Collective Mind

by Klyukin, Vasily

  “Thanks,” Bikie mumbled.

  “Help yourself. Sandrine is my very close friend, my girlfriend and, I hope, my fiancée.”

  Sandrine smiled and laid her head on Peter’s shoulder.

  “We’re going away on a trip for a couple of months. First to Stockholm, Copenhagen and the Baltic, possibly to St. Petersburg and Moscow, and then we’ll decide where else. I haven’t done any traveling for a long time, so I’ll enjoy the ride. They say the summer in those parts is very pleasant, not as hot as here and I think I’ll get by without the sea for a while. I want to take a look at Poland, my grandfather’s home country. They say Polish girls are quite something.”

  The final remark earned him a light cuff to the back of the head from Sandrine.

  “Anything’s possible,” he said with a smile, for which Sandrine pinched him too, quite painfully.

  “Sandrine! Stop it!”

  “What do you think is possible? I’ll show you Polish girls!” she barked.

  Bikie had already recovered from his error and was about to joke on the subject of Polish girls and Russian lovelies, but after glancing at Isaac, he didn’t.

  Wolanski took his friends around the grounds and gave them a tour of the house.

  “This is a safe place, but I’m going away for a long time, you never know if something might break down or someone might creep in. In short, would you mind living here and taking care of the house while I’m away? I could even pay you for service,” he added with a smile. “A little bit.”

  Well, how about that! The very idea that he could live in a swanky villa like this for a while took Isaac’s breath away.

  Bikie instantly forgot about the affront he had suffered and started gazing around intently.

  “I’m sorry, but I have no secrets from Sandrine,” Wolanski went on. “The two of us have decided to support you, but we won’t get involved. In a few weeks I will acquire full control over my father’s legacy. Right now I live in a good house, I can afford to pay almost any expenses, but I don’t have control over his fortune. I have free access to a large amount of money, which I can spend as I wish. But there will be almost a hundred million so I don’t want to put that at risk.

  “And so, I’m sorry guys, the house is at your disposal, I can even write you a check for a couple of thousand a month, you have the internet here, a television, a small chemistry lab in the basement if you need it. You can order food and other small stuff, apart from booze and weed, and that will be deducted from my direct expenses account, but that’s all that I can offer you. As for financing and advice, sorry, you have to handle that yourselves.”

  Peter felt awkward for steering clear of the risks, and his voice had a guilty ring to it.

  “You’re here as security guards and sort of household help. I don’t need to know what you are up to while I’m away. So let’s agree that if I don’t ask, you avoid discussing your business in my presence. I ask you not to involve any one else until you have at least a provisional plan. Naturally, I have cameras here so if I see visitors, I’ll ask you to move out,” Peter added. “And you must not use the main bedroom. Better not even to go in there. And finally, good luck! And let’s drink to that!”

  For the rest of the evening the group ate meat, drank wine and beer, discussed music and never mentioned business again.

  Isaac and Bikie were totally excited, and each of them chose a nice room on the guest floor. If you didn’t count the small salary that Peter had set for them, he hadn’t done anything to solve their cash problems. But on the other hand, no one knew if they would need more money, or this would be enough. At least now they had food and a roof over their heads. And quite a roof it was!

  Chapter nine

  Isaac and Bikie decided not to waste time, and move to Peter’s place as soon as possible, even before he left. In comparison with Wolanski’s villa, Isaac’s old apartment looked like a dismal slum.

  Isaac gathered up his things, looked round his old room and thought that he would never come back here. He did not feel any regret. Even his beloved crack on the opposite building had turned from a mysterious cobweb into an ordinary, shabby, peeling surface.

  “How weird,” thought Isaac, “I have lived here for five years, but I don’t have any particularly pleasant memories associated with this dump.” Isaac had even tried not to bring girls back here, he felt ashamed, it was better to go to their hotel. “But even so I feel sad at the thought that I won’t be back here anymore. It’s like I’m cutting off a big slice of my past, finally slicing off my youth and my student years.” Vicky wouldn’t come back here again either.

  Isaac walked into his sister’s tiny little room. Her things had been tidied away a long time ago as if she had known. Clothes tidily folded away in boxes, a little bit of makeup, some books and textbooks, even an old doll. All he had to do was collect the bed linen. “It might come in useful. We’ll stay at Wolanski’s place for a while, but afterwards I’ll have to rent somewhere. Damn, I almost forgot about the kitchen and the bathroom. Glasses, plates, spoons, forks, knives… God, what a drag it is gathering it all up now and making sure nothing breaks.”

  Isaac lived an impoverished life, so he collected up absolutely everything he could. He only left the furniture since it wouldn’t have survived another move anyway, and Wolanski would have flipped at the sight of this old lumber.

  He hardly had any personal things at all: jeans and t-shirts, one suit from his graduation at the university and his computer which all fit into two boxes. He also has a vintage poster of Einstein with his famous phrase: “Only those who attempt the absurd can achieve the impossible”.

  That aphorism was very apropos and highly relevant. Isaac took the poster down carefully, rolled it into a tube and took it with him. Bikie had a similar modest collection, apart from the fact that instead of a scooter, he had a genuine Harley and a guitar.

  “That Bikie-guy is a true rock’n’roller,” thought Isaac.

  Wolanski met them at the gate, and he had everything ready for dinner by the pool again: drinks, hors d’oeuvres, beer. Sandrine was relaxing on a soft, white sun-lounger. She waved them hello and carried on relishing the beautiful sunset over the sea while sipping on some kind of juice. Bikie and Isaac each took a beer.

  “This is some life!” exclaimed Bikie, either making a toast or just thinking out loud.

  They drained their bottles in one, picked up their things and headed for the main entrance. Peter gestured them to stop and asked to go in through the side door.

  “Guys, we agreed that you live in the guest section of the house, didn’t we? It’s safer that way. No hard feelings?”

  “Whatever you say, buddy, no problem,” Bikie said amicably. “Don’t think we’ll have any use for your oval fireplace and swimming pool anyway. We won’t have time for long soulful evenings and swimming… But the loungers… Can we bring chicks in?”

  “Bikie!” exclaimed Sandrine, already there beside him. “Do not bring chicks into the house!”

  “ I like you, guys. I really hope I haven’t made a mistake by inviting you to take care of the house. You settle into your rooms and I’ll wait for you here.”

  The first thing Bikie did in his room was take his guitar out of its case and check that nothing had happened to it in transit. The guitar was all right.

  “What is this?” Isaac asked.

  “A relic.”

  “Meaning?”

  “I bought it on the internet. Keith Richards himself played it. He even signed the body. I forked out a grand for it. A rare item.”

  Isaac looked at the half-erased scribble.

  “Are you sure this really is his autograph?”

  “Positive, I saw a photo of him with this guitar.”

  “I see. Ever heard the word ‘Photoshop’?”

  “Screw you,” Bikie growled.

  “Just kidding. Surely it’s original.”

  “Sure as death. In our crowd they don’t pull tricks like that.”
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  He then hit the strings so hard that almost made Isaac jump.

  Isaac went to his room, set his things by the bed, carefully hung up the poster and switched on his laptop.

  “What’s the Wi-Fi password?” he shouted out of the window.

  “Alchemist28015,” Peter answered.

  “Your rating, right?” Isaac asked loudly.

  “U-huh.”

  “Mine’s bigger,” Bikie put in.

  “And mine’s longer”, retorted Peter.

  “You boys are gross,” Sandrine said and everyone laughed.

  When Isaac and Bikie sat down by the pool, the sun was already setting and the sky was scintillating with the most brilliant tones in the orange spectrum.

  “Look, orange energy’s draining away…” The setting had put Bikie in a poetical mood.

  “The orange energy of the sky,” Isaac commented pensively.

  “The creativity of the sky, expiring at dusk, reborn the next day with not a drop lost,” Bikie commented rather neatly.

  “Beautifully said! You’re a genuine poet,” commented Sandrine. She and Peter were sitting beside the pool with their arms around each other and also looking out to sea.

  “I write songs and play sometimes, but mostly rock’n’roll, not lyrical stuff. I even used to play in a rock band at school.”

  “Peter, why don’t you write me poems? Long ones…”

  Peter started fussing about and ventured over to the table to fill the glasses, ignoring Sandrine’s remark.

  “Friends, I declare the official ceremony to celebrate your moving in open!”

  Peter knew how to create a distance when he wanted, and also how to break it down quickly, and then you could feel like a really old friend of his.

  “Bikie, by the way, why are you Bikie?” Peter asked.

  Bikie didn’t like to answer the question about the origins of his nickname, because mostly it came from drunken customers at the bar. But he was still feeling pleased with Sandrine’s compliment and decided to answer.

  “The usual story, that name has been with me ever since school. I’ve liked motorbikes all my life. On my way home from school, I always looked at the mopeds, and the choppers especially... I used to ask a lot of questions and even made friends with a few grownup biker dudes. I dreamt of getting my license as soon as possible and dreamed about having my own Harley. But let me tell you: there are different kinds of bikers. Let’s say, there’ve been some gangs whose business was drugs or guns. And then there are folks who are there for the love of art. I’m one of those. There used to be a whole set of us at university. It’s fallen apart now though. One became a Veggie, one grew up and lost interest, one was killed in a crash… yeah… Well, as for my nickname, I got it when I was still a kid. My parents bought me a scooter, a red one, so I could easily be seen on the road. And I went straight into my dad’s garage, where he kept his paint. That chrome stuff, you know. And black too. I glued on a Harley emblem (I had a real one that someone gave me) and drove off to my friends. Didn’t even wait for the paint to dry, got my trousers all soiled. Everyone said, now you’re a true biker, kiddo, only a little one. So we’ll call you Bikie and it stuck. Bikie it was. Basically I got to enjoy being Bikie and then I shot up and no one dared hang any other nicknames on me, cuz I could hang a punch on them that they wouldn’t forget in a hurry.”

  “When I was a little girl my mum used to call me Sasha,” Sandrine’s added in a gentle voice “In the Russian style from some Russian book. And I just couldn’t understand, I kept asking: ‘Mum what is this nickname of mine?’ ”

  Everyone laughed except Isaac who looked morose

  “Isaac, what’s up?” Wolanski asked.

  “His sister, stepsister, has Russian roots,” Bikie explained. “She’s in the hospital now.”

  Sandrine put her hand on Isaac’s shoulder.

  “Don’t feel bad, Isaac. Everything will be all right. We have to give all these new inventions their due, medicine has become excellent, a real breakthrough. I’ve never seen such equipment before. For instance, I recently had an x-ray or a scan, I don’t remember exactly what. I was roller-skating down a steep slope and I fell, so I went to check that everything was all right.

  They put this kind of special elastic suit on me, and a helmet. I stood in the middle of the doctors’ office like an astronaut. And the doctor had a full 3D image of all my internal organs on his monitor. Yuck! And then he pressed a button – click! – and his screen showed my skeleton.”

  ”My father,” was amazed that no one was afraid of dentists any more” Peter added, “I told him: not only is no one afraid of them, no one ever goes back to them anymore. When they treat something or fix something, it’s done once and for all. But that didn’t stop dad from being opposed to UNICOMA. He lost a lot of money when they started their operations, but he wasn’t against them because of the money. He said we knew too little about all this.”

  “Now they’ve completely beat AIDS,” Sandrine went on. She obviously wanted to improve Isaac’s mood. “Now they can cure cancer, asthma and all forms of allergies. They can cure everything, Isaac!”

  “Everything, but not quite.” Bikie growled, “Some illnesses have been left out in the cold. Alzheimer’s for instance – no one knew what caused the degenerative changes, and no one knows now. And your OE computer hasn’t learned how to cure Parkinson’s either. They can only cure the diseases that scientists have already done lots of research on. COMA itself can do nothing, they just put together old crossword puzzles. Hell, why am I telling you, as if you didn’t know all that stuff. .”

  Strangely enough, it was Bikie who lifted Isaac’s mood, not Sandrine or Peter. What Bikie said inspired Isaac, and he cheered up, recalling that his plan to destroy the system had already started to become a reality. Everything was going really well. He had a team of fellow thinkers. Maybe it was not very big – only him and Bikie – but Peter had given them a place to live and a bit of money. It was a good thing that Peter was on the sidelines since he turned out to be a great guy. It wasn’t clear yet if they were going to do anything illegal or it might not work out at all, but so far it was working and he was glad. “And so tonight we relax, drink and socialize!” Isaac thought with a smile, reaching out for a bottle.

  “Friends! Not another single sad thought today and not a single mention of COMA! You and Sandrine are used to this place, but I want to luxuriate in paradise!” He cast a significant glance at Bikie and at his guitar. Bikie nodded eagerly

  “This time shall we set out to sea, or sail off on a drinking spree?” he sang, strumming the guitar, before reaching out for his bottle.

  “Is that Byron?” Wolanski asked.

  Isaac laughed so hard he almost choked.

  Bikie gave Wolanski a severe look.

  “That’s not By-ron, it’s By-kie. It’s my song, you dorks.”

  “I wasn’t joking, I actually like it.”

  “That’s the most terrible compliment I’ve ever heard. Dorks like my music.”

  “I don’t get you. I can’t compliment you and I can’t criticize you either.”

  “Why don’t you just listen without any comments?”

  “Okay, okay. Can I at least light up my cigarette lighter and stand beside you for a while, like at a rock concert?”

  Sandrine and Isaac laughed until they cried.

  “You can lie down on the bottom of your pool with the lighter if you like. The longer the better.”

  Bikie carried on strumming, sometimes the words were sad, sometimes really jaunty. There was a lot about women and drinking. Everybody enjoyed listening.

  “She gobbled her food by the ton, and her figure was soon lost and gone. She crammed down that swill and GMO slop, in massive amounts, unable to stop” he sang.

  For some reason the women in his songs were beautiful, but very fat, a Botero of music.

  “Her backside was just like a nut!” he continued, “Tra-la-la .All fatty and rough to the touc
h, La-la-la. Her backside was just like a nut, Tra-la-la, that goes by the name avocado.”

  Boom! A loud final chord.

  ***

  The evening was so heartwarming that Isaac felt amazing. Nice company, intelligent people, light-hearted mood, even more awesome than with his university friends. “Man does not live by Pascal alone,” Isaac noted, recalling his evenings with his friend. And he had never sat around with a guitar like this before. Every cloud has a silver lining. If he hadn’t had problems, he wouldn’t have met Bikie or Peter, and he wouldn’t be sitting here at this classy villa. He even saw the terrorist Elvis through different eyes now and regretted that he hadn’t talked to him while they were in the police cell. Where was he now? Probably already in jail. But never mind, if Isaac pulled this off, they would let Elvis go too. He would definitely prefer to sit in jail for any number of years, but not volunteer for downloading.

  The next day he went to see Vicky in the hospital. She was in relatively good shape. The situation was stable, and Isaac had two months to find the money for the operation. Two months ought to be long enough for him. Fortunately he only had to pay for the operation itself and for bringing the specialists from Germany. His sister’s stay in the hospital was covered by social insurance.

  When he got back to the villa, Bikie met him with contrived cheerfulness.

  “Well then, back already from your sweet little cutie?” Bikie really wanted to cheer his friend up, but it came out awkward.

  “What are you talking about?” said Isaac, puzzled. “I’ve been with Vicky, my sister.”

  “Your stepsister. That’s who I meant,” Bikie chuckled. “Your little sister’s high-class. I looked at your photos with her. A jaw-dropping figure and great smile. A real beauty! Got to get her cured quick. Why that acid look, you guys have different folks, don’t you?”

  “We do”- said Isaac slowly.

  He felt a sudden, sharp sting. He wasn’t offended by Bikie’s offhand manner, he had simply never thought about his Vicky as a beautiful young woman. “Vicky, a little cutie,” he repeated to himself pensively. It was true. Neither hospital surroundings nor her wan complexion could spoil her looks. Vicky was beautiful.