Tatyana Tolstaya - White Walls - Collected Stories

…So he ran away, he broke out and ran away. He knew, he knew the road all along! The forgotten roused themselves, the shades lifted their heads, transparent apparitions pricked up their ears, listening: he’s running, they’ve released him, go and meet him, go out on patrol, wave flags, light beacons! The sleepwalker is running along impassable paths, his eyelids closed, his arms outstretched, a quiet smile on his lips, as though he sees what the seeing cannot, as though he knows what they have forgotten, as though at night he grasps what is lost during the day. He runs over the dewy grass, through patches of moonlight and deep black shadows, over mushrooms and pale nocturnal bluebells, tiny baby frogs. He flies up hills, runs down hills, pure and bright, and under the bright moon, the heather lashes his fleet legs, night blows in his sleeping face, his white hair flutters in the wind, the forest parts, the maples blossom, light begins to appear.

Surely he’ll keep running till he meets the light?

“GO AWAY! Go awaaay, you lousy beast!”

Someone’s dog—white, matted, disgusting—not only jumped into the elevator after Serafim and whimpered, its paws pacing the dim, clunking box racing up toward the sixteenth floor, but dared to rush to the apartment, scratching insistently at the padding of the door while Serafim struggled with the keys on the landing.

“Get out of here!”

Serafim was squeamish about nudging the warm brute with his clean foot. The dog was possessed by a frightful impatience: it drummed at the door, quickly wedged its nose to the crack and snuffed the air, drummed again, insisted, would not be dissuaded.

Serafim stamped his foot and yelled—useless. He tried to trick the animal by swiftly pushing his way into the apartment, but, shuddering and wriggling like a furry snake, the filthy cur slithered in with hideous speed, rubbing against Serafim’s legs in the process, and ran around the dark room, its claws clicking. Serafim squealed, grabbed a mop, overtook the dog, struck it, struck again, kicked it out, slammed the door, and with a pounding heart collapsed against the frame. The fiend of hell quietly fluttered about on the landing, circling and rustling. It left.

His legs could still feel the revolting sensation of dog flesh slinking by. He felt nauseous.

Serafini lay against the door, calming himself. Better now? Almost.

Leave me alone. What do you all want from me? I don’t want anyone. I am separate. Higher. I descended from the starry fields to this filth, and when I’ve completed my earthly circle, I’ll go back from whence I came. Don’t touch me.

Serafini took off his coat, drank a glass of cold, clean water, lit two candles, sat down in front of the mirror, and took a look at himself. Handsome. He narrowed his eyes appraisingly, threw back his head, observed from the side—excellent! That’s me. Uncommonly fine! That’s—me! Mind your own business, all of you. He remembered the dog. Disgusting beast. He jumped up in horror and glanced at his trousers. Just as he thought—fur. Get rid of it immediately. A hot shower. He sat down at the mirror again.

…What a vile world. Women, children, old people, dogs… Yellow, heaving swill. Flesh is nauseating. The flesh of others is revolting. Only what’s mine is ravishing, pure, transparent. I am fleshless and sexless. I don’t play your games. Get your muck out of here.

Serafini looked into the dark mirror. On both sides of the glass was a pure, living flame. Heavenly countenance. Candles. Heavenly countenance. But only I am permitted to admire this marvelous, inhuman sight. Turn your nasty faces away from me.

To go to work Serafim was obliged to ride the bus. He tried not to look at the swinish snouts, the camellike muzzles, the hippopotamus cheeks. People are all vile! And all of them, base, revolting, are staring at Serafim with bug eyes, grinning their grins. Yes, I am magnificent. Yes, my face shines with an unworldly light. Yes, golden curls. Snow-white wings. Angelic eyes. Part, crowd. Stand aside—Serafim goes here!

He looked in the mirror once more. Serafim’s countenance swam up from the dark depths, wavering in the warm flame. A rosy glow, the reflected light of white wings behind his back. To gaze forever… Who are you, my beauty? Serafim sank into the divine reflection. Time to go to bed. Tomorrow would be a hard day. He blew out the flames, folded his wings together, and hung in the soft twilight.

For the Montgolfier brothers’ jubilee, the district was planning a mass flight of thirty kilometers. Serafim was also participating. He had to collect various papers: a bilirubin blood test, a general urine analysis, and a certificate of residency. I’ll fly higher than all of them, thought Serafim while the nurse drew his delicate blue blood through a tube. Higher than the crowd, higher than the human throng, higher than their base passions. I, a child of the ether, will spread my blinding, silky, snow-white wings like a million white hummingbirds. Oh, how magnificent my triumphant flight will be!

He strolled leisurely along the drying spring path, carrying his curly golden head high. The quacking word ZHEK—the housing office—squatted on a brown plaque. Get the residency certificate.

He pushed open the door and entered. Two old ladies were asleep in a room without curtains, furnished with rows of chairs. A middle-aged lecturer slowly read from a notebook covered with oilcloth:

“According to the absolutely apocryphal legend, god-the-father, who doesn’t exist, supposedly fertilized the so-called virgin Mary by way of the nonexistent holy spirit; the result of this fraudulent conception, according to the mendacious allegations of the clergymen, was the mythical figure of Christ, who is totally alien to us. These unfounded fabrications…”

The old ladies woke up.

“Come in, come in, Serafim!” cried the lecturer. “Today we’re having an anti-Easter lecture on the evil of the so-called immaculate conception. Have a seat, it’ll do you good to listen.”

Serafim looked at him coldly, slammed the door, and left. I’m against any kind of conception. Fight, lecturer. Fight. Eradicate. I’m above human beings, above their fables about vulgar gods giving birth to idiot infants in dirty cow sheds. I am pure spirit, I am Serafim!

At the store “Woodland Gifts they had pigeons. Serafim took a pair. Simmer in a covered pot for up to an hour and a half.

The pigeons bubbled in the pot. The doorbell rang. So. It’s Magda, his neighbor. She wants to get married. She visits Serafim under various pretexts, the redheaded scourge! Serafim folded his arms and began looking out the window, began to heat up. Magda sat down on the edge of the chair, her legs under it; she never knows where to put her hands. She likes Serafim. Vile thing! “Khhem…”

She’s thinking about how to start. She glances around the kitchen.

“You’re boiling a chicken?”

“Yes.”

“Khhem.”

Silence.

“I bought some pork, too, you know, a fairly large piece, well, I mean, about three pounds, I kept looking at it, thinking, should I take it or shouldn’t I, but I did; I thought I’d bake it or something, I stood in line a long time; when I got home and unwrapped it—all fat. All fat!”

Fat is nauseating muck. The whole world of flesh—is fat. Fatty, sticky children, fatty old ladies, fatty redheaded Magda.

“Ahem. I thought, maybe, I could do some washing for you, dirty sheets or whatever. You live alone.”

Go away, you nauseating creature. Go away, don’t soil my clean, clear, mountain spirit with your swinish hands. Go away.

She went away Serafim threw out the pigeons, drank a cup of clear broth. A pure, lean bird.