On the next morning, Alexander Ivanovich, head of the department, rushed into the ward furiously. It was the first time that I had a chance to see him closely. He looked like an aging Christ. Deep and clear eyes, sparse hair. The bright-blue shirt matched his eyes very well. The shirt collar was open. Alexander Ivanovich was yelling,
‘So much! Money! Spent on you! All the specialists! But you keep dying like flies! You don’t care a damn about your children! You prefer being sad, that’s why your lungs rotten alive! And you aren’t old women or something! We don’t waste medications on the old ones! But you are f…ing moms!’
So I learned that a young woman died last night of pneumonia. Her room was opposite mine. Her parents came to see her in the morning and brought her a lot of presents. She left two little kids…
‘But you aren’t going to be that lucky, sweetheart! I won’t let you die at my department! Do you understand? Stop slobbering!’
I nodded obediently. Alexander Ivanovich flew out of the room and came back 5 minutes later. He had a sheet of drawing paper and a black pen in his hands. Then he said what I will never forget, ‘Look at these two coffins (drawing boldly). Their lids are raised. These coffins are for your kids, understand? You are driving them in by being unhappy. An unhappy mother drives her children alive into a coffin. Well, they will be alive of course. But their fates will be hopelessly warped. They won’t be able to build normal relationships. They will be scared for life. The expression in your eyes will captivate them forever with the fear of life. They won’t have enough power of their own to cope with it. Only one person can do that. Mother.
‘You must be happy. Even if you don’t see your children, they will be happy if you are.
‘Define what you need to be happy. Everyone is different. Some people want money, others want to be famous. Maybe you need five lovers to be happy – then get them! But your eyes should always sparkle! Find another job, dance striptease at restaurants!’
My eyes shone when I heard about ‘five lovers’. My forehead sweated. Alexander Ivanovich prescribed me a permission to be happy. And he didn’t restrict me at all. Neither did he set any moral boundaries. Instead, he helped me through of the unwanted skin like a snake. And the new skin he helped me put on shone with all its scales, though timidly so far. This happens when the sun rises slowly over the mountain.
‘Yes’, I said to Alexander Ivanovich. ‘You are right. Actually, I don’t need too much. All I need is Oleg and my children.’
Alexander Ivanovich went out. I came up to the window and looked out pressing my forehead against the glass. A stretcher with a body tightly closed with a blanket was carried slowly through the hospital door. ‘Someone has died again’, I thought, scared for Alexander Ivanovich. But this funeral procession had subtle inconsistencies. I looked closely. The nurses carefully tucked the deceased person’s body all round with a thick woolen quilt.
Suddenly a wrinkled little fist appeared from under the top corner of the quilt. Then I saw angry eyes, wet as watermelon seeds. The wrinkled fist threatened menacingly to the frightened young nurses.
‘To freeze an old man!’ the old one yelled. ‘Aren’t you just a pair of stupid sluts?!’
I laughed wildly hitting my head against the glass. And kept laughing like crazy! Then, holding my belly, I ran to phone Oleg.
I was getting better quickly as by magic, and Alexander Ivanovich was the magician. Oleg picked me up a few days later. I got an apartment, and we had a wedding party in it. My ex-husband sued the judge who had divorced us but lost… I wished him the best of luck quite sincerely. By doing that, I closed the door to the past.
An absolutely new life was in store for me…
I will never forget the huge sheet of drawing paper with two children’s coffins painted in bold marker, with oily black paint, shockingly wide open. And my system of life values, firmly impacted in my consciousness by my parents, school and the entire country, was shaken seriously.
When such things as “duty”, “morality”, “loyalty”, “generosity” and so on stand in my way, preventing me from breaking through to a sense of being when the air seems divinely delicious and the sky looks blindingly bright, I sweep those words away with a huge broom like dirty last year’s leaves…
What was next?
‘So what was next?’
‘You know, Valery Petrovich, I didn’t want to come today… Honestly, I’m not sure whether I will ever come to you at all.’
‘That’s why your cell phone didn’t answer?’
‘No. I lost the phone in the forest. I returned to that place in a few days and found it… But the reason is different. Valery Petrovich, you see… I didn’t expect that working with a psychotherapist would mean such terrible intimacy. Such an access to one’s soul… I have opened just a small part of it, but it already feels so scary.’
‘You don’t trust me?’
‘I am even afraid of that little radio on your desk. Do you record what I am telling you? Is there a Dictaphone in it?’
‘No.’
‘Good. So it’s just my fears. It’s really hard for me to trust someone.’
‘Let’s try once more… So what was next, after the marriage?’
‘It was like this. Valery Petrovich, just imagine a room like yours though larger. A long table covered with a red velvet cloth. The light is off, and it’s late at night outside… Round the table, candles are burning. And the most amazing thing is that the candles are absolutely black… There people at the table; they sit densely, in two rows, and only a few of them can lean their hands on the table. Some mystic, magic. Fabulous and scary… All this whispering, the common secret of the adults, women and men, tied up with an ineradicable thirst for knowledge… Waiting for a miracle, a sacrament.’
‘Are you telling me about your dream?’
‘No, it was not a dream. When I married Oleg, I soon learned that he was a member of a secret underground organization, a sect… Nobody used the word ‘sect’ though. They called it ‘yoga’. Although for me, yoga classes mean something different, but that was a special ‘yoga’, and its purpose was to develop latent human abilities.
‘I began telling you about my first visit… It was quite a different world… It smelled of sandalwood and opium… And there was a damp smell of an ancient land, the other world. I was bewitched…
‘The bewitchment lasted eight years Valery Petrovich.’
‘As long as eight years?’
‘Yes. I don’t regret it for one simple reason: the Universe had never poured so many emotions upon me at a time: curiosity, admiration, idolization, doubt, denial. Fury.
The most important thing was that I wanted to be close to Oleg. He was the whole Universe for me.
My happiness was difficult… It was much more difficult than I expected…
The resistance of my children who were so young and met with their father – it was something I had expected, though vaguely. My ex-husband, after losing the lawsuit, tried to influence the children. Years would have passed until they would grow up and learn to think for themselves…
The resistance of my new mother-in-law, quite foreseeable and understandable. There was one thing only that I didn’t expect, namely, that it would be so deeply secretive and take so many years. Oleg was her only son, and she dreamed of grandchildren. I tried many times to give birth for Oleg but failed…
Initially, I didn’t pay any attention to the odd events Oleg took part in. Gradually, I began to notice that my husband was deeply and passionately interested the mysterious life flowing past me. I wanted to know everything about it. Everything, just everything…
Oleg trusted Alexander Vasilyevich completely. Besides, he just adored guru Rubin…’
‘Who were Alexander Vasilyevich and guru Rubin?’
‘Oh, how I wish I could tell you that in a different way lest you should interrupt me and break the whole… Reminiscences are more fragile than butterflies. Genuine reminiscences one seeps through one’s fingers when one tries to comprehend or understand the logic.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I will try to tell my story the way you want. But the very beginning only, not more. As to the rest, let it be the way it is… Maybe I will understand everything myself while I am telling it.
Alexander Vasilyevich was a yoga instructor. The other one’s name was Oleg Borisovich. They used to come to us from Moscow every week as there were trainings on Saturdays and Sundays. Those were paid classes. The premises were rented in secondary schools and gyms. Everyone would bring a rug, sportswear and a notebook to take notes. But we didn’t have many physical exercises; we spent most time listening to recorded lectures. Then there was a discussion that ended in the house of one of the participants, late at night or even in the morning…
The Yoga Academy was in Moscow. It was headed by guru Rubin. He came to our town once a year, in spring. Special parties and balls were arranged in honor of his visits.
The Academy had a lot of trainers, and they traveled around Russian towns, just like our Alexander Vasilyevich and Oleg Borisovich. There were many students. I think that there wasn’t a single town not covered by yoga classes. That was a very serious organization. Many of our politicians are graduated Academy of Yoga graduates.
Anyone who studied with the Moscow trainers for three years took an exam and received a yoga trainer diploma. That person was supposed to recruit new groups, and tuition payment was transferred to Moscow Academy. Soon there were a lot of yogis in our town. Evening classes were held in every high school. We identified each other instantly, we had a special terminology. Specific gestures.
We possessed Knowledge. I felt Peculiar. Is this state familiar to you? I always suspected that I was unlike the others. Who of the people living on the Earth are not familiar with this state? There, in that class that was supposed to be my family, Peculiarity, like a viscous cloud smelling of wild orchids, floated in the sky; the walls, the people, the words were shrouded in it.
I can’t express with words my fascination. Visiting the classes was like a dream. And the methodical clapping and motions we made, the trainer’s loud staccato voice… Sometimes, I felt that I was in paradise. In paradise, where everything was safe and calm like in a womb. The smell of a carefree childhood and meadow grasses. I hoped to have found a family…
The tall and stately Raisa Mikhaylovna, the group senior, wearing a bright crimson dress and the same bow on her head, came up happily when Oleg and I entered the hall. She hugged me and stroked my hair, something that my mother, stingy on affection, had never done. ‘You have an amazing wife’, she nodded importantly to Oleg. ‘Have you ever immersed in her past lives? It’s a pity… You would be amazed.’
Oleg was surrounded by a joyous crowd. They hugged him, asked him something, clapped him on the shoulder as if they had parted many days ago rather than yesterday…
Oleg was already a yoga instructor. He had a degree from Moscow, a big diploma in a red cover saying in golden letters, ‘From the Government of Russia.’ In the evenings, he and Larisa Petrovna, a plump fair-haired woman of around 40, taught his group in secondary school No. 47. She worked as a primary school teacher and lived alone.
I noticed a lot of single women in the yoga class, especially school teachers. Many of them liked Oleg, including Larisa Petrovna, Raisa Mikhaylovna, and another one, the goggle-eyed Valya, who had a lot of moles on her face, each having black rigid hairs, and the tall one named Nadya having a funny tuft of hair at the crown. Her surname was Durova. And many other women also liked Oleg as up to that time he remained the only single man in the whole class.
Women in the yoga class did their best but failed to forgive me for being happy…
I heard muffled whispers behind me,
‘An upstart, and a snobbish one. She has two children but grabbed the best guy.’
‘That’s just passion, girls. It lasts from two months to two years, then it goes away. We must tell Oleg about it.’
‘It’s good that she doesn’t study at our course. The difference in spiritual development is enormous…’
And indeed, Larisa Petrovna, a woman with a huge hooked nose and big hands, immediately jumped to Oleg when I was close by and whispered loudly in his ear, ‘You should know that passion doesn’t last more than two years. And what you feel to this woman is just passion!’
It was many years after, Valery Petrovich, that I suddenly remembered that episode, and the picture was as vivid as on a wide color screen. I saw that woman, Larisa, bent to Oleg so sharply that she even tore an armpit seam in her silk dress. The dress had the color of a swamp, and I thought that I felt the smell of bottom mud and wet soil. While she was whispering in Oleg’s ear, she was looking back at me constantly, and her lips were curved in a smile. Many years later, looking at the distant screen of memories, I was able to give a clear response, ‘Yes, yes, don’t worry, Larisa Petrovna, Oleg knows you’re just a jealous old woman.’
It’s a pity I failed to defend myself. Besides, Larisa had a high status, which was sometimes conferred to yoga students. Trainers who arrived from Moscow used to stay at her place. We would get together there in the evenings. My first experience, when I was astounded to see black burning candles, was at her place…
Oleg was at the 4th course when I entered the 1st one. But I had an irresistible desire to be with him.
‘Well, you can’t always go to the classes with me’, he would say. ‘It’s not aloud. Nobody will let you do that. Only in the evenings, when we get together at someone’s place.’
I wanted to be close to him, which was impossible. But my desire was so strong that life, in the long run, did it to me…
It was spring, and everyone was waiting for guru Rubin’s arrival. Preparation for his visit was in full swing. We decorated the auditorium with balloons, flowers and Academy of Yoga banners. I stood on a high ladder, receiving colored balls from those standing. Suddenly, I felt someone’s eyes. Alexander Vasilyevich was looking at me; as I knew, he had reached the level of Master of Yoga, which meant that he could do just anything.
Alexander Vasilyevich stood by the window holding on to the frame. Sunlight was coming from the window. He looked an ethereal, disembodied person in the sunlight. And those deep-set, big blue eyes… They were scrutinizing me carefully… I laughed and threw a red balloon down to him. He caught it easily…
I walked down the ladder and went to him across the room. My own boldness amazed me. But somewhere deep in my heart I felt, even knew that I had the right to behave like that.
I came up closely to him and said quite seriously,
‘You are the teacher of my husband, Oleg Zolotov. It’s the 4th year, while I’m at the 1st one yet. But I want to study together with my husband in your class.’
Alexander Vasilyevich laughed.
‘You want to jump over to the 4th grade? Do you think you can do that?’
‘Yes’, I said firmly. ‘I can.’
‘OK’, Alexander Vasilyevich was quick to agree. ‘But your husband should bear full responsibility for you.’
I jumped up with the unexpected joy, kissed the laughing trainer on both cheeks and ran around the auditorium like crazy, looking for Oleg.
The news of Oleg’s wife being raised to the 4th grade reached all the yogis immediately. That was something incredible. Alexander Vasilyevich, unlike Oleg Borisovich, the other trainer who used to come from Moscow, was very severe, so some of us had to study at the same course for several years only because they failed to submit the required control papers (yes, control papers, like at school.) But here, out of the blue sky, someone was raised to the 4th course in no time!
For example, a person for whom people in the city had a great respect, Evgeny Alexandrovich, director of the machine-tool plant, a grey-haired man, was not able to move to the third course because he failed the World of Professions exam. The World of Professions was followed by the toughest one, the World of Relations. To study it, they took Pushkin’s fairy tales and the characters were used to discuss people’s patterns of behavior…
I joined the 4th grade students to study together with my husband. I was proud of myself. The most important thing, though, was that Oleg admired me! That’s why all the rest, including the buzzing, even the sea of women’s anger behind my back, was of no big importance for me, and I took it easy.
‘Look at that upstart. She did break through!..’
‘It’s OK, girls, you’ll see her going crazy because of the ocean of information!’
‘She will be very sorry… I think this green-eyed snake decided to charm Alexander Vasilyevich…’
But all that was just nothing in comparison to what was going to happen!
As I told you, we were looking forward to guru Rubin’s arrival. He used to put the students upon the path (it was an initiation ritual), and then lectured for 2 days.
That arrival was quite special. The teacher decided to see what progress in yoga the women had made during those years and prepared a test for them. He was going to grade their femininity and choose the Queen of the ball!
On the day of guru Rubin’s arrival, Alexander Vasilyevich solemnly gave out large sheets to all the female yogis (including me). The sheets listed 48 feminine qualities, for example, virtue, humility, honesty, and so on. My favorite qualities were 34, the ability to fly, and 48, enjoying sex.
Each quality was followed by a dash, so it looked like this:
34. Ability to fly –
36. To say a kind word –
37. Please man’s eyes with serving –
Guru Rubin would put percentage by each of the qualities so that they would make 100% altogether! The hundred-percent woman would become the queen!
Everybody was awfully nervous. They said that the Master rarely put more than 5%, that’s why the Queen, who would, together with guru Rubin, open the ball, was chosen very rarely, so the Master had to perform all the ceremonies on his own. Only once, in Kharkov, the honor fell to the lot of a woman by the name of Valentina…
I didn’t care about choosing the Queen. The only thing I was afraid of more than death was shaming myself in Oleg’s eyes! I saw how much he respected, even adored the Master, so I envied guru Rubin! I felt that I didn’t deserve high marks: the Master can look through you, you can’t hide from him. ‘He will understand that I was a marketplace thief’, I thought and mortal anguish overflowed over my chest.
I didn’t watch the concert in the honor of the Master, and I didn’t see guru Rubin. I was waiting for that test like a death-penalty and was going to run away home. Why not? I will say I had a headache! Why do I have to suffer like that?
Happy, right? The 4th year, right? It’ll be too late to regret!
I turned around. There were shadows of apprehension on the women’s faces. So I decided to stay despite anything…
Guru Rubin, deep in thought, sat on a wooden bench. He had already examined several women. He was around sixty. He had a brown face, large eyes and white teeth. The way he was looking was amazing, I had never seen anyone like that. Looking at someone, he was looking through that person, and it was very strange. On the covers of the books sold everywhere, he looked more attentive and concentrated.
I thought that the Master was bored. Women, their legs trembling, came up to him in turns, picked up their skirts, sat down, rolled their eyes up and handed their sheets to the Master. He also rolled up his eyes. Scrutinized something attentively up there, closed his eyes, and, after that magic act, put a mark quickly. There was a rumor that the Master was in low spirits on that day. The percentage marks were low. The women tried to hide their sheets and fold them into tubes. But nothing doing! The hooked-nosed bloodthirsty Larisa Petrovna would snatch every sheet from the owner’s hands and read it aloud in her corner!
Oleg was pacing nervously back and forth, very close by. I took a deep breath and went on. Hey, a woman can die but once!
In front of me was Anfisa. Her hair was cut ‘like a pot'” as if in an old tale. ‘I wonder’, I thought, ‘how she manages to teach drawing at the school having such a haircut? She must be called…’ I had no time to think through what nickname Anfisa’s students could give her as she stood up slowly, pale like death, her hands over her face as if shaking off something invisible but terrible, and went bobbing like a dream… I sat down in her place.
And then, out of despair, the forgotten blood of my unknown though obviously rampant ancestors suddenly woke up inside me. It started seething and walloping, making me pull the Master’s sleeve. He looked at my shameless eyes, astonished…
‘You know what’, I whispered in his ear and the smell of cigars, Indian sticks and dried lavender enveloped me like a cloud… ‘You know what, guru Rubin’, I trusted him as a faithful friend, ‘I just desperately need a high score!’
‘Oh, really’, the Master’s eyes gleamed with joy. ‘What do you need it for?’
‘You see. My husband is here. I can’t let him down. I love him.’
‘Your husband? Where is your husband?’ The Master startled, even more joyfully. He looked very pleased that there was such an amazing hitch.
‘There he is’, I waved my hand to Oleg, who was running, not even walking, around us, seeing nothing.
‘Ah, that’s your husband!’ the Great Master winked at me slyly. ‘Well, he is quite all right! And so young!’
After saying that, he boldly, like a king, put me 100% in each line.
I took the sheet out of his hand, pressed it to my breast and stood up proudly as if I were a queen. The nimble Larisa grabbed my sheet and flew with it to the corner where the evaluations were read out.
‘Come on!’ I thought tiredly, too weak to feel any malevolence, ‘Read it loudly!’
There was stunned silence in the auditorium. Then the audience began buzzing. I heard no one and nothing. I only saw my husband’s jubilant eyes!
Panting with happiness, holding the Master’s hand, I opened the ball! I rushed towards my victory past the cameras, reporters and cute smiling ladies!
Holding with both hands my heavy pink dress embroidered with threaded gold rose and silver leaves (I managed to make it in one night), I went down the stairs to cool my hot face… I looked in a large mirror in a gilded frame and gasped: a strange woman with mockingly curved lips was looking at me, and the proud turn of her head struck me… as if I had known her for a long time. As if, very long time ago, I had seen the woman’s portrait, though in an old palace hall…
I pressed my fingers to my lips; they smelled like beeswax and fresh milk. I was all wrapped in the smell. Somehow, standing before the mirror, I was able to recognize my own scent for the first time…
And later at night, my crowned head slightly bowed, I was graciously accepting congratulations…
A few days later…
A few days later, after the ball euphoria, when I reveled in being delighted by myself, I began to remember what had happened at that ball, and other important events…
The Master brought from Moscow a live present, a charming performer of Arab dances. The woman was dressed in a resplendent costume of bright red silk trimmed with beads and flanked with hanging long strands of glittering stones. In her hands, she had a transparent cloak of the finest intricately woven web of gold threads. Her legs, arms and neck were twined with silver necklace which seemed to rustle softly while she was breathing. In the dance, which the stranger immediately performed, they rang desperately, turning the woman into a great cosmic serpent.
The music, the dance and the dancer were in wonderful harmony. Also, I was horrified to feel that once, long ago, I had seen all that…
The Arab dancing presented to all women in our city by the Great Master broke into my life like a memorable flow, a fiery avalanche, and left a lasting impression in it…
The name of the beautiful stranger who stunned me at the ball with her Arab dancing was Irina Malinkina. She taught Oriental dance in Moscow and came to us at the behest of the great guru Rubin. He decided that the whole of Russia was supposed to perform Arab dances. And he got what he wanted…
Irina used to come to us every weekend, together with the yoga instructors. There was dancing after the yoga class. By Irina’s next arrival, I had pink satin pants ready as well as a passionate desire to master dancing as soon as possible. I went crazy with joy…
After five lessons, I decided that Irina wasn’t good enough to hold a candle for me. I remained for a long time in that state of mind. My enormous self-confidence didn’t leave me for a second. Oleg admiringly looked at me and rejoiced each dance I rehearsed…
A month later, I decided it was time to perform a concert. But where? I racked my brain. A week passed, and I read a newspaper headline, ‘November 10 – Police Day Celebration.’ That’s exactly what I needed! At the time, I worked as a schoolteacher and sold fruit at the marketplace. No documents of course, and a lot of problems with the police. And then, suddenly, I had a plan of killing two birds with one stone: I would not just dance but also please the police so that they would know me in the person and so not touch me. And as soon as I came up with the plan, I didn’t hesitate for a minute and rushed to the marketplace police chief. I rushed to him, only afraid of one thing, which was changing my mind. Although winter didn’t set in yet, it was very cold. I was wearing felt boots and a thick sheepskin coat. My downy shawl would slide on my forehead and I had to adjust it on the run…
The time has come to tell you about Ivan Nikolayevich, the police chief of the whole grocery market. Many bosses have since been replaced, but I remember Ivan Nikolayevich the most.
He was rather short, his hands were small and kempt, you couldn’t get your eyes off them for some reason. I also liked the scent of his expensive perfume, a dense grassy scent. He was very aggressive. He was always yelling, screaming, stomping! All violators of economic discipline (most of the sellers were women) jumped out of his office looking so miserable that I just don’t have enough words to describe!
I burst into the office so scared that I even forgot to knock.
Ivan Nikolayevich was sitting at the table and talking with a bald, very important gentleman. Both looked awfully busy like at a Central Party Committee meeting.
When I flew up to the table, the police chief rose in indignation, he even opened his mouth to utter words relevant to the case, but I didn’t wait and asked him politely,
‘Ivan Nikolayevich, are you going to have a Police Day banquet?’ And then, before he had time to recover, I blurted out, ‘I have prepared a gift for you! I’ll perform Arab dance at the party!’
Strange silence was hanging in the office. Ivan Nikolayevich looked dumbfounded at the bald guy, the latter shrugged his shoulders helplessly, then both of them stared at me. I felt that I was able to capture their attention completely because they remained silent, so I breathed in more air.
‘My costume glitters with precious stones, it’s embroidered with beads’, I purred like a pussycat. ‘Oriental ‘music, just amazing, ringing necklaces on my feet, I’m sure you’ll enjoy it…’
It seemed to me suddenly that Ivan Nikolayevich’s eyes flashed with… a kind of bewilderment. I knew it. He didn’t believe that I knew how to dance.
I was confused. My knees trembled badly. I squeezed my hands into fists, and my voice was hoarse beyond recognition.
‘If you don’t believe me’, I shook my head in the direction Ivan Nikolayevich, ‘leave the office and I’ll dance (I said that to the bald one, his eyes sparkled with delight, he even got up; now he was standing close to the police chief). Then you’ll tell him what kind of dancer I am!’
While I was speaking, Ivan Nikolayevich became more and more like a confused little boy who didn’t know what to do.
‘I don’t know what to tell you’, he said finally doing his best to avoid looking at me. ‘We have never had dancers at our banquets.’
‘So you’ll have one’, I said joyfully. ‘It’s never late to begin.’
‘Yes, but I can be fired’, Ivan Nikolayevich said, even more confused. ‘And besides, you know…’ he looked at the bald one seeking support, but the guy was busy sharpening a pencil.
‘What should I know?’ I want on the attack. ‘I won’t be dancing naked! And it will be free, just a gift for you!’
‘OK’, Ivan Nikolayevich said. ‘I have to discuss this. Come tomorrow.’
‘And please give us your phone number’, the bald one said, quite unexpectedly.
‘I should not be scared, not be scared, I kept saying all day, dancing, sewing my costume, then dancing again.’
On the next day, I appeared before the eyes of the police chief again. He looked at me having no idea what to do. I had never seen him like that before.
‘Sorry, I don’t know the date of the banquet yet. Please come tomorrow.’
I came tomorrow, then the day after tomorrow. Ivan Nikolayevich didn’t give me a definite promise. He looked embarrassed and kept telling me that he had plenty of work and, besides, nobody knew anything.
‘But why?’ I wondered. Although I liked the way our severe chief looked at me smiling, my patience was coming to an end. ‘Maybe he thinks that I am crazy?’ I thought.
It was over after a week of my non-stop visits. Ivan Nikolayevich was very busy. A group of teenagers was brought to his office. They carried drugs, so they were interrogated for a long time. Ivan Nikolayevich asked me to wait out in the corridor. I waited for three hours, and my optimism collapsed. It was replaced by despair.
‘I won’t leave until I tell him everything! That’s a matter of principle for me as a woman!’ I decided and rushed into the office full of people, again without knocking at the door.
‘I know’ you think I am crazy’, I said with dignity, though my voice was trembling treacherously, ‘but I really wanted to make a present for you and dance at your party.
Don’t you understand that, when I become famous, you just won’t be able to afford inviting me?’
In complete silence, I turned on my felt boots proudly and went out. I felt bitterness. So much effort wasted, and all for nothing! Even the fact that the police stopped bothering me in the market place after that event (maybe they saw too much of me in their chief’s office) didn’t make me happy. Why didn’t they want me to dance for them? Why?
I understood why when I saw a video showing me dancing. It was something awful. I have no words to describe my awkward shuffling feet, which, by the way, seemed awfully thick to me, and my self-satisfied look of a silly goose.
So I decided to quit Arab dancing for good. But on the same day the phone rang!
A nice male voice said that his name was Oleg Viktorovich… and asked me to dance at a restaurant!
‘I want to make a birthday present for a friend’, he explained.
‘But who are you?’ I asked him, bewildered. Oleg Viktorovich was the bald gentleman I had met in Ivan Nikolayevich’s office.
So it was not in vain, it turned out that life was again wonderful and amazing!
‘How much will you charge for your performance?’ Oleg Viktorovich asked me in a businesslike manner, while I imagined myself spinning and floating under the very heavens…
‘I don’t know…’ my voice disobeyed me.
‘Don’t worry, think of it, and I’ll call you back in half an hour.’
What shall I do? On the one hand, I was already flying in a cloud of glittering beads in a mysterious night restaurant, on the other hand, I honestly knew that I was a very, very poor dancer.
Looking for support, I frantically attacked the phone. I called everyone. I phoned to Oleg’s office, to Irina Malinkina in Moscow, to all the girls I danced with. But the more I called, the more clearly I heard silence buzzing in the receiver.
I realized that in the hour of need, I had to make my own decisions instead of asking for help. So when Oleg Viktorovich called back, I replied calmly,
‘OK. As to the payment, it’s up to you. It’ll be my first performance.’
‘What if you find the sum too low?’ my dear Oleg Viktorovich asked.
‘No’, I said firmly, ‘that’s out of the question. It will be my first performance, and I need it even more than you do.’
‘OK, great. It’s Next Saturday, 10 p.m., restaurant ‘Bylina’. And please don’t worry: it will be 2 hours after the beginning of the party, the guests will have drunk a lot, so it will be OK even if you are not quite up to the mark. You can bring another girl with you. Bye.’
So, I will be performing. In four days. Four days is an eternity. I went to my friend Julia. Julia is very brave, and although she is even a poorer dancer than me, I love her very much. Besides, she is a beauty. Dark-skinned and black-eyed like a gypsy. She looked great in her blue costume, strands of beads hanging down up to her knees (we had spent all night making them), she wore a kind of yashmak on her head, cobweb covered her entire face, but her black eyes sparkled like stars even through it.
She was also happy to have a chance to perform, and we began rehearsing like crazy…
