviet elite, he’d had people to take care of his personal needs. Mikhail needed her.

  The days and weeks passed, though time itself, without work or friends or outings to measure it by, lost all meaning. Automaton Galina shopped and cooked and cleaned; she tended her little garden, she cleared the rubbish in the lane; when the roof leaked in a heavy storm, she found a plumber and had it fixed. Automaton Galina kept the wheels of life turning.

  It might have been different if Mikhail were easier to like, but he ordered rather than asked, he took rather than gave. But could it have been different? Lidiya had hated this man. To like him, even to tolerate him, would be a betrayal of her mother. Yet there was a vague, haunting sense — nothing she could hold on to — that here in Australia the claims of family trespassed where once they would not have dared.

  The saddlery reeked of his smoking. When he moved, when he spoke, when he breathed, it was with a lifetime of cigarettes. He complained constantly. The cigarettes in this country were shit, gavno. The food in this country, also gavno. The whole damn country, gavno. And she wanted to say: Then leave, just leave. But where would he go? Mother Russia wouldn’t take him back, and that was, in truth, the only place he wanted to be.

  Finding the right cigarettes became a priority: if he was happy while smoking, he would have less opportunity to complain. She took him to a tobacconist, and translated his preferences to the proprietor. They returned to the saddlery with four different packs. The first was the local Marlboro brand, which he insisted was not the same as the Marlboros he had smoked in the Soviet Union; Australian Marlboros were gavno, he said, and tossed the pack in the rubbish. He then tried the Peter Stuyvesants, another brand he’d smoked at home — also quickly trashed. She prayed, as non-believers do in desperate situations, that one of the brands would suit. And when Mikhail declared himself satisfied with the English Dunhill (what a life of privilege he must have enjoyed in the Soviet Union), she decided God must be a smoker. She bought Mikhail a carton. A whole carton, she learned, lasted a single week.

  He wasn’t interested in seeing the sights. Melbourne couldn’t compete with Moscow, it couldn’t even compete with Leningrad, a city for which he had little fondness; besides, walking tired him. She said they could order a taxi, but he was not interested in taxis. He did, however, allow her to take him to a barber, not to have his hair dyed as he initially wanted, but to have it cropped. She explained that thick grey hair in an older man was considered attractive here, and the appeal to his vanity worked. But little else did. He complained about the food, he complained about the saddlery, he complained about the absence of friends. He absolutely refused to meet her Jewish Russian friends. ‘I’m not interested in your zhidovnia,’ he said, the insult so much worse coming from the mouth of a Jew.

  He sat on the green, floral couch, smoking his cigarettes and watching TV. He liked the game shows. And golf, he liked to watch the golf. ‘Do you play?’ she asked, already planning to sign him up at a club.

  Of course he didn’t play. How many golf courses had she seen in Russia? He liked the pace of the game, and it required no English. ‘It is suitable for me at this time of life,’ he said. ‘I have earned my relaxation.’

  One day she observed him watching an American slapstick movie. He was still laughing when the credits started rolling. The very next day she invested in a video recorder and signed up at the local video store.

  She kept him occupied, and that kept her occupied. He watched the TV, he watched the rented movies, he ate the food she prepared, he smoked his cigarettes, he complained often, he never thanked her. But then what did he need with thankyous? As far as he was concerned, she was just doing her duty.

  He would sit on the couch and make a mess, he would eat his meals and make a mess, he would use the bathroom and make a mess. He filled ashtray after ashtray. And she cleaned up after him — the couch, the kitchen, the shower, the disgusting toilet. Her life was busted, but she didn’t need to live in a pigsty; and besides, cleaning was easy for the automaton niece: the muscles moved, the mind was motionless.

  She tried to work, but she had no heart for work, and anyway, whenever she settled at her desk he seemed to want more tea, more cake, more heat, more cool, more cigarettes. The automaton niece always responded.

  About a month after Mikhail moved in, she met Andrew for coffee. She had put him off several times, but could do so no longer. She had no idea how she would manage to be her usual self, but when she saw him, already seated at a table, a smile entering his face at the sight of her, she was rushed with a sense of familiarity, of blessed normality. Immediately they fell into their usual chatter. It was such a relief being with him, and she wondered if, with his help, she might manage Mikhail and reclaim some of her old life. It was a brief moment of optimism. Andrew was attempting to make future engagements with her: a movie, a drive to an old homestead recently opened to the public, even the High Country holiday, and suddenly she felt caught. She declined all his suggestions. Not now, not now, she said, wrenching the conversation back to his project for Parks and Gardens, his parents, his dog, his days.

  These difficulties notwithstanding, the hour spent with Andrew restored a little of her lost self. She’d had a life, and it was gone. She’d had a future, and it was stalled. Mikhail could live for another twenty years; unless she acted to change the current situation, she’d be resuming life as a fifty-year-old. She needed to give Mikhail a life, so she could reclaim hers. As a starting point, she needed to get him out of the house, and then she might be able to send him on sightseeing daytrips, introduce him to some of the community groups for seniors, find him some friends, shift him.

  So she planned an excursion. With so much resting on this outing, the destination was all-important. She considered and dismissed several options. Then it came to her: the food hall at the Myer Emporium. Together with the TV and smoking, eating was Mikhail’s favourite activity; he would enjoy the beautiful displays and the huge variety of foods. They would take the tram, they would stroll through the food hall, and they would buy their dinner there. It was perfect.

  He resisted, as she knew he would, but she insisted, for the first time revealing her stubborn side. Still he continued to resist, demanding she show some respect. In the end she bribed him: there would be no meal that night unless he joined her on the Myer expedition. Mikhail understood bribes.

  It was just before eleven when they entered the food hall. The delicious smells hit her immediately. She loved this place, and the life in her quickened. She pointed out the confectionary, the cakes, the salads, the cheeses; as her voice grew more and more animated, he became less and less interested.

  ‘At home,’ he said at last, ‘I shopped at the special shops.’ He cast a withering glance at her. ‘I am not impressed with these foods.’

  Her hopes dwindled and then died. He wandered off. She watched him from a distance. He moved slowly, heavily. He was not yet seventy, but his was a Russian age, and he was old and weary.

  As was she. She did not bother with the rest of the food hall. There was no point, no point to anything anymore, foolish to have even tried. She guided him outside to the tram stop. They travelled home in silence.

  For two years, her Australian life and her Russian past had existed uneasily together, like a tandem bike with differently sized wheels. Now Soviet Russia was not simply shaping her Australian days, but had actually taken over. She was stuck, with neither desire nor en
ergy to get going again.

  14

  LOVE AND OBLIGATIONS

  The seemingly endless winter of 1988 was wearing itself out.

  Two months had elapsed since that red-letter day when Galina had agreed to go on holiday with him, a mere eight weeks since the intruder had broken into her home, but from Andrew’s perspective everything had changed. While Galya appeared to have recovered from the break-in, she was even more controlled and unreadable than before and, significantly, she was keeping him at a distance. They had met for coffee at her local café and there had been a couple of lunches, but he had not been to the saddlery during the past two months, and all his suggestions for exhibitions, for films, for the Saturday excursions she used to like so much were rejected; indeed, she hardly seemed to give them any consideration, responding with a mechanical no-room-for-discussion refusal. As the weeks turned over, his hopes, fired up by her ready agreement to take a holiday with him, were turning to ash.

  ‘She wants to see me only occasionally and always in public,’ Andrew said to his mother. ‘She couldn’t be clearer about this.’

  Sylvie nodded. ‘She’s treating me in much the same way. The mystery is why she’s suddenly changed.’

  It was late one Sunday morning, Leonard was out walking, and Andrew and Sylvie were sitting in the Morrow kitchen. A packet of shortbread was open on the table, along with a pot of brewed coffee — a surprising but welcome change, Andrew thought, from the powdered stuff his mother usually served.

  ‘I can’t believe the intruder is the sole explanation,’ Andrew said, helping himself to another biscuit. ‘Something’s wrong.’ He paused, and when he spoke again it was an unambiguous plea. ‘Would you speak to her? Galya sees you as a mother figure, a confidante. My position’s far more muddy.’

  Sylvie smiled. ‘I think that’s muddying the obvious.’

  Were his feelings so transparent? And were they to Galina? Not that this was his major concern at the moment. ‘Will you speak with her? Please.’

  He realised even as he spoke, that requesting his mother’s help in this, or indeed anything, reinforced rather than loosened her entrenched over-protectiveness. But he was desperate.

  However, Sylvie, much to his surprise, was not stepping forward.

  ‘Galya’s been through so much these past few years. Then just as she’s settled into her new life, an intruder breaks in.’ She shrugged. ‘Maybe that’s the entire explanation. And if it’s not, I’m prepared to wait until she’s ready to open up. But if you want some answers now, then it’s up to you to approach her.’

  His mother was right, he knew this even while he was asking her to do his work for him.

  ‘Just make up your mind and do it,’ Sylvie said. ‘Do it today. When you leave here, don’t go home, go straight to her place.’

  He nodded. He would. The decision was made, so no need to dwell on it, and, checking the time, no need to worry about it just yet. He poured the remains of the coffee pot into his mug and took a sip. It was cold, and he pushed it away.

  ‘So what have you been up to?’ he asked his mother.

  ‘Oh, just the usual,’ Sylvie said.

  She carried the coffee pot to the sink. With meticulous attention, she rinsed out the grains and prepared a fresh pot. She kept her back turned to her son. Unlike Galina, her face was all-too-readable.

  Just the usual, said with polished ease.

  She’d always considered herself a poor liar; certainly, that’s what Leonard believed, but then he knew rather more about the topic than she did. As it turned out she was rather good at it, which was crucial for a life now manoeuvred with military precision. She planned her lies, she kept them simple, she held her gaze steady when telling them, and just in case she forgot one in the welter of excuses that were now required to explain her lack of punctuality, her forgetting to collect Leonard’s dry-cleaning, her not having bought a birthday present to send to Leonard’s brother, her not doing any of the myriad of chores that used to occur like clockwork, she kept a note of her lies. Tuesday: lunch with Maggie; Wednesday: shopping with Galya; Thursday: an extra few hours at the op shop, whereas all these times had been spent with Mark. Leonard was so convinced of her being a poor liar, it would not occur to him that she was telling him anything but the truth.

  She checked the kitchen clock, and changed her mind about fresh coffee. ‘You’ve decided to talk with Galya,’ she said to Andrew in a no-nonsense sort of voice. ‘No point in putting it off. And when you do talk with her,’ she said, as she hugged him at the door, ‘say you were worried about her. She can’t take exception to that.’

  As soon as Andrew left, Sylvie checked the clock again, made herself another drink, instant coffee so as not to waste a minute, and took herself to the living room. She dialled Mark’s number and settled into the couch for a giddy half-hour before Leonard returned from his walk.

  Since Winston’s departure, Leonard had come to understand the value of exercise. By devouring time and decanting the mind, it provided much-needed respite from a life under stress. During the week he walked every morning and evening, and on weekends he walked through half the daylight hours. He walked so much that Butch, initially thrilled at his master’s new habits, now baulked at the front door.

  This Sunday morning, with no particular destination in mind, Leonard had set off soon after breakfast. Clad in overcoat and blue beret, he strode briskly and rhythmically eastward. His head ached constantly these days, his poor brain seizing pain as if it were its only friend; it was particularly insistent this morning. After about two hours, he found himself somewhere in Caulfield or Carnegie. The sun glared with a piercing wintry white, he pulled his beret lower, and although he should have been heading back, he ambled on. There had been a couple of spring-like days recently, but today the weather had returned to winter — a relatively mild winter, according to the weather bureau, yet it had felt perpetually cold to him. He had no idea how he would make it to the end of the year, much less the end of his life.

  Things with Sylvie had settled, but apart from her letter project, she had little need of him. She had changed these past months, had become more independent, perhaps having decided she could no longer depend on him. She didn’t seem unhappy, despite what had happened between them, just different. Andrew hadn’t needed him for years. And Winston, who had promised him a lifetime, had tossed him out like old milk.

  Every day found him in a perpetual tussle with memory. He knew that if he tried not to think about Winston he would suffer less, but at the same time he wanted to remember all that he once had in order to feel less alone. Perhaps the worst of it was he’d become so accustomed to his parallel lives that, with one suddenly shut down, he felt strange to himself. His routines were different, his emotional world was different, his working days were different; he might well have been exiled to another life.

  He was gradually coming to terms with the changes when his old life had intruded in the worst possible way. A man he could hardly remember, a man with whom he’d had a short affair not long before he met Winston, this man was ‘doing the right thing’ by contacting former sexual partners to let them know he had tested positive for HIV. From the little Leonard could glean during the brief telephone call, the man actually had full-blown AIDS.

  Neither Winston nor he had taken the test. Winston had had only a handful of sexual partners in his entire life; as for himself, the men infected with AIDS were promiscuous homosexuals (definitely not him), and bisexuals (not him either). As to what he was: some men frequent prostitutes, others watch porn, others are turned on by women’s feet, or knickers, or rolls of fat; he was a married man who was turned on by sex with other men.

  He felt attacked on all sides for simply being who he was. He recalled Galina saying that for her, leaving Russia was not really a choice, that she was pushed to act by outside circumstances impinging on who she was. It occurred to him that th
e real choice for him was the same impossible one as for her: not to be the person he was, not to be himself.

  The last leaves dangled brown and dead from the branches, a sheet of newspaper lifted by the wind slapped against his legs, and as he walked, his mind filled with the oddest desire: to be held inside an Old Master — he could see it so clearly — a huge canvas of a family group, all of them wearing Elizabethan collars, and he, the youngest child, forever surrounded by parents and siblings. Forever young, forever loved, forever safe.

  Winston was gone and he missed him. He might have AIDS and he was terrified. He was desperate for his wife’s comfort but unable to seek it. He felt shockingly alone and fatally unmoored. No matter how far and fast he walked, his past was in hot pursuit, and any satisfactory future was punishingly out of reach.

  He had reached a five-way intersection, vaguely familiar, and paused a moment before veering up one of the roads. Immediately he was assailed by the sweet, sweaty hay-and-hair smell of horses. He knew there was a racecourse in the area, and assumed there were stables nearby.

  The smell brought a flush of an old happiness, and he slowed his pace better to capture the memory. It was twenty years ago — such a carefree time — and he, Sylvie, and eight-year-old Andrew were on holiday in the UK. For a week they had taken a furnished flat in London’s Primrose Hill, and every morning a troop from the Royal Horse Guards would clip-clop past. He would hear the horses long before they appeared at the corner, the hooves sounding crisp and percussive in the still, cold air. As they passed, and for minutes afterwards, there would be that sweet, grassy smell. There had been a groomsman too, who’d added extra spark to that trip. And now the same smell and a deep longing to return to those untroubled days.

  He set off again at a pace. There was no point in hankering for the impossible. He might have AIDS, and he had to make a decision about the test. He should be grateful he’d got away with his parallel lives for so long. But he wasn’t grateful, and if it had been in his power, he would not have chosen to be this way at all.