by Maxim Osipov
Now he’ll get back in his car—after waiting for over an hour—and drive away, as fast as he can.
•
When he regains the ability to think—already some twenty kilometers outside of Moscow—he comes to understand the following.
Lora needed help—to rent a hall or an orchestra, to assist the creative type. He would have helped. But she changed her mind. Perhaps she found help elsewhere. Then suddenly he remembered all of the Mashas, Olyas, Katyas on the convent’s wall, and the blood rushed to his face: What if Lora was pregnant? The chances were next to nil. So why had she called? Maybe she wanted him to knock her up. What was she ever going to get out of the creative type? Whereas with him, both she and the baby would be set for life.
He sees the situation from the outside: look what she’s done to him! He’d been close to tears at Novodevichy. Now he feels better, almost his old self again.
BOYS
Why did he leave the city? Where is he going? Wouldn’t it have been better to have a driver for such trips to the country? Probably so—life outside of Moscow is frightening and unpredictable—but he prefers to be behind the wheel. He’s a superb driver. And besides, any servant is a witness to the life he or she was hired to serve—a witness who hopes to become part of that life. Our people’s experience with modern economic relations is relatively limited, and we learn too slowly.
He thinks of Rafael, of Yevgeny Lvovich. He doesn’t think ill of them—he’s just puzzled. There was nothing offensive in what they had said, exactly: the emperor, the crows . . . And he should probably take Renaissance man—he says it aloud, in English—as more of a compliment than anything else. But the overall tone, the sense of superiority—what right did they have? What value have those two created; whose lives have they improved? He suddenly realizes that he’s had enough of his teachers—enough of Rafael’s swagger, of Yevgeny Lvovich’s alcohol-soaked melancholy, and of their all-knowingness, their relentless, unassailable correctness.
Whereas Lora had simply forgotten about their meeting. And she’s spending her nights at a friend’s place, so to speak; otherwise she would have let him pick her up. She had needed something—money, obviously—but then she scrounged it up someplace else and got out of the jam she was in. She had arranged to meet him, then forgot all about him. That’s exactly what will happen after he dies. Everyone will forget. Rafael, that eternal survivor, will sound off in his usual condescending manner: he’ll mourn a charming man, a seeker, then give a speech about art, our era, and, first and foremost, himself. Lora will praise his straightforwardness, recalling the flowers with the vase and the cloth—one shouldn’t laugh at a memorial service, of course—and then she’ll sing, with feeling: Not a word, my dear friend . . . making that graceful gesture with her hand. And Rafael, swaying back and forth, will accompany her on the piano. Victor will gnash his teeth in grief; he’ll shell out for an archimandrite or—what do they call him?—an archbishop to conduct the service, for a plot at Novodevichy Cemetery, for deluxe wreaths and banners. Yevgeny Lvovich will complain, secretly, that the whole thing is in poor taste; Rafael will complain openly. Too bad Robert won’t be there.
Strange thoughts come to mind at the wheel. Best not to die quite yet. And why would he? He’s got plenty of life left to live.
•
He’s driving out to Robert’s dacha. After Robert was arrested and his wife and children moved to England, where they were eventually joined by Robert himself—the Russian Trio had driven a hard bargain over that—the dacha was entrusted to him for safekeeping. Robert didn’t want to sell it; he still had hopes of returning. And in the meantime, he requested that everything be left as it was, including Alexandra Grigorievna, Old Sasha—the woman who made sure, as Robert put it, that there was life in the house. She comes by once a week, on Sundays.
This Old Sasha—again, in Robert’s words—is a woman close to sainthood. She supports her niece, her dead sister’s daughter, who drinks like a fish, along with a whole pack of grandnephews. Of course, if she stopped supporting them, maybe the niece would drink less, find a job. So it’s unclear whether Old Sasha’s feat is actually doing anyone any good. Say the grandnephews—as many as five of them, by now—grow up to be parasites? She also feeds birds—takes the bus to some special market where the grain is cheaper; Robert always found that touching. In any case, she’s here at Robert’s request. A fresher face might be nicer.
Outside of Moscow, it’s already winter. He finds winter to be the best time of the year in these parts—because of the snow, the smooth white surface that conceals the ugliness and uncleanliness of it all. To the left is a field covered with snow, while to the right and slightly ahead the snow has been partially swept away by the wind, exposing dirty, withered vegetation. In the Baltic countries, they call that kind of unworked field rus. Some rusted-out piece of machinery. Recklessness, rudeness. To be frank, it’s a country of fools. Yevgeny Lvovich would add: “And saints.” That’s a tough proposition. We don’t often run across saints. That is, if you don’t count Old Sasha, who, by the way, curses like a sailor and smokes like a chimney. In any case, people like him, like Robert, and even like Victor, for all his faults—people who work—are in awfully short supply.
There are two routes to the dacha. There’s the short one, through the village where the locals live, including Old Sasha; that route is ill-advised—the road is bad. Then there’s the long one, around the rus fields: a few extra kilometers, but no sign of human presence. He wants to test the car on a slippery, bumpy road, so he chooses the shorter route. The car handles it beautifully.
At the entrance to the village is a gas station. Beside it huddle a bunch of boys, not even in their teens yet. He gets out of the car, stretches his legs, arms, and back. His malaise has all but dissipated: the sun, the snow—soon he’ll be straddling a snowmobile . . . And the joy of liberation, of recovery—he’s adopted that stupid word from the intels, among whose number he now counts Lora (she gives off that vibe). He’s only gone a little ways out of town, and it’s already a whole new world, other experiences.
Fuel delivery. He has to wait ten minutes. Daylight is short, so he’d better hurry, but ten minutes won’t change anything in his life.
Yes, the sense of liberation is a pleasant thing. Once, at a party, Robert had told them about the happiest day of his life. He was a young PhD back then, with a head full of ideas, and he had wanted to talk about these ideas with a certain world-class mathematician. And one day in Pärnu, on the beach, Robert sees this very mathematician, stripped down to his shorts. He agrees to talk: “But first you need to take a few lessons. My student will see to it. In exchange, he’ll eat at your expense.” Robert is more than willing. The student knows his stuff—they eat and talk, day after day. But then, one time, the student finishes his main course, sticks a toothpick in his mouth, and asks: So, what’re we gonna talk about today?
“And you know what I told him?” Robert lets it hang there a minute, scanning the others’ faces with his big eyes. “Get the hell out of my sight! And the student scrammed. That was the happiest day of my life.” Robert would never see the student or the great mathematician again, and soon he was on to other things—the stock market, shares. In those early days, Robert, with his math skills, seemed like the perfect man for the job—but later it turned out that the most reliable strategy was “go and take it.”
“Hey mister, want your windows washed?” one of the boys shouts, and he immediately begins smearing dirt across the windshield. Another is already busy with the headlights.
Good boys, he thinks—already working. It pleases him to think well of them. He fills up his tank—hands off, he’ll do that himself—and gives the little fellows some change. Then he walks around the car and sees another boy standing behind it. A bit older than the others, but still small.
“And why aren’t you working?”
The boy doesn’t look up: he’s mesmerized by the rear window. He follows the boy’s gaze: iri
descent oily patterns and colored spots left by the cleaning chemicals, interspersed with reflections of the sky, sun, and clouds. It really is beautiful—diffraction, refraction, interference—wow, he’s forgotten so much.
The boy has reddish hair, not exactly like Lora’s, but he suddenly thinks: If Lora and I . . .
“How old are you?”
“Eleven.”
The boy’s name is Kostya.
“Would you like to go for a ride, Konstantin?”
Would he!
Incidentally, the only inscriptions that had truly moved him at Novodevichy had been left by children. “I want to be good at school, then people will be nice to me.” And another one: “Make sure nothing bad ever happens to my mom, ever.” What’s Kostya’s mom’s name? He shouldn’t have asked. Looks like the boy doesn’t have a mother.
“Kostya, do crows peck at you?” So many birds by the roadside. If only he had his rifle!
“No,” answers Kostya. “They ate the neighbors’ grain, and they give chicklets a bad time.”
See, what did he say.
The neighbors had to get a scarecrow. Kostya does an impression of the scarecrow. They’ve arrived. A shame.
People walking along the street. Glum and surly. It’s the same in Moscow. Of course, in Moscow, it’s that everyone’s in each other’s way—but what’s the matter here? The economy. He’s been to the Italian countryside, to the Netherlands . . . Is there any comparison? Hard to be a patriot, Yevgeny Lvovich, almost impossible.
For some reason, he follows the boy into his house. A single-story dump—half a house, actually. The stench of rot, soot, and urine hits him in the nose. On a bed, in the semidarkness, sits a man covered in rags. The boy’s father? His bare feet are monstrously thick, his nails twisted, his face unshaven, puffy. This, he thinks, is what Yevgeny Lvovich will look like ten years from now, if he doesn’t stop drinking.
The man rasps: “Kostya, that the doctor?”
No, not a doctor. But he can call the doctor . . . One moment . . . He needs to step out and get some air. The man will be taken away, to the hospital; they’ll do everything in their power. The negotiations take a rather long time. Why is he doing this? Because he has the money. And not just the money, but the responsibility. If you’re a person of wealth, then the lives of hundreds, of thousands of people all around you must improve.
How will the boy get along without the man on the bed? How did he get along with him? How does Kostya feed himself—who does the washing, the ironing? He returns to the house: the doctor is coming. And he and Kostya will take the snowmobile for a spin. The boy will have a chance . . . The man makes a vague gesture.
•
Robert’s empty house, which has known far better days. But never mind, thanks to Old Sasha, it’s in relatively good shape. Tomorrow’s her day, by the way.
They walk through the house: You see, Kostya, this is the house. His friend’s house. Here’s a black-and-white photo of Robert, with beard and glasses; he looks like Freud, but in a sweater. We’ll see the rest later.
“The snow isn’t soft at all,” he explains to the boy. “See, feel it.”
Kostya, with an intelligent look on his face, squats down and touches the snow, as if for the first time.
“Snow is as bad as asphalt. Keep this in mind: a snowmobile can be especially dangerous. It’s not like a motorcycle. A motorcycle falls into the turn . . .”
Kostya, he sees, is really trying to understand.
“Look,” he draws lines in the snow with his shoe. “When a snow-mobile loses equilibrium, it falls along with you. You fall, the snow-mobile somersaults—and lands on you. Especially on a slope. All right, let’s go.”
He remembers what it was like to be eleven. It’s a wonder that boys survive into adulthood. Most of them, at least.
“Kostya, this is the main thing: in case of danger—jump.”
It’s nice that Kostya listens to him. Not like Lora: not just to his voice, his intonation, but to his words.
“Last year, two people fell through the ice,” Kostya tells him, his eyes getting wide. “Drowned.”
But apparently, Kostya isn’t the slightest bit scared. He lies down on his back, swinging his arms up and down, then stands up and shows him the imprint: Look like an angel?
“Absolutely. Time to ride?”
He sits Kostya in front of him, holds the steering wheel, but tells the boy to hold the wheel tight too. The boy’s cap is so threadbare . . . A little string of hair, and a skinny little neck. He’d really like to see the boy’s face right now. He adjusts the mirror so he can see it.
“You’ve got the controls—this is the brake and this is the gas.”
Kostya focuses. And it looks like he’s happy. It’s so easy to make kids happy.
They ride up to the little river—a stream, really. How did anyone manage to drown in that? Then they turn left, to ride along the field. They need the headlight to find their way back. A wonderful outing.
Kostya’s things need drying. They find him something to wear—all huge, adult size. The sleeves dangle, like on a straitjacket.
“Let me help you roll them up. Kostya, you like pizza?”
Silly question: Kostya likes everything. Everything and everyone. They find the phone. A bar crawls across the computer screen: it’s loading. In the meantime, he calls Brick: He needs clothes for a boy of eleven, a whole set, from head to toe. Buy it, bring it, and you’re free.
“Can’t make it today,” Brick huffs. “I’m sorry, but there’s no way.”
Brick will try for tomorrow morning. All right, fine.
The boy lies down on the banister and slowly slides down from the second floor to the first.
“What are you doing, Kostya?” This isn’t your house.
“I’m loading,” the boy tells him. Loading, like an app.
Amazing, he thinks. A talented kid. Phenomenal. If Kostya were to get a proper education . . .
Food delivery. A thick, pallid woman in a compact car. Pizza, meat casseroles, soup.
“Eat up, boys.”
It feels good to hear that: “boys.”
Kostya eats carefully. He’s obviously trying.
“Listen, a brick weighs half a kilo more than half a brick . . .”
The boy, apparently, is unfamiliar with this type of puzzle.
“The bricks—are different . . .”
“No, it’s the same brick. Two halves of the same brick: One weighs half a kilo, so the other must weigh the same. Put them together, and you get a kilo. Do you understand?”
Aha. Then Kostya says something terribly sweet and irrelevant, and it’s clear that he didn’t understand at all. The boy’s been neglected. They’ll have to make up for lost time.
He had picked up the brick puzzle from Robert, who used to pose it to everyone who applied to work at their firm. Robert called those who answered incorrectly—and there were many of those, more and more over the years—aliens. They weren’t hired.
What next? he thinks, putting the dishes in the dishwasher. In the next five minutes, and in general. And what is, so to speak, the status of his relationship with Kostya? He can’t just take the boy back to that empty dump. But who are they to each other?
The immediate future takes care of itself. By the time he returns to the living room, Kostya’s asleep. He carries the boy to the bed, covers him up, and even allows himself an intimate gesture—he pets Kostya’s head. Boys sleep very soundly. What a good lad! Noble, simple. A proper little gentleman.
It’s completely dark outside. He’ll call Lora again. Better yet, he’ll write: “I’ve found us a wonderful redheaded boy, a young gentleman.” Or maybe he should wait, give it some thought?
He calls Victor, who apologizes for the bad connection. He’s out hunting boar with Oleg Khrisanfovich. They’ll talk in the evening. But it’s already evening. Who’s Victor out hunting with? He couldn’t make out the name. With the gov—the governor. Oh, the gov, well, that’s imp
ortant.
He himself has abstained from these gubernatorial hunts lately. Maybe Victor’s right—maybe his abstaining is harmful to their business. But, first of all, the howling has begun to turn his stomach: They sing prayers in unison before each hunt. And then everyone stares at him: Why doesn’t he want to make the sign of the cross over his forehead? And finally, he’s always been against humiliating the prey. The last time he and Victor spent hours chasing a fox; she was exhausted and couldn’t run any longer. Victor hoisted her up by the tail, as a joke, and she swung around and bit his arm; Victor had to get rabies shots. He remembers how the fox looked at them. He didn’t feel too sorry for Victor. Yes, he thought, about time they parted ways.
The boy sleeps and sleeps. He calls Victor back late at night.
“Well,” he asks, “how goes it for the favorite of the gods and govs?” And then he tells Victor what needs to be done. Fast. Deprive one wino of parental rights. That’s step one. He tries to make it sound as if it were an everyday trifle. He can’t make it sound like a favor; Victor is attuned to every sign of weakness.
“Let’s just whack the wino,” Victor suggests. “Cheaper, and a service to society.”
What is he, drunk?
“Come on, I’m just kidding. Wino, step one—what’s step two?”
Step two, he sighs, is that he wants to adopt the wino’s kid. He and his girlfriend. Well, she isn’t fully decided yet—in regard to her, this is a preliminary conversation.
And in regard to him, asks Victor—is the conversation final?
“Yes,” he sighs again. “Yes, it’s final.”
“The kid’s name? Age?”
He tells him.
“Great idea, boss!” Victor exclaims. “I’ve been doing all the dirty work. I mean, the menial work. And now we’ll have Kostya . . .”