“What will I say to him? How will I be able to look him in the eye? He’ll figure everything out as soon as he sees me. I won’t even have to admit anything. He’ll rip my throat out,” Mark thought, “or break my legs—one at a time—or stomp my ribs in, or scalp me, or gouge my eyes out and leave me to beg for alms in the streets. I’ll sit there on the warm asphalt with my McDonald’s cup, asking for spare change, but he’ll take it all from me at the end of the day and dump it into his capacious pockets. But first he’ll tell his sisters—Zina and my mom—and they’ll finish me off, doing what he wouldn’t dare do—they’ll deprive me of my manhood. Literally. They’ll cut my private parts off with a pair of garden shears. What’s my mom supposed to say to this? What does my mom usually say in these kinds of situations?” Mark thought for a bit but couldn’t come up with anything. Well, he couldn’t recall any situations quite like this one. Clearly, his mom would side with her niece, try to calm and console her. They’d sit there on Kolia’s rug, trying to figure out what to do with Mark first—hang him in the hallway or quarter him in the kitchen. “Well, it’s my own fault. I got myself into this mess; nobody made me drink with her on the rug, nobody made me listen to her stories, and nobody made me… well, come in her,” Mark thought. He was holding Kolia’s breakfast; he looked exhausted, his gaze was weary, and he had a few fresh scratches on his neck.
Kolia received him gloomily, nodded wordlessly as he snatched his breakfast, looked at the fish Nastia had prepared, clearly suspicious, and sniffed the herbs mistrustfully.
“Fish? She knows I can’t have fish.”
Something had clearly gone down. Kolia had apparently been showing the other patients who was boss—the gentleman promptly brought him and Mark two teabags, the factory worker passed him his heating wand, and the headphones guy turned toward the wall submissively. Kolia sat on his bed, looking at something behind Mark, so he could neither meet his eyes, nor look away.
“Markster,” Kolia said, starting to put the pressure on, “children are not always born out of love. Sometimes their coming into this world is random and unplanned. Then their lives are full of hardship and adventure—but mostly just hardship.”
“What’s he talking about?” Mark thought in a panic. “Has he really figured everything out already? Why isn’t he stomping my ribs in yet?”
“Hey sleepyhead, what’s the deal?” Kolia asked, finally looking at him.
“I was up all night,” Mark explained.
“Well, obviously you were up all night if you’re sleepy,” Kolia said. “How come you were up all night?”
“I had some work to do.”
“Good, I’m glad you’re keeping busy.”
What was he talking about? Mark could feel himself starting to sweat profusely. What was he hinting at? As soon as Kolia reached for his food, Mark tried to wipe off those first beads of sweat dripping down his face in one swift motion before they could betray him, but Kolia lifted his head lightning-fast. He saw everything. Mark felt blood rushing up toward his throat, then even higher. He sat there in front of the dark and heavy Kolia, sweating bullets and blushing deeply. All he could do was keep sitting there, not knowing what to do with his hands or how to conceal the scratches on his neck. Kolia, gaze still fixed on him, rooted around in the bag, took out the fried fish, and started gnawing on it wordlessly, without even looking down. Sauce clung to the edges of his mouth and green flakes of garnish stuck to his chin; his eyes were all bleary and his face had swollen up. “He can’t eat fish,” Mark thought. “Maybe I can’t either.”
“How’s your mom?” Kolia asked, chewing. He chewed slowly and methodically, the way conspirators chew up codebooks to confound their enemies.
“Fine,” Mark answered reluctantly. He was absolutely convinced that he’d already been exposed and sentenced.
“Fine?” Kolia asked incredulously, continuing to masticate the fish with his yellow incisors. “Tell her to give me a call.”
Mark nodded.
“The women in our family have always known how to make good fish,” Kolia said, scrutinizing his nephew. He spoke quietly, but Mark had no doubt that everyone in the ward could hear him—even the headphones guy. “Fish takes time. The women in our family have always had time. Nobody has ever pressured them. I’ve never pressured them. I’d advise you never to pressure them either.”
“I didn’t.” Mark’s answer said more than he meant it to.
“You sure about that?”
“Yeah.”
“All right, then.” Kolia tossed the rest of the fish back into the bag, had Mark hold it, took a towel out from under his pillow, carefully wiped his face, took the bag from Mark, and stuck it under his blanket. “There’s no need to pressure people,” he continued. “There’s no need to lie either.”
“I’d better get going,” Mark answered. “I’ve gotta get back to work.”
Nastia was waiting for him, sitting barefoot on the steps. When he came over toward her, she got up, turned around, and disappeared behind the apartment door. Mark hurried after her.
She awoke in the middle of the night, moved his arm away gently, so as not to wake him, got up, opened the suitcase on the floor of Kolia’s bedroom, found some pills, and took them with a sip of wine. Mark woke up and touched her skin. Nastia shuddered, but calmed down quickly; she turned toward him. Lying on his stomach, he rested his chin on her lap, considering her suitcase, reaching out to touch her things. “It’s all up to us,” he thought. “We can make it happen, if we want. I can’t change anything now. This is how it’s gonna be.” He took out some books and started leafing through them. They were chemistry textbooks and detective novels. They typically use poisons in detective stories, so they’re basically chemistry textbooks too. He picked up pieces of clothing she had worn, feeling how coarse the fabric was. Nastia didn’t object. Then he picked up an icon. It depicted a female saint. With a dark face and bright clothes.
“Who is she?” Mark asked.
“Saint Sarah,” Nastia said.
“What kind of name is that? Was she Jewish?”
“Uh-uh, she was Egyptian,” Nastia answered, from out of the darkness. “She saved a boat with some important people on it.”
“So what do you have her for?”
“I got her at camp. Ages ago. When I was a kid, I mean. My mom would send me to a Catholic camp.”
“Why?”
“Well, she had to send me somewhere for the summer. She wouldn’t keep me in town, she was afraid I’d run away. We didn’t have the money for a regular camp, so Mom let the Catholics deal with me, and they gave me Sarah as a going-away present. You see that writing at the top?”
“What’s it say?”
“Well, besides all the stuff about Jesus and the church hierarchy, it says that the greatest danger is hidden in rivers… but the most reliable protection is down there, too, because rivers separate friend from foe and partition light from darkness; they protect us from immediate threats and unexpected turns of events. All you have to do is hug the shore and be ready to administer first aid when you’re out there on the water. Can you swim?”
“Yeah, but not very well.” Mark didn’t want to think about the time he and Kolia took their fishing nets out to the reservoir and he tumbled into the black rift of the water. Kolia had to fish him out and resuscitate him with alcohol, cursing him up and down all the while.