The Superfluous Man

by Botyakov Anatoly

  “You are digressing from the subject,” she corrected him.

  “Can you see that spot, right there? It is where they attacked me, beat me up and, having thrown me into their car, abducted me,” Victor pointed at the place of the assault, waited until Mariam found it, and then made an indifferent gesture, describing their swift, sudden disappearance.

  He was trying to seem cheerful because it did credit to his allegedly indestructible courage. Outside he might seem calm indeed, but his mind was literally turned inside out; he could deceive her, but he could trick himself the same way, no matter how desperately he tried it.

  “And did not you try to strike back?” Mariam asked with a naive look of surprise on her face, staring at him and for some reason still holding the wheel firmly.

  “What do you mean by that? Can you imagine that I did not try to strike back?” the storyteller stood up against such question formulation. “About five of them fell practically at once, but in several seconds another half-dozen came running to rescue their friends; here they somehow managed to bring me down using all their weight.”

  Then both of them grew silent, but as Victor knew this joke much longer than she did, he was doomed to be the first to burst out laughing.

  “You are lying!” Mariam blamed him reasonably, “Not to mention that all this is not funny.”

  “Yes, you are right, it is not,” Victor bit a little his lower lip. “There were just two of them. I did not even have time to understand anything. First, I got a punch in the stomach, then a kick in the face, and I lost consciousness. When I recovered I found myself with a bag on my head, all covered with blood as if already dead. You know, all this seems comical now, but at a moment like this you involuntarily realize that it is time to say goodbye to your life; you begin to think about all things that you have not managed to do yet, even your favourite melodies start to sound in your head as if doing it for the last time.”

  Mariam was listening to him very carefully, with a sinking heart. She would fail to hide her curiosity even if she tried to, not to mention that she did not even think to do so.

  “You cannot help thinking of what you have not seen yet, of what you have not learned yet; all your achievements, all the people you have had honour and disgust to meet – all this is in front of your eyes at such moment. I must admit, in all sincerity, I did not remember about you in the first place, but later, when you nevertheless came to me, I was so worried that we would never meet again, and you would decide that I just ran away.”

  “I would never think so!” Mariam answered thoughtlessly.

  “And what would you think then? That I died? That some green aliens kidnapped me and brought me to their planet?”

  She was silent; she had no answer and could not have one, either.

  “I do not know why, Mariam, but I do not want you to be disappointed in me even one single time in your life. I do not know whether it is possible now, when I have done what I have done, but I want to be the best person in your life regardless of how much time we are going to spend with you together; even if or ways are destined to be parted, I want you to remember me with a smile on your face,” Victor looked in her eyes in a new way and took one of her palms. “Will you remember only good about me, Mariam?”

  “I do not know what to answer,” a barely audible whisper was heard in reply.

  “Later it turned out that the only thing mister T. wanted were the explanations,” Victor quickly released her hand and reverted to the story, doing his best to pretend that he never digressed from it. “The explanations that for some reason were withheld from him by his very or maybe not very loyal driver. And when I told him that I disclaimed my liabilities in view of the fact that madam M. had not been seen come in contact with anybody who could possibly compromise her, mister T. with his characteristic humour tried to make me look guilty of everything what happened there, without having apologized but at the same time having intelligibly explained me that if I, a man with an injured head, decided to go to the police, then he would gladly show me that I was wrong when assuming that I became a witness of the real cruelty. You know the rest of the story yourself.”

  “I am really sorry,” looking before her, Mariam, playing the role of madam M., offered her untimely and that was more important, inappropriate apologies.

  “Stop this nonsense, please! Frankly saying, I do not see anything extraordinary in what has happened; just a story, it may be a bit rare, but it is not equivocal for sure. By the way, are we still going to pay a visit to your so-called friends or what? I am ready to change my mind at any opportune or an absolutely inopportune moment!”

  “Keep the flag flying, soldier!” Mariam said seriously and finally started the engine. “I was just thinking ahead over the future.”

  They both were silent all the way, not counting several mutual questions and answers concerning mere trifles, which, most likely, were soon irretrievably forgotten. There might be found a plethora of causes for that, but for some reason nobody tried to do it. They reached the place very quickly. Having stopped near a nine-storied house, Mariam quickly went out of the car, and then Victor did the same. Before he approached the main entrance, she already managed to talk to someone on the on-door speakerphone whereupon she entered the opened doors. While they waited for a lift to take, nobody said a word either, which made the atmosphere around them have very unusual shades. They were standing silently as if not even being acquainted, having been brought here by pure accident.

  When a lift finally came, something suddenly came over Victor, and he unexpectedly felt some hazy, passionate desire to kiss his ‘accidental’ companion. Mariam was closer to the doors, with her back to Victor, seemingly thinking about nothing at the moment. He could not explain it even to himself, but something made him begin to stare at her as if being bewitched and unable to avert his eyes; so he was staring at her without batting an eyelid and making no attempts to do something about his odd desire either. Every instant of his delay brought him closer to an inevitable moment when the doors would slide apart again, proposing them to leave this cramped world where the very life could be seen in a different way. In the upshot, he decided to risk and made a hesitating step towards her, but due to a lack of his determination, this untenable attempt failed miserably at the start. All what he achieved there was her undivided attention. Having felt some sort of activity that seemingly was aimed at her, Mariam turned back and looked at Victor with notable bewilderment in her eyes.

  “Did you say something?” she inquired casually without knowing how to react.

  “No, I did not,” adding fuel to the invisible fire, he answered.

  “Are you sure about it, mister?” she raised her eyebrows, unwilling to cease this interrogation.

  After hearing her second question Victor lost his reason for a second and decided that their thoughts were now mowing in one direction, therefore, in his rather delusional judgment, Mariam was giving him the last chance to charge at her.

  “Sorry, if I am not right,” he asked her quietly and greedily kissed her lower lip.

  Before feeling it, Mariam attempted, vainly, to understand where exactly he might be mistaken, but failed. When they reached the seventh floor, the lift uttered a faint sound and released its temporary hostages, who were looking now even more suspicious than before. After Mariam rang the doorbell a couple of times, a blond woman opened it to meet them; there could be no mistake – it was Anna, the Mariam’s friend whom Victor have not managed to properly discern yet.

  “Hello there!” the hostess greeted the guests joyfully and then squinted suddenly, staring at them. “Are you guys all right?” she asked, distrustfully looking first at Mariam, then again at Victor.

  “Do not even ask me about anything here!” Mariam answered quickly and entered the apartment briskly, having left her friend in perplexity, though not for long.

  “And you must be Victor?”

  “I apologize for turning up uninvited,” Victor gladly took her
hand, feeling either a winner, or a complete fool.

  “Oh, do you really need to say that, a friend of my friend is my friend, too!” Anna replied, looking into his eyes without turning an eyelash.

  She was a very beautiful girl indeed: well-featured, with long eyelashes and big, beautiful, eyes of blue colour, which were reflecting everything around. The same perfection concerned her body; moreover, she was perfectly cognizant about the effect that her appearance caused, wearing nothing but a faded pair of green shorts and a red T-shirt.

  “Please come in,” Anna took Victor’s hand and pulled him inside in immediate proximity to her body.

  The moment Victor cast a look at a drawing room, he immediately understood that the previous marriages definitely yielded some fruit, for he was looking now at a truly luxurious apartment, custom-designed in all probability.

  “By the way!” Anna joyfully cried out behind Victor’s back, which made him quickly turn in her direction in order to address her all the attention he had; however, to his surprise, he suddenly realized that no one actually needed it.

  “Do you remember I asked you about where you had bought that suit of beige colour? I asked Den to get me the same. I do not care where he is going to find it but I want it even if he has to turn the whole city inside out. I hope he will find it eventually. Oh no, it is a wrong attitude! He will get it no matter what, it is the right one!”

  Anna was talking about what she did not even have yet with a cunning smile on her face, holding Mariam’s arm. “And one more thing, go with me now, I will show you something you are going to like!”

  “Do you mind if we leave you alone here for a short while?” Mariam turned towards Victor to get permission.

  “By the by, and what is wrong with your face, mister?” Anna interrupted her friend, having pointed at Victor the forefinger of her right hand.

  “Some obvious and still inevitable consequences when you save the world,” Victor answered shortly, smiling with a great effort, “and do not worry about me, go about your own business, and as for me, I will be quietly sitting somewhere in a corner. I think I need a minute to predict the next attack of the aliens so that the world could remain where it is now.”

  “How sweet he is,” Anna smiled, taking Mariam away.

  “We’ll be back like winky!”

  So the ladies disappeared in one of the rooms the total number of which could easily be a secret even for the owner of the apartment herself. Victor was left all alone again, which by that time seemed to be his absolutely normal status; he had nothing else to do apart from approaching a white leather sofa, standing in the center of the drawing room, and falling victim both to his habitual melancholy and tiredness. And so he did…

  The big room was breathless with the strong light filling it throughout, from the floor to the ceiling. However, despite this superfluous illumination, every second drew Victor deeper in somnolence, making him fancy that he was sinking indeed, falling into the bottomless soft stuffing of the sofa.

  “Who the hell are you anyway, allow me to ask? Darling!” someone demanded angrily, standing on Victor’s right hand.

  Having heard this panic shout, Victor, who up to this moment was peacefully dozing and causing no troubles, instantly lost his will to sleep and therefore looked at the breaker of the peace with completely watchful eyes.

  “Oh, so it is you again…” Dan, incapable to hide his discontent, preferred at least partially replacing it with surprise. “Still and all, what are you doing here and how did you get in our apartment anyway? By the way, what is wrong with your face?”

  “Yes, hello!” Victor hurried to give Dan’s hand a good squeeze in order to smooth over the previous rudeness. “I am here with Mariam,” he replied, having touched his face; the version with the saving of the world no longer seemed to him so good.

  “That’s right, I understand now,” Dan began to nod, seemingly incapable of ceasing; he seemed to be trying to accept the fact as quickly as possible, but was not particularly successful in it.

  “Oh please, you do not worry about anything here, I will not tell Anna anything about your secret,” Victor blurted out the very first thing that came to his mind.

  “What secret? What are you talking about here?” Dan all of a sudden returned to his former state of extreme alertness.

  “I mean your secret about the wedding and the music lessons.”

  “Oh, that secret, of course, of course… Talking about secrets, where is…?”

  “Anna?”

  “Right.”

  “To be honest, I am afraid I cannot tell you anything about her current location. All I remember is that she wanted to show Mariam something allegedly very interesting, and I here fell into a doze a little by reason of being alone.”

  “I will leave you alone again with your permission,” Dan decided not to continue this strange conversation and left in haste.

  Victor silently watched him leave and changed the place in order to avoid the same awkward situation in the future. This time he chose one of two armchairs standing on each side of a coffee table in the theory, whereas practically it was a marble monster covered with glass and metal. Fortunately or not, but he did not want to sleep any more, mostly because of the room that now seemed to him absolutely inappropriate for this sort of pastime, namely too big, too white, and too strange.

  Several minutes after Dan set out in search of his disappeared fiancée, Victor heard a hurricane of voices that was approaching him from somewhere, carrying not a single articulate word. As a result all three appeared before him almost simultaneously: Mariam whose look he tried to catch first of all but failed because, as it seemed to him, she was looking towards the Anna’s fiancé, the hostess herself – Anna, dressed in a snow-white wedding dress, and among them, as a shadow, Dan was slithering.

  “What would you tell me about it, Victor? In your estimation, does the dress suit me?” Anna asked suddenly, having made two half-turns in both directions.

  First Victor became confused by the question and looked at Mariam again as if she knew the right answer and could share it with him. However, to his regret, the only thing that his today’s companion could share with him was her own confusion.

  “You know, Anna, with your appearance you will look perfectly even if you cut holes in a sack and use it as a dress,” Victor answered without expecting that his compliment could sound somewhat ambiguous.

  “How interesting,” Anna responded, doubting, “I hope it is a compliment.”

  “And it is up to you to decide!” Victor added vigorously, suspecting her of an intention to start playing with him some cat-and-mouse game.

  Staying in this apartment gradually became for him more and more onerous, but he was not alone with this feeling, for there was at least one more person who felt something similar – Dan – even a swift look was now enough to discern a deep-seated grudge that he harboured. In fact, there was no point in guessing about the level of his indignation in this situation. Whether he could not keep his spite back or just did not wish to do so – all this was unimportant because both options testified to the most abysmal degree of the emotions he was experiencing.

  “Well,” having left the senseless analysis of the strange compliment, Anna said. “Make yourself comfortable, and I will quickly change my clothes now so that we all could become closely acquainted with each other without getting distracted by anyone’s dazzling beauty.”

  She quickly ran away, and Mariam and Dan silently found sits. They both looked confused, constrained, maybe even fettered, without attempting to utter a word, without trying to smooth over the awkward situation, which now seemed to be solely Victor’s personal problem. Victor was utterly surprised indeed, thinking only about that secret reason that made Mariam bring him here when even she did not feel belonging to this place at least a little.

  “What a wonderful apartment you have here, I just cannot help admiring it,” he decided to make everything even worse and stared at the ceili
ng that was covered with plural bright lamps.

  “Yes, very true,” Dan responded quaveringly, “It is all Anna, long before we met.”

  After that, all became silent again, squirming restlessly with even bigger confusion now.

  “Here I am again!” Anna ran into the room after several minutes of dead silence, wearing indoor clothes that might be of different colour but not of different provocative size.

  Having nothing else to study, Victor fixed his eyes on her, which was especially pleasant now, when he could estimate her at full length. She quickly, virtually running approached the sofa on her tiptoe and dexterously jumped on it, having nestled against her obedient fiancé. And by that moment when Victor noticed on her left shin a tattoo in the form of a rose-flower with a drop of blood on one of its thorns, Anna was already perfectly aware about being examined, which she willingly marked with a happy smile, showing her white teeth. Attention was what this woman wanted above all; the more attention one paid to her, the more mastery she had over one.

  “Your return was the only thing we all were looking forward here!” Victor gave her an intriguing smile in reply.

  “Seriously? I must say it is very pleasant to hear,” Anna tucked her legs under herself.

  “To be honest, I have been looking forward to one thing as well. Could you please tell me…?”

  “Yes, of course, I could tell you whatever you might be interested in, I am all attention,” Victor purposely interrupted her without letting to finish the question.

  “In fact, the question is going to be interesting not only for me; I believe it is important for all us to know. Victor, please, tell us who are you anyway?” Anna paraphrased the question at the last minute, which was obvious by a faint, elusive pause in it.