The Fantastic Worlds of Yuri Vynnychuk

by Yuri Vynnychuk

  “There... there...”

  His hand was pointing at the water (the gray sign of fear was on his face)... he doesn’t say anything else, suddenly he turns back and with a quick step sets off straight for home. I want to catch up to him, to murmur something gentle (for example: ...), but some kind of power forces me to kneel down near the water and fervently look into the depth. Now I sense the puzzling fear that has overcome my father.

  2

  Earlier I had said: “...in the cotton of clouds, in the crowns of willows tiny fish, tadpoles shimmered...,” but now I understood that all of this looks far from peaceful—these little fish, tadpoles, these tritons and bugs don’t just shimmer, but fulfill some kind of task, because their movements are sharp and synchronized. Several tadpoles have grown motionless by the shore and are following after me. Anger flashes in me, which even now I’m still unable to explain to myself, because it is so unexpected and senseless. Then I break a willow branch and try to chase away the tadpoles. Suddenly a strange force tears away the swatch from my hand, and it disappears beneath the water. I barely manage to grab onto a bush, otherwise I would have flown headfirst from the shores. Anger overtakes me, pushing me to do even more senseless things: I gather stones and toss them. Suddenly those very stones fly at me from the water, I save myself by running away, they hit along my back, my head...

  I don’t know whether I really sense laughter behind me, or it just seemed so.

  3

  My father locked himself up in his room, he didn’t come out all day. By evening my mother went to the neighbor woman, and we are able to toss a few words back and forth. My father is somber, hands behind his back, shoulders drooping...

  “... ... ...?”

  But I couldn’t make it out.

  “Did you see? Did you?” He keeps repeating.

  “Yes. I broke off a willow branch and tried to chase them away, but something tore it from my hands... then I threw stones, and they shot back at me...”

  “You’re too imprudent.”

  “Because I don’t know anything.”

  “Several nights I’ve been dreaming the same dream: water is coming out from the shores, and the fish, tadpoles, frogs, and water beetles and tritons are breaking into our buildings, seizing them, drowning us like kittens, and the entire earth then begins to belong to them.”

  “So you took me to the river on purpose?”

  “I knew that you wouldn’t believe my words alone. Now are you convinced of how strong they are?”

  “And what if we throw dynamite at them?”

  “The same thing’ll happen as with the stones.” His fingers nervously fold the tablecloth. “But I’ll try to come to an agreement with them,” he says, biting his lips.

  “On non-aggression?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Or on an alliance?”

  “Hmm...”

  “Is it possible you’ll become one of them?”

  “The snails, too, are all together with them.”

  “That’s even better.”

  “I know that you will judge me harshly, but understand (his voice trembles, breaking here and there, growing quiet)... otherwise it will be impossible (he quiets down)... we don’t have the strength...

  4

  Father got dressed in his new suit and went to the river.

  It was already becoming evening, and that very same wind that had danced in the morning above the water, now played with the curtains and blinds, threw a bunch of dry leaves into the room. It began to rustle... I want to defend myself from it, from its blasts, but I sense that I am losing my body, and that it’s becoming alien to me and distant. I see myself from without—here I stand so helpless and follow after my father who is returning from the river. He’s returning bare-chested, wet, his gait is weary, and he’s entirely like a bunch of autumnal yellowed grass. I’m standing—I’m not me. And I already understand that my father is bearing bad news, but I’m happy with the hope that he will announce it to the other me, and not to me, because I’ve already separated from myself and already was lurking behind the blinds.

  “They’re enraged and don’t want to speak (his sleeves and breeches are in green water reeds, wet tracks on the floor)... but I’m not simply going to capitulate, I’m going to fight (he makes a theatrical gesture, he wants to look calm, and winks).”

  When he turns his back I see a tiny hump. That hump is still going to grow.

  5

  Father for days at a time disappears at the river, he returns wet and mother says: he’s changed so much. The hump keeps growing and growing, though, slowly, but not so little that you can’t notice it. His body is growing smaller, scant, he’s transforming into a teenager. Sometimes he brings fresh news... sometimes nothing…

  “The slugs have joined with them, the land slugs and wood slugs... But they’re not depending on them as much as on the snails. The snails occupy the high posts…”

  “The river has flooded about half a meter over the shores...”

  “In the lake an unknown fish has appeared... Maybe it’s a resident of a different basin...”

  “They acquainted me with it. It’s satisfied with my intentions to help them and promised to take care of getting documents that would support the fact that I’m really a snail...”

  “The river flooded about half a meter over the shores...”

  The other day he brought me a big snail in his pocket and, pointing his finger at me, said:

  “This is my son, he feels great affection for you... Since childhood my son has dreamt of becoming a snail... Other children want to become a pilot, others a sailor, others a government minister, and ours—just wants to be a snail. He especially likes your principle: I carry everything with me.”

  And the snail:

  “Uhuh... uhuh...”

  “Son, they’ve asked me if you could write them an anthem.”

  The snail in a dignified manner nods his feelers, my father waves his hands, and pronounces the words filled with pathos.

  6

  My father got more and more miniscule. In the winter he hid beneath a dresser. He ordered me to give him food there and not to bother him with stupid things. From that time we saw him very rarely. Mother went into mourning and tells everyone: our father has died... You could understand her—it wasn’t very pleasant when one of your family wants to become a snail.

  At the end of February my father began to appear, these visits of his were always unexpected—he’d dive out of some crack in the floor, he’d wave his feelers and disappear. Sometimes, though, he would pass along the latest news. Still it was nice that he didn’t forget us.

  It would happen that my mother would cry, then I would console her: our father is carrying out a very important mission. My mother leaves crumbs of food in the corners so that dad can have a snack. From time to time she cooks his favorite soup and pours spoon after spoon into the cracks.

  In the spring the bedbugs, cockroaches and ants united with the watery inhabitants and the snails. The spiders stubbornly maintained neutrality, though they had supplied them with weapons. We walked about the house very carefully, fearful of crushing any of the allies. But we didn’t manage without difficulties. Once my father was resting in a vase, and I poured water over him. He nearly drowned. Another time my mother sat down on an armchair, forgetting to look for him before sitting... A slight crackling could be heard. Mother frightened tore to her feet—the pitiful remains of a crushed snail could be seen on her skirt and the armchair. We got terribly upset, mother quickly wiped away the armchair, and threw the skirt into the fire.

  The next day our dad appeared and calmed us—it turned out that that particular snail was a deserter, and as well had views that went counter to the foreign policy of the allies. So they even sent us a note of thanks for destroying their ideological enemy.

  When the cherry trees blossomed my fear passed. I stopped being afraid of water, and the fact that war was possible no longer affected me as weightily. Father
moved into the garden, there you could see him with other snails in the furrows.

  At the beginning of June he greeted me cheerfully:

  “The war has been postponed! We’ve achieved peace!”

  “Father,” I said with worry, “can you return to us now?”

  “No, I still have a lot of things to do here... In fact, you can congratulate me—I’ve taken the post of prime minister... Now I’m forming my cabinet... If you don’t get a job anywhere, then I could find you something... Your anthem is on everyone’s lips here. They know and respect you. They introduced it even into a mandatory school program... They want you to write them something else... will you?”

  “Well, if you wish me to...”

  “Of course I won’t force you, but... but who knows... maybe it’s in your own interest... And how’s our mother doing?”

  “She’s still in mourning.”

  “Poor mother.”

  We say good-bye, both of us are sad that we’re in different worlds and don’t want to yield to each other.

  After all, I lean more decisively to the fact that snails are more civilized than we are, and, perhaps, soon I will take up my father’s proposition, all the more so that I entered their school program.

  And all the more so that an elegant and very nice little hump has begun to grow on my back.

  A Cat Named Abel

  “His name is Abel!” And she charmingly began to laugh. “You’ll thank me yet for this gift. This is a really sweet kitty. A Persian breed, Mr. Lutsyk.”

  “Yes—yes...”

  He obediently nodded his head, trying to avoid this piercing glance that forced him to do what the woman wanted. He could already see that he wouldn’t have the strength to refuse, and it was already too late, because, when she was handing him the cat, his hands just stretched toward it and accepted the fluffy black body into his open palms.

  “But...but I don’t have anywhere to keep it. I live in a rented apartment. I don’t know how the landlady will take to this.”

  “Never mind,” as though swatting a fly, the charming stranger waved her hand. “She should also like it. It’s tidy, obedient and not wild at all. Its name is Abel. A—bel, will you remember?”

  She spoke without emotion, as though she were dictating a text that someone else had written.

  She wants me to remember her words.

  And those words, like an incantation, swaddled Mr. Lutsyk and subdued him for themselves.

  And she’s beautiful, devilishly beautiful... Why did I mention the devil? Perhaps because she has those eyes? Well of course, she has the eyes of a devil! Incredible eyes... But who am I to her?...”

  “You’re right,” she began to laugh, as though she had guessed his thoughts.

  “Right in what?” Mr. Lutsyk gave a start.

  She didn’t answer, she just began to laugh again. Then, seeing that she was getting ready to go, he got the courage to do what he had never had the courage to do in similar situations:

  “Tell me, where did I meet...”

  And already he saw that he had vainly seen what lay in his heart. But she had tempted him only just recently, he just noticed this, though he didn’t defend himself.

  She came to his concerts, sat in an empty row and stared at him ardently. Directing the orchestra, with his back he sensed her electric gaze and barely kept himself from looking back at her. And when the concert had ended and he was bowing, then he saw that she would get up and disappear during the applause. Isn’t this similar to temptation? Perhaps she simply did this this way unexpectedly, as women often do just to be convinced of their abilities, they likewise do this involuntarily, the way they look into a mirror, checking if a disobedient tuft of hair somehow has strayed.

  “Nowhere. Today I’m leaving Lviv... Ah, I’ll never forget our concerts... Your music—it’s...it’s... In a word, wonderful!”

  She waved her hand and disappeared. She dissolved in the fog like sugar. Beside him leaves fell quietly and unnoticeably, and he imagined himself to be a tree that was strewing its leaves. Somewhere below at the base janitors were shuffling their brooms. The scent of burnt leaves and gloom climbed up the trunk.

  The landlady was so corpulent, and like a great percentage of all corpulent people, quite good-natured. Therefore she didn’t object when her renter (a very intelligent man, if only you knew how many books he had read—wow!) took in a cat. She just couldn’t remember the cat’s name and called it “Matsko.”

  For days at a time the cat lay in the house, it stubbornly refused to go out into the street, and although it often sat down on the window sill, it never started up acquaintances with other cats. This terribly irritated and intrigued all the female cats, who, in the interests of anxiety over the good stock of future generations, alternately strove to allure Abel, explaining that there wasn’t any debauchery involved here, but only high ideals and, if he’s a patriot, and additionally of the Persian breed... At that point convinced of the hopelessness of these endeavors, they left with dissatisfied looks on their faces.

  Mr. Lutsyk never had a liking for cats, he never though of having this particular creature in his home, but when Abel appeared in his room, then it seemed that he couldn’t get along without him. Earlier, let’s say, he never sensed such a need to express something aloud, and right now he was doing this constantly, just this way: “Well, what, Kitty, do we start up a new symphony? We’ll look right now what masterpiece they’ve shoved at me... Though what kind of masterpieces can there be in our day anymore?” In actual fact it turned out that it was as though he were consulting with the cat. After a while he noticed that Abel never took his eyes off him, that he constantly followed him. This was touching—such devotion! Replying with reciprocity, Mr. Lutsyk coordinated every one of his steps with the cat. Soon all of his actions became like an imitation of Abel’s decisions. When he sometimes wavered on how to resolve this or that problem, an unknown power turned his eyes to the cat and forced him to find an answer there. And when the cat just barely nodded his head, Mr. Lutsyk calmed down, assured in the correctness of his intentions.

  And once he caught himself humming some strange little song that was composed of just a single word “Abel.” All of this was somehow incomprehensible, he didn’t believe it, several times he resolved to revolt, to do something opposite, but always lost. Everywhere he saw only those piercing eyes that allowed no-one to enter them, but rather seized everything with themselves, covered everything with a netting, laced very carefully so that you could easily notice that they were nudging to certain action.

  Sometimes Mr. Lutsyk sensed someone’s footsteps behind him, at first very quiet, at first only in his skull, and then outside of it, but somewhere not very far away, quite nearby. He looked around impetuously, capturing the surprised looks of passers-by, he apologized and walked on further. But again he heard those steps... And just before they were about to disappear, the doors of a car slammed shut and the motor of an invisible car rattled. The rattling little by little moved off into the distance, and everything grew quiet. The strangest thing was that Mr. Lutsyk didn’t see a single car around him. But on the other hand some kind of car constantly was following him. Somehow even during his directing session when the symphony resounded, Mr. Lutsyk heard it drive up quite close and stop behind his back. He wanted to turn around immediately and catch it with his eyes, but he understood how stupid he would look in front of an audience of hundreds. The car was standing behind his back and was rattling quietly. Then the door slammed. Then an unknown person struck a match and loudly released some air with smoke: “Pfu-u-u...” And all of this was here, next to him... Almost on stage.

  Overhearing what was happening behind his back, Mr. Lutsyk directed entirely mechanically. Just once did he lose control over himself and get thrown out of rhythm, when suddenly a woman’s voice echoed. The voice appeared quite audible and could have belonged to that charming strange woman. She asked someone: “Well, what?” And a man’s voice responded: “E
verything’s in order.” “Then sit down, let’s go,” she ordered. And the car drove off.

  That car appeared every week in the most unexpected moments and always behind his back. And whenever our hero finally couldn’t stand it and looked back, he didn’t see any car.

  Once it drove up at night while he was sleeping. He heard the rattling of a motor through a dream and woke up. He lay motionless for a minute, waiting for this to pass, that he was just imagining hearing this, but the motor didn’t subside. Then he carefully turned his head. In the room there clearly wasn’t anyone. And at the same time that car was there... Finally the door slammed... Someone got out... A man’s voice said:

  “He’s sleeping...”

  “Somehow I don’t believe it,” the woman’s voice disputed.

  “His eyes are closed.”

  Mr. Lutsyk truly had shut his eyes, but all the same he couldn’t see anything.

  “Why isn’t he sleeping with Abel?” The woman said again.

  “Really, it’s strange...”

  The car disappeared following these words.

  What do they want from me? Mr. Lutsyk didn’t understand. What are they checking?... Last night I couldn’t fall asleep. And in the morning...

  “How you’ve grown exhausted, dear sir,” the landlady said. “You should take some time off. Really, you’re overworked.”

  “Indeed, of course...,” he agreed.

  After breakfast he went upstairs to his room and, having sat down on his bed, pondered her words. And here again he sensed the gaze of the cat, and when their eyes met, he noticed that the cat had nodded his head affirmatively.

  Is he really even reading my thoughts? Mr. Lutsyk got frightened and for the first time felt annoyance. This time the cat had gone too far.

  But he took some time off anyway. And suddenly he became convinced that this wasn’t the best way out, because now the cat had him in sight the entire time, and it seemed that he didn’t wish to release him anywhere. Several attempts to start off on a stroll collided with such skillfully set out traps that the very thought of going somewhere in just an instant appeared ridiculous and even stupid. He was left to sit in the house and read books, but even here the feeling did not leave him that he himself wasn’t reading, but that someone invisible was looking over his shoulder, and Mr. Lutsyk sometimes noticed a strange habit; having read a page, he waited for a minute and didn’t turn it, by doing this it was as though he were letting someone standing behind him read to the end.