Albena Stambolova - Everything Happens as It Does

When Philip woke up, Rallie was gone. After a momentary pang of fear, he realized he felt exhausted and slumped back onto the pillows. Images from the previous night rushed through his mind. He was certain that if he called the apartment in Suhata Reka, Stephie or one of the other girls would tell him that Rallie had gone to work. And what was he calling about anyway?

What life was this? It seemed to Philip that despair had deluged the world and people were living sub-aquatic lives. He had started to move through his daily obligations more and more like a ghost, like a sleeper through a dream, as if driven by someone’s dreadful spell.

His job consisted of finding causes. The causes of death. Only one thing prevented him from succumbing to the anguish of staring at the pale corpses — his students. He was outstanding as a teacher. He was good at it; it was his calling, he knew. After the last crisis, when he had again blamed himself for the death of a “patient,” his doctor had recommended finding another job. But Philip decided to keep struggling, or at least to give it another try.

That was when he discovered he enjoyed working with students, with “the kids” as he called them. It wasn’t the first time he had read lectures or led laboratory classes. But he had never realized how good he was at it. If teaching anything to his own kids was entirely out of reach, here at least, he could be useful.

Of course, he doggedly clung to that “thing” inside him. And he was grateful to his colleagues for preventing his dismissal throughout this time of abysmal descents into underwater caves.

He knew that he was hanging by a thread. More than anything, he yearned to break free from himself, to flee from something he designated by the harmless word “failure.” All words seemed innocent in comparison to the unnamable, that which every now and then hurled into the world a different Philip, with a face familiar to no one. Not to his brother, not to his parents, not to his friends.

Only his doctor recognized these faces as a collection of new personae of sorts. But whether his doctor kept them, or hid them in a file somewhere, whether he found them of any use once Philip had reverted to the familiar Philip, bending over to examine yet another corpse, he had no idea. What he knew with absolute certainty was that even if Maria and the twins could magically return in his life, things would still remain irreparable — this filled him with despair. For a brief moment it had been possible to be happy. For such a brief moment. And it now felt so incongruous with the rest of his life that Philip simply wondered when, if ever, the suffering would be over.

He opened his eyes again and decided to follow the movements of his body, to become dependent on them. Just as a diver was dependent on the movements of his body under water.

He decided to place his trust in a part of himself that was not his head and that — unlike his head — had never betrayed him.

Fanny was smart and had figured out her options a long time ago — there would be either proud silence, followed by unexpected retreat; or a bubbly, chatty attempt at re-education with the end-goal of caging the specimen. In the first case, the person in question acquired a romantic aura and became the source of suffering. In the second case, he inevitably turned out to be a miserable loser who quickly lost her interest.

In some distant, youthful past she had tried both alternatives, and both had ended with the need to replace the object of love, either immediately or after a period of solitude. When she established beyond doubt that the result was the same either way, she changed her approach. Thus her life became something like a think tank with a mission to discover a winning strategy.

So far her think tank’s best product was the icy beauty that projected its competence like an indomitable fortress. Buttressed with moderate additions of wide-ranging consumerist appeal.

But she could still hear the voiceless call of the bien-être, reminding her that this was not it. And yet, proud of her trophies, proud of her sophisticated self-made product called “Fanny,” Fanny kept going. Anger served her as a battering ram, fear gave her the self-containing rigidity of armor.

When Valentin had entered her field of vision, so young and ridiculous, she had given him three days, a week at most.

For some inexplicable reason, however, he was still around, two months later. He seemed absorbed by problems of his own. She never managed to get a coherent story out of him. Then that girl, his twin, also appeared. And the whole Christmas brouhaha.

Fanny was back from Athens, but the fretful desire for something different was still there. She was sitting in the reception room of her gallery, staring idly.

How was she to find him, that little boy, Valentin, who, on top of everything, bore an idle name suggesting love?

He had left with his sister. Fanny had almost had to throw them out in order to put a stop to their insistent offer to help with the cleaning. Poor things, they imagined that she would clean with her own bare hands.

She couldn’t understand why she was unable to get these two creatures out of her mind. They belonged to a world that had no overlap with hers. She had allowed some mix-up to happen, only because, when she had come home that late afternoon on Christmas Eve, she had found brother and sister sitting by a lit fire and a decorated Christmas tree. At first, she had been dumbfounded by their half-entreating suggestion to organize a party. These two disgracefully innocuous creatures had dared think the Snow Queen’s palace might be open to guests.

But then something had just switched in her, unnoticed. She only remembered that at some point she did not want to refuse them anything anymore. As if the spirit of Christmas had sent them down to her and they had won her over. How could that have happened?

There had to be some kind of explanation. They were very odd together. They had a strong family resemblance, as all twins, but so much so that you simply couldn’t take your eyes off them. Incredibly beautiful, although in an unsophisticated way. Not to her taste. But still, if she could only compare them to something and get rid of their ridiculous spellbinding charm. And surprise, surprise — they looked like elves! Valentin, whom she knew from before, had not made that impression on her when alone. It worked only in combination with his sister.

Fanny was enchanted by the thought, feeling that she could finally be free. She would now be able to go back to her previous life. It wasn’t Valentin who intrigued her so. Thank goodness! But this face, half-boy and half-girl, which they shared together. She remembered that they had produced the same effect on Mr. V.

She decided to call at her mother’s place and wish her and Mr. V. a happy New Year.

No one knew where Boris was. He himself made sure to forget where he was, absorbed, as usual, in whatever he was doing. He was sitting and speaking into a Dictaphone, transferring his voice to the tape — a one-way process, in the order of things.

Christmas fireworks crackled outside, but Boris was oblivious to them. No sound or light could reach him. Over time he had mastered his ability to isolate himself completely, as if in a coffin, extinguishing his senses, letting his neurons do their work and communicate on their own. The voice he was recording on the tape could hardly be called his voice. Those who had heard it speak were so few. Apart from that little girl, Margarita. But she was of no importance.

Maria had appeared as the only possible other person in his life. He had recognized her at first sight. He met her in the street, the only place where there was any probability of meeting her, as he did not socialize with people at all. He had stopped short in his stride and turned to follow her. She immediately turned back and he saw her looking at him with her eyes, the color of fog. They were in front of her house and she invited him to come in.