Sergey Dyachenko - Vita Nostra

Mom seemed pensive, as if she were calculating something in her head.

“When you are done eating, could you please run out and get some milk?”

“Sure,” barely containing her relief, Sasha placed her tortured slice back onto the plate. “Be right back.”

When she came back, her brother was already awake and lay on his back, thoughtfully studying the merry-go-round horses that swam slowly over his crib. Mom had already cleaned up the kitchen and was now pushing her iron over the ironing board. Steam rose over the baby’s blue shirt.

“I’m coming with you.”

“What?!” Sasha almost dropped the bag of groceries.

“I’m coming with you. Valentin can watch the baby for a couple of days.”

“It’s vacation time right now, there is no one at the Institute.”

“Then who is going to teach the extra classes?”

“My professor… Mom, wait, are you going to check up on where I live, who my friends are, what I do there?!”

“I want to see with my own eyes who’s teaching you, and what is going on there.”

“It’s a typical learning institution.”

Mom shook her head.

“No. You’re hiding something.”

The iron pressed into the shirt stretched over the board aggressively, like a tank. Mom kept pushing the iron over the same perfectly smooth spot.

“At first I didn’t want to humiliate you with my nurturing: beginning of independence, friends, boys… Then, to tell you the truth, I had other priorities. Then… Sasha, admit it, have you been threatened, and now you are afraid of confessing?”

“What am I supposed to confess?”

“Is that a cult? Do they make you pray?”

“No, of course not!”

“I am going to Torpa,” Mom’s voice was full of metal. “I am going, and… if need be, I will raise hell. I’ll get police involved, public prosecution office. I will find out what’s going on, and they will have to answer to me!”

A year and a half ago upon hearing such words Sasha would have wept and thrown herself into her mother’s arms. She would ask, beg her to come to Torpa, to help her, to save her. Back then she would have believed that her furious mother had power over Farit Kozhennikov.

“Kind of late, don’t you think?”

‘What?!”

“Mom, I don’t want to change anything. And I’m not going to allow you to interfere.”

“What?!”

Mom let go of the iron. It stayed on the ironing board, steam rose hissing underneath the platform, making the iron resemble a steam train.

“So it is a religious cult?”

“No. I don’t want to change anything.”

“You promised to return!”

“I never promised anything.”

“What have they done to you?”

“Nothing.”

“I’ll write a statement for the police.”

“On what ground? I’m over eighteen.”

“Have they poisoned you? Hypnotized you? Is it some sort of conspiracy?”

“Mom, it’s been going on for two years. Haven’t you noticed anything?!”

Mom stepped back.

A few minutes ago she was ready to attack, fight, defend. Now she looked as if she were hit on a head with a stick.

“Two years,” Sasha repeated ruthlessly. “Nothing can be done now.”

Mom stared at her as if through wet glass. As if the outline of Sasha’s face wavered in front of her, melting and flattening.

Black smoke rose from underneath the iron’s platform. Sasha forced the iron off the board; a burned hole gaped in the blue baby’s shirt.

‘You have a new life,” Sasha continued without remorse. “A new husband, a new baby, new happiness. And I have a new life too. I’m not leaving forever, but you should not try to force anything on me. Don’t try to find out what’s going in Torpa. Things are perfectly fine, believe me.”

The baby cried in the bedroom. Perhaps Sasha spoke too loudly. Mom flinched, but continued staring at Sasha.

“I feel badly about the way things worked out,” Sasha said looking at the hole in the baby’s shirt. ‘But there is no way back. I am sorry.”

“Miss! Torpa in fifteen minutes!”

“Yes, thank you. I’m awake.”

She’d never before returned to Torpa this early in the summer. The night was stuffy, windless. The train departed. Sasha walked ten meters along the platform and found herself knee-deep in fog.

The birds began waking up. The bus came on time.

The linden trees were green on Sacco and Vanzetti.

Sasha dragged her suitcase up to the third floor, unlocked the door of her loft. She placed the suitcase by the door, poured some water into a cup and watered the ivy in the flowerbox outside her window.

She lay down on her bed, stretched out—and realized she was home. She knew that the dark shadow circling over the city had melted. And she, Sasha, was once again a singular entity.

“Greetings, third years.”

September first in Torpa is always filled with sunshine. For the third time Group A was greeting the new school year, and for the third time outside the windows of the first auditorium—an Indian summer, green linden trees, dark shadows on the pavement, heat and dust.

Portnov remained true to himself: a wrinkled checkered shirt, old jeans, straight blonde hair pulled into a ponytail. His glasses, long and narrow like razors, designed to allow him to look over the lenses.

“Goldman, Yulia.”

“Here.”

“Bochkova, Anna.”

“Here.”

Once he called a student’s name and heard his or her answer, Portnov would allow for a short pause in order to bestow a significant glance upon the student. Occasionally the glance would last three or even four seconds.

“Biryukov, Dmitry.”

“Here.”

Somewhere in the assembly hall terrified first years listened to Gaudeamus. The dorm, filled with new residents, smelled of paint and fresh whitewash.

“Kovtun, Igor.”

“Here.”

“Kozhennikov, Konstantin.”

“Here.”

Kostya sat next to his wife. Clean-shaven, ascetically skinny, slouching slightly. Sasha’s heart skipped a beat when he walked into the auditorium; they said hello as if they only parted last night, and did not say another word to each other.

“Korotkov, Andrey.”

“Here.”

“Myaskovsky, Denis.”

“Here!”

Denis was smiling. The euphoria he experienced after he passed Sterkh’s test put a stop to his prolonged depression. Sasha noticed that Denis looked suntanned and that he sat sprawling at the table, one leg thrown over the other, and judging by his looks, he was not afraid of anything.

“Onishhenko, Larisa.”

“Here.”

“Pavlenko, Lisa.”

“Here.”

Dressed in a black tee-shirt and black jeans, completely devoid of makeup, Lisa resembled a monochrome photograph. Smooth blonde hair appeared to be glued to her head.

“Monastery style,” Portnov said. “You’re missing a wimple.”

Lisa did not reply.

“Samokhina, Alexandra.”

“Here.”

They glared at each other for five seconds or so—Portnov over his glasses, Sasha—straight at him. Portnov was the first one to look away.

“Toporko, Zhenya.”

“Here!”

Zhenya had gained some weight, and Sasha thought that her face had grown harsh. Zhenya pushed her pencil over an empty page in her notepad, as if scared of looking up at her professor.

“Very good,” Portnov leaned back in his chair. “Congratulations on the beginning of your third year. This semester we will concentrate on studying Speech as a multilevel system of efforts that either alter the world, or prevent it from changing.”

The third years of Group A resembled a garden of stones. No one moved. It seemed that no one even blinked.