‘Foo!’ spits Masha, not looking at it. ‘May they both rot in hell.’
I pick up the photo and look at it. They’re standing side by side, shoulder to shoulder in their white lab coats and caps, smiling out at the camera. Two colleagues, two friends. Doctor Alexeyeva on the right, and on the left …
Anna Petrovna Kryuchkova.
Mummy.
‘Mummy’
I feel cold as I walk back to our room holding the photo. The photo of the two scientists who ‘observed’ conjoined twins in a laboratory fifty years ago. I didn’t say anything when I picked it up. Nothing at all. I didn’t tell Joolka, or Masha.
I put it down on the bedside table and we go to clean our teeth and wash our nappy. Masha’s chattering on as we get into bed, saying that Aunty Nadya should go to a doctor with that limp of hers, then she tucks the Guinness Book of Records under her pillow. We lie in silence in the dark for a while.
‘What’s wrong?’ she says, after a bit.
‘It’s that photo.’
‘What about that photo?’
‘The one of those two scientists, the two scientists who studied us.’
‘Yes?’
‘One of them was Mummy.’
‘Mummy?’
‘Yes. Mummy.’
She doesn’t say anything. She’s thinking.
‘No, it wasn’t. Mummy wouldn’t have done that to us.’
‘It was. It said A. P. Kryuchkova. Anna Petrovna. Mummy. It said so on the back. And it’s her in the photo.’
I’m waiting for her to jump up and start swearing, but she doesn’t. She just lies quiet at the other end of the bed, in the darkness.
Then she says in a whisper, ‘Mummy?’
‘Yes,’ I say, and I can feel this slow pain coming across to me from her, so I add quickly, ‘But she was only doing her job. I think she loved us, Masha. I do think she loved us. How could we have loved her so much if she didn’t love us back?’
There’s still a dark silence.
‘She sang us bye-oo bye-ooshki bye-oo, remember? Every night,’ I go on. ‘She kissed us. She kissed us, Masha. No one else in there did that.’
We lie there in the darkness of our room, in our big bed. I know she wants to cry. I move over a bit and reach for her hand. Like we did in the cot when I was scared of the cockroaches.
And then she does.
Age 53
2 April 2003
Proving we’re still Together for the Medical Commission
I reach for one of the lipsticks in the drawer of our dresser and lean forward towards the mirror, pouting.
‘Who’re you hoping to meet down there – Prince William of England?’
‘Just taking a bit of pride in my appearance, Masha, nothing wrong with that.’
‘Here, I’ll do it, you’re getting it all over the place.’ She takes the lipstick from me and frowns, sticking her tongue out as she applies it carefully. ‘Might as well do me too. Don’t want to look like the ugly sister, and a bit of war paint never hurt anyone.’
I paint her lips, then she picks up the comb and runs it through my hair. When she’s finished I comb her hair for her and we walk over to the sofa to put our boots on.
We never talked about Mummy again. What’s the point? She’s still Mummy to us. I don’t regret that we found out. Knowledge is power, and I don’t blame her either. She was doing her job.
‘Why do we have to go down now, Dasha? The Medical Commission’s not even starting for half an hour …’ whines Masha.
‘You know that the later we leave it, the longer we’ll have to stand in line.’
‘Can’t believe we have to go through this every year to prove we’re still Together so we can get our pension – as if we’re going to magically drift apart or something …’
‘Chance would be a fine thing. Right, got everything? Passports?’
‘Yes, yes, gospodi, it’s like having God Almighty and the Holy Trinity at my side nowadays … lya lya topolya …’ She flaps her thumb and forefingers at me like a quacking beak.
‘God Almighty is part of the Holy Trinity,’ I say, picking up my crutch. She rolls her eyes to the ceiling. ‘Come on,’ I say. ‘Davai, davai.’
‘Da-oosh,’ says Masha with a little salute. ‘When the Komsomol says You Must, the People say We Will.’ I laugh. Masha’s funny.
We tap down the empty corridor with its shiny dark green walls and brown linoleum floor, turn the corner, down another empty corridor, two more corners and then take the lift.
The queue’s already halfway across the entrance hall. I don’t know why reception halls are so big in these Homes, they’re like aquariums, lined with big plants and mirrors. We used to have the Politburo up on the wall and now we’ve got Putin, a framed portrait in pride of place with two half-furled Russian flags on either side, like wings. There’s a curved text above his head, a bit like a halo now I come to look at it, one of his inspiring quotes probably, but I’ve never read it. We saw his latest one, in a headline in Izvestia – Russia needs a strong state power, and Russia will have a strong state power. Our avenging angel. Masha’s starting to like him now. She says he’s becoming more like Stalin day by day. As if that’s a good thing … Everyone else is starting to like him more too. He’s someone tough. Someone for us to be proud of. Well, apart from Olessya, that is. Not after the Kursk submarine tragedy when all those young sailors died and Putin did what every Russian leader does – Olessya says – he lied. Because an explosion on board a submarine was another flaw. And it seems Putin doesn’t like flaws either. None of them do. I look around for her, but she’s not here yet.
‘We’ll be standing in this line for an hour at least,’ says an elderly lady with two sticks who’s just joined the queue behind us. She sighs. ‘You’d think since they’re assessing invalids they’d give us appointments, wouldn’t you? Or at least give us chairs, not make us stand like this.’
‘Why should they, babulya?’ says Masha. ‘They’ve got nice comfy chairs behind that desk in the assessment room, haven’t they?’
‘We should get up a petition or something.’
‘Our friend Olessya tried that,’ says Masha cheerfully. ‘It was put in the trash bin. The Administration don’t listen to the ignorant masses. Never have. Never will.’
‘Well, well, no use poisoning the mind by dwelling on injustice, is there,’ she goes on. ‘There’s enough people out there trying to poison our lives without us making it worse for ourselves. Better just to accept.’
I nod at her and smile. Joolka used to say that what she loved most about Russia was how we didn’t have trite, English conversations. She said you couldn’t take a ten-minute taxi ride without the driver giving you a treatise on politics, love and religion.
The low hum of chatter in the hall falls suddenly silent as Zlata Igorovna sweeps through to her office. After Timur stole our money, we decided to keep all our dollars in the safe in the Administration offices. We weren’t going to keep it in a bank. Not after the rouble collapsed a few years ago under Yeltsin and wiped out everyone’s savings like a tsunami. Now all our money’s tucked away in a dark safe. Joolka wanted us to make a will leaving Aunty Nadya all our money if we died, because otherwise it might go to our brothers, but instead Zlata persuaded us to sign a document saying it would go to the Sixth. Zlata is very persuasive … and me and Masha thought she might be nicer to us. Some hope.
‘Da, da,’ says the babushka behind us. ‘No use torturing yourself with regrets, is there … for wasted years …’
‘Gospodi, that’s all we need right now, babulya,’ says Masha, laughing. ‘Good old Ostrovsky’s “Man’s Dearest Possession is Life” – give us a break!’ I laugh too, remembering the essay she refused to write in school. Masha knew how to stand up for herself, all right. Like the time she started giving the Sanity Commission in the Twentieth a lecture about how clever I was. Or when she stood up to the crowds in the zoo while I was cowering behind her.
; ‘All my life, all my strength …’ Masha proclaims, holding one arm out like an actor, ‘has been given to the finest cause in the world …’
‘The liberation of Mankind!’ we all chime together and laugh. We’re allowed to make fun of the Soviets now.
‘Well, well, we mustn’t mock,’ says the old lady, smiling but shaking her head. ‘It was a fine idea. A grand idea. We were happy back then. We all need to believe in something.’
‘I believe in Masha,’ says Masha, then glances across at me. ‘And Dasha.’
‘Ah yes, it must be nice to be you two,’ the woman goes on.
‘Nice?’ says Masha.
‘Yes, I was orphaned in the War and then there weren’t enough men to go round so I’ve been on my own all my life. And do you know what I miss most?’
‘Don’t tell us, babulya, I’ll blush,’ laughs Masha, clapping her hands over my ears.
The babushka laughs too. ‘No, no, not that, you never miss what you’ve never had. No, I miss human contact. Just a hand on my shoulder, a little kiss on my cheek. Tenderness … You two are sweet together. You always have your arms around each other.’
‘Ei, I’d fall tit over arse if I didn’t hold on to her! But I’ll give you a hug any day, babulya – if you’ll give me a dollar.’
‘Aaakh, I’ve no dollars, meelinkaya. I’ve a few kopecks and I wouldn’t buy hugs with them.’ She shifts painfully on her sticks.
‘Why don’t you go over and sit on that chair,’ says Masha. ‘It’s stupid you have to stand up, we’ll keep your place.’
‘No, you fucking won’t!’ A man with one leg standing behind her pushes into our conversation. ‘We’d all go and fucking sit down if we wanted! Then we’d all lose our fucking places, wouldn’t we?’ He glares at the old woman.
‘That’s all right, meelinki,’ she says soothingly to him. ‘I’m fine standing. We’re all fine.’
But Masha’s chortik rises up dark and flashing behind her eyes and she pushes angrily towards him. ‘Well, you’re a great example of yobinny Mankind, aren’t you? Wonderful member of the human race, you are. When you need us to hold your place because you need a pee, I’ll make sure not to.’ He’s twice our size.
‘No, Mashinka!’ I grab the back of her collar and pull her away sharply. She looks round at me, seething. ‘Stop!’ I say. ‘You don’t need to get into a brawl with some bullying idiot like him.’ The old lady moves between him and us, making hushing sounds.
‘Come on,’ I say, ‘this queue’s going faster than I thought. We’ll be in soon.’
The last time I saw Masha’s chortik was soon after that article in Moskovskii Novostii. She’d wanted vodka. We’d been sitting in our room, staring at the walls. Both of us horribly, desperately, wanting vodka.
‘I’m going downstairs,’ she’d said finally with a crack in her voice. ‘I’m going to find someone to get us a bottle.’
She went to stand but I refused.
‘Get up.’ She looked at me and I saw it, I saw it there, her chortik, dancing mockingly behind her eyes, the chortik that needs to be fed fear in order to exist. ‘Get the fuck up,’ she said.
‘Nyet.’ I didn’t move.
‘Get the fuck up!’ She’d pulled me then, with all her body, but I wouldn’t follow her. She hauled me right off the bed and I fell, flopping on to the floor, still refusing to move with her. And then she leant over me and grabbed my hair, trying to haul me up into an upright position. ‘Oh yes you will fucking get up, you will, you will!’ I shoved her away then, with all the strength I had, and pulled myself back on to the bed. Then I leaned over and before she knew what was happening, I put my hands around her throat and looked into her eyes. I looked right at her stupid damn chortik, dancing around back there, stabbing me with its evil little electric shocks and I said, ‘Nyet.’ I closed my fingers around her neck, I’m stronger than her, we both know I’m stronger, and I started choking the life out of her. And then I saw the fear in her own eyes, a silver sphere which popped, and I swear I heard it burst as her chortik just shrivelled and shrank. It was at the moment we both knew I’d won. Finally.
And from then on, we found our balance. We found each other. I think I found the Masha who’d always been there, waiting to be told what to do. The Masha who never wanted to be a cruel, psychopathic bully but who wanted to be held in check by a strict ‘parent’. And to be loved.
And as for me, I’ve fought day by day, month by month over the last three years to be strong, not weak. I’ve fought for her, because I know it’s best for her, for both of us. I’d realized that, like a mother, I’d spoilt her, I’d loved her too much, and I’d created an out-of-control monster who I feared.
Until now.
‘So anyway, what I meant,’ goes on the old lady as if nothing has happened, ‘is that you two must never get lonely.’
Lonely? I consider that for a moment. No, she’s wrong. I’ve been lonely with Masha. I think back to the time when she wouldn’t let Slava come and visit us in the Twentieth. And I was lonely after he died. I feel that, despite being Together with Masha, I’ve sometimes been the loneliest person in the world.
‘Although I suppose we all need solitude?’ she goes on. ‘I’ve had enough solitude for ten lifetimes, but perhaps, yes, we all need solitude?’
‘She gets solitude, all right,’ says Masha, grinning. ‘She puts those new cushioned earphones on and she’s off into her world of lovey dovey lya lya. She might as well be Lenin in Exile for all she cares about me.’
We all laugh.
When it’s finally our turn to go into the Medical Commission room, the doctor glances up at us. She’s the same one we’ve had for the past twelve years in the Sixth.
‘Still together are we, girls?’ she says cheerily.
‘Still together,’ we both say at the same time, smiling.
‘Off you go then.’
And she ticks her box.
13 April 2003
We meet Father Alexander and Masha gets a pain in her side
‘She needs banana skins,’ says Masha, cocking her head on one side and looking at the little lemon tree she’s just placed carefully out on the balcony. ‘That’s what Baba Iskra said. She said banana skins have potassium.’
‘Who’s going to get us bananas in April?’
‘They must sell them somewhere. In one of those superskii supermarkets.’ She takes out a handkerchief and starts wiping the leaves, one by one, making them gleam in the spring sunlight.
‘Why’s it got to be outside? Can’t we have it inside? It looks pretty on our table with those little white flowers.’
‘She needs direct sunlight. Baba Iskra says that sunlight through a window hasn’t got all the healing properties. She’s not getting her vitamin D.’
I laugh. ‘Do you remember when you got us all to play truant in school because we weren’t getting our vitamin D? And everyone followed you out like a flock of sheep! Do you?’
‘Course I do. Valentina Alexandrovna sat right down there on that log, didn’t she, and we had our lesson in the sunshine.’
‘You were throwing pears at us. Or was it peaches?’
‘Pears. Juicy nyelzya pears.’
‘So, wait, you’re not leaving your Lyuba out all night, are you?’
‘Of course not.’ She digs her fingers into the earth of the pot and gently stirs it about. ‘She needs to be acclimatized, bit by bit. I’ll bring her in every night. Plants need nurturing, you have to really care for them. These things take time.’ She strokes the leaves again tenderly.
I’ve never been into plants. Or sewing machines … Masha’s funny. She lights up a cigarette and backs up against the wall so she’s as far from Lyuba as possible. ‘Cigarette smoke kills,’ she says softly and puffs carefully into the wind away from the little tree.
‘You’ve never cared about killing me with your cigarette smoke,’ I say.
She sniffs. ‘You don’t need nurturing.’
When we go back insid
e, Nina’s trundling in with our supper of fish soup.
‘Remember fish soup in the Ped?’ I say, once she’s gone. ‘They brought it in the same bucket as they do here. Except there they slammed the bucket on the floor with that great clanging sound, and here it’s on a trolley. And you always wanted the eyes. Remember?’
‘Don’t know why you’re getting all starry-eyed about that place,’ says Masha, wincing a bit as she takes her spoon. ‘Reminiscing like an old …’ She winces again and puts the spoon down.
‘Mash, you OK?’
‘My side hurts a bit,’ she says, squirming to get comfortable.
She never complains about pain, unless it’s really bad, so I rub her side for a while.
‘Is it your kidney stones again?’
‘No … Oof! I feel like something’s sitting on me,’ she groans. ‘I can’t breathe.’
I put my bowl down and stack some pillows behind her, but that doesn’t seem to help either.
‘Let’s watch the six o’clock news then,’ I say and pick up the remote control. She turns to the TV with a twisted, hurting expression on her face. I hate it when she’s in pain. ‘I’ll call the duty nurse, Mash,’ I say, leaning over her for the phone on her side of the bed. Yulia, the nurse picks up, says she’s busy and puts the phone down.
‘I’ll get you painkillers then,’ I say. But my mind’s racing. What’s wrong? Why has she got such a bad pain? Is it serious? ‘I’ll get them now, Masha, that’ll help. Then we’ll just go to sleep.’ As I get up to open the drawer, she groans, but stands while I reach for them and then obediently pops two of them into her mouth.
Two hours later the pain’s worse. It’s moved to her back. I’ve called Yulia about five times but she’s not picking up. Masha won’t let me get up for more painkillers because it hurts too much. I don’t feel her pain anywhere except in my helpless head. Like I felt her pain in the Ped. I want to help her. How can she be hurting this much? My Mashinka, who was once stabbed in the leg by one of the boys in SNIP and who drew the knife out slowly, as if she was taking a spoon out of a bowl of ice cream and said, ‘So who’s blood is going to mingle with mine now?’ You should have seen them run. They ran so fast, they slammed straight into the walls.
The Less You Know the Sounder You Sleep Page 39