Back to Moscow

by Guillermo Erades

‘It’s been a long winter,’ I said.

  The corner between Tverskaya and Kamergersky was one of my favourite spots in Moscow. Maybe it was the way the small-village feel of Kamergersky – a pedestrian street which you might easily see in Western Europe – met the metropolitan grandeur of Tverskaya. Or perhaps it was the historical imprint of the place, with the central post office covered in Communist symbols on one side, and the Moscow Art Theatre on the other. It was in this very theatre, before and after it moved to its current location, that Chekhov had premiered his main plays: The Seagull, Uncle Vanya, Three Sisters and, just before he died, The Cherry Orchard.

  The red kiosk on the corner was selling fresh blinis and the smell of fried butter wafted into the street. I suggested we have a couple of blinis while we waited. As we were about to head over, a young woman walked towards us holding a folder in her arms.

  ‘Hello,’ she said, in English. ‘Tatyana, from Evans.’

  Tatyana’s pretty face was flushed, from the cold or perhaps because she’d been running late and walking fast. Her eyes were apple green.

  We followed Tatyana into a side alley. She stopped in front of a metal door, peeked at some papers in her folder, then tapped in the door code. She climbed the stairs to the first floor, with us behind her. She was wearing a yellow woollen hat, a black coat, tight jeans.

  ‘Cute ass,’ Colin said into my ear.

  On the landing, Tatyana rang the bell of the apartment and turned to us. ‘It’s a very nice place,’ she said. ‘You’ll see.’

  Tatyana took her hat off and a mass of blonde curly hair unfurled over her shoulders. Our eyes met and she smiled for a brief moment, nervous, naive – clearly unaware of her own beauty. Her smile, which was marked by a small gap between her front teeth, cut through my many layers of skin and bone and muscle, ripping its way into my chest, making my heart pump with violence. Fucking 1917.

  The doors opened and we were greeted by an old Russian couple, well-dressed, smiley – obviously expecting us. The old man was even wearing a tie.

  We took our shoes off and walked in. The flat was furnished in dark soviet style, not unlike Stepanov’s flat. In fact, it was remarkably similar to Stepanov’s. The walls were lined with bookshelves. Tapestries hung above the couch. The centre of the living room was occupied by an enormous piano.

  The babushka went around the apartment showing us what she thought were its best features. Her husband followed behind without saying a word.

  ‘The piano is well tuned,’ she said, tapping three or four random keys. ‘The apartment is very quiet because all windows face a backyard and not the pereulok.’

  That was a pity, I thought, because it would have been nice to have at least one window overlooking the cafés in Kamergersky.

  Colin asked a few questions, out of politeness, I imagined, as I could see he was disappointed. He knocked on the tables, pulled open a few drawers. I noticed a bunch of framed pictures crammed on top of the piano and a family portrait hanging by the entrance. After a few minutes we thanked the old couple, Tatyana told them she would be in contact, and we left the building.

  ‘What the fuck,’ Colin said once we were in the street. ‘This is their own flat. These people live here.’

  Tatyana seemed confused. ‘Of course,’ she said, ‘but they would move out if you rented it.’

  ‘But I’m looking for an empty flat.’

  The three of us stopped beneath Chekhov’s statue.

  ‘It would be an empty flat if you took it,’ Tatyana said, blushing. ‘The owners would move out.’

  ‘Out where?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Tatyana said, ‘maybe to live with their family in the suburbs, or in a dacha, if they have one. It’s a common situation, these people are the old intelligentsia who had good connections in the Communist party and occupied the best flats in the centre. With the perestroika they were allowed to privatise their flats but they now live on very small pensions. Life is very expensive in Moscow. They have to move out and live off the rent.’

  Colin seemed distressed. ‘I would be kicking them out of their own place.’

  ‘They like foreigners as tenants,’ Tatyana said. ‘They know you pay well and won’t stay for ever. If you rent their flat you’ll be doing them a favour.’

  ‘I was thinking about something more modern,’ Colin said. ‘I don’t want to move into someone else’s apartment.’

  Tatyana forced a smile. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, ‘we’ll find something. There are good apartments in this area, renovated to Western standards.’

  I felt sorry for Tatyana, who’d come all the way to show us the apartment and, I guessed, worked on commission. Her eyes looked teary from the cold.

  ‘This is a very nice area,’ I said.

  ‘It is,’ Tatyana said. Then, pointing at the MKhAT, ‘This is a very famous theatre in Russia. Stanislavsky, Chekhov, you know. See the emblem above the entrance?’

  ‘The bird?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s a seagull, after Chekhov’s play.’

  I could hear in the humble way she spoke that Tatyana was not from Moscow.

  ‘I’m also looking for a flat,’ I heard myself saying.

  Colin looked at me, at first surprised, then grinning.

  ‘You are?’ Tatyana asked.

  ‘Yes, my flat is small. I could move somewhere bigger.’

  Tatyana smiled. ‘Maybe I can also try to find something for you.’

  She handed me her card, and we agreed to keep in touch. We said goodbye and shook hands. She then walked away, turned left at Tverskaya, and disappeared in the direction of Okhotny Ryad.

  41

  I WAITED IN THE MIDDLE of Pushkinskaya, observing how the snow that had covered the streets for months was now melting away, revealing the tarnished skin of the city. Without its white layer, Moscow looked exposed, somewhat uncomfortable, like a dyev the morning after – too much light and no make-up.

  I saw Tatyana crossing the street, marching towards the centre of the square. She was wearing the same black coat and yellow hat. A couple of hours after she’d given me her card, I’d sent her a message asking if she wanted to meet for a drink.

  I took her to Maki, a new café five minutes away from Pushkinskaya. Decent music, polite waitresses, dim lights – Maki was the closest thing to a modern European café. By now I preferred it to Pyramida. The young clientele was better dressed than the students in Project OGI but not as pretentious as the elitni tusovka of Vogue.

  We sat at one of the small tables, checking out the menu. I asked for a bottle of red wine. When the waitress came back with the wine, Tatyana remained undecided, her eyes fixed on the menu as if she were reading a book. She looked at me and blushed.

  ‘The mushroom soup is very good,’ I said.

  ‘Great,’ she replied with relief, ‘I’ll have that.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘I’m not that hungry.’

  ‘Salad, maybe?’

  ‘Davay,’ Tatyana said. ‘That would be nice.’

  I ordered two mushroom soups and two Caesar salads.

  At first Tatyana wasn’t very talkative but, after a swiftly drunk glass of wine, she became more relaxed. She told me that she came from Novosibirsk and had been living in Moscow for six months. She liked Moscow but she missed her family, especially her babushka, who was the one who had really raised her. It felt good sitting in Café Maki with Tatyana. I imagined everybody around us would be admiring her blonde, curly hair and her eyes, so green and perfect. She was clearly unaware of it, but Tatyana was without doubt the prettiest girl in the café.

  ‘I’m happy that my aunt found me a job in Moscow,’ Tatyana said. The aunt lived in a small town two hours away by elektrichka and Tatyana dutifully visited her every weekend. ‘Back in Novosibirsk it’s impossible to find work that pays decently.’

  What she liked best about the capital, Tatyana said as our plates of soup were laid in front of us, was the culture on offer.

&n
bsp; ‘There are so many things going on in Moscow’s theatres,’ she said. ‘The classics, but also very nice new musicals. If I had the money I would go every night.’ She smiled, her lips closed, probably conscious of the gap between her front teeth.

  As Tatyana was talking about her interests, I took my red notebook out of my backpack and placed it to the right of my soup plate. I took some notes – Novosibirsk, babushka, aunt, theatre.

  ‘What’s that?’ Tatyana asked.

  I told her about my research project, how it was not just about reading books, but also about getting to know what Russians thought about life.

  ‘But I don’t have any interesting thoughts about life,’ Tatyana protested.

  ‘That’s an interesting thought in itself,’ I said, scribbling in the notebook.

  Tatyana smiled. Her face was red. ‘Can I have a look?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said, pushing the notebook towards her side of the table.

  She turned the notebook round, glanced at it in silence. ‘But it’s in English.’

  ‘Of course.’

  Then she started to read slowly, sliding her finger under the lines, in heavily accented English. She started from the top of the page.

  ‘“When you saw the yellow tape, you knew spring was around the corner.”

  ‘What does it mean?’

  ‘Just random thoughts.’

  She continued reading.

  ‘“Black coat. Yellow woollen hat. Apple green eyes.”’ She laughed. ‘You are so funny.’

  I kept refilling her glass of wine. When the salad arrived, I ordered a second bottle.

  Tatyana wanted to know what I thought about Russia, as a foreigner.

  When we were done with the salads I suggested we share a plate of blinis with preserved strawberries and mascarpone.

  ‘Davay,’ she said.

  The blinis arrived and I slid the plate into the middle of the table.

  ‘I didn’t know what mascarpone was,’ Tatyana said, her mouth still half full. ‘But I like it, it’s just like thick smetana.’

  After dessert, we finished the bottle of wine, I paid the bill and we walked out into the dark street.

  ‘Thanks for dinner,’ Tatyana said. ‘It was lovely.’

  ‘Let’s walk to the metro,’ I suggested.

  She looked at her watch. ‘I think I’m a bit drunk.’

  It was colder now and, as we walked in silence back towards Pushkinskaya, I had to repress the urge to put my arm around Tatyana. Reaching the square, we descended into the perekhod but, instead of going all the way to the metro entrance, we climbed the stairs out into the street again, and stood next to Pushkin’s statue, where we had met earlier.

  I pointed to my block across the street. ‘That’s where I live.’

  ‘Above McDonald’s?’

  ‘On the other side of the block,’ I said. ‘You know the Scandinavia restaurant?’

  ‘Never heard of it.’

  ‘Would you like to come up for a cup of tea?’

  ‘I showed a flat in that block,’ she said. ‘A couple of months ago.’

  ‘It’s very central. I love it.’

  ‘Wonderful location,’ Tatyana said. ‘I don’t understand why you want to move somewhere else.’

  I smiled, said nothing.

  ‘Is it noisy?’ she asked.

  ‘Not really. My balconies face the courtyard and I live on the top floor. There is a great view. I’ll show you. Let’s go up for a cup of tea.’

  She stared at me in silence. For a few seconds we stood in the middle of the square. Cars piled at the traffic lights, expelling white fumes into the chilly night air. Muscovites rushed out of the metro, onto the street, cramming into McDonald’s, Café Pyramida, the Pushkin cinema. I could see the neon lights of the casino reflected in Tatyana’s eyes. Just above us stood Aleksandr Sergeyevich, leaning slightly forward, ready to descend from his pedestal. In the darkness of the night, Pushkin’s face revealed a soft smile.

  Tatyana looked at her watch, then back into my eyes. She opened her mouth, as if about to say something, then closed it again without uttering a sound. I put my arm around her shoulder, squeezed her body against mine, gave her a kiss.

  42

  THE RAIN CAUGHT ME by surprise as I walked down from Mayakovskaya. I increased my pace, hoping to reach my apartment before the water soaked my clothes. A gust of wind came out of nowhere, flapping the advertising banners above Tverskaya with unusual strength. The sky dimmed to leaden grey, the rain thickened and – though only two minutes away from home – I had no choice but to take shelter from the storm. I stepped into the Stanislavsky theatre.

  The entrance hall of the theatre was empty, aside from a babushka at the ticket booth. I smiled in her direction. She grumbled back. Waiting for the rain to clear, I began to study the posters on the walls. I noticed the babushka glancing my way above her thick glasses, frowning in a menacing manner – accusing me with her gaze of having entered her theatre under false pretences.

  To dispel her suspicions, I approached the programme on the wall and ran my finger down the list of plays. After all, I could be a genuine theatregoer, interested in the shows the Stanislavsky had on offer. When I peeked back at the babushka I could see she was irritated, impatient, about to ask me to leave. Outside, the rain was battering the pavement with increasing force, forming lakes and flooding the asphalt. Realising that I would have to stay inside the theatre for a while, I approached the booth and asked the cranky babushka for the best pair of tickets available for the evening performance.

  That night’s show turned out to be a play based on Bulgakov. I placed a thousand-ruble note on the counter and, after checking its validity against the light of a table lamp, the babushka relinquished the tickets and the change, still reluctantly, as if suspicious of my intentions.

  When the rain eased off I rushed home. I changed into dry clothes, boiled some pelmenis for lunch and lay on the couch. Tatyana and I had agreed to meet that evening.

  A month had passed since we’d met and Tatyana was now spending two or three evenings a week in my flat. After dinner, we would linger at the kitchen table, brewing tea with the samovar, and she would tell me about her day: how the price of real estate was going up, about the difficult clients she had, mostly expats who were looking for perfect apartments but were stingy with their budgets.

  Tatyana’s angelic beauty – her blonde curls, soft smile, trusting green eyes – stirred something buried deep inside me. Even the gap in her front teeth, the only imperfection in her otherwise faultless face, made her real, provincial, likeable. For some reason, I often found myself picturing Tatyana and myself from an outsider’s point of view, as if we were actors in a film. Cooking at home, walking in the street. Every time Tatyana was next to me, I would pose for an imaginary viewer.

  I fell asleep on the couch. When I woke up I made some tea, picked up my book of Chekhov’s plays, sat by the balcony. It had stopped raining. The sky was now white.

  I started to read bits from Three Sisters. I went through the first act, pondering Irina’s daydreaming of Moscow and the symbolic value the city acquired in the play.

  Chekhov had turned Moscow into a symbol of yearning, standing for things left behind and for the unreachable horizon that lies ahead.

  After finishing the first act, I looked up from the book and saw the city extending away beneath my balcony, the white sky pierced by soviet constructions and red-brick chimneys. The wet roofs and terraces reflected the brightness of the sky like pieces of broken mirror. I thought how different my Moscow was from Chekhov’s Moscow, the city the three sisters dreamed about. And yet, the enormous amalgam of buildings and squares and wide avenues continued to capture the dreams of thousands of people, like Tatyana and myself, who, coming from different places, had been brought together by the city. I wondered whether being in Moscow made us happier.

  Tatyana had left her hometown in Siberia – her babushka, her family – to search for a better li
fe in Moscow. Had she dreamed in Novosibirsk about Moscow? Now that she was in the city, with a job and a few friends, now that she had me, was she happier than before?

  ‘We want happiness,’ Vershinin says in Anton Pavlovich’s play, ‘but we are not happy and we cannot be happy.’

  Tatyana came over just after six. She hung her faux-leather handbag on the kitchen door handle, kissed me.

  ‘I have something for you,’ I said, handing her the pair of theatre tickets.

  She grabbed the tickets and, before even looking at them, thanked me with another kiss.

  ‘Tickets to the theatre,’ she said, with a broad smile, her eyes shining. ‘Great, I haven’t seen this play. I only saw the film. An old soviet film, in black and white, very good one.’

  ‘I’m glad you like them,’ I said. ‘Would you like to eat something before we go or should we just grab a bite afterwards?’

  She looked back at the tickets. ‘But they are for today?’

  ‘The show’s in an hour.’

  ‘But you should have warned me,’ she said, anxious.

  ‘It’s supposed to be a surprise. A change from watching a movie on the couch.’

  Tatyana’s smile was gone. ‘But I didn’t know we were going to the theatre.’

  ‘It’s the Stanislavsky theatre,’ I said, ‘just around the corner, a two-minute walk.’

  She looked at me, her face red. ‘But I have nothing to wear.’

  ‘What do you mean? You look great like this.’ She was wearing a black jacket and a black skirt, which I found quite elegant.

  ‘These are not theatre clothes. If you had told me I could have brought a nice dress from my flat.’

  ‘If I had told you then it wouldn’t have been a surprise. Don’t worry, it’s a small theatre, not a fancy opera. You look really good.’ To emphasise my words I kissed her again.

  She was unconvinced. But, noticing my disappointment at her reaction, she forced a smile. ‘At least this is not Novosibirsk,’ she said. ‘Nobody knows me here. I’ll try to look my best.’

  Tatyana took her cosmetics bag into the bathroom and locked the door behind her. First I heard the shower, then a hairdryer, which she must have had in her bag because I didn’t own one. Then I heard more water, and then silence for at least thirty minutes.