28

Every day for the rest of the summer Mitya woke up guilty about not going to Donetsk with Marina. She didn’t call, and her former roommate hadn’t seen her, so he knew she wasn’t in Moscow. But had she made it home safely? Mitya wrote a letter to her using the address she had given him. He put most of his Valerka money into the envelope and thought that it only made sense for Marina to receive it, after all. He also drew a picture of Marina rocking out with Viktor Tsoi, and an infant of vague ethnicity showing the sign of the horns with its plump fist next to them. Mitya made the clothing for all three out of black sunflower shells.

He tried to persuade himself that his worries were unnecessary. What could have happened on the train? Surely, she had returned home, to her family, and he hadn’t needed to return because he was already home. It was now Mitya’s firm belief that everyone returns one day. You might feel miserable at home, but at least you know how things work there. Or you’re close to figuring it out.

Still, Mitya couldn’t shake the feeling that he had betrayed her. Not by staying back, but by not becoming a part of her life moving forward. He liked to think that his role in Marina’s life would be different from the roles of Gleb and Sasha, but here he was, in Moscow, like them, instead of helping her. But then he thought that it was better that way. Imposing himself on her family, who could barely make their ends meet, was presumptuous of him. It would even be shameful for him to go live with other people when he had a home.

A home that was, thankfully, not threatened by Vovka anymore. He had been released from the hospital without any damage reported, as Alyssa Vitalyevna told everyone, and he did not dare return.

Mitya became more relaxed with Dmitriy Fyodorovich, although little in their daily interactions showed that same care that had radiated from the father’s face as he punched Vovka for hurting his son. Mitya was reading The Brothers Karamazov, a long book he had found on his grandmother’s bookshelf and had planned on reading for a long time. It was a hard one to read and had so many characters, mostly men, with problems. There was a father, and a son also named Mitya. The Mitya in the novel wanted to kill his father. Would the real Mitya kill his father, if given the opportunity? Previously, perhaps. But not after the incident with Vovka. It was as if all the hurt was softened. He still wouldn’t want to appear as Devchonka in front of Dmitriy Fyodorovich, but at least he knew that his father cared for him.

It turned out that the storm wasn’t the only tempest of that summer. First, in early July, an army general turned politician, Lev Rokhlin, was killed, allegedly by his wife. He was a prominent figure in both the Afghan and Chechen Wars. Dmitriy Fyodorovich took his demise to heart: he drank a lot and angrily ranted that Yeltsin’s special forces had the hero general killed because he was a threat to the regime. He especially liked to direct his raving at Alyssa Vitalyevna as if she were part of the special forces operation to take down Rokhlin.

Then, one Friday in August, Mitya woke up to find all the grown-ups gathered in the kitchen, sober but worried.

“I’m telling you, Cleopatra’s son works for a man in the Duma, and he is saying that it’s dangerous,” Alyssa Vitalyevna said with her usual arrogance.

“I don’t trust the gossip,” Dmitriy Fyodorovich replied in his booming voice. “They are banks, not pyramids. Banks shouldn’t go bust, that’s where the rich keep their money.”

“Maybe it’s safer to get the money?” Yelena Viktorovna asked quietly. She didn’t want to argue; she wanted to do something.

“Cleopatra’s son knows everything! He knew that Yeltsin had a heart attack before others!” Alyssa Vitalyevna could not believe that the indyuk would even risk losing the money he had before he would listen to her.

“And your beloved Yeltsin said there’ll be no devaluation!” Dmitriy Fyodorovich did not trust the government at all, but was even less inclined to listen to his mother-in-law.

“Maybe I should try the branches in the area, see if they have cash?” Yelena Viktorovna asked. No one responded. She was already dressed, in black jeans and a crisp white blouse, a look that made her look younger, skinnier. She put on a pair of shoes, grabbed her purse, and was out of the apartment. Alyssa Vitalyevna and Dmitriy Fyodorovich argued in the kitchen for a while, each refusing to capitulate to the other.

Mitya listened to the arguments coming from the kitchen, Dmitriy Fyodorovich’s voice a roar, Alyssa Vitalyevna’s higher pitch keeping pace with him. Yelena Viktorovna returned much later when both Dmitriy Fyodorovich and Alyssa Vitalyevna had left for their work shifts. She had many banknotes in her purse, which she had managed to get after standing in lines to seven banks in the area. Most of the banks’ clients had not yet caught on that there was a risk of losing their savings, but the lines were still pretty long.

She asked Mitya to help her sort the cash. They hid it in the books, sticking banknotes between the pages.

“Mama, why do you have all these rubles?” he asked.

“There will be a bank collapse,” Yelena Viktorovna responded. “Your father doesn’t believe it, but there is clearly a lot of commotion going on, and some banks are closing down. Luckily Lana made a card for my wages, so I used the machine. I only got a small part of our money. I’ll try again tomorrow.”

On Saturday more people were crowding by the machines, as only a select few branches were open, and it was even harder to get any money. Yelena Viktorovna took Mitya with her to stand in lines while she checked out other bank branches, hopping on and off buses. More remote areas were a better bet, but that was how the thinking of other people went too. They got some money, but not much. As they took the metro back home, Yelena Viktorovna leaned back against the chocolate brown of the seat and sighed, exhausted.

“I have been so fed up at work lately. Lana is always recovering after her surgeries. Kristina has been acting crazier lately. She terrifies me. I thought I’d start looking for a new job. Well, good luck to me keeping this one now. The rich folk keep their money in the banks too. It’s been seven years, and yet this country will never cease sucking us dry.”

That evening, the grown-ups convened in the kitchen again. They had powdered mashed potatoes with canned peas and sosiski for dinner and everyone except Mitya had vodka. He wouldn’t have minded having some, but Dmitriy Fyodorovich didn’t offer. His parents and babushka were concerned with getting the money back. It was settled that on Monday no one would go to work, and they would spread out to cover as many bank branches as possible. And then they’d buy supplies. Mitya would go with Mama again. He didn’t mind.

Having to wait in lines gave Mitya enough time to consider the things he had avoided thinking about. He assumed that the bank collapse would not touch Marina since she was in a different country, and that calmed him down. To distract himself further, he read The Brothers Karamazov. And then, to distract himself from the dense reading, he stared at the people. Unfortunately, no one admired Mitya in the bank queues; no one thought he was a beautiful girl. They were all too preoccupied with their money and talked about how the ruble would keep depreciating. Mitya asked Mama, and she explained that it was becoming cheaper but was still valuable. They didn’t get rubles that day, except for some on Alyssa Vitalyevna’s part. She put the money away into a sock and beneath her mattress.

“I know the tellers at our branch, and they helped me,” she boasted to Dmitriy Fyodorovich at dinner. Dmitriy Fyodorovich did not answer. He poured more vodka and chewed on the grilled chicken drumstick Yelena Viktorovna had bought at a kiosk.

Over the next month, Mitya’s parents and babushka tried to get money again numerous times but to no avail. The government announced something called “sovereign default,” and everyone was talking about it, Babushka on the phone with Cleopatra and Dr. Khristofor Khristoforovich Kherentzis, Dmitriy Fyodorovich with his drinking buddies. The prime minister was fired. And then, Dmitriy Fyodorovich was too.

On the day before school started, Mama and Mitya spent the whole morning and afternoon buying new school supplies at the Pedagogical Bookstore in the center of Moscow. The other child­ren with their parents, who had all kept this until the thirty-first of August, formed endless lines. They were clutching at the lists of what kind of stationery they were supposed to get, and what books to buy.

When that was done, it was time to buy a bouquet of flowers for Tatiana Ivanovna, his homeroom teacher. Though Mitya’s parents never gave her gifts, it was unimaginable to show up to school on the first of September, Teachers’ Day, or her birthday without flowers.

“It’s the worst timing ever,” Mama said to the woman behind them in line to the flower shop, hoping to find someone to commiserate with. The woman was holding her little daughter by the hand. The girl was so small it was hard to believe someone that size could be going to school. She had a pink allergy rash on her cheeks.

“And these urody are raising the prices through the roof too,” the woman responded, and then pulled hard at her daughter’s arm because the child was bored and had started spinning around. “Stop this right now, or I’ll give you to the gypsies.”

“Mama, why don’t we go to the Nariyan sisters’ kiosk? It should be cheaper there,” Mitya asked.

“They’ll fleece us like the rest of them, Mitya. Such are the times,” Yelena Viktorovna replied.

When it was their turn, Yelena Viktorovna bought a bunch of red gladioli and sighed as she paid. She let Mitya carry them home.

When they arrived, Dmitriy Fyodorovich was there already, drinking vodka. It wasn’t his custom: on Mondays he returned only at dinnertime, and he normally never started drinking before dinner.

Mitya went to the living room to sort through his new possessions. He didn’t have Mickey Mouse notebooks or shiny gel pens, the things that his classmates so enjoyed, but he still had some nice new things. He had neat green notepads with plastic covers to put on them, pencils with erasers on their tops, blue pens with transparent stems. He even had a wooden ruler, which he knew he would put into his mouth during classes, and feel the bubbles come out of the moist wood and hit his tongue.

Then he read The Brothers Karamazov for a bit: he had made it through the elder Zosima’s endless musings, which he had been attempting all month, and realized that it had gotten dark and they hadn’t had dinner yet.

Mitya went to the kitchen and saw his father sitting alone, crying. He had never seen him cry, not even when Lev Rokhlin was killed, and now here was a striking sight. Tears streamed down Dmitriy Fyodorovich’s meaty cheeks; his large, hairy fist rubbed at his eyes.

“What happened, Papa?” Mitya asked him, but Dmitriy Fyodorovich grunted and threw his stopka against the wall next to him. He did not want his son to see him like this.

Mitya slipped out of the room and looked for Mama and Babushka. They were nowhere to be found until he thought of looking outside, in the staircase. Both of them were smoking, where Vovka had usually smoked. It was another surprising sight. When she saw Mitya come out, Mama threw her cigarette on the floor and stepped on it with her shoe to put it out, hoping he hadn’t noticed.

“Why is Papa crying?” Mitya asked.

“He lost his job again, and now we’ll be even poorer,” Alyssa Vitalyevna said spitefully. “We’re the only breadwinners in this family now.” She also put her cigarette out and went past him back into the apartment.

“Mama, is this true? We don’t have enough money?”

“We don’t, Mitya. But don’t worry. We’ll think of something.”

She wasn’t so sure herself, but making Mitya worry would only make him grow up, and she didn’t want that.

Yelena Viktorovna ushered him into the apartment, and as they passed the kitchen, Mitya saw Dmitriy Fyodorovich still sitting at the table, still crying.

In the living room, Mitya counted the banknotes that remained in his Valerka fund after the care package to Marina. Only a little more than 500 rubles remained. One hundred dollars before the devaluation, with the present currency, it was a mere twenty-five dollars. It wasn’t enough. So Mitya gathered all his new treasures: the pens, the pencils, the notebooks with their covers, even the textbooks. Then he brought them to the kitchen along with the money bag.

“Here, this is money, and we can sell these too, Papa,” he said, placing the pile on the table. He was overwhelmed with pity for this big man, who was so menacing but could not do anything about this situation. “We won’t starve.”

Dmitriy Fyodorovich pushed the pile off the table with a brusque movement. The notebooks fluttered their pages; the pens fell all over the floor; the money bag landed quietly. He wanted to make his son disappear, along with his shame.

Mitya slipped out into the corridor. Mama came and led Mitya into the living room, where she sat him on the sofa and held him. She felt powerless. She hadn’t saved their money; she hadn’t saved her husband’s job; she hadn’t protected her son from disappointment, yet again.

“It will be all right, everything will get better,” she whispered. “He doesn’t mean it.”

But that was what she always said, Mitya thought.

Next day at school, Mitya had to write his name on the covers of notebooks that were wrinkled, torn, and wavy with spilled vodka. He didn’t care. He finished The Brothers Karamazov over the next few days to discover that the Karamazov father was indeed murdered by his son, but not the one called Mitya.

In the following weeks, Dmitriy Fyodorovich drank a lot and swore a lot. He promised to find Vovka and kill him for his crimes, but he never did, because the angrier he got, the closer he was to a blackout. Mitya never saw him cry again. He never saw his bag with the money, either.

Marina responded to Mitya’s letter in mid-September. She was doing well, she wrote, and she had taken care of her syphilis. The baby was growing inside of her, and seemed fine. She was eating her grandmother’s borscht with garlic every day. She had never received the money that Mitya mentioned in the letter because someone at the post office must have gotten to it first.

“That’s too bad,” Marina wrote. “We could have used it. Ukraine is feeling worse and worse after the default in Russia, and the hryvnia has fallen hard. No one in my family has a job. I don’t want to sound mean, but I’m glad you didn’t come with me.”

Mitya wrote his answer to Marina in one of his wrinkly composition books, while the teacher droned about math. He still felt guilty, but not as much, as the recession was taking its toll.

Yelena Viktorovna was fired in early October after a fascinating workday.

She was Lana’s kitchen, ironing the boss’s shirts and watching The Streets of Broken Lights, the new TV show about the adventures of militsionery in Saint Petersburg. The boss’s mother was there, too, cooking some mountain Jewish dish from spinach and eggs for lunch. Kristina came in to cut the label off the new top Lana had bought for her and took the scissors from the kitchen cabinet. When the grandmother said that the dress top was too revealing, Kristina methodically and quickly stabbed her in the eyes.

Lana ran in from the living room and instructed Yelena Viktorovna to call the ER and the psychiatric emergency services, but not the militsia. Yelena Viktorovna got on the phone while trying to stop the bleeding from the elderly woman’s face with a kitchen towel. Meanwhile, Lana managed to wrest the scissors out of Kristina’s hand, despite the mad, primal strength that filled the girl.

After an urgent surgery, the grandmother survived but lost vision in both of her eyes. A few days later, Kristina was diagnosed with schizophrenia. And though the family now needed even more help at home, Lana did not want to continue the employment of Yelena Viktorovna.

“You understand, of course, it’s a delicate matter,” Lana told her a week after the incident.

“‘It is a delicate matter,’” Yelena Viktorovna fumed to her mother and son that night. “I keep having nightmares. Some of them have the livid Kristina stabbing her grandmother, but the majority are about trying to find a new job in the recession.”

Alyssa Vitalyevna was the only one in the family who got to keep her job, because of her relationship with Dr. Khristofor Khristoforovich Kherentzis.

“I never thought I’d be making a career ‘through the bed’ at sixty,” she said, leering. Her paycheck had shrunk, but at least there was the safety net of the best healthcare available in Moscow.