The Less You Know the Sounder You Sleep

by Juliet Butler

  ‘That’s right.’ Masha’s nodding but the others aren’t. ‘The less you know, the sounder you sleep.’

  Olessya shakes her head. ‘I’m not so sure, girls. I think I’d sleep a lot sounder if I knew the truth.’

  New Year’s Eve 1967

  New Year’s Eve party with Slava

  We always have this party on New Year’s Eve in school. It’s held in the Hall for Extra-Curricular Activities, and the nannies lay a long table of food, which is the best ever food we have all year. They make potato salads with salted cucumber and peas, and we have salted herring, and slabs of lard with white bread. There’s grated carrot and raisin salad, grated beetroot salad, and even sliced tongue, if we’re lucky. We’re not allowed alcohol, but Slava’s smuggling in some vodka for him and me. We’re going to get really, really drunk, and then we’re going to Do It for the first time ever. We haven’t talked about it, of course; we can’t do that because of Masha. But we both know. We’ve said it with our eyes. I don’t care if I die. But we won’t. Olessya says Zinaida was only trying to stop us doing it to protect herself. She says Zinaida doesn’t know a heart from a brain.

  ‘Right, I’m going,’ says Masha. We’re lying on our bed under the duvet because the heating’s off, and it’s minus twenty outside, and piled sky-high with snow. We’ve got a heater, but all the girls are crowded around it at the other end of the dorm. They’re not talking to us. Or rather not talking to Masha, so that means me too.

  She gets upset with people, and when she does, she bears a grudge forever. Her big mistake was making an enemy of Icy Valya. She got it into her head that Valya had stolen our food parcel from Aunty Nadya about six months ago. I don’t know if she did steal it, but Masha took her to our School Komsomol Court to be put on trial. Valya wasn’t found guilty because there wasn’t any proof, but now she’s turned everyone against Masha. If I’m honest, I think they were turning anyway because the others don’t like the way she beats me up at night sometimes. I’m used to it and I understand why she does – it’s because she can’t stand me always being there, and being so weak, not strong like her. It’s upsetting for her. But the kids don’t like her for it. Olessya and Little Lyuda tried to stop her to start with, but that made her even angrier. They both still talk to us, but they’re the only ones now. They’re sitting snuggled up together under the duvet in Olessya’s bed, reading a book.

  Masha gets out of our bed.

  ‘I’m not lying here watching those yobinny idiots tarting up,’ she says loudly. The girls have managed to get some lipstick and mascara from somewhere and they’re making each other up, and giggling. I’d love to wear lipstick and mascara too, but Masha’s not into anything like that. Not at all. She doesn’t care what boys think. We’re not even wearing our nice blouses. Just our plain flannel shirts and trousers. ‘Come on, we’ll go to the Hall and wait. Get our coats.’

  I don’t care. Not tonight. Slava’s got vodka. His brother dropped it off last week, and he’s been keeping it at the bottom of the woodpile. Masha’s fed up with everything so she wants to get blind drunk. We haven’t talked about me and Slava, but I think she knows because my heart’s been racing like a mad thing all day.

  ‘You’re early, girls! No one’s here.’ The nanny, Aunty Traktorina, is laying the table. There are only two nannies looking after us and Valentina Alexandrovna is in charge, but she must still be in the kitchens. Masha puts her icy-cold hand down the back of my neck to warm it up. I shiver. He’ll be here soon. The boys are in their dorm getting ready too. I can’t think of anything but Slava. Not being able to have him makes me want him all the more. It’s like being starving hungry and having a steaming plate of the tastiest food in the world sitting right in front of you. You can smell it all the time but you can never eat it. Masha lets us sneak a kiss sometimes, when she’s in a good mood, but as soon as she thinks it’s getting too heavy, she pushes him off. ‘A bit of a kiss is all right, but I’m not having you falling in love. You’re mine, all mine,’ she always says. I can tell Slava’s frustrated. There’s this new girl, Anyootka, who’s just come to our school. She’s really pretty. And sweet. And clever. She’s in our class and of course she likes Slava. And poetry.

  Masha’s got her leg over my knee and is jiggling it up and down angrily.

  ‘Thank goodness there are boys here,’ she says. ‘Boys aren’t bitches. Girls are bitches.’

  I look up at the frosty window, and blow on my hands. Masha would never let me put my cold hand down her neck. Slava would. I’m worried though, because if Slava ever gets too fed up of not being able to be with me, he might start seeing someone else. Like Anyootka. If he did that, I’d die. I would – I’d die, I know it. Sometimes it feels like I’m just waiting all the time, every stupid second of the day, for him to stop liking me, and start liking her instead. It’s torture.

  ‘I should set Uncle Mikoyan on them …’

  I sigh and push her hair back over her ear. ‘That’s part of the problem, Mash,’ I say. ‘When you started going on all the time about how he really was our uncle, at least our real great-uncle, it got them all angry. I mean, you did go on all the time about it …’

  ‘They’re just jealous.’

  ‘Making people envious doesn’t make them like you, Mash. It makes you feel better, but not them …’ She’s not listening. ‘It does the opposite,’ I add quietly. Sometimes I don’t think Masha understands what people think – or cares. I hear a noise and look over at the door again, but it’s only Valentina Alexandrovna coming in. Masha does think up all these really crazy things, like she tells everyone now that we were created in a laboratory by Professor Dolyetsky and Anokhin, and that when we graduate with our diplomas we’ll be taken on a trip all over the world as one of the great Soviet Achievements, and get awarded the Order of Lenin. If I’m honest, she believes these things so hard that she gets me half believing them too. I don’t want to be taken away from Slava though, not ever. Not for anything.

  The door opens again, and this time the boys all come in, laughing and whooping when they see the food. They’ve already been drinking. I’m afraid for a moment that Slava’s not there, but he’s right at the back, and when he sees me, he comes straight over to us.

  ‘All right, girls? C’mon then, let’s go somewhere quiet and sort this out.’ He taps a bulge under his shirt. Vodka. Masha laughs.

  Midnightish, dark, very very dark and swirly-wirly … soooo drunk can’t see … Masha laughing’n’laughing’n’music’s thumping thumping’n’Slava kissing kissing … his hand ’nder my shirt on my breasts. Mmm, can smell his breath’n’sweat … reaching down and down to touch me, feel me … heavy on top of me … inside me … ’n’ I hold him so haaaard, so haaaard, can’t breathe … joined in one, him’n’me … together … Slava … Slava … at last … aaakh … Slava!

  Age 18

  Spring 1968

  Sitting under the pear tree discussing our future

  Masha doesn’t know I’m not a virgin any more. I didn’t bleed at all. I was beautifully throbbingly, sore, but she wasn’t. Obviously. I don’t remember what happened after we had sex, or even how long we did it for. All I know is that when me and Masha woke up, in our bed, she had a headache but no memory of me and Slava. But I did. Oh yes, it was all a bit muddled, but I did … he was so hard and his lips so soft …

  The sun’s all warm, even though it’s evening time, so we’re all sitting on the grass under the pear tree listening to music on Slava’s transistor radio. He gave me a hot secret smile when we walked up to meet them just now. He always gives me this hot secret smile. Masha wants Aunty Nadya to bring us a transistor radio next time she comes. Last time she visited, Little Lyuda asked her to look up her parents, to see if they were still at the address she was writing to. She thought maybe they’d moved, but they hadn’t. Aunty Nadya did go. She’s kind like that. She knocked on the door and said she’d come from Lyuda in Novocherkassk but they wouldn’t even open the door properly. They kept i
t on the chain and told her through the crack that they’d adopted another daughter now. They said that they’d named the second one Lyuda too, and to go away.

  I knew I wasn’t going to get pregnant because we haven’t got our periods yet. I smile inside. I’ve had sex! Masha said we couldn’t, but we have. Kha!

  We’re all sitting here together, Masha, Slava, Olessya, Little Lyuda, Big Boris and Anyootka. She’s sitting next to Slava. We’re talking about the Medical Commission. We all get graded by how defective we are when we’re eighteen years old, by this panel of defectologists. No one talks much about the grading system, but everyone hates it.

  Top grade is Four. That’s for the kids like us in the school, who are clever and can walk and work for a living. It goes down to One for the totally paralysed who can only be dumped into full State Care and treated like rotting vegetables.

  ‘What are you going to d-do, Olessya, when you leave here?’ I ask. She’s leaving school in two months. So are Little Lyuda and Big Boris, because they’ll be graduating. She’s leaning back against the tree trunk with her eyes closed.

  ‘If I get top marks in my diploma, I’m going to apply to the Moscow Technology College,’ she says, without opening her eyes. ‘And live in a student dorm.’

  Big Boris is registered to live in Novocherkassk, so he’ll have to study and work here, but the two of them don’t seem too bothered about splitting up. Valentina Alexandrovna wants him to apply for the Engineering College, and then maybe go and work in the Locomotive Factory. Little Lyuda’s not sure where she’s registered now.

  ‘I hope it’s Moscow,’ she says. ‘Because that’s where I lived …’

  ‘Do you think we’ll get Grade F-Four?’ I ask no one in particular, and no one in particular answers. ‘I mean we can do everything. It doesn’t make any d-difference being Together. Right?’ Anyootka looks up then, but she’s looking at our third leg, not us. Then she just looks back down again to her stupid book of poetry.

  Olessya opens one eye. ‘Why don’t you ask Valentina Alexandrovna, Dasha? She’ll know.’

  ‘Yeah,’ says Masha, who’s been quiet up to now. ‘She’s on night duty. Let’s go now; she’ll be in her study.’ I don’t want to leave Slava and Anyootka alone, even though I really think he wants me more than ever, now we’ve Done It, but I have this ache, sort of chewing away all the time inside me, which is me being afraid I’ll somehow lose him. ‘C’mon, scarecrow. Let’ s go,’ says Masha. And pulls me away.

  Taking Valentina Alexandrovna’s advice on our third leg

  We knock on her study door and walk in. She’s looking through some essays, but she gets up with a big smile, and goes over to the samovar of hot water. We often come in to sit with her, just for a chat, now that Icy Valya’s gang aren’t talking to us.

  ‘So how are you doing this evening, girls?’ she says, and waves her hand at the chair we always sit in. It’s a cosy armchair. All around the room there are vases of flowers that she’s been given for International Women’s Day, so it smells like a garden in here.

  We sit down and Masha looks at me in her Go on then way.

  ‘W-we just w-wondered,’ I start, ‘if you knew w-what grade we’re likely to get for the Medical Commission?’

  She gives us a glass of sweet tea each, and sits down herself. ‘Well … hmm … it’s always difficult to tell what their criteria is, you know, about the severity of the disability, even though it’s all set out in the rules. Of course you’re perfectly agile and intelligent, so it should definitely be a Grade Four … I would easily give you a Grade Four myself, everyone here would …’

  ‘B-but what about the Commission?’

  ‘Well, I have heard some rumours, just rumours you know, that there’s been some law passed, tightening up the criteria. So, I know it doesn’t get in your way or anything, but maybe your leg might make a difference to them … it shouldn’t, of course, it doesn’t make any difference to you, and that’s the main thing, but they’re assessing whether or not you can go out to work, you know, in the workplace, at desks or in factories. I just wonder …’

  I stare at her with the tea halfway to my mouth. I know what she’s going to say. I just don’t want her to say it.

  March 1968

  We go back to SNIP to have our third leg amputated

  ‘It feels strange being back,’ says Masha. She pokes at the pillow. ‘Same old blue stamp, Property of SNIP on everything. Same old staff, same old routine right to the minute with all the bells. And Mikhailovna looked almost pleased to see us. Cracked half a smile, she did.’ I nod and look around our isolated room. It’s the same one we had when we first moved in. ‘It feels strange, not having our leg too,’ says Masha, and goes to shake it, but can’t. I laugh.

  ‘Thank goodness they used general anaesthetic,’ I say again. I still can’t quite believe we’ve actually done it.

  ‘I wasn’t having you ruin it for us again. Coming all the way up here just to be humiliated by my worm of a sister.’

  ‘And it doesn’t even hurt much now, does it?’

  ‘Speak for yourself. I’m in agony.’

  ‘No, you’re not. I wonder what people will think? Back at school?’

  What I actually mean is, I wonder what Slava will think. We’ve been here two weeks and we’ve got two more to go. I can’t bear to think of him and Anyootka together every day, sitting next to each other in class, and under the pear tree. Olessya wrote us a card but she didn’t say anything about them. He hasn’t written any cards. Not one. I miss him all the time. All the time. I can’t wait to go back. Today’s the first day we can get out of bed and start walking again.

  ‘I’ll tell you what they’ll think, they’ll think we’re idiots. It won’t make any difference to them, will it?’ says Masha. ‘I mean, the kids don’t care if we’ve got five legs. It’s all for the yobinny Medical Commission. We have to go and mutilate ourselves, don’t we? We have to go and lop bits of ourselves right off, just to please the morons on the panel.’

  ‘I was thinking, Masha … you know how they’re all defectologists on the panel? Well, I was thinking maybe we could study to be defectologists ourselves? You never see any who are actually Defective themselves. It makes sense though, doesn’t it?’

  ‘You can study whatever you like. I’m going to be a trapeze artist in a circus, now we haven’t got the leg.’

  I laugh. ‘I’m not going up any trapeze! I’m scared of heights!’

  ‘And I’m not training to be a defectologist. I’m fed up of seeing scarecrows like you day in, day out!’

  The door bangs open and Aunty Nadya comes in. Aunty Nadya! We smile and hold out our arms to be hugged. We all laughed so much when she brought us back to SNIP, in the very same room. It’s like Masha says, it’s really strange. So much has changed in us since we left. I never thought that my life would be filled with the thought of one boy instead of thoughts of being Together, and of Masha. Slava has pushed all that into a corner.

  ‘Right then, girls, on your feet!’ she says, not even hugging us. ‘Today’s the day we get up and walk.’

  ‘Get up and run, you mean!’ shouts Masha. ‘Run and run!’

  ‘Well, let’s do the walking bit first, shall we,’ she sniffs. ‘Right then, legs over the bed, up we get, arms round each other and …’

  Plookh! We fall right over, flat on our faces. She picks us up, laughing.

  ‘Ladno … try just standing first.’ She lets go of us and plookh! down we go again, head first. It hurts. ‘Hmm, your balance is going to be a bit different now, girls, the leg was heavy, fifteen kilos—’

  ‘I wanted to keep it, why wouldn’t they let us keep it? I wanted to pickle it in a jar.’

  ‘Aaakh, Masha, you say the oddest things,’ says Aunty Nadya, shaking her head. ‘I suppose you’d have it on display by your bed? Well, enough of that. Right, this time try and lean back to compensate for the leg. That’s it. Aaakh!’ She shouts as we’re over again with even more of a bang.
I can’t keep us standing up, not for a second. Not even for half a second.

  ‘I’m s-scared.’ I look up at Aunty Nadya. ‘What’s wrong? What’s h-happening?’

  ‘Now, now, none of that talk. Remember, it took us months to get you to walk. It will just take a bit of time, that’s all.’

  ‘I’m going to be black and blue, and have two broken arms by that time,’ grumbles Masha, as Aunty Nadya lifts us back on the edge of the bed.

  ‘Right. We’ll start off with a chair, like we did when you were little. Here you are.’ She pushes one towards us, and we grab the back of it. ‘Tak … I’ll hold you from behind and you stand up … Aaakh!’ This time we fall over, right into the chair, and she catches us just in time to stop us breaking our noses, but we all three end up in a stupid heap on the floor.

  ‘It’s as if every time we try and stand, something’s p-pushing us down,’ I say. ‘As if someone’s p-pushing us right down flat.’ I won’t cry. I look at Masha. She’ll tell me to stop being a sheep. She’ll tell me everything’s going to be all right. But she doesn’t. She just looks up at Aunty Nadya and bites her bottom lip.

  27 March 1968