The Faces of Strangers

by Pia Padukone

  It wasn’t that Nico was unattractive or undesirable. He had heard that girls thought he was cute; he had even dated the preppy Charlotte James, in the first few months of sophomore year. After a few weeks of dating, she’d told Nico that she liked him because she could imagine him turning out very handsome when he was older. He’d been rather startled by her declaration. Did that mean he wasn’t handsome now? Did she mean that she would stay with him until he was adequately handsome? Or that she wanted to stay with him until they grew old? In the juvenile fashion that serves all high school students, Nico broke up with her at the end of the fourth week without asking her what she had meant. She stood opposite him in the empty hallway that had been cleared out instantaneously by the last bell of the day, her large eyes quavering and rolling around in their sockets in an attempt to avoid eye contact with him and not spill the tears that had gathered. He’d been surprised at the pinching feeling he felt between his own eyes when he saw her holding hands with Wilson—his own teammate!—later on that month, but he didn’t mind because he was a stronger wrestler than Wilson anyway. But Charlotte James was no Mari Sokolov.

  Before that afternoon with Mari, Nico had been looking forward to his return home, to his bed that held his body’s indentation, to a room with an actual door that closed, to the brutish camaraderie of his teammates and the wise tutelage and gruff bark of Coach’s orders. He’d found himself trying to remember the scent of the laundry detergent that Stella used, the slip of a MetroCard through a turnstile, the heady aroma of the hot chocolate at City Bakery. He’d even missed squat thrusts during wrestling practice.

  But now the desire to return to all that was familiar seemed to disappear as he found himself only yearning to be with Mari. He pictured the two of them walking down a street but whether they were in Manhattan or Tallinn was unclear; the only sharp edges to this daydream were the two of them together, fingers linked, inhabiting the comfortable silence that only lovers can maintain. He imagined the faces of other men in a restaurant as he pulled a chair out for her to fit her slim body into, faces filled with abject jealousy and remorse that this stunning woman had chosen this ordinary man. He imagined the hours that they would lose simply just lying in bed side by side, because their connection had to be more than sex; it was kinetic, set in motion from the moment Mari happened upon him in the early morning of his first few hours in Estonia. The daydreams were harmless, or so he thought. When he realized that Mari and thoughts of being together were occupying his every waking moment, and sometimes his subconscious when he slept at night, he told himself to get a grip. He was turning into a needy, desperate being, pining over a woman who lived on a completely different plane than him. What was that hormone that was released during sex—oxytocin, was it? The intimacy hormone, they had called it in biology, that bonds you to your mate. He shook his body, as though he could rid himself of it. Maybe Mari’s body hadn’t produced enough to make her feel the same way. It appeared that the seduction had really just been all about the sex.

  In the mirror in his childhood bedroom, he looked the same, now with a slight hangdog expression from thinking unrequitedly about Mari. He had to snap out of it and move on. He couldn’t pine after her in his bedroom like a brooding teenager in a John Hughes movie. But it felt disingenuous to return to his world without a nod to what had happened. After a while, he began to wonder if their tryst had accomplished the opposite of what he’d felt initially. Had she actually succeeded in setting him free? One thing was for sure: he’d been changed. Mari had changed him.

  NICO

  New York City

  January 2003

  The final stage of Nico’s metamorphosis had been empowerment. A slightly different person exited the lobby doors of his apartment building with Paavo by his side on that first day of the spring semester in New York City. Nico had developed a slight swagger in his walk. He’d spiked his hair gently, he tucked his shirt jauntily in on the side but not the front, the way he’d seen in the magazines Mari brought home from her fashion shoots. He felt a great deal of confidence in the way he spoke to people. He felt like addressing the whole of Fifth Avenue as they walked down the street. He was even able to keep up with Paavo’s strides as the boys walked toward the subway.

  “Check this out,” Nico said, pointing overhead. “There are these random seagulls that nest in the floral crest of that building over there. It’s so weird.”

  “Why is it weird?” Paavo asked, craning his neck without breaking his stride. Four screaming gulls circled and dove from overhead, while one kept watch from the edge of the building. “Don’t the birds need a place to build a nest?”

  “Yeah, but you’d expect like, a pigeon or a sparrow. This is Fifth Avenue, right smack in the middle. It’s the farthest you can get from water on either side, so why would seagulls hang out here? They’re just...out of place. It’s like a polar bear hanging out on a patch of sand.”

  “It’s warmer here than Estonia,” Paavo said, popping his top button and opening his chest to the wind that whipped down the street.

  “Dude, everywhere is warmer than Estonia,” Nico said. The boys smiled and Nico felt relaxed about being around Paavo for the first time in weeks. He’d already been worried about Paavo’s comfort once he’d arrived in New York City, coupled with what he might or might not have found out before he’d left Tallinn. Nico, on the other hand, had smiled enough for the both of them, mostly out of nervousness. He wasn’t sure what Mari had shared with her brother after Nico’s departure. Did Paavo know about the afternoon? Was he incensed with Nico’s behavior, or was he just being his usual stoic self? It seemed that Paavo remained ignorant to all that had transpired. He hadn’t mentioned his sister once. As calm as Paavo seemed, Nico was the opposite inside. He perversely brought her up time after time.

  “How’s Mari doing? Her modeling going okay?”

  “Yes,” Paavo said. He pulled the straps of his backpack away from his armpits. “She’s counting down the days until she leaves for Moscow.”

  “I bet she’s going to make it big over there.”

  “She wants me to leave after graduation, too. She says there’s no future for either of us in Estonia.”

  “How come?”

  “Jobs are scarce.”

  Nico nodded. “Times are tough. Here, too.”

  “Yes, but here it’s a trend. It’ll change next quarter or the one after that. In Estonia, that’s how it is all the time.”

  “Do you think you’ll leave?”

  “We’ll see.”

  * * *

  At the registrar’s office, a thin sheen of sweat overtook Paavo’s forehead as they waited their turn. When he removed his backpack and placed it on the floor, two strips of moisture lined his armpits over his green T-shirt, turning it a darker shade.

  “You okay?” Nico asked.

  “I told you—it’s warm here compared to back home,” Paavo said.

  A thickly built woman with mannish features approached. Nico greeted her as she extended one hand toward Paavo.

  “Hallström kid? Welcome,” she said. “Come with me. I’ll hook you up with your schedule for the semester. Nicholas, go on ahead to homeroom. I’ll make sure he gets to where he needs to go.” Paavo looked as though he were about to be devoured, his eyes darting wildly from side to side.

  “You’ll be okay?” Nicholas asked. Paavo nodded.

  “Yes, of course. You must not be late, Nico.”

  Nicholas sighed. “It’s really not a big deal if I’m a little late. All my teachers know I’m in the program. They’ll cut me some slack this week while you get adjusted.”

  Nico’s classmates not only cut him some slack, they wanted to hear all about it. Nico had spent the past week thinking about his return to school. Hallström was an opportunity that most students were never granted. He had the chance to make the most of himself, t
o reintroduce his peers to a new Nico, one who was potentially more popular and charismatic. He’d had a slight internal conflict over whether he should return to wrestling, but he figured that since Mari was clearly into his body and wrestling had made it this way, there was no reason to give it up. Band, however, had to go. There had been no playing, or hardly any practicing while he had been abroad, but there had also been a realization that the flute was really a pussy instrument.

  In homeroom, a girl turned around in her seat to talk to him. “Nicholas, heard you just came back from Russia.”

  Nico glanced up from his notebook. He could hardly believe it. He had sat behind Cassidy Simon for three years, and this was the first conversation they’d ever had. She was certainly pretty, but it was more than that. It was that she was unattainable. Nearly every guy in Nico’s class wanted to date her, but she hadn’t shown interest in anyone since the first day of high school. Her father was a big-shot music producer, and she had backstage passes to practically any rock concert she wanted.

  “It was Estonia, actually. And it’s Nico. It’s what they called me in Tallinn. Sorta stuck.” Nico winked at Cassidy and was immediately horrified. He’d never winked in his life. In fact, the few times he’d tried, he had felt so self-conscious that he had tried to pass it off as though an eyelash had fallen in and he needed to blink it out rapidly. Cassidy didn’t skip a beat.

  “I like it.” Cassidy turned her entire body around to face him. “Very Velvet Underground.”

  Soon, Nico and Cassidy would spend much of their time together, platonically at first. She would invite him to attend a Weezer concert, and then to hang out with the band in their trailer where it was parked outside the stage door exit on West Fifty-Second Street, and it would only be around three in the morning when they descended the trailer steps that he would attempt to kiss her as she turned her head toward him under a streetlight. She would lean into the kiss but then pull away, deciding on the spot that they were better off as friends than as lovers, but make a promise to him right then and there that this incident wouldn’t affect their friendship. Fairly soon after that, Cassidy would prove to be right, as she nominated him for student union president. Then it wouldn’t be long before Nico found himself giving a speech in front of the whole class, denouncing ninth period and vowing to do away with it altogether. He would pledge to start an anti-bullying initiative—at this he made eye contact with Paavo, who was sitting in the first row in the auditorium during the student debate—and would follow through in his senior year to work with the dean of students to create a no-tolerance policy that would result in black marks on students’ permanent records if they were caught participating in any bullying-related activities.

  Nico would eventually be elevated into a new spotlight cast by his newfound friendship, by the speeches he had to deliver as the president of the student union, by getting voted captain of the wrestling team by the rest of his teammates. It was only natural that the girls would follow at some point. But until then, Nico would settle easily into the glow that that December afternoon had left upon him.

  * * *

  At the end of that first day back at the Manhattan School of Science, Nico had exhausted so much energy in creating his new persona that he could barely envision getting to wrestling practice. He stood in front of the registrar’s office, leaning against the doorway, watching the building empty as if a magnet were drawing students out. From time to time, people waved at him, or stopped to chat, but Nico kept his eyes keenly peeled for the bowl cut of Paavo’s head. There he was, standing near the wall, erect as an arrow as he kept his distance from the flow of students exiting the building.

  “Nico,” Paavo called, his face relaxing at the sight of him.

  “Well? How was it?”

  “Good,” Paavo said. “Interesting. There are so many students from Europe here. Many who moved recently from Russia, did you know? It was nice to speak to them in the language. And Sabine is in my English class, so it was nice to have a familiar face.”

  “That’s good. I hope people are being nice to you, or I’m going to have to knock some heads.”

  “No need, Nico. Everyone is very nice.”

  “You ready to go? Wrestling practice starts in fifteen minutes.”

  Nico and Paavo were the first inside the locker room, which held the lingering odor of bleach. Nico’s friends generally gathered by the water fountain toward the exit, but Nico wanted to avoid any attempts his friends might make at sabotaging his secret. There would be a thousand questions for Paavo—they might imitate his accent, ask about KGB ties, but mostly, Nico was nervous that they would ask about his sister.

  The day Nico had returned from the airport, he had tucked Mari’s head shot and a comp card within the pages of his calculus textbook and slid them out in front of his friends at their usual corner table at the diner. The booth was windowed on each side overlooking the skate park across the street. The cold hadn’t deterred the skaters from rolling their boards over the undulating parabolas, and the sound of wheels scraping against the concrete accented the boys’ conversation as they pored over Mari’s photos.

  “She’s a knockout,” Chen said.

  “Definitely Maxim-worthy,” Toby said. “What did I tell you?”

  “She came after you?” Carmine asked. Nico nodded. He’d thought that bragging about Mari would have puffed him up with pride, but he felt strangely territorial. He reached for the photos but Carmine held them out of his reach.

  “What’s the rush?” Carmine’s long arm held the comp card over his head and scrutinized it like an X-ray. “I could stare at her all day.”

  Now Nico could hear his teammates filter into the locker room, and he hoped they would remember what he’d told them about being discreet about her in front of Paavo. Nico got dressed in record time as Paavo loitered on the bench, opening and closing lockers. Nico knotted a bandanna around his neck and nodded to Paavo as they let themselves into the gym.

  Coach was at the far corner, scrutinizing a clipboard. Nico jogged out toward him.

  “Looking good, Coach,” he called. He could see the sinews in the man’s legs even from the three-point line and the arrow-like muscles in the backs of his calves pointing down toward his narrow ankles as he bounced on his toes.

  Coach looked up. “Lefty! I missed you, man.” They exchanged fist bumps.

  “That nickname has even more meaning now that I’ve lived in a formerly communist country for four months.” After the four months in Tallinn as Nico, he’d nearly forgotten about his wrestling nickname and he smiled fondly at the mention.

  “Hey, there’s no shame in it. In fact, I hear Magnet High School has a left-hander now. In your weight class, too.”

  “Finally, some apples to apples,” Nico said.

  Coach chuckled. “Oh, please. You’ve done fine even with your handicap, no pun intended. So, how was it? The formerly communist country?”

  “It was good.”

  “That’s it?”

  “What else are you looking for?”

  “More than teenage code. Give me some details, Lefty.”

  “I didn’t do any wrestling, if that’s what you’re wondering. They do have this thing called Wife Carrying, though, which is exactly what it sounds like. You carry your wife through this obstacle course. People are really serious about it.”

  “Crazy. What’s the point?”

  “I guess way back robbers used to literally steal people’s wives and forcibly marry them. But now it’s all friendly. The wives volunteer to participate.”

  “I don’t even know what to do with that information. The people must be interesting, to say the least. Speaking of which, where’s your friend?”

  Nico pointed at Paavo, who was settling himself in the bleachers.

  “Lefty, you know I don’t run a day care,” Coach said
to Nico. He raised his voice and called to Paavo. “Hey—Paavo? Welcome. Go throw on a jersey and some shorts. I have some extra kits in my office. There’s no watching on this team.” Paavo stood up uncertainly, and Nico nodded to him and pointed toward the office.

  With Coach’s face having narrowed down so much as well, the pads on his glasses couldn’t grip his nose, which looked more like a beak now. The glasses slipped down. Coach pushed them up with his forefinger. They slipped down again. Watching him made Nico sympathetic for Coach, and he looked away in embarrassment. Coach was hairy; hirsute was the appropriate SAT word for it. Little succulents of growth sprouted from his ears, and vines of hair snaked down his still-muscular quads in mossy clumps.

  “Anyway, you’re different somehow. What changed?” Coach asked.

  “My mom said the same thing. I don’t know, I’m a man of the world,” Nico said, bowing deeply.

  “You’re a man about to do five suicides. Get to it, suck-up.” Coach grinned.

  Nico jogged over to the red line. He felt suddenly energized by his teammates’ voices echoing through the locker room, pounding their fists into empty lockers in glee, happy to see one another. A rush of air filled his chest and he smiled, happy to be considered one of them, happy to be part of a team, happy to have a foundation.

  “Sucking up to Coach already, Lefty?” Carmine hollered. He jogged up and slapped the side of Paavo’s head lightly. Paavo flinched. “Ooh, sorry, guy. Didn’t mean to scare you. Who’re you anyway?”

  “This is Paavo. From Tallinn?” Nico had found that saying that someone was from somewhere specific made it seem less ignorant.

  “Paavo! Oh, right, the one with the hot—” Nico shot Carmine a glance and shook his head. “P-Train. How long are you going to be here? You gonna wrestle with us?”