Swimming with Sharks

by Anna Legat

  ‘No, she’s gone to breakfast.’

  ‘Your wife?’

  He laughs. ‘No, not my wife – my mother.’

  Nicola exhales. She wants to get up but her head hurts. She winces and groans.

  ‘Stay here. Stay in bed. I’ll bring you something to eat from the restaurant.’ He lifts her hand to his lips and kisses it like a gentleman. Like a true count.

  Nicola limps to the shower. Her ankle hurts. It looks swollen. She puts pressure on her toes and balances awkwardly like a three-legged dog. A cold shower is what she needs, she tells herself, for the swelling in her ankle and for the fever in her head. It is burning with excitement. She washes her hair, lathers her shoulders, breasts, stomach and legs; watches the water carry away in rivulets the scents and stains of last night. As she steps out of the shower the sun dries her skin almost instantly. She moisturises it with her face cream. At first it feels like paper, then it softens and gives in to the touch of her fingers. She brushes her hair, slips on a long beach dress. She is pampered, dressed, fresh and radiant, like a bride. She has almost forgotten about the ankle. Anyway, the pain feels good; it’s a reminder that this is not a dream.

  They come along the beach. Karenin is carrying a plate. He waves to Nicola as soon as he notices that she is watching from her veranda. His mother puts her hand to her forehead and strains her neck to take a look. She is tiny compared to her son. She is walking in quick, small steps, her long, striped dress restricting her movement. She is also carrying a plate. They are both heading in the direction of Nicola’s chalet. She bites her lip: she will have to meet Karenin’s mother. Nicola is not good with people, the woman won’t like her. Is he bringing his mother with him to prevent any more intimacy? A safeguard – a chaperone …

  Not too far behind them another man follows. He is alone. It strikes Nicola that he appears to be hiding, staying close to the line of bushes, ready to dive in should one of them turn to look back. Nicola recognises the man: he is the Russian, the father of the two boys. She knows him by his thickset frame, deep tan, roundness of the head. She is also sure that he isn’t just taking a stroll on the beach. He is following them, stops and looks away when the mother pauses to take off her sandals and pour sand out of them. She decides to carry on barefoot, flinging the sandals over her shoulder. The Russian moves too, maintaining the same distance. He is obviously annoyed with Karenin for shouting at his boys, but he is also, for some reason, reluctant to approach him directly. Perhaps he is afraid of him.

  ‘We bring gifts!’ Karenin lifts the plate over his head and produces his trademark naughty-boy’s smile.

  ‘Is it for me?’ She makes an attempt to get off the deckchair, but stands on her sore foot and winces in pain.

  ‘Don’t get up! I’ve got you!’ He is holding her around the waist and ushers her back to the chair. He puts the plate in her lap. ‘I hope you like bacon and egg for breakfast? It isn’t called English breakfast for no reason … You are English, I am guessing, looking at your rosy cheeks.’

  ‘I’ve got cereal and fruit,’ says the tiny woman by his side. ‘In case you don’t like English breakfast.’

  ‘Ah! And that’s my mother. She knows better, of course!’

  ‘I am Agaata. Call me Agaata.’ She is a no-nonsense, straight-talking woman, who looks Nicola in the eye with calm interest. She doesn’t have her son’s fiendish smile, but she has his directness and her English is less accented than his. ‘Now let me look at that ankle,’ she touches the swelling gently. ‘Move your toes. Good … It’s a sprain. Mishka,’ she turns to her son, ‘Yey nadah prinimat’ aspirine.’ She instructs him to bring the aspirin from her bag and the two women are left alone. The Russian man has also disappeared. Maybe he was on his way somewhere, minding his own business, and Nicola has imagined everything.

  ‘I’m Nicola,’ she says. ‘Thank you very much for –’

  ‘That’s no problem – you have to help when people are in trouble.’

  ‘Your son has been very kind …’

  ‘Has he? What has he done?’

  ‘I was being taunted by a couple of boys, nothing really, but I guess I was tired and a bit confused where I was, and he, well – he chased them away for me, brought me home.’

  ‘It must have been a long chase. He only came back at dawn,’ she nods knowingly, but without sarcasm. Nicola blushes. ‘I didn’t miss him, don’t worry. We’ll have to elevate that foot,’ she fetches a pillow from the bed. Nicola wonders if she noticed the faint blot of blood on the sheet. ‘Do you have any ice in your fridge? It’ll bring down the swelling.’ She is rummaging in the fridge. ‘Oh, I found it! It will do wonders.’

  ‘Thank you! You’re very kind.’

  ‘Stop thanking me please. You’ll make me blush.’

  ‘Your English is very good.’

  ‘It should be. I taught English Literature at St Petersburg State University.’

  ‘I guessed you were Russian. I heard you speak. I understand Russian a bit … very little.’

  ‘That’s unusual … We speak Russian with each other, yes, but we’re from Karelia.’

  ‘I see.’ Nicola hasn’t got a clue what that means.

  ‘And we now live in Finland.’

  ‘Finnish?’

  Agaata nods. ‘I am. Mishka … Mishka is Russian. He lived his whole life in Russia, born and bred. St Petersburg and the Karelian country – that was the only home he knew until we left Russia.’

  Nicola is not making much sense of it. The woman looks pensive, regretful in some way. ‘We moved to Finland fifteen years ago. After Mishka’s wife Daria died.’ She looks sharply at Nicola, then pats her hand. It’s an affable gesture. ‘I shouldn’t be talking about his wife. He wouldn’t want me to. Not with you! I think he likes you.’

  Nicola feels something grip her stomach. It is a mixture of delight and guilt. Delight because he likes her and because his wife has died and won’t stand between them; guilt because it is wrong to be happy about it. What do they call it? Schadenfreude?

  ‘I’m sorry to hear about it … I mean, about Mishka’s wife …’ It is the first time she has uttered his name – his real name. This makes him more real. He is no longer a character from a book. He is a man, a real flesh and blood man – a man in Nicola’s life.

  ‘It was fifteen years ago, but it feels like only yesterday. Everything changed that day. It all fell apart. Mishka gave up everything … he had a good job, a comfortable life … What do you call it? He was a high-flyer … Is that right?’

  ‘Yes, a high-flyer – someone who does well for himself.’

  ‘She died in a car accident. Just an accident. It happens! Nobody’s fault … Nothing could be done to prevent it. Mishka took it hard. Left his work, left St Petersburg, came to me and said, “Mama, we must go. You and I.” “Where do you want to go, son?” I asked him. “As far away as possible,” he said. “Finland.” He had never been to Finland. I had only memories of it, distant memories from my childhood. He never as much as asked before and suddenly there he was: “Finland”! So we left as we stood. I just packed a few things. He insisted we went the same day. It was the most bizarre day of my life … Grief does strange things to people. It was hard at first, but we are settled now –’

  ‘What stories are you telling her, Matushka?’ Mishka returns with the aspirin in hand and his big smile. ‘Don’t believe a word she is saying! It is all lies!’

  ‘He doesn’t like to speak about it,’ Agaata whispers, and then adds out loud, ‘I was telling your friend about my birthday treat.’

  ‘I did it for me. You just came along – there was a spare seat on the plane.’

  Agaata wags a reproachful finger at him. ‘As if that were true! My seventy-fifth birthday … Mishka came and said, “Mama, it is time you saw a coconut tree.” And I said, why would I want to see a coconut tree at my age. He said, “Because you may never get another chance.” And so here we are. Mishka has always been like that: spur of the moment, hot
headed! As I told you …’

  He is laughing. ‘Matushka, Matushka, you’re giving me a very bad reputation!’

  ‘Not at all,’ Nicola says. ‘It all sounds very romantic.’

  ‘How about that aspirin?’ He swiftly changes the subject. Is he embarrassed by his talkative mother who has dragged into the daylight all of his life’s secrets?

  ‘Oh yes, aspirin! Two tablets. It’ll bring down the swelling. Get a glass of water, Mishka, don’t make the girl suffer!’

  Agaata left them an hour ago, claiming a headache, yet she did not ask for her aspirin back. Mishka told her he would follow her soon. ‘Don’t even think about it,’ she said. ‘I need peace. Give me space!’ So he has stayed with Nicola. They talk, sitting on the veranda, gazing over the quiet rolling ocean, laughing at his jokes. Strangely Nicola does not feel like they could ever run out of subjects. There is no koala-bear awkwardness she would so often experience with strangers. She doesn’t feel the need to escape, excuse herself and run away. She wants this moment to stretch into infinity. ‘Your mother is a lovely lady. I don’t know how to say how grateful I am.’

  ‘No need for that. She enjoys being indispensable. And she knows everything about sprains and broken arms. She had me, you see, and I was so damn accident prone!’

  ‘Were you? You’re such a … strong man – stable.’ She blushes.

  ‘In Karelia, when I was a kid, I did what kids do: climbed trees, swam in the river, tamed horses and teased guard dogs. Everyone else would get away with it, but I wouldn’t. I would get caught or injured. She would have to … what do you say? Bail me out. My father was a lieutenant in the Red Army – I didn’t see him much, didn’t know him that well. My mother was my guardian angel even though I didn’t believe in such things as angels. She believed. She still does. The Finns are very superstitious. My father used to laugh at her, I remember, but she stuck to her way of life.’

  ‘How did your parents meet?’

  ‘Impossible, wouldn’t you say? Finnish and Russian, mortal enemies. Well, miracles happen – according to my mother. When Karelia passed to the Soviet Union after the war, Mother’s family stayed put – they wouldn’t let go of their land. Mother was only twelve. There were few Finnish left in the area – most of them ran back to Finland. My father was from St Petersburg, Leningrad we called it them. He was older, sixteen years Matushka’s senior. They met in 1956. When he was stationed in Karelia in the fifties, he saw her – milk and honey, he used to say about her. That was it: head over heels he was in love. They were married, had me and … all the troubles started,’ he chuckles. ‘I was a handful! When I was out of primary school, we moved to St Petersburg. Mother took up teaching. And so it goes …’

  ‘Your mother said you moved to Finland? You live there now, permanently?’

  ‘We do now. I always suspected she wanted to go back there. It was only a matter of time so when she retired fifteen years ago –’

  ‘She said it was your decision, after your wife died –’ Nicola bites her tongue. Too late. She notices how his face darkens.

  ‘Enough about me. Tell me about you.’ He controls the emotion, and covers it with a wide grin. ‘Do you realise I don’t know your name?’

  ‘Oh dear! Nicola. Eagles. Nicola Eagles.’

  He picks up her hand, kisses it like an old-fashioned gentleman. ‘Mikhail. Lakso. Mikhail Lakso. Misha for short. It is my honour to meet you.’ He charms her with another kiss planted on her hand, and with his round, faintly blue eyes and with his mischievous smirk. ‘Now you will have to tell me everything about you. Everything there is to know!’

  Nicola fears there is little to tell. Her whole life story may take no more than a couple of minutes to relay. She starts with Maidenhead and with the wave of memories come little things: her and Robert’s tree house, the day when she fell from the swing and broke her leg, the night she spent home alone when Robert’s appendix burst and they rushed him to hospital, forgetting her at home, frightened of those liquid shadows gliding on the ceiling from the headlights of passing cars. She tells him she doesn’t see Robert that much these days. In fact, she doesn’t see him at all. He left England soon after their parents died, one after the other, like in one of the Brothers Grimm’s tales. She was left on her own, though of course she’d still had Great-aunt Eunice, until she died too …

  Nicola worries she has strayed into the doom and gloom of her life. ‘I studied Russian,’ she says merely to change the subject, but instantly a thought occurs to her that perhaps it was meant to be: it was her destiny to read Russian so that she would meet Mikhail – Misha – Mishka …

  ‘I had better watch what I say to Matushka behind your back,’ he laughs.

  ‘I wouldn’t understand much of what you say to each other. My Russian isn’t half as good as your English.’

  ‘Ah! I think it is much better than you care to admit. I saw some Russian books in your room. Anna Karenina is not an easy read.’

  Nicola smiles with all due modesty, but she is pleasantly tickled. ‘Well, I worked as an interpreter for Amnesty International for a short while, then for The Ritz Hotel. Funny thing is they didn’t need me. Their Russian guests were perfectly fluent in English.’

  ‘So what do you do now for a living? If you don’t mind me asking.’

  Nicola doesn’t mind anything he asks. Without shame or embellishment, she tells him how five years ago she found the perfect job for an overqualified spinster – the position of librarian at the Manuscripts Department of the British Library. Her work with the dusty manuscripts on the second floor is as undemanding as it is uninspiring, but she is content with her lot. She travels to work by train and does not own a car, which is just as well since she cannot drive. She is paid peanuts but that doesn’t bother her either because of Great-aunt Eunice leaving her lots of money. And a cottage in the country. The cottage in the country, she tells him, comes with a cat called Fritz and strawberry fields smelling good just over the hedge. It is not such a bad life, Nicola ponders, it is lonely, but not bad.

  ‘I wish I had your life,’ Mishka says, ‘very little could go wrong with it. Given a chance, I would like it better than mine.’

  ‘Surely yours is much more exciting!’

  ‘Oh, exciting! Exciting it has been: parties, drink, gambling; the high life!’ He smiles at his memories, and out of the blue, mentions his wife: ‘Daria was a ballerina. With the Kirov Ballet. We knew all sorts of people. We lived our lives to the fullest. Top of the world – that’s how it felt! Like your lungs were bursting with air and the world lay humble at your feet. She used to wear those soft, soft furs and the jewellery – it sparkled. She sparkled … Why am I telling you that?’

  ‘I don’t know. I guess I asked.’ Nicola feels small and insignificant. A little grey moth. He must have realised that as well. The illusion is gone. This tropical island, the heat of the sun, the remoteness and the glamour has made her into someone she is not, and now the veneer has fallen off. He knows. She is such a fraud!

  ‘I need a swim!’ He jumps to his feet and takes her in his arms. ‘Come on! Let’s go! Into the ocean!’

  ‘My foot! I can’t!’

  ‘I’ll carry you! No such thing as can’t!’ He is holding her folded and curled, clutching onto his neck, and he is running across the hot sand towards the edge of the ocean. His laughter is loud and open and in that instant she knows he is no Karenin – he is Vronsky, a daredevil, a show-off, a man who doesn’t take ‘no’ for an answer, a man who is used to having it his way. Nicola laughs with him. She sheds her inhibitions. What the hell! She screams. She tells him she is wearing nothing under her dress. Even better, he replies, and his eyes light up with lust. He is strong. He presses against the wall of water, trudging deeper into the ocean, crossing the shallow lagoon with her in his arms until the water levels with her back. He lays her on the surface. ‘Tilt your head back,’ he tells her, ‘relax your muscles. Just float.’ Which she does. She trusts him infinitely. He withd
raws his hands from under her back. The wave rolls her gently. She closes her eyes so that the sun doesn’t bore into them, and she drifts, lost but not alone in the deep blue sea. When she opens her eyes, he is gone. Panic sets in, her stomach muscles tense and she starts dropping, waving her arms, splashing, choking on water. The shore seems miles away: tiny huts in the distance. Where is he!

  The water bubbles and he shoots up a couple of metres away. She spots him just before she is dragged under and before she catches her last breath. Has he abandoned her? Her eyes are wide open under the water. A colourful fish glides by, ignoring Nicola and her efforts to stay afloat. She can feel the sharp sea bottom with her foot, the healthy one that doesn’t shrink from touching down. And there he is. His face materialises in the murky depths and his hand reaches to her and grabs her and lifts her and pushes her out of the water. He is standing firmly, holding her up with one hand and showing her something with the other. ‘Look! It’s a starfish! It’s beautiful!’

  Nicola coughs as she chokes on air, which she has tried to gulp down too greedily. She spits water. He hasn’t even noticed she nearly drowned. He is grinning proudly. ‘It’s for you,’ he says.

  She takes the starfish out of his hand. It feels rough. She throws it back into the sea, wraps her arms around his neck and presses her forehead to his. ‘You gave me a bloody fright,’ she whispers. Her dress has opened up like a parachute on the waves. She feels his body as she clings to him. Urgently, with the agility of a monkey, she folds her legs around his back and sits astride him. There comes a memory of those two lovers rocking against the wall of the pool. He must be reading her mind for he pulls her down and into him, and she is bound to him and safe.

  Day Four

  He has stayed the night with her. When Nicola wakes the next morning she finds him fast asleep on his stomach, his knee bent, his arm stretched across her chest, his face buried in the pillow. She examines his naked body – it is toned and still youthful. Not like hers, but it doesn’t matter that she is a bit flabby and pale, because he likes her the way she is. He likes her, full stop. And he has stayed the night with her. Agaata doesn’t mind, Nicola is sure of that. Agaata is used to being alone. Her husband, Mishka told Nicola, died suddenly of a heart attack three years after they moved to St Petersburg. Agaata had never remarried, never cared for another man. She must have been worried that Mishka took after her: a one-woman man, and that he would not find – or search for – anyone else after his wife’s death. But Agaata must worry no more because he has found Nicola. A touch of miracle, Nicola marvels, and miracles are what both she and Agaata believe in. Maybe Mishka, against his better atheist’s judgment, believes in them too.