“I’ve found a solution,” mumbled the old man, “A solution for all Lithuanians. It’s too late for me now, but I’ll pass on the secret to Vytelis. He still can. .”
It was sad and depressing. Here this all-powerful old man’s entire life didn’t even earn him a nurse at his deathbed! They kicked him out of the hospital so he wouldn’t ruin the mortality rating!
The Soviet hospital is the most immortal in the world!
I kept thinking: and what do I have to do with this? Why me in particular? Somewhere I read this thought: one London money lender loved and suffered, stockpiled money and worried, in a word, lived his life, without even suspecting that the only purpose of his life, all of its meaning, was to catch the eye of an alcoholic playwright and to become the prototype for Shylock. More and more, I’ve come to believe the only purpose and meaning of my life is to be the commentator on VV’s fate, to create an epitaph for him, and at the same time for Lithuania; to write my mlog.
“I’ve found a solution!” the old man wheezed. “Tear off your balls and don’t give birth to any more Lithuanians! Tell Vytelis so he’ll hurry! Don’t let him wait until the end like me! He should hurry! Later it’ll be too late!”
The old man, his covers pulled off, tugged at his masculinity like he really did want to rip it out. It was the second time in my life I had seen such a bulky sexual organ — the first one like that belonged to VV.
Things were even more fun at the old man’s wake. The ghosts of Vilnius who gathered there awoke even my exhausted brain. You couldn’t call those people anything else. Nearly hundred-year-old men and women. I never suspected people like that even existed. Some of them wore tuxedos. Greenish mold shone on their lapels. Spittle ran out of their mouths, and one old lady hiccupped nonstop and blew farts continuously. A lively old man most drew my attention. He was completely bald, and kept saying over and over that he’s called Rafalas and is a count. He was the only one who didn’t fall asleep during the night of the wake, but right before morning he peed on himself. With great dignity, he got up from the bench, leaned over and sniffed at the puddle, then sat down again somewhere else. Those ghosts were furiously intrigued by only one thing: would they bury Vargalys with his false teeth, or had they ripped them out? Choosing his moment, the bald Rafalas, with unexpected strength and agility, opened the corpse’s mouth and pensively announced to the gathered crowd that the dentures were in place. The old folks spiritedly discussed this information for some time, and then quieted down again. A few hours later, he got interested again in whether Vargalys would be buried with or without his dentures. Rafalas inspected the corpse’s mouth again. Everyone got lively again and discussed the news — in the exact same words they had used earlier. I thought I would go out of my mind. I was the only vaguely normal person in that company. None of that moldy crew went to the burial. I stood at the graveside all alone. I was soaked by an annoying, murky rain the entire time.
After that funeral, I wanted to punch VV in the nose. Since I’m like a dwarf in comparison to him, I had decided to smack him with some brick or a cudgel. I opened the door to his office panting with rage, and he raised his deep, intelligent, suffering eyes to me. I saw such despair in them that I immediately backed down. VV didn’t live in our world; at that moment he was somewhere completely, utterly different.
“I’ve thought of it at last,” he said suddenly. “The best thing to do would be to get castrated.”
Some ancient nation (perhaps more than one) has already thought up a mythological God who, in disappointment with the world, fixed himself — so that his seed wouldn’t prolong the degenerate human race. To cut your throat means no more than to make an end of yourself. To destroy your seed means much more: to make an end of your entire family, of all your descendants. That was what the elder Vytautas Vargalys wanted to say, that it would have been better if neither his son nor his grandson had ever been born. That they shouldn’t have been born, that in a certain sense they hadn’t been born, they’d never lived. This thought inspired him with the desire to destroy the horrible future waiting for us all, that it would be better if it never came.
The defenders of Pilėnai, to a man, burned themselves alive, but they didn’t become slaves for the invaders. Homo lithuanicus, smacking his lips in excitement, listens to the opera about Pilėnai, but out of all of Lithuania, only Kalanta burned himself to death. All the rest slave away quite valiantly.
At least the senior Vytautas Vargalys offered a decent solution. Without Lithuanians, the world wouldn’t be either better or worse. Haven’t any number of small ethnic groups disappeared without a trace? A sudden end would be quite a bit better than a slow death in the Ass of the Universe.
Why VV got the urge to castrate himself, I don’t know. Despite the horrifying measurements of his sexual organ, VV was sterile. I know this for sure. I shamelessly questioned a plastered Kovarskis; he had tried to cure VV. Unfortunately, the Siberian permafrost irreparably locked up VV’s seed; it stayed there, behind the barbed wire of the camp. No, his sexual prowess wasn’t affected; he was unusually potent, but infertile.
Probably VV was particularly Lithuanian in this symbolic sense alone; the true apotheosis of homo lithuanicus: of gigantic proportions, enormous power, but absolutely infertile.
Perhaps because I knew this, I was struck speechless the first time I saw VV naked. His masculinity wasn’t just gigantic. It was carefully tended, even, and smooth, without the slightest wrinkle or protruding vein. It was so flawless it looked fake.
It wasn’t merely that he and Lolita had no intention of prolonging the human race; they were incapable of it. The two of them had been condemned beforehand to the divine suicide VV’s grandfather suggested.
Poor Lolita was the victim of her origins, her position, and her passions. She was in a hurry to place herself upon the sacrificial altar. Perhaps she secretly wanted to be incinerated and at least rise up to the heavens in sacred smoke.
She didn’t take into account that smoke can only go down in the Ass of the Universe.
When she sat on the floor in my room, she would look quite tiny, helpless, and defenseless; you could encircle her with one hand. I understood her rudeness — it was only a defense against the world.
Lolita, Lolita, Lolita! Where are you now? Is the other hell worse than the hell of our lives?
When I can think for at least a few minutes, I get tired right away. I’ve gotten unaccustomed to thinking. Today an investigator slunk into the library and was asking about everything under the sun. But probably least of all about Lolita and her relationship with VV. He was interested in weird things: V’s habits, his predilections and buddies, even what bookshelves he would rummage through. What could that mean? I don’t get it.
I’m going to that wretched coffee break. Our office’s habits wouldn’t change even if the prophecies of the Revelations started coming true.
“It’s surely some kind of conspiracy,” Elena declared as soon as I walked in. “They don’t investigate things this thoroughly for no reason. It looks like there was an entire group at work here. Lola could have been sent here on purpose. You do know who her father is.”
I sit directly across from her, like I always do. Even the places around the coffee table haven’t changed. VV’s and Lolita’s chairs are empty, so Marija’s left at the end of the table, seemingly cut off from the others.
“It’s really awful about the meat,” she replies pensively. “Yesterday there was nothing but boiled sausage for two-twenty in the store — and only one kind too. In the meat section just chicken and pig heads. It’s just awful.”