Russian Debutante's Handbook (29 page)

Wheezing along with his new pal, Vladimir hardly noticed that Mother had slipped into the room and was leaning over their prone bodies. “Ah,
druzhki,
” she whispered to them, a word meaning, roughly, “little friends,” a word Vladimir to this day considered one of the most tender of his youth. “Has anyone assaulted you yet?” she asked them.

“No one has touched us,” they whispered back.

“Good . . . Then get some rest,” she said, pretending they were battle-hardened comrades returning from the front. She gave them each a Little Red Riding Hood chocolate candy, as tasty a candy as one could hope for, and rolled them into a blanket. “I like your mama’s hair, the way it’s so black you can almost see yourself in it,” Lionya said thoughtfully.

“She is beautiful,” Vladimir agreed. His mouth coated with chocolate, he went to sleep and dreamt that the three of them—Mother, Lionya, and he—were hiding along with Lenin in his horse-tail tent. It was cramped. There wasn’t much room for bravery or anything else. All they could do was huddle together and await an uncertain future. To pass the time, they took turns braiding Mother’s lustrous hair, making sure it framed her delicate temples just so. Even V. I. Lenin had to admit to his young friends that “it is always a great honor to braid the hair of Yelena Petrovna Girshkin of Leningrad.”

BACK IN HIS
prava
panelak,
Vladimir got up from his bed. He tried walking the way Mother had shown him a few months ago in Westchester. He straightened his posture until his back hurt. He put his feet together gentile-style, nearly scuffing his shiny new loafers, a parting gift from SoHo. But in the end he found the whole exercise pointless. If he could survive Soviet kindergarten hobbling Jewishly from humiliation to humiliation, then surely he could survive the scrutiny of some Midwestern clown named Plank.

And yet, even at a distance of half the globe, he could still feel Mother’s fingers poking his spine, her eyes moistening, the lyrical hysteria well on its way . . . How she had loved him once! How she had doted on her only child! How she had set an absolute standard for herself: I will do anything in the world for him, throw myself in front of the likes of Seryozha Klimov, enlist five-year-old playmates to his cause, leave my dying mother behind to emigrate to the States, force my ne’er-do-well husband into a life of illicit profit, just to make sure little Vladimir continues to breathe each shallow breath in safety and comfort.

How does one person sign over an entire lifetime to another? Selfish Vladimir could hardly begin to imagine it. And yet generations of Jewish-Russian women had done the same for their sons. Vladimir was part of a grand tradition of ultimate sacrifice and unbounded insanity. Only he had somehow managed to break free of this filial bondage and now found himself motherless and alone, punished and chastened.

What do I do now?
Vladimir asked the woman across the ocean.
Help me, Mama . . .

Amid the ghostly warble of old Soviet satellites circling over Prava, Mother gave her answer.
Proceed, my little treasure!
she said.
Take those uncultured bastards for all they’re worth!

What?
He looked up to the cardboard ceiling above him. He had not expected such criminal candor.
But how can you be sure? What about the wrath of Cohen . . .

Cohen’s an ignoramus,
came the reply.
He’s no Lionya Abramov. Just another American, like that smiling hippopotamus-girl at my office who tried to screw me over last week. Who’s smiling now, fat
suka?
 . . . No, the time for Phase Two has come, my son. Take your little poem to the reading. Do not be afraid . . .

Grateful for the imprimatur, Vladimir lifted his hands up to the sky, as if he could reach out across the ether of uncertain space and false memory and once again braid Mother’s hair on the long train ride to Yalta, massage the white scalp between her parted locks.
If I succeed tomorrow,
Vladimir told her,
it will be because of you. You are the mistress of daring and perseverance. No matter how I may place my feet, I am endowed with everything you have taught me. Please do not worry for me . . .

My whole life is worry for you,
Mother replied, but at this juncture, with a great declarative thump, the living-room door nearly collapsed under the force of two rifle butts.

“
VLADIMIR BORISOVICH
!”
A
duo of throaty Russian voices shouted from the hallway, interrupting Vladimir’s transatlantic séance. “Hey, you! Opa! Wake up in there!”

Vladimir quickly waddled over to the door, losing both slippers in his haste, his ears still ringing with Mother’s godlike intonation. “What is the meaning?” he shouted. “I am an associate of the Groundhog!”

“The Groundhog wants you, pussycat,” one of the louts shouted back. “It’s
banya
time!”

Vladimir opened the door. “What
banya?
” he said to the two big peasants, their faces completely yellowed by a lifetime of drinking, so that in the pale glow of the hallway they appeared perfectly green. “I have already bathed this morning.”

“The Groundhog said take Vladimir Borisovich to the
banya,
so put on a towel and let’s go,” they said in unison.

“What nonsense.”

“Do you dispute the Groundhog?”

“I follow the Groundhog’s imperatives blindly,” Vladimir told his intruders, who both looked like adult versions of Seryozha Klimov, the hooligan from kindergarten. What if they tried to pinch him to death à la Seryozha? Mother was certainly not here to
protect him, and Lionya Abramov, his former best buddy, was probably running some sleazy night club in Haifa. “Where is this
banya
?” Vladimir demanded.

“Building three. There is no changing room, so put on your towel now.”

“You expect me to walk over to building three in nothing but a towel.”

“That is the procedure.”

“Do you know who you’re talking to?”

“Yes,” the two men answered without hesitation. “We answer to Gusev!” one of them added, as if that alone explained their impertinence.

AS TOWEL
-
CLAD VLADIMIR
walked across the courtyard to the third
panelak
flanked by his two armed escorts, a group of Kasino whores peeked out of their gloomy hole to whistle at the near-naked young man, who instinctively covered his breasts with both hands the way he had seen buxom girls do it in pornographic literature. So it had been a setup! Gusev angling to humiliate him, that turd. Perhaps he had forgotten that Vladimir was the son of Yelena Petrovna Girshkin, the ruthless czarina of Scarsdale and Soviet kindergarten both . . . Well, thought Vladimir, we shall see who will fuck whom, or, as they say in Russian in two simple, elegant syllables—
kto kovo.

The
banya
wasn’t a true Russian bathhouse with its peeling walls and charcoal-stained stoves, but rather a tiny prefab Swedish sauna (as dull and wooden as Vladimir’s furniture), which had been attached to the
panelak
in a makeshift manner, like a space module to the Mir. Here, the Groundhog and Gusev were slowly cooking themselves alongside a platter of dried fish and a small barrel of Unesko.

“The King of the Americans has deigned to bathe with us,” Gusev announced upon Vladimir’s arrival, fanning himself with a large salt-encrusted perch. Without clothes, Gusev’s body matched the Groundhog’s curve for curve, a preview of what Vladimir would look like ten years hence unless he succumbed to Kostya’s exercise regimen. “And have we been sleeping ’till this late hour?” Gusev asked. “My men tell me your car and driver have been idle all day.”

“And what business is this of yours?” Vladimir said carelessly as he picked up the traditional bundle of birch twigs with which the Russian bather flogs himself, supposedly to improve circulation. He flicked the birch through the air in what was meant to be a menacing gesture, but the wet twigs only said, “Shoo,” in a sad and lethargic way.

“What business?” Gusev bellowed. “According to our money man, in the past two weeks alone you’ve spent five hundred U.S. dollars for drinks, a thousand for dinners, and two thousand for hashish. For hashish, mind you! And this when Marusya has her own little opium garden right here on the premises. Or perhaps our opium’s not good enough for you, eh,
Volodechka?
Some thrifty Jew we’ve found ourselves, Groundhog. He thinks he’s the party boss of Odessa.”

“Groundhog—” began Vladimir.

“Enough, the two of you!” the Groundhog shouted. “I come to the
banya
for relaxation, not to hear this pettiness.” He spread himself out on a bench, his stomach overhanging both sides, sweat running down the pocked immensity of his dorsal plane. “Two thousand for hashish, ten thousand for whores . . . Who cares? Melashvili just phoned from the
Sovetskaya Vlast’,
they’re leaving Hong Kong with nine hundred thousand worth of crap. Everything’s fine.”

“Yes, everything’s fine,” Gusev sneered, biting off the perch’s
head and spitting it onto the steaming logs in the corner. “Melashvili, that nice Georgian black-ass has to toil the world over to keep our Girshkin happy—”

Vladimir leapt up in anger, nearly dropping the towel that covered his small manhood, a weakness he did not want exposed. “Not one more word from you!” he shouted. “In the past two weeks I’ve befriended nearly every American in Prava, I’ve started work on a new literary magazine which will take the Western element by storm, my name has appeared twice in
Prava-dence,
the expatriate’s journal of record, and tomorrow I will be an honored guest at an important reading of rich English-speakers. And after all the work I’ve done, most of it stupid and degrading, you dare accuse me . . .”

“Aha! Do you hear that, Goose?” the Groundhog said. “He’s publishing magazines, making rich friends, going to readings. Good boy! Keep at it, and you’ll make me proud. Say, Gusev, remember those readings we used to go to as kids? Those poetry contests . . . Write a poem on the theme ‘The Oft-Tested Manliness of the Red Tractor Brigade.’ Such fun! I fucked a girl at one of those, I surely did. She was dark like an Armenian. Oh, yes.”

“I do not question your authority,” Gusev began, “but I do—”

“Oh, shut up already, Misha,” the Groundhog said. “Save your whining for the
biznesmenski
lunch.” He reached over to the fish platter and shoved a small specimen into his mouth. “Vladimir, my friend, come here and strike me with the twigs. Got to keep my blood going, or I’ll melt on the spot.”

“I beg—” Vladimir started to say.

“Hey, hey, fellow!” Gusev shouted as he leapt to his feet. “What’s the meaning? Hey! Only I am permitted to whip the Groundhog. That’s practically
diktat
around here. Just ask anyone in the organization. Put down those twigs, I say, or it won’t be cheerful for you.”

“You’re being petty again, Mikhail Nikolaevich,” the
Groundhog warned. “Why shouldn’t Vladimir give me a whipping? He’s a strong young buck. He’s worked hard. He’s earned it.”

“Just look at him!” shouted Gusev. “He’s flabby and weak-wristed. He’s half my age and already his breasts are distended like a cow’s. Oh, he’ll whip you like a little pederast, that’s for certain! And you deserve so much better, Groundhog.”

Any discomfort Vladimir may have had at the prospect of whipping his employer faded with Gusev’s words. Before he even knew it, his hand had made an angry gesture through the air and there was a clap of thunder at the Groundhog’s back. “Mwwwaaarff!” cried the Groundhog. “Uga. Hey, there. That’s the stuff!”

“Is this the whipping of a pederast?” shouted Vladimir, shockingly unconcerned over the illogic of that sentence, as he flagellated the Hog once again.

“
Bozhe moi,
that’s pain, all right,” the Groundhog grunted with pleasure. “But a little higher up next time. I’ve got to sit on that thing.”

“To the devil with both of you!” Gusev whispered loudly. He stepped up to Vladimir on his way out, ostensibly to give him the look of a lifetime, but Vladimir, knowing better, busied his eyes with the red topography of the Groundhog’s back, a challenge for any budding cartographer. Still, he couldn’t avoid a glimpse of Gusev’s neck, a thick and corded piece of anatomy, despite the corpulent disorder below.

Only after Gusev had slammed the door behind him did Vladimir remember his childhood fear of saunas, the paranoid feeling that someone was going to lock the door and let him steam to death inside. He thought of himself and the Groundhog trapped together, their skin as translucent as that of a steamed dumpling, nothing inside but boiled meat: it seemed like the worst death imaginable.

“Oh, but why have you stopped,” moaned the Groundhog.

“No, I shall prevail over that fat-necked bastard,” Vladimir muttered to himself, and he set to task with such ferocity that upon his first strike a purple-black pimple exploded, and the Hog’s heavy blood made its way through the sauna’s fishy air, which was as thick and inviolable as Gusev himself.

“Yes, yes,” the Groundhog shouted. “That’s the way! How quickly you learn, Vladimir Borisovich.”

THE JOY WAS
a vegetarian restaurant but beneath it lay a meat market of a disco where the perennially hard-up regulars lured unsuspecting backpackers, many still sporting their Phi Zeta Mu T-shirts, into nights of forgetfulness and mornings of waking up on a futon in the nether reaches of Prava’s suburbs, trying to connect with an authority figure back in the States on an antiquated telephone that could barely reach out across the Tavlata. On Sundays they had readings.

Vladimir went down the threadbare stairs, where the small pink-and-mauve dance floor was lit up by a series of overly bright halogen lights, giving the place the look of a rather impersonal womb. Presently, this arena accommodated three rings of plastic chairs and weathered couches and recliners; randomly placed coffee tables were home to bright, shapely drinks from the bar; and the artists and spectators themselves wore their Sunday best—jackets all around and hair tied or slicked back. Earrings and piercings gleamed peacefully from within their thoroughly scrubbed fleshy enclosures, gusts of rolled American Spirit tobacco emerged from fresh-colored lips, lingered in newly trimmed goatees.