If only I could stand in line for a different fate …

ALLA PUGACHEVA

‘You’re spoiling the boy!’ Stasia told her sister one mild October afternoon in 1967. Once again, Miqa had refused to play football with the neighbours’ son, and had instead taken refuge in Christine’s bed, supposedly with a sore throat. Christine was sitting in the kitchen crocheting a tablecloth. Stasia stood in the doorway, in dirty gardening boots and old, rolled-up trousers at least two sizes too big, eyeing her sister crossly. Since turning sixty, Stasia had begun to shrink; her bones seemed to become more slender, she herself ever smaller and more delicate. By her eightieth birthday, she would have the figure of a little girl.

‘What’s the matter now?’ Christine was irritated, but didn’t look up from her crocheting.

‘Can’t you see what you’re turning him into? The boy’s behaving like an old man already. He never goes off to play with other children; he’s always so serious, always with you. It’s not healthy. Even his father’s complained that he —’

‘What are you getting at?’

‘I’m trying to tell you that you’re not a little girl any more, and the boy needs to be with children his own age.’

‘I have no intention of being declared a fossil just because I’m not twenty any more.’

‘He’s a little boy, Christine, my God!’

‘I try to give him everything he needs. He’s happy. For me, that’s the most important thing.’

‘You’re giving him what you think he needs. But he needs other things. He’s not a toy. Besides, he’s not a girl, and the way you are with him certainly isn’t good for him.’

‘You’re jealous, you’re just jealous, because I’m finally able to raise a child, and do it so that he’s happy, whereas you …’

Christine was shouting. The tablecloth slipped from her hand and she stared at her sister, enraged.

‘You’re still a spoiled brat! A blind, pampered, stupid creature, Christine!’ Stasia returned her younger sister’s furious glare. ‘You’re getting old — accept it! And get your satisfaction elsewhere!’ Stasia stamped out into the garden, leaving damp earth on the kitchen floor.

Christine was annoyed. Why did her sister always have to be so frightfully humourless, so entirely lacking in charm, so serious and bitter? Yes, it was true, Miqa was a dreamer through and through, and perhaps her excessive pampering of the poor, frightened little creature who had felt so alone when first he came to them was not a good strategy for his future survival.

His features were coarser than his father’s, but they suggested he would be a very attractive man one of these days, at least for the part of the female population that is drawn to brute strength. He radiated physical power and a healthy groundedness. Only his large eyes, clear and blue as the sky, betrayed the childish vulnerability within. His outward appearance belied his extreme shyness, his nervousness of strangers, his love of literature and loathing of physical activity. Certainly, the way he could sit for hours in the garden with little beetles on his palm, listening to the birds, did not really endear him to children his own age. But he managed to keep trouble at bay; his external appearance inevitably commanded respect.

How happy he always was, thought Christine, when he was able to come home to her after the summer holidays. How relieved not to have to act tough in front of his unsympathetic mother and drunkard father. How delighted he was then to be allowed to listen to the old gramophone with her as she told him something about each of the arias, or when she put one of her favourite novels on his pillow; when she took him out for an ice cream and told him tales about every street and corner.

And what was wrong with that? Why shouldn’t she do all these things? Nana’s critical looks had not escaped Christine’s notice, either, whenever she and Miqa sat poring over a book or bent over a plant in the garden. Ever since she had come back from Moscow, Nana had regarded the world around her with alarming pragmatism. At first, Christine had assumed Nana was despondent because she was missing her daughter, but by now all she felt for her was irritation. She should have gone to Russia to be with her husband, then her relationship with Kostya wouldn’t be so cold and distant! Then she wouldn’t have had to share him with Russia and the Cold Sea, with state secrets, and, above all, with other women! But Nana and Kostya simply weren’t suited. She knew her nephew far too well not to know this. Right from the start, Nana had maintained a certain distance; from Christine, but, above all, from the boy, as if she were afraid of loving him too much.

*

Over the past few years the thought of Kitty had become an obsession for Stasia, an inescapable prison that made her more bad-tempered, irritable, and abstracted than she already was; that robbed her of sleep, and made her inattentive at work at the library.

She had to see her. Otherwise one day — she was quite sure of it — she would simply not get up, would wait until Sopio or Thekla came to take her hand and lead her over the Jordan. If that was even how it happened. She sensed it: she had no doubt whatsoever that she would die very soon if she was not able to put her arms around her daughter at least once more.

The thought led her to start having conversations with her daughter, her lips silently forming the words she addressed to her. Was she eating properly? Could she bear living abroad? Or she would ask about the country Kitty was living in, tell her tales of daily life at the library, complain about Christine’s infantile stubbornness, explain that Elene was growing up far away from her mother.

Lying in bed at night, her glassy stare fixed on the ceiling, she would dream of how she might contrive to see Kitty again. But in none of these scenarios could she find a way to bypass Kostya. He was the intermediary. The black angel who presided over the fates of both mother and sister. She knew her request could put him in danger. But how else could she find Kitty? Where in the West, where in England — if it was true, if that really was where she was living — should she look for her, and how would she get there? The mother of a traitor would never be allowed out of the country. Never!

Christine was no support: as was typical of her, she approved of Kostya’s behaviour. He had a responsible position now, she said; they were all protected because of him; he couldn’t take such a risk. Just think of all the interrogations the two of them had been subjected to after Kitty’s disappearance; if Kostya hadn’t had his position, those interrogations would have ended badly. They would both have been banned from working in public institutions like the hospital and the library — or possibly worse.

Back then, years ago, in another life — in another world, or so it seemed to her — she had travelled hundreds of kilometres across war-ravaged countries, first for her husband and then for her son; had had the courage to defy the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks, and the fascists, too; and she had had no fear, because she’d been convinced that she was doing the right thing. And why shouldn’t she do the same for her daughter? Neither of her journeys to Russia had had the desired outcome, of course; but she had made them, she had tried, she had done something, albeit in her own way, which was twisted, hard to comprehend, not always logical. Perhaps she had had less to lose back then — yes, perhaps, perhaps her behaviour had been thoroughly egotistical, but what did it matter? Wasn’t this terrible inaction just as dangerous?

Even the card games played in her garden by the two dead women whom no one but she could see were no longer able to distract Stasia from her oppressive thoughts. Whenever the ghosts appeared, she turned her back on them and buried herself in a book or newspaper. What use were they to her if they didn’t help her, if they didn’t show her the way, if they showed no interest in anything apart from their cards?

But when Kostya returned to Tbilisi with Elene for the winter holidays and started to prepare for a big New Year’s party, she said the unsayable. She set aside her fear of his anger and began to urge him, beg him, to tell her where her daughter was, to arrange some kind of contact between them, a meeting — it didn’t matter where or how.

‘That’s absolutely out of the question!’

There was no mistaking Kostya’s horror: his hand flew to his mouth as he spoke, as if he were suddenly afraid of his own voice.

Just then they were alone in the kitchen; she was helping her son to unpack and put away the lavish quantities of food he had bought at the central market.

‘If I don’t see her, I’ll go mad. I dream of her all the time, when I do actually manage to fall asleep, and they keep giving me warnings at work because I —’

Kostya put a finger to his lips and glanced around in alarm. There was something pitiful about her, the way she was pleading with him, permitting him to glimpse her needs and fears, something she never usually did. He wanted to contradict her, to put an end to the subject as quickly as possible, but he couldn’t help feeling profoundly moved. She was like a little child, frail and shrunken, sexless, so utterly lost, standing there waving her hands to emphasise her words.

But she didn’t stop; she kept going on at him, and since it had already become clear to him that this was not something he could resolve quickly, he took her by the hand and led her over to the table. He suddenly felt like a giant beside her: her shoulders were hunched, her face so pale. The lines around her mouth were deep and depressing. Despite her grey hair, which, unlike her sister, she didn’t dye, she didn’t really seem old. She had the air of a person who, in some peculiar and obstinate way, was defying time, sticking her tongue out at it.

Her speech was confused. She jumped from one point to the next, from one memory to another. Craning her head towards him, desperately searching for something she could cling to, a shred of hope in his eyes. She touched his hands — she hadn’t done that for a long time. She didn’t reproach him. She flattered him. She called him ‘my boy’; she really begged. It was all too much for Kostya. Fortunately, they were alone. The small, naked piglet lay on the draw leaf of the kitchen dresser, staring at them with sad, dead eyes. Mountains of oranges and mandarins, persimmons and dried fruit lay in several bowls on the table and refrigerator. Bottles of sparkling wine stood around in shopping bags on the floor.

He loved the New Year’s party. The sumptuous meals, the excess, the ringing in of the new year, the grandiose addresses on television, the counting down from ten, the fireworks; he loved giving presents to his family, and he thought about the fact that she, his mother, who was now sitting before him and would soon prepare many of the delicacies he loved so much, had no idea that, not so long ago, he had had to come to terms with the thought that he might never enjoy such celebrations ever again; that, in a sickbed in a western clinic, he had stared death in the face for months on end.

This thought was hard to bear. He would have liked to have told her, when he didn’t know if he would ever get well again, that despite everything he was grateful to her for having borne him. Despite everything from which she had not been able to shield him; despite everything she had withheld from him, had not given him; despite all the times she had eluded him. He had wanted to write her a letter, back then; in this letter he would have addressed her as ‘Deda’ again, not by her first name, as he usually did, to maintain distance between mother and son.

He looked at her, and felt as if they had swapped roles. As if he were the father and she the child. As if it were unthinkable that another human being could have sprung from this ageless, childlike person. Himself. And his sister, for whom she now wept with such abandon.

But in the same breath he also felt anger welling up inside him; anger at this fragile person with the drab bun and the shining, colourless eyes. How often, as a child, had he stood before her, completely at a loss — and not just him, her as well, her beloved daughter, her ray of sunshine — how often had they both failed to reach her, frustrated by her unworldliness, her habit of retreating into an inner world to which they were denied access? How often had they wished they had a normal mother who didn’t say and do such confusing things, but whose actions were straightforward and easy to understand, a simple woman with simple desires and maternal instincts? Would their lives have taken different paths, Kostya wondered, as he shrank from an unfamiliar fervour in Stasia’s eyes, if she had been a better mother to them? If they hadn’t had to vie for her love, her attention, to wear themselves out in this all-consuming rivalry? Were there even any answers to such questions? Or was it perhaps too simple to believe there was a single answer to their question, one that made all others redundant? Rather, didn’t each answer conceal another answer, and behind that another, on and on, until it drove you mad?

Stasia told him about her journey to Russia, all those years ago, and her attempt to trace him. Why is she telling me this now? he asked himself, not knowing whether to be pleased or angry.

Was Kostya sorry? Did he feel any pangs of conscience? Did he question what had happened? Did he waste even a single thought on how Kitty was faring? I don’t believe he did: he forbade himself to think about such things. Because here, too, he didn’t believe in answers. The only possible definitive answer was the life that they were living.

His mother, this shadow trapped in a world of her own — no fairy, as Christine had once been — stood before him, weeping, her hand clamped round his wrist. He couldn’t cope with her tears. He didn’t want to have power over her: for what was perhaps the first time since the pursuit of power had become his main aim in life, Kostya felt it as a burden. He didn’t want to sit in judgement over her tears. He wanted nothing to do with her suffering. But it was impossible: they were all far too tightly bound to one another, whether they liked it or not. They would never be able to disentangle themselves; nothing in their story was ever truly over, not as long as they lived. There were always other outcomes, twists and possibilities that revealed themselves after every supposed end.

He lowered his head; he raised her hand to his lips; he touched her cool, soft skin; it felt good to sense the possibility of forgiveness, the possibility of considering a different possibility, for himself and for their story together. Even if they wouldn’t rewrite it, not now, even if it was impossible to preserve this peace, to believe in a new beginning, the illusion was nonetheless soothing, calming, reconciling.

When her speech got as far as his birth and its associated torments, he was cursing himself for letting himself get caught up in this mawkishness, this emotional indulgence, for not stemming this flood of words at the outset and setting about the profane activity of sorting out the food. But it was too late: for a moment he had been weak, for a moment he had allowed himself to be carried away by his feelings, and now he had to bear the consequences and listen to this sentimental mother-son claptrap.

‘Yes — nine hours, nine whole hours the contractions lasted. You were big, even then; you weighed more than four kilos, I didn’t have much strength left to push —’

‘Stasia, please.’ He didn’t want to hear any more, didn’t want to have to listen to the bloody details.

‘And the midwife shouted —’

‘Stasia!’

‘— push, push, and I thought: I’m going to faint!’

‘All right, that’s enough! I’ll think about it. I can’t promise you anything, but I’ll think about it.’

*

When the telephone rang, Kitty was standing in the middle of her living room, locked in a tight embrace with Fred, feeling for a moment as if she had overcome everything that separated her from happiness. She had been dancing with Fred, laughing as her red-haired friend floated dreamily across the dark wooden floor, twisting her body into peculiar shapes, while Kitty’s own voice sang out of the big speakers.

They had fought the previous night. Perhaps for the first time it had been as fierce as the fights Amy had with this woman who was lover to them both. Kitty had never intended to let that tone creep into her voice, that contempt, which was really only an admission of her own dependency and powerlessness. She had been ashamed of her loss of control, the pointless reproaches, all aimed at Fred’s ideas about life and morality. Kitty felt she had behaved shabbily in her desperation. The cross-examination she had inflicted on her beloved, the cheap, repulsive, almost vulgar insults and threats. Unlike Amy, she had never hoped she would be able to change Fred. Perhaps she had never wanted to, either, but equally she did not want to make her happiness, her contentment dependent on this woman. On the tiny morsel of clandestine love she threw her way. And Fred, as if she didn’t take herself seriously in the role of cruel heartbreaker and thoughtless egomaniac, had waited for Kitty’s anger to subside, only to sweet-talk and bewitch her again, to soften her up and explain to her once more that this lack of commitment, this unreliability, this freedom actually constituted the greatest fidelity of which she was capable.

Kitty hated it, and it seemed she would never get used to the idea that Fred didn’t have a romantic bone in her body and had to reduce everything to sex. But perhaps it was easier to describe their relationship as a liaison with no commitment; perhaps it was easier to persuade herself that they shared nothing more than a bed and the traumas of their pasts.

As dawn was breaking, Kitty, hoarse and exhausted, had admitted defeat, after which Fred had coaxed her into going for a long walk, then had bought fresh fish with her at the weekly market and made her a delicious meal. Kitty would never have believed Fred’s hands were capable of such a thing had she not been present and seen it with her own eyes: Fred, over-excited and giggling like a little girl, preparing the food in Kitty’s kitchen with such patience, such attention to detail; the time she took over the cooking, the many spices weighed and tasted like a medicinal remedy.

After the meal, Fred put on Summer of Broken Tears and held forth about every song on the album. And once they had finished a bottle of wine, and Fred had rolled a joint, they were sufficiently uninhibited to dance to Star Collector, too, whirling around the room, singing over and over again: ‘Let’s pretend we are lovers and start to collect the stars.’

How many people there are in this one person, thought Kitty. She was constantly amazed by how deceptive and changeable Fred’s body was. How transparent, defenceless, insubstantial as breath, weak, and devoid of all eroticism; how possessive. She could have danced with this woman for ever and a day.

The sound of the telephone roused Kitty from her stupor. She reeled back to the sofa, flopped onto it, and picked up the receiver. Even before he had said hello she recognised his even breathing. He had never called outside their prearranged times. What had happened? Her body tensed. No, please no, not bad news, not now, she thought.

‘I’ve been asked to make you an offer.’ He sounded particularly matter-of-fact.

Kitty took a deep breath and signalled to Fred to turn the music down.

‘I thought something awful must have happened.’

‘No, no. It’s a good offer, in my opinion.’

‘I’m happy to hear your voice.’

Fred eyed her with curiosity. It was the first time she had heard Kitty speak in her mother tongue. She watched her, fascinated, as if she were performing a work of art.

There was a crackle at the other end of the line.

‘The Komsomol Club in Prague is interested in a performance.’

‘Prague? Did I hear that correctly?’

‘Yes, precisely.’

‘That can’t be right, that’s —’

‘Yes, yes, it is. In a few days’ time your manager will receive an official request. And if I were you, I would accept the offer, because there, you might …’

He fell silent. Kitty’s heart was racing. Prague. The city was full of scars; the memory of that city was full of bruises. She felt all her courage draining away. What she really wanted to do was ask him to go with her. Only now did she realise that he hadn’t finished his sentence.

‘I might — what?’

‘You might meet someone; someone who …’

Kitty put her hand over her mouth to hold back the scream. Did he mean Kostya, her mother, Christine? Andro, perhaps? No, that wasn’t possible, they would never give him permission to travel abroad. Most likely her brother. Never mind who, the main thing was that it would be someone from her family, someone from home, someone from her old life.

‘Who?’ she cried, overwhelmed by the joy filling her heart.

‘You know the rules.’

‘Yes, yes, I know the rules. Yes, I’ll accept the offer, of course I will.’

‘That’s what I thought.’

‘Do you know that I really like you?’ Kitty could no longer suppress her laughter.

‘I’m very glad. Because the feeling is mutual.’

After she hung up, she threw open both windows in her room and let the cool air flow into her lungs. Fred, who had gone into the kitchen, returned with a glass of whisky in her hand. Normally Kitty would have been cross and warned her that she drank too much, that she constantly needed some kind of stimulant to act as a crutch for her life, but this time she didn’t care, she wanted to get drunk, too, wanted to celebrate this incredible news. She turned and flung her arms around Fred’s neck.