Vita Nostra

by Marina Dyachenko

  “Perhaps… No, I must consult someone. Let us go, Sasha.”

  One-on-ones with Portnov had not yet ended. When Sterkh opened the door of auditorium thirty-eight, Sasha saw Laura Onishhenko who stood in the middle of the auditorium, staring fixedly at the opposite wall. Laura did not react to their appearance: tense, with her eyes nearly popping out of her head, she looked both ridiculous and terrifying. Sasha looked away.

  Sterkh nodded to Portnov. The latter motioned for them to wait. Laura inhaled with a hiss and coughed.

  “We will do it one more time,” Portnov promised coldly. “Get ready.”

  “I worked on it….”

  “I am still hoping to see the result of that effort. You have one minute. Leave the room and try to concentrate.”

  Laura left, eyes lowered to the ground. Portnov looked from Sasha to Sterkh and back.

  “I need a consultation,” the hunchback asked curtly.

  Portnov cleaned his ring with the hem of his sweater and nodded to Sasha. She came closer. A sharp ray of light—harsher that usual—whipped across her eyes.

  “Not happening,” Portnov said. “I really don’t think so.”

  Sterkh sighed.

  “Fine… Let’s assume you are right.”

  “You can play with it for another week or so,” Portnov murmured as if considering different options. “But I would restructure right away.”

  “I see,” the hunchback said. “Sasha, please wait for me in auditorium fourteen, I’ll be right up.”

  The fourth floor corridor was almost dark. Sasha located the light switch, entered the auditorium, sat down and put her head down. After what seemed like only a second, she jerked awake.

  “Taking a nap? Of course, you must not be getting enough sleep… Sasha, I made a mistake in your professional profile, you have a different nature, a different destiny, and I lied to myself and confused you… It is a shame. But let us not talk about that. Let’s do this: put away the CD player, you will not need it anymore. We’re going to try another approach, radically different.”

  The slightly open window pane let in the scent of rain and rustle of the remaining leaves. In the space over the streetlight the leaves lived a little longer. Sasha had noticed it sometime last year.

  “I am going to give you…” Nikolay Valerievich rummaged through his black briefcase. “I am going to give you this study guide.”

  He pulled out a soft-cover album, the size of a glossy magazine, but completely black, and placed it on the desk.

  “Shall we try right now? We still have a few minutes. Take it, Sasha, open the first page.”

  Obediently, she opened the album. Inside she saw nothing except for black pages that resembled an old kind of carbon copy paper. Sasha inhaled; she thought she could hear the smell of printing ink. “In a blackest-black city, on a blackest-black street stood a blackest-black house…”

  Somebody may have smiled. But not Sasha.

  “Page two,” the hunchback said. “Fragment number one. You will see three white dots in the middle of the page. Can you see?”

  Sasha nodded. The picture looked like the famous painting by Malevich, tainted by three drops of white oil paint.

  “Attention, Sasha. These three dots are the anchor for your sight, for the direction of your thoughts. You must look very carefully, holding your breath, slowly counting to ten… Do it right now, I will be watching.”

  The three dots looked like two eyes and a round mouth. Not thinking, just waiting for the session to be over, Sasha inhaled deeply and stopped breathing. “One, two, three…”

  The three dots rushed toward her, turning into the train lights in a tunnel. For a moment she glimpsed a landscape, three-dimensional, vivid. Sasha saw arch bridges penetrating each other, distant jagged mountains, tunnels that looked like interlaced tendons; she longed for oxygen, wanted to inhale, but for some reason she was forbidden to breathe. Darkness was absolute, and then the auditorium developed in front of her eyes, followed by the teacher’s desk and the hunchback over the open briefcase.

  Sasha gulped some air, like a diver who just nearly drowned. She breathed, swallowing bitter saliva, and the black album lay in front of her, black pages thrown open, as an open invitation to repeat the experiment.

  “Hmm,” Nikolay Valerievich said uncertainly. “It’s not exactly what I wanted… But this is a good working start, Sasha. It is a hint of future development, albeit a modest one. Please take this album and very carefully—as carefully as you can—work with Fragment number one. Ideally, I would love for you to hold your breath up to two minutes. Count to one hundred and twenty.”

  ***

  “I must pass this test,” Sasha chanted out loud. “I must pass this test!”

  She opened the album given to her by the hunchback. The pages were numbered, and so were the black fields, the “fragments,” which could be distinguished by these numbers only. Each one of them had three white dots in its center, like three stars or three holes in dark fabric.

  “I must pass,” Sasha murmured, held her breath and concentrated on the three white dots. “One, two, three, four…”

  Everything would amalgamate in front of her eyes, and then clear up again. Strange harsh outlines swam out of the darkness. Sasha saw a city, sharp roof peaks, intertwined ropes and wires; one-dimensional creatures, brown like coffee grounds, jumped over them like fleas on unwashed hair.

  Resembling checkmarks drawn with a thick brown marker on a list of groceries, they twitched their legs, wriggled and made sudden jerky movements. Sasha would never be able to explain why she found these creatures so repulsive, but every time she shuddered at their appearance. “Thirty-one. Thirty-two. Thirty-three.”

  At “sixty,” the brown checkmark insects would notice that they were being watched. They saw or felt Sasha’s presence, they crawled closer, up to her very eyes, and moving her head was impossible.

  Perfectly defined graphical landscapes unfolded in the background: mountains, arches, buildings and towers, a gorgeous and sinister city. The oily pavement glistened, like a carbon-black ear of corn. From one fragment to another the distant landscape changed, filled with details, became three-dimensional; the amount of brown checkmarks grew with it. They threw themselves at Sasha like a cluster of starving bedbugs. Lacking arms, unable to breathe, she chased them away the only way she had at her disposal—by concentrating. By staring. Occasionally, she moaned over the album, frightening her roommates.

  “I must pass this test!”

  “You don’t even look like yourself anymore,” Yegor would say softly.

  Sasha memorized his schedule. Every day she showed up at the dining hall holding his hand. She had worn every single one of his shirts and sweaters. She made out with him in front of everyone, as if it were her last chance. Shamelessly, she kicked her roommates out and made love to Yegor, the door locked and secured with a broom handle.

  Afterwards, Yegor would pull on his sweatpants and go to his room, and Sasha lay without sleep for the rest of the night.

  She had to pass this test.

  Or die.

  ***

  At the end of November Kostya and Zhenya went through with their marital plans and had a “student” wedding at a small restaurant not far from the Institute: vodka, mineral water, salami and cheese sandwiches, and endless jars of pickles. All the second years were invited; everyone was allowed to bring one guest. Sasha brought Yegor. Lisa did not show up at all.

  At the wedding Sasha saw Kostya’s mother for the first time—a prematurely aged, overweight woman, fidgety, with a shrill voice. She thought of Farit Kozhennikov, who was married to this woman and then left her… Or was it a mutual decision?

  One more thought kept bothering her: how could Kostya’s mother not realize, not see that something was really wrong with her son’s school? Or was a quick view from the outside not enough to see the booby trap?

  Sasha tried to imagine herself in this woman’s shoes: her only son, about to be draft
ed, just started his second year at a provincial college, and now he was marrying his classmate. Everything was normal. Everything was perfectly natural. Next year her son would choose his profession, and his mother in her silk dress, too tight on her spreading body, hopes he will go for economics…

  Sitting in Yegor’s lap (there was plenty of space at the table, but it was important for Sasha to sit exactly like that at Kostya’s wedding table), she was thinking that there, right in front of her, fifty young men and women were acting out an elaborate play for the sake of a single middle-aged woman. Everyone sitting at the table—second years, third years, even the first year Yegor—knew that Kostya would never become an “economist.” Nevertheless, they all played out a well-known script. Toasts were proposed, music was playing loudly, a pink-cheeked vociferous stand-up comedian hired as master of ceremonies was telling jokes, occasionally even funny ones, sang karaoke and invited everyone else to sing along. Wine and shot glasses clinked, and Kostya’s mother kissed her brand-new daughter-in-law, wiping her tears and wishing happiness to her “sonny…”

  Kostya looked awkward and pompous in his new black suit. It seemed as if he could not wait for the wedding to be over. The long tulle veil kept getting in Zhenya’s way; behind the scenes, the girls discussed her wedding dress and declared it hopelessly low-class. Zhenya was upset.

  In the midst of all the fun, when the floor trembled under the dancers’ feet, and tobacco smoke hung heavily in the air, Sasha and Yegor finally made their quiet exit. It was raining in the old park, the trees were now bare, and the fallen leaves lay under their feet like a rippled, glutinous rug.

  Sasha and Yegor took a long silent walk under the same umbrella.

  “I thought everyone would get really drunk,” Yegor said.

  “Portnov does not let us drink. Something to do with that… with metabolism.”

  They fell silent again. The rain thumped slyly over the membranes of their umbrella.

  “Sasha… let’s run away from the Institute.”

  “What did you say?”

  “Let’s. Run away. Together. We’ll earn some money, or steal it. Buy airplane tickets. They won’t be able to get us.”

  Cold drops flew through the night, lit up by the ancient lanterns. Sasha walked, grasping Yegor’s elbow, considering his proposal.

  If she failed Sterkh’s exam… and it looked like she would anyway, even if she kills herself studying…

  What did she have to lose?

  She shook her head, trying to get rid of excruciating thoughts. As far as she knew, Yegor was doing just fine in his Specialty sessions, there was no reason he should not pass his exam…

  “Thank you for offering,” she said.

  They passed the alabaster arch and crossed from the park to Peace Street, a stone’s throw away from Sacco and Vanzetti.

  ***

  Next day, Monday, Portnov offered reserved congratulations to the newlyweds, immediately followed by the warning not to expect any leniency in their classes.

  “The honeymoon has been rescheduled for your vacation! By the way, where are you planning to reside? Will you be renting an apartment?”

  Kostya mumbled something incomprehensible about appealing to the dorm superintendent.

  “You will not be getting a family unit until after the winter exams, when some space will free up. Until then—deal with it as you wish, home is where the heart is. With this, the official part is over, everyone open your books to page sixty-three. Samokhina, you don’t look well.”

  “She was studying all night,” Lisa offered under her breath. “Practicing new positions.”

  “Yeah, that’s exactly what I was doing,” Sasha snapped. “Jealous?”

  ***

  Upon her return from the wedding, she spent the rest of the night hunched over Sterkh’s album. Yegor’s words “Let’s run away” rang in her ears, in turn loud and soft; they abated and came back, like an echo in an empty well. Yegor was only a first year; he had not lived through a single exam, he still did not understand anything. Even if his advisor was Liliya Popova, and she may have been kinder than Farit Kozhennikov… If one could use the word “kindness” in this case. However, Yegor simply did not understand what exactly he offered to Sasha, shuffling alongside her under the same umbrella.

  The brown checkmark insects seemed to wait until Sasha opened the page and focused on Fragment seventeen. Fidgeting and jerking their legs, they attacked her eyes. Sasha screamed; Vika and Lena woke up. Lena cried in fear, and Vika picked up her pillow and blanket and went to sleep in the kitchen, on chairs stacked next to each other.

  ***

  “Sasha, what was your assignment for today? Fragment twenty-one? Did you work on it?”

  Again it was Monday. The day before, as usual, Sasha called home and spoke with Valentin. Mom split her time between home and the hospital; her due date was January twelfth. The ultrasound showed a boy, a big one. Valentin sounded high-strung and happy; he informed Sasha that he would go shopping for a stroller, a crib and all the other necessary things only after everything goes well.

  “That’s superstition,” Sasha told him.

  “It’s tradition!” Valentin’s laughter sounded false. “How have you been? Will you come home for the winter break to see your brother?”

  Sasha promised.

  And this morning, the schedule for the winter exams had been posted. And Sasha found out that the “Introduction to Applied Science” exam for second years, Group A, was scheduled for the eleventh. January eleventh.

  It was snowing.

  “I worked on it,” Sasha said dully. “Nikolay Valerievich, I worked hard, honestly, I am doing everything the way you tell me to. I…”

  Sasha stopped talking. Sterkh hitched up his sleeve: on his wrist, held by a leather band, instead of a watch, was a round metal reflector.

  “Let us take a look at the condition of your, hmm, inner world…”

  A sharp ray of light deflected by the metal made Sasha blink. The hunchback frowned, pulled his sleeve over the bracelet and pushed his palm over his long gray hair. His face, usually pale, now seemed gray.

  “Not very good. Not quite. Something is not right, Sasha. I am under the impression that you are using your uncommon will-power to resist my subject.

  “No, I’m trying! Honestly! I’m doing everything I’m supposed to.”

  Snow fell gracefully on the naked branches of the linden trees. Below, a truck drove along Sacco and Vanzetti.

  “Sasha, please have a seat.”

  She sat down at her desk by the window. Tremulous air rose above the radiator, and a cold draft curled around the cracks in the windows. Between the window frames, a large dead fly whiled away eternity.

  “When I saw you for the first time, I was simply numb with happiness,” the hunchback confessed. “I thought you had this gift… a rare, precious gift. The gift of an astounding clarity and strength. And now I don’t know what to do with you. The test is only half the problem. The test you can retake, if worse comes to worst. But the placement exam!”

  Sasha shook her head violently.

  “I can’t do any make-up tests! My…”

  She stopped short. The hunchback held up his hand:

  “I know you don’t like make-up tests. None of you do. But the difficulty of the placement exam is that you may not retake it. You have to pass it on the first try. Only one try. And you have a little over a year before that exam, Sasha. Ah, what hopes I had for you…”

  “If I’m that hopeless,” Sasha whispered, “maybe you don’t need me here in Torpa? Maybe I don’t belong here? Maybe you made a mistake accepting me, and now you can…”

  She fell silent, afraid to continue. Against her will, she saw herself being released from the Institute, while Yegor stayed behind. She could forget Torpa, like a scary dream, and along with Torpa, she would forget Yegor…

  Sterkh bent further over the teacher’s desk, making his hump seem even bigger. Sasha thought he now looked
at her with certain interest. As if the idea, offered by the student, was not all that stupid.

  “Listen, Sasha. At six o’clock tonight please meet me in the teachers’ lounge. We have something to discuss.”

  ***

  “Let’s get married,” Yegor suggested.

  They sat in the gym on a pile of wrestling mats. Yegor just finished helping Dima Dimych fix the ping-pong tables; the first-year girls took over the paddles and the gym was filled with the cheerful sound of ping-pong balls flying from wall to wall.

  Sasha went on as if she did not hear him. And only when he was about to feel really insulted—usually people have some reaction to this sort of suggestions—only then did she turn and look into Yegor’s eyes very attentively:

  “Why? Aren’t we happy right now?”

  Yegor was taken aback.

  “Well, what do you mean, ‘Why?’ Why do people get married?”

  The ping-pong balls knocked about, a celluloid rain.

  “I am supposed to meet Sterkh at six o’clock in the teachers’ lounge.”

  “So what?”

  Sasha took a deep breath, and exhaled again. Her hope wasn’t based on anything serious. She simply desperately wanted to have this hope. If I get out of here, I will certainly get Yegor out as well, Sasha thought. I just need to get out. Let them say we made a mistake; you have no talent for our profession, go home.

  In her mind Sasha pictured the hunchback sadly shaking his head and saying these words. She saw Portnov cleaning his glasses with the hem of his shirt. She saw herself pretending she was extremely upset, and then going and packing her things, and returning home….

  “And after that?” Yegor asked.

  Sasha flinched as if he read her mind.

  “What about after that?”

  Yegor put his hand on her shoulder.

  “Sasha. I love you. I… Will you be free after six?”

  Automatically Sasha pulled up the sleeve of her jacket. The smiley face was bright-red, as if ashamed. Sasha pulled the sleeve back over her wrist. She felt chilly.

  “Yegor, I really don’t know right now. Let’s decide… later.”