"Don't be angry at me, Roseanne," I said passionately, "it's my misfortune, it's my disease. Everyone in our family was alcoholic," I said without a trace of embarrassment. "My uncle the doctor died under the wheels of a train. I hadn't told you, I'm ashamed to tell, but now I'm forced to. I'm holding my own, but it's a hereditary disease, sometimes I don't have the strength to fight it." Moved by the solemnity of the moment 2nd the secret I was supposedly confiding, I even sat up in bed.
My brazen lie made an impression on her. She looked at me attentively, sighed, and said, "Yes, I thought you had something the matter with you. But I thought you were conscious and wanted to get back at me for not giving you enough attention. I saw you were nervous, but it was a party, there were so many people, one asking where's the salt, another where's the pepper, a third where's something else, I got so tired.
"Lily should have left," she went on. "Everyone saw you in each other's arms, that's bad, why do Russians always get so drunk. We had interesting people, this poet, George, we planned to read some poetry, then we thought you'd read too. But why did your friend get drunk?" she said. "Why are you Russians forever getting drunk? Masha got drunk. We had a drunk Russian poet lying in one corner, a drunk Russian writer in the other."
"I've told you why I got drunk," I said ruefully. "It doesn't happen often, only when I'm very nervous. In a calm mood I'm perfectly normal. Often I don't have the strength to fight my disease," I concluded, and assumed a bleak, humble expression. "Forgive me, Roseanne," I added.
Sober Seva, the photographer, later told me that the Chinese girl was fucking terrific, that I had made no mistake, and that although he, Seva, was with his wife, he had nevertheless counted on getting something going with her, but when he was ready to make his move he saw that I was already lying down – lying down, you notice – with my arms around her, kissing her, and saying something, all but making love, in front of everyone.
"And how did she react to it?" I asked Seva.
"She lay there, she felt awkward, of course, there was a crowd of people around, but you could see she was enjoying it, she was giggling. Roseanne chased her out, Roseanne even cried, she was so furious. When you have a girl friend like that, don't invite her," Seva concluded philosophically.
Seva reported all this to me later. But even that morning it was clear to me what I had done with Lily. I knew myself well.
"Yes, you were nervous because I wasn't paying attention to you," Roseanne persuaded herself. I had begun sinking into a doze, which was about to turn into sweet slumber. You think I fell asleep? Fuck no. She wouldn't let me. The love of order that she had brought from Germany summoned her to clean the apartment. Since I was in the house, she had to make use of me. Subsequently I was amazed by her ability to use me and evidently everyone else. If I was going out, even after making love, even at two in the morning, she did not forget to hand me a bag of garbage, which I was supposed to stick in the garbage chute on my way. If I came to her penthouse to get a tan, she always thought up some job for me – first I had to help her transplant flowers, then it was some other equally urgent matter…
Even that morning she wouldn't let me sleep. Instead of lying there, sleeping, waking up, and loving each other – despite all, we had become lovers that night – I was forced to crawl out to the living room, reeling with fatigue and barely propping up my eyelids with my hands to keep my eyes from closing. Then, like sleepy flies, she a spiteful and irritated fly and I an unhappy one submitting to someone else's will, we had breakfast on the veranda.
It was all in small quantities, but nicely served. I would have preferred to eat without plates, but more of it. She was muttering and practically weeping, kept going to the telephone, having long conversations, not forgetting to report that she had had a party yesterday and the Russians had been very drunk.
I drank from a big jug of wine, I had a splitting headache from the sun. A bright red tomato lay cut open on the table, a little breeze was blowing, there seemed to be all the makings of a good mood and happiness, if it weren't for Roseanne. I drank wine; people had brought so much that there was a month's supply left, she had told everyone to bring wine, everyone had obediently done so.
I drank three glasses of California chablis from a gallon jug, dreadful shit. I must say I would have preferred a bottle of beaujolais. I saw Roseanne had five or six bottles of good wine left; why drink shit if you can drink good wine? But she didn't offer it to me, and I didn't want to start a conversation about wine with her when she was irritated, she wouldn't have understood. Subsequently she always gave me bad wine, although she had good wine, French or Spanish, lying right next to it.
The general principle is correct, you know, thrifty. Why waste bad wine. She always asked me, "What, is the wine bad?" But she couldn't fight herself, she always invariably gave me the bad. Poor girl, what psychic torment I caused her. Sometimes I wanted to bawl, "Yes, the wine's bad! Bad! Shitty! Give me that one over there, Roseanne, the Spanish one! I know what's what in wine, why begrudge the good stuff, woman? You don't buy it, after all, people bring it. So let's have it! And not in a piddling glass, drag out the bottle!"
Oh, I never did say it. My mama had taught me, and so had my papa – Communist and political instructor, worked in the MVD's secret police force – they taught me while they could, my parents did: "Don't throw people's weaknesses up to them, Edichka, pity them, don't hurt them. He who has a weakness is already hurt!"
I felt no malice toward her, toward Roseanne. Well, was it her fault if she was stingy by my standards? She had been born in this world, where children were not raised to be carefree idlers and wastrels. The gesture, the display, the overgenerosity that suited us barbarians, us Georgians and Russians – according to one anecdote, a Georgian leaves his overcoat as a tip for the doorman and instead of saying "Keep the change!" says "Keep the coat!" – this was hardly necessary in a young lady from a Jewish family that had emigrated from Germany.
"You've come to an alien land, be patient, they have different customs here," I told myself with anguish, watching the wine in my glass diminish at each swallow. Thank God, while she was on the phone I managed to drain my glass twice more, since it hardly showed on the gallon jug.
"Does she understand that I can view her this way, from such an unexpected angle?" I wondered. "She should have foreseen it; after all, she's been to Russia."
Oh, it may be petty, but this was what formed my image of her. I was open, so help me, I was open to people; I stopped at any word on the street; I sought love, wanted love, and could give it myself; but I couldn't give it when things were this way. All this stuck in my mind, you can't cast out your petty displeasures. Even when I fucked her I could not forget this pettiness, could not separate her sweet cunt from her stinginess – stinginess in my view, gentlemen, only in my view. To you, perhaps, it's the rule.
I didn't thrust my preference on her. But if she had good wine and we were lovers, I simply could not comprehend why she didn't give it to me. I, after all, begrudged nothing, gentlemen. Such feasts I put on for my guests in Russia, even though a poor man! To celebrate my birthday, for instance, I went to the bazaar with friends and bought fifty pounds of meat, gentlemen, and invited forty people, and bought liquor the Russian way, allowing a bottle of vodka per boy, a bottle of wine per girl. I spent all my money, to my last kopeck, and at times I also borrowed. I had no bank accounts, I cared little what the morrow would bring. "God will give the day, God will give us food," as my grandma Vera used to say.