Vita Nostra

by Marina Dyachenko

  “It is going to rain,” she said out loud.

  No one answered. The garden was too big. The interns had lost track of each other a long time ago.

  Sasha slid down her tree. Carefully transferred the cherries from her basket to a box. To be on the safe side, she covered the berries with a piece of plastic that lay nearby on the grass.

  Then she lay on her back and stared upwards. Stillness descended upon the garden, like during Portnov’s lectures; the leaves froze. Sasha stared straight ahead.

  A thin layer of hot air surrounded her face. Above she detected another layer, filled with whirling flies. Higher still was the thick top of the cherry tree; to Sasha it seemed transparent. Above that—frozen masses of air, and beyond—a thick layer of clouds. Higher, still higher, the stratosphere…

  The clouds swirled into a funnel, and simultaneously Sasha fell into the sky. This used to frighten her. In her childhood, at a summer retreat, she lay on the field just like that, stared up and was afraid of tumbling into the sky.

  And now it happened.

  Wind tore the plastic sheet off the box, and the cherries stared out of it in a multitude of dark eyes. Sasha saw herself from their point of view: the picture would splinter, then collect into a whole, and that would cause a stereo effect.

  She was caught and pulled up like a kite, while her body left on the grass remained inert. A thread that connected her to this anchor helped her soar and kept her close. She felt the trees as her arms, and grass, as her hair. A lightning struck, torn leaves flew by, and Sasha laughed with pure joy.

  She knew herself to be a word spoken by the sunlight. She laughed at the fear of death. She understood what she was born for and what she was destined to carry out. All this happened while the lightning remained in the sky, a white flash.

  And then it began to rain, and she came to her senses—soaking wet, her tee-shirt stuck to her body, a lacy bra, coquettish and pitiful, peeking through the wet fabric.

  ***

  “Greetings, second years.”

  Specialty lectures were still held in the same Auditorium number 1. Second year students of Group A sat behind the same tables that looked like high school desks.

  Sasha looked around, surprised to see many familiar but entirely forgotten details. Here was a black board, just like in high school. Here was a dent on a painted wall. Here were the people who stayed close to her almost the entire summer; at some point they ceased to mean anything, became transparent like soap bubbles. But now the second year was starting—and everything was gaining a new meaning.

  Sasha herself had changed. It felt as if she were taken apart—and then put back together again, and at first glance she seemed exactly the same. Sometimes even she herself thought that she was exactly the same as last fall, when they listened to Gaudeamus in the assembly hall.

  Portnov opened the thin paper-bound attendance journal.

  “Goldman, Yulia.”

  “Here,” Yulia sat lopsided, doodling in her notepad. Every now and then her head twitched.

  “Bochkova, Anna.”

  “Here,” Anna blinked, too often and too fretfully.

  “Biryukov, Dmitry.”

  “Here,” Dmitry covered his face with his hand, as if the sunlight blinded him.

  “Kovtun, Igor.”

  “Here.”

  “Kozhennikov, Konstantin.”

  “Here.” Kostya raised his head. His hair was bleached by the sun and stood on its end. He sat next to Zhenya Toporko, but not right beside her—an empty chair remained between them.

  “Korotkov, Andrey.”

  “Here,” for some reason, during the summer Andrey had shaved his head and now resembled a very young suntanned recruit.

  “Have you decided to save money on hairbrushes?” Portnov squinted at him. “Not bad, not bad, it suits you. Myaskovsky, Denis.”

  “Here.”

  It was abundantly clear that the entire group was present, but the roll call continued, a solemn ritual. Sasha breathed deeply. The very smell of the Institute, the smell of fresh paint, plaster, dust, linden trees outside reminded her and stressed the point: she was alive, her life was rich and colorful, and everything was back to its normal state: September, learning, Auditorium number 1, sunlight.

  “Pavlenko, Lisa.”

  “Here,” said Lisa.

  She was wearing exaggeratingly wide jeans with decorative suspenders falling along the pant legs. Unexpectedly, these baggy jeans only emphasized Lisa’s thin, fragile figure; she had a tan that made her blonde hair seem even lighter.

  “Samokhina, Alexandra.”

  “Here.”

  Portnov measured her with his eyes, but did not comment.

  “Toporko, Zhenya.”

  “Here.”

  “I can see you enjoyed your vacation,” Portnov squinted. “You look like you’ve spent it at an expensive resort.”

  Zhenya seemed unperturbed. She’d visibly matured since the last year; out of a frumpy teenager emerged a sexy, shapely young woman. Her school-girl braids remained in the past; this summer Zhenya cut her hair fashionably short. Her tanned face boasted a gentle blush; sitting near Kostya, she looked at Portnov almost without fear: beautiful, yes, I am fully aware, now what?

  Roll call completed, Portnov gave the group one more glance over his glasses:

  “We all had a good rest, and are now ready for new accomplishments. This semester, as usual, we prepare for hard work. You will now have another Specialty subject: Introduction to Applied Science. Your professor is Nikolay Valerievich Sterkh, he is an excellent teacher, try not to disappoint him. You will now have fewer subjects on general education. Physical Education remains a mandatory subject. Has anyone yet spoken with the first years that just moved into the dorms?”

  A light whisper ran through the rows.

  “I have,” Sasha said. “I got two new first year roommates this morning. Am I not allowed to?”

  “You are allowed. However: if anyone here has a discussion with a first year student regarding the profile of our institute, its specialization, education program, or educational style—that person will answer to his or her advisor. Therefore I suggest you restrain yourselves.”

  The murmur of voices in the auditorium became louder.

  “But what should we tell them?” Korotkov asked. “In case they ask?”

  Portnov smiled unexpectedly:

  “Give them good advice. Convince them to study hard and attend all their classes. Comfort them in case of hysterics. You are mature people, come up with something, remember how last year the former third years gave you moral support…”

  “We’ll support them,” Denis said.

  Sasha glanced back. The student body of Group A of second year watched their professor: some people sat leaning to one side. Some had a tough time focusing their eyes. Some twitched, some giggled uncontrollably. A gathering of freaks.

  “Some of you are still going through the deconstructive stage,” Portnov said, as if addressing her thoughts. “Which is not surprising, considering your laziness and lack of energy. I want to remind you: only those who study hard have a short and easy path to normality… to the state that you deem normal at this point. Reminder: alcohol is forbidden on the premises. The first years are going to drink, and at first they will not be punished. But if I see even a trace of alcohol in your blood… I am not even talking about drugs, because those of you who attempt to smoke pot at this point in the process are doomed. If I find alcohol in anyone’s room, I will make sure that you will vomit every time vodka is even mentioned. Is this clear? Any questions?”

  His glasses reflected the window panes. No one had questions.

  “That’s it for the administrative issues,” Portnov said. “Prefect, the textbooks are on the table. Please distribute them to the class: Textual Module, Level Four, and the Problem Set, Level Three.”

  “Am I prefect again this year?” Kostya ventured.

  Portnov raised an eyebrow:


  “Group A, are there any other candidates?”

  “Let Samokhina be the prefect,” Lisa said. “She’s our star student and a community leader.”

  Someone giggled, but the sound died down immediately.

  “Samokhina,” Portnov wasn’t looking at Sasha, “has enough work this semester. Kozhennikov, you’ve already taken up two minutes. Just do your job, I beg of you.”

  The textbooks were old and smelled of dust. Sasha couldn’t help herself and peeked at the first page of the book of exercises.

  “Samokhina!” His voice lashed at her like a whip. “I did not give permission to open the book!”

  Reluctantly, she closed the book. The first lines of the very first exercise caused her to sink into delicious ecstasy.

  ***

  The two weeks that she spent at home turned out to be harder than she thought: she was constantly forced to check herself, listen, hear, give appropriate answers, and smile at regular intervals. Sasha did her best, but Mom kept getting more and more worried.

  “Sasha,” she said one morning when they were alone in the apartment. “You know… Show me your arms.”

  At first Sasha had no idea. Apparently, Mom was looking for needle marks, and, not finding any, did not completely relax.

  “Mom, that’s just silly. What made you think that?”

  “You are acting strange. You answer out of turn. You look… detached. What is happening to you, can you tell me? What’s going on? Do you smoke? Sniff? Are you taking pills?”

  “I swear to you,” Sasha said tiredly. “I’ve never tried anything like that in my life. I don’t even drink vodka.”

  Mom did not seem convinced. She seemed anxious herself, first high-strung, then cheerful, she would look preoccupied, then forget about her worries, and finally Sasha ended up asking her:

  “Is something going on with you? What happened?”

  “Can you tell?” Mom said after a pause, and she blushed.

  “What?” Sasha blinked.

  “I am expecting,” Mom said simply. “We are—Valentin and I.”

  “How?!”

  “The usual way,” now Mom was trying to be unflappable, even sarcastic. “I am not as old as you may think.”

  “I don’t think that,” Sasha mumbled. “I meant something different. But...”

  “But when a man and a woman love each other, it is perfectly natural that they want to have a child. Valentin wants a baby.”

  “And you?”

  “And so do I!” Mom’s laugh sounded a bit tense. “Don’t you want a baby brother? Or a baby sister?”

  “I don’t know,” Sasha admitted, having considered the possibility. ‘It’s all sort of transcendental.”

  At this moment she understood Mom’s state of mind, and she also knew why the subject of drugs and Sasha’s unusual reactions had not developed any further. Sasha had no idea what she would have done had Mom pressed her against the wall with questions like: what do you do in that Torpa? But Mom was too busy. She was growing a baby, and that unborn baby, and not grown-up Sasha, was getting all her attention.

  Sasha thought about it, realizing her own unfairness. Mom was not indifferent to her fate. Mom was torn between her new family and Sasha, and Sasha felt torn in half: she desperately wanted her mother to release her from Torpa. She knew perfectly well that her wish was unattainable and criminal. She was terrified that one day Mom would learn the truth and would attempt to free Sasha—and would perish in the struggle, because she had absolutely no chance in the fight against Farit Kozhennikov.

  “If only you went to a normal school close to home,” Mom said the night before Sasha’s departure. “You would have enough time… and you would want to… and you would see the baby grow up, you would help me… It would be good for you; someday you will have children of your own… how about transferring?”

  “It would be too crowded for the four of us,” Sasha said. “The apartment is too small.”

  “But this is the only apartment we have! Perhaps a bit later we’ll find a bigger apartment, but for now…”

  “For now I will stay at Torpa,” Sasha said. “They have really nice dorms.”

  Mom sighed. At this moment she desperately wanted to believe that the dorms were indeed very nice.

  “I’m going to pack,” Sasha got up. “The train’s tomorrow and I haven’t even started packing.”

  She went into her room, sat down on the couch, put down her hands and imagined that soon nothing familiar, kind or old will exist. The next time she comes home… everything will be different. A new life, a new childhood will begin. Sasha’s room will change, and the cold draft will blow the memories that lay on dusty bookshelves out of the window. Yes, Sasha is selfish, she was used to having Mom all to herself; first there was Valentin, now there will be somebody else who will own the informational space of this home. And Sasha, back on the periphery, will be slowly transforming into a new creature. Into an unknown entity. Perhaps into something life-threatening. She will transform silently. And it was a good thing that Mom had Valentin and that she will have that baby, because the girl who was born and grew up in this home no longer existed…

  Sasha felt sorry for herself. Then she discovered—and was not surprised by her discovery—that she no longer knew how to cry.

  ***

  “Introduction to Applied Science will be taught for two semesters. We shall have a test in the winter, then in the summer there will be another one. During the third year we should expect a full semester of hands-on projects, followed by a placement exam. This is serious stuff, my dear children. Experience shows that students who excel equally in Specialty and in the Introduction to Applied Science pass the placement exam easily. This means that from now on you must share your efforts between two major subjects: mine and Oleg Borisovich Portnov’s. While you have worked with Oleg Borisovich for a year, you do not yet know me…”

  The hunchback smiled.

  He stood in front of the class, almost hitting the ceiling with his head. If he stood up straight, he’d definitely reach it. Nikolay Valerievich wore a black old-fashioned suit. Every now and then he moved his shoulders as if his curved back bothered him.

  “We shall study on an individual basis. Perhaps later we will break into smaller subgroups, three, four people in each, but first I have to figure out the professional abilities of each student. At this point there is only one person here, whose future is more or less obvious…”

  “And that person is Samokhina,” Lisa suggested.

  Nikolay Valerievich raised his eyebrows:

  “My dear girl, didn’t Oleg Borisovich teach you to be quiet when a professor is speaking?”

  Lisa reddened but did not look away.

  “Yes, this person is Alexandra Samokhina. She has very vivid, um, professional abilities, they became evident during the first year, and Alexandra will have a customized program. That does not, however, mean that one of you will be left unattended.” He smiled genially at the class.

  Apparently, unlike Portnov, not all of the professors here had manners worthy of the Spanish Inquisition. The hunchback seemed kind enough. Second years exchanged hopeful looks; some even seemed to think that they might be able to goof off just a little bit.

  Sasha had no such illusions.

  ***

  The hunchback made his own schedule of the individual sessions, not trusting this task to anyone else. Sasha was the last one on his list; she had time to go to the library and experiment with the new set of exercises.

  The first glance did not deceive her: the new exercises were similar to the old ones, but were substantially more complex. Multilevel transformation of entities, infinitely abstract, that sometimes formed a circle, sometimes compressed to a single point, ready at any moment to break through and rip apart the fabric of visualized reality; if these were somebody else’s thoughts, they were so decidedly inhuman that Sasha was simply scared to imagine a brain naturally capable of producing these chimeras. At the sam
e time—Sasha already knew enough to see this—these exercises were astonishingly beautiful in their harmony.

  She remembered her session with the hunchback a minute before her scheduled time slot.

  Auditorium number 14 was located on the fourth floor, squeaky and echoed. Sasha ran down the corridor, made an effort to calm her breathing and knocked on the door.

  “Hello, Sasha. Sit down, let’s chat.”

  The auditorium was furnished with desks, just like a classroom. Sasha chose the one near the window. Below her—all she had to do was to reach out her hand—the green sea of linden trees rustled softly.

  “The first year has gone by,” the hunchback sat across from her at the teacher’s table. His ash-blonde hair, long and straight, framed his face in two falling curtains. A sharp chin lay on a high white collar. He is so antiquated, Sasha thought.

  “Sasha,” the hunchback said pensively. “Has anyone ever told you that you are a very different, a very special person? Someone who has an extraordinary and very important mission?”

  “No,” Sasha said quickly.

  The hunchback smiled.

  “And it’s for the best. We don’t need any superiority complexes… However, Alexandra Samokhina, this is your time. You are not only our best student; you are a rare talent, let’s admit it, a rare gift. You have a magnificent future ahead of you. And what does that mean?”

  Confused, Sasha did not respond.

  “First and foremost that means that your present is one of daily hard labor, like that of a slave, without idleness, fear or doubt. The preparatory work that you have done during your first year is nothing compared to what you—we—will have to learn, grasp, and master. Today, right now, we begin to prepare for the placement exam that awaits you in the winter of your third year.”

  She listened, bearing down on a small desk. The hunchback spoke with a slight smile on his face, but he was not joking, oh no, and Sasha knew perfectly well that he was serious.

  Linden trees swayed outside. Sasha’s left cheek felt the warm wind tasting vaguely of autumn.