The War in 2020

by Ralph Peters

  "Throw your weapons over the bar. Then raise your hands. Keep the palms open and turned toward me. Get up slowly."

  "All right, man," Vargas shouted, his voice hitting its highest pitch. He was already rising. He still held the gun in his hand, swinging it around toward the other man's voice. He squeezed the trigger too soon.

  The last thing Vargas saw was the face of a devil.

  PART II

  The Russians

  4

  Moscow

  2020

  The real veterans, the women who had been here so many times they had lost count, said it was nothing. Less of a bother than having a tooth pulled. But the slow cramping deep inside made Valya want to draw her knees as close to her chin as bones and sinews allowed. Yet she did not move. She felt as though all of the energy had been bled out of her, and the comforting movement of her knees remained a vision, a futile dream. Her legs lay still, extended. Dead things. Only her head had turned out of the corpselike position in which the assistants had left her. She faced the wall at the end of the ward, facing away from herself, away from her life, away from everything. Staring at chipped pipes and plaster that had not been painted or even scrubbed down for decades.

  She focused casually on a spray of brown droplets that trailed along the gray wall. Old stains, the beads and speckles seemed to have grown into the surface, and it was impossible to tell now whether their substance was old blood or the residue of waste. The business had been hard on her before. But Valya did not remember it as being quite this hard. Yes, it had seemed like a punishment then too. But not such a blunt punishment. Windows painted over, discoloring the cold daylight. The iron of the bedstead. She was conscious of a sharp, metallic clattering and terse voices in the open ward. But her humiliating inability to move, the dead weight of sickness in her belly, seemed to insulate her from practical concerns. If they could not help her, she would settle for being left alone on this bed whose sheets had not been changed under the day's succession of women.

  Behind the masking smell of disinfectant, a morbid odor brewed. Valya sensed that she knew its identity very well, I but each time she almost named it, the label dissolved on her tongue, teasing her, prickling her ruined nerves. And her failure to find the word, to anchor reality with the hard specificity of language, left her somehow more alone than she had been in the emptiness of the previous moment. She thought of the lies she had needed to tell, another use of words, to escape from the routine of the school for a day. Wondering how much they knew or divined. Superiors sour with small authority. And the children with no color in their faces. The usage of definite and indefinite articles in the English language….

  No. She would not think of that now. Especially not of the children. Nor of Yuri. And where was he now? God, the war. How could there be a war? It was impossible to imagine. There was no sound of war. Only the sameness; of the evening news. Yuri was fighting in a war. She knew it to be a fact. Yet, it held no meaningful reality for her. And it was unclean to think of Yuri now.

  She wished she could clear her mind of all thought. To purge herself of present knowing like some mystic. But the harder she tried to empty her mind, the more insistently the images of her life tumbled out of their mental graves. Beds, lies, betrayals. The worst thieveries. And the feel of a new man's whiskers scrubbing her chin. The distinctiveness of the breath.

  More than anything else, she hated the weakness. She hated any kind of weakness in herself, struggling against it. Only to grow weaker still, a greater fool. And now this dull physical weakness tethering her to this bed. And the faint, constant nausea.

  Most of the other women in the ward remained silent. There was no desire to make new friends here, or to be known even by sight. Like a dirty train station, the clinic was a place through which to pass as quickly and anonymously as possible.

  A girl became hysterical. Valya tried to keep her total focus on the plaster desert of the wall. But the voice, young and stupid with pain, would not relent. Valya thought that, if only she could find the strength to rise, she would slap the girl. Hard.

  "First-timer," a woman's voice announced to anonymous neighbors. The remark was answered by cackling laughter and snickers.

  Footsteps came down the ward.

  An unwilling alertness in Valya isolated the sound. Heavy. Mannish. Cheap shoes on broken tile. Valya closed her eyes. She felt as though she would give anything she owned to lie undisturbed just a few minutes longer. Her best dress, the red perfect dress from America. The jacket from France that Naritsky had given her to wear to the party with the foreigners. The few precious shreds of her life. Take them.

  "Patient!" The word was dreary from years of repetition. "Patient. Your time is up."

  Reluctantly, Valya opened her eyes, turning her head slightly.

  "Patient. Time to go."

  "I… feel ill," Valya said, and, as she listened to herself, she despised the cowardice, the subservience in her voice. Yet she went on. "I need to lie here for a few more minutes. Please."

  "This isn't your private apartment. Your time is up. And you're not bleeding."

  Valya looked up at the shapeless creature beside the bed. Barely recognizable as a woman. The attendant's gray uniform smock looked as though it had been last washed long ago, in dirty dishwater, and her fallen bosom strained at a plastic button that did not match the others holding the cloth stretched over a lifetime of poor diet. When the attendant spoke, no anger animated her voice. There was no real emotion at all. Merely the unfeeling voice of duty, tired of repeating itself. The lack of emotion rendered the voice unassailable.

  For a moment, Valya looked up into the woman's face, trying to find her eyes. But there was no spirit in them. Bits of chipped glass in a mask of broken veins, divided by a drunkard's nose.

  Will that be me? Valya thought in sudden terror. Is a creature like this waiting inside of me, just waiting to appear? The thought seemed worse than dying.

  In a last, uncontrolled attempt at fending off the attendant, Valya shook her head.

  The older woman's expression did not seem to alter, but, then, in the instant before the woman spoke, Valya realized that the face had, indeed, changed, hardening into a mask of professional armor, refusing to regard Valya as anything more than a number.

  "The bed is needed. Get up."

  Valya surprised herself with her ability to rise unassisted. She imagined a real, well-defined cavity inside herself, a place of vacancy and coldness, and the ability to bring her legs so easily together and then to force them over the side of the bed astonished her.

  "I think I'm bleeding," Valya said.

  "No, you're not," the attendant said. "I'd see it." But she let her eyes trail down below Valya's waist. A flicker of doubt. "Finish dressing and report to the desk."

  The woman left. And even before Valya could draw on her litter of clothing, another young woman appeared. Guided impatiently by a thickset woman in uniform who might have been a sister to the one who had roused Valya.

  The new girl was a colorless blonde, whose hair and complexion struck Valya as much less vivid than her own, possessed of less of the tones men wanted. Yet, some man had wanted her. As the girl approached the bed her eyes looked through Valya, fumbling with reality. Her skin was white to the point of translucence, as though she had lost far too much blood. Steered by the attendant, she collapsed onto the soiled bed just as Valya herself had recently done, without regard for Valya or anyone else on earth. She stared at the ceiling.

  Valya steadied herself against the wall, drawing on a stocking. The attendant marched away. And the girl touched herself timidly, as if expecting to discover some terrible change. Then her lower lip began to flutter. At first Valya thought the girl would speak, perhaps asking for help. Instead, she simply began to cry, a lanky child smashed by an adult world.

  Valya averted her eyes, refusing to make a gesture toward the girl. But as she looked away she found herself trapped by the gaze of a solid little woman dangling da
rkhaired calves over the edge of a bed. Somewhere in her thirties, the woman had coal-black hair and a bit of a mustache. Georgian, perhaps. Her face bore the scars of disease, but otherwise she looked as robust as if she'd merely been on an outing. She grinned at Valya as though she had only been in to have her temperature taken.

  "If they can't take the consequences, they shouldn't be so quick to spread their legs," the woman said with a slight accent, nodding proudly to the sickened girl who had taken possession of Valya's bed. "They all want to have their fun, then they don't want to pay the price."

  Valya broke away from the woman's stare and worked unsteadily down between the rows of beds toward the exit. But the harder she tried to avert her eyes, the more she seemed to see. She tried to force her eyes down to the floor, to simply scan her next steps, but the sight of old stains and splashes, chips and scuffs, only aggravated her feeling of hopelessness. Why couldn't they take a bucket of water to it? It certainly was not sanitary. Weak-legged, she suddenly saw her future with perfect clairvoyance. Another nondescript clinic. Another bed not quite dirty enough to force a change of sheets. Another…

  What kind of a life was this?

  Trailing her little bag of essentials, Valya stood in line before the desk. She breathed deeply, fighting the nausea, but the effort only poisoned her with bad air. She felt sweat prickling under her clothing, polishing her forehead. She thought that she would collapse at any moment, that she would be terribly sick. Then they would see. Then they would understand…

  But nothing occurred beyond the slow falling away of the queue ahead of her, until she stood before the clerk at the desk. The woman's hair was drawn back into a strict bun, and the skin stretched over her lean features with no hint of softness or resilience. She did not look up from her paperwork.

  "Patient's name?"

  "Babryshkina. Valentina Ivanovna."

  "Difficulties?"

  For an instant, Valya imagined herself telling this woman how sick she felt, how badly she needed to lie down just a little longer.

  "No."

  "Sign here, Comrade."

  Valya bent down over the emptiness that seemed to grow larger in her with each new thought or action. She almost wished she would discover some terrible wetness on her legs that would make them let her rest a little while.

  She signed the form.

  "And here, Comrade. In two places."

  Valya made no effort to read the forms. She signed where she had been told to sign, wanting now to be gone from the place.

  Without a discernible gesture of completion, the woman behind the desk said, "Next."

  * * *

  Naritsky waited for her down the block, posing against his automobile. Even before she could distinguish the expression on his face, Valya knew that Naritsky was very pleased with himself. For waiting all the while. The thought i of him sickened her now and, for a moment, she could not imagine how she had ever allowed him to touch her, to have her. But even at her most self-pitying, Valya could not tolerate such mental flaccidness for long. She had enjoyed her times with him. And the sex had been all right. Not as sheerly athletic as with Yuri. But far more imaginative. Naritsky was vulgar. And that part of her was vulgar too.

  Yet, handsome though he was, it was not sex that had attracted her to Naritsky. She could do without sex. And she had not run out man-hunting the moment Yuri left for central Asia. But Naritsky had seemed like a chance, a last chance.

  Once, Yuri had seemed like a chance too. To a young, very foolish girl. And she had thought she was being so wise. An Army officer would always have a job. And Yuri was so bright, so much the ideal of what an Army officer should be. Everyone had predicted a great future for him. But this was not a country of great futures.

  Officers, Valya thought, in a split second of disgust. Lives as stiff as their uniforms. In a country falling apart, where everything had been falling apart for decades, where nothing ever quite worked, where no dream ever quite came true, Yuri had seemed so strong and safe and capable of providing a worthwhile life. But there was nothing to it. And behind the rough uniform cloth he had hidden a love that did not even respect itself. Yuri and his slobbering devotions. A love all weakness. When she needed him to be strong. Men were filth.

  And what does that make me? Valya asked herself.

  Naritsky. Smiling. By his late-model automobile. Not too flashy. Naritsky was too clever for that. Naritsky was clever in so many ways. But he had been an ass when it mattered.

  A friend had put them in touch. There's this guy. Works with foreigners. Business. You know. Nothing illegal. Not really illegal. You know. Anyway, he's got friends. But he needs a good English interpreter. A few extra roubles. Odd hours. Supplement your income. And he can get the nicest things. Let me show you…

  The nicest things. Men aren't really my vice, Valya decided. I'm the tart of nice things. When it all went to pieces, she had considered, for an instant, destroying all of the material goods Naritsky had given her. But the mood passed like an inkling of terror, forcibly suppressed. She knew that she did not have the strength to cut and tear and throw away the only primary colors in her gray world.

  And Yuri? I'm not a good woman, Yuri. I lied. And when you had to choose, you chose your army. What did you expect?

  Yet, she knew that she would never tell him a thing. And if he found out, she would deny. And, anyway, he would forgive her. Everything. Yuri was hopeless.

  Thank God for that, she thought.

  Well, she had failed. She had convinced herself that she could control the situation with Naritsky. That she could use him. But now, wobbling out of a clinic on a lifeless October afternoon, there was no denying her failure. She had not controlled a thing. Naritsky had used her as his whore, paying her off in clothes and little toys that blinded her to everything else. And they were trifles to him.

  She had considered turning him in. But there would have been no point in it. Naritsky had too many friends. And it would have been far cheaper for him to buy off the militia than it had been to buy her off. Minor consumer electronics. Or just the European condoms he refused to use.

  She had actually imagined that Naritsky would marry her, that it would only take a divorce from Yuri. But Naritsky had never intended to marry anyone. Thank God she had not written to Yuri, hadn't really started anything.

  She had been a fool.

  Drunken, Naritsky had laughed in her face. "You're spoiled goods, my darling."

  Later he had sought, lavishly, to make up for that single, killing, honest remark. But Valya had finally grasped the extent of her folly.

  Now Naritsky preened against the side of his little blue car, jacket thrown open despite the cold air. A rich man in a country that grew poorer by the day. A country that, after a hundred years of promises, could not provide adequate birth control devices to its people. A country that still could not feed itself. All the promises. Like the promises a man made to a stupid mistress.

  As Valya approached, Naritsky gestured toward her but did not really move. He had selected an expression of concern that made Valya want to shout, "Liar, liar, liar.

  "Are you all right?" he asked.

  Valya pulled her light stylish jacket closer against the chill, tucking in her scarf. She nodded. This was no place for a scene, no time for final decisions. And Naritsky seemed to sense something. He did not touch her but merely opened the car door. Automatically, she moved to get in.

  Then she stopped.

  "I need fresh air. I want to walk."

  Naritsky looked at her, unsure.

  For a moment, she imagined that he feared her. Some scandal. But he would be easily capable of managing that. She was the one with something to fear, with everything to lose.

  "Valya," he said, in his warm, convincing voice. "You're in no condition to walk. You need to rest. Get in."

  Unexpectedly, Valya lost her temper. "I'm walking. Do you understand?" Then she stopped, as surprised by her reserve of energy as by her loss of sel
fcontrol.

  "It's too far," Naritsky said, with an unaccustomed edge of uncertainty in his voice.

  "I'll get a trolley."

  "Please. You're not well. You need to rest."

  He was already back in control of himself. It was as if he could see into her, know everything about her. While she could not look into him at all. And she had considered herself so wise, the master of men.

  "Don't speak to me as though I were a child," she half shouted.

  "Valya. Please."

  "I want to walk. And don't follow me."

  Naritsky backed away, palms open, as if he had been accused of an infraction of the criminal code. He opened his mouth, then chose not to speak.

  Valya took a last, heartbroken, furious look at him, and turned away.

  "I'll phone later," he called after her. "To see…"

  She forced herself to think of sex with Naritsky, and with others. Making herself sicker now with the images, even though she recognized that it was all emotional and physical reaction, with no intellectual honesty in it. She thoughtlessly swore that she would never let another man slop his weight on top of her ever again, then she began to choke with laughter at her brazen dishonesty. And her physical illness returned, nearly dropping her against a wall lathered with tom posters: The Future Belongs To Us!

  Lies, lies, lies. A world of lies. Promises broken before they could be fully articulated. She forced herself to move along, eager to be well out of Naritsky's sight.

  The back streets through which her journey took her seemed dismally gray and poor. All her life she had wanted to climb out of this plodding squalor. But there was nowhere to go. All of the good men were hopeless fools. And the bad men helped only themselves. Reformers came, but the reforms always failed or, still worse, worked halfway. Nothing ever worked more than halfway in this country. The reformers disappeared. But the reactions against the reforms, too, only worked halfway. As Valya walked along the broken pavement, the sickness in her made her feel as though she were slowly sinking, as though all her life she had been slowly sinking but had not noticed because everything around her was sinking as well.