Eugene Vodolazkin - The Aviator

MONDAY

Anastasia. It’s an astonishing name, simultaneously pleophonic and gentle, with four ‘a’s and two ‘s’s. She said: ‘My name is Anastasia.’ She was standing over me like the Snow Queen in new Halifax skates with her hands in a muff, in the middle of Yusupov Garden. What did she utter first? I remember everything: ‘Please forgive me.’ She uttered: ‘Did you hurt yourself?’ And I am on all fours. I am looking at her skates, at the flaps of her coat, and at the fur hem from which extend barely, barely – only about a vershok – shins in leggings. I am seeing stars after my fall. Blood is dripping from my nose to the ice and that is the most awful, the most shameful, part.

She bends – no she crouches – and takes a handkerchief from her muff and applies it to my nose: ‘I knocked you down, forgive me.’ The spot on the ice is spreading and I draw my hand along it in shame, as if I want to erase it, but that doesn’t work. The orchestra continues playing, everyone skates past, some stop. The handkerchief smells of perfume and is covered with my blood, but I still cannot stand, I’m at the rink for the first time, and there are tears of shame in my eyes. She gives me her hand – it’s warm, from the muff— and I sense it with my entire palm. And then one of my palms is on the ice and the other is in her hand, and there is such contrast in that, such convergence of warm and icy, lively and lifeless, human and… Why did I compare her to the Snow Queen? Her beauty is warm.

After all, she had not pushed me; it was I who recoiled from her. She was skating fast, beautifully, sometimes alone, sometimes together with other grammar school girls. It seems she was a grammar school girl, that’s how it seemed, what else could she be… At times they skated in threes, in fours, crossing arms with one another. Their feet moved so very beautifully – simultaneously and broadly, with a cutting sound. Once I had put on my skates, I stood at the edge of the ice for an entire hour, delighting in the skaters, delighting in her. After the damp chilliness of the changing room and the smell of wooden benches and perspiration, there was the frosty wind on the rink, shouts, laughter, and the main thing, the music. And how she danced when the orchestra stuck up ‘Chrysanthemums,’ oh my! With some student who, of course, was not even close to her level; I tried not to watch him and saw only her, and my soul was transfixed.

Other falls (pun unintended) in my life were linked with women. I recently described swinging in a hammock. And I retained that because I crashed hard then. The girl rocked the hammock so forcefully that I flew out of it and hit the back of my head on the root of a pine tree. I had a nosebleed then, too, and they stitched up a wound on the back of my head. I had agonizing headaches for a long time after…

What comes to mind after all I’ve said: it was not Anastasia in Yusupov Garden. If I’m not mistaken, she and I met in 1921. And what kind of skating was there in 1921! Why did I decide that had been Anastasia?

TUESDAY

Today I made a chronological discovery: I placed a date on my present day. I placed a date on it and cannot believe it myself.

Valentina usually brings my pills on a tray but today she took them out of a box. She forgot the box on my nightstand. I examined the unusual packaging and read: Date of manufacture: 14.12.1997. I initially thought it was a misprint but then I saw, lower: Expiration date: 14.12.1999. Not bad.

It works out that it’s now either 1998 or 1999 if, of course, they’re not using expired medicines. What kind of accident could I have been in that I turned up at the opposite end of the century? What was this: my damaged consciousness playing games? I was certain there was some sort of simple and rational explanation for those figures.

I laboriously rose from my bed and went over to the mirror by the door. Deeply sunken eyes with circles underneath. Gray eyes, circles of dark blue. Lines from my nose to the corners of my lips, but creases, not wrinkles. That’s thought to evidence smiles: I have to think I smiled a lot in my previous life. Medium-brown hair, not one strand of gray. Pale. Pale but not old! In 1999, someone the same age as the century should have a completely different appearance.

Geiger came in.

‘Doctor, is it now 1999? Or 1998?’

‘It’s 1999,’ he answered. ‘February 9.’

He was completely calm. A quick glance at the medicine.

‘Did you read that on the package? I suggested Valentina leave it here. Hints like that are admissible.’

‘Maybe you could hint the rest to me? How I got here in the first place and what happened to me?’

He smiled:

‘I’ll certainly hint but I won’t tell you. I did already explain everything to you. Your consciousness resembles a stomach after a fast: overloading it means killing it. As you see, I’m candid with you to the greatest degree possible.’

‘Then tell me what’s happening in Russia now. At least in general terms.’

Geiger thought for a minute.

‘Dictatorship gave way to chaos. They steal like never before. The person in power abuses alcohol. That’s general terms.’

Yes… Well, there you have it, Aviator Platonov.

FRIDAY

I haven’t felt like writing for two days; I have been thinking about what Geiger said. And about my ninety-ninth year. I haven’t come up with anything because I cannot fathom it. It seemed I had grasped it, accepted it, and calmed, but then it was as if I’d come to my senses… and my head began spinning again. Geiger is right: if I learn any thing else new now, I’ll likely go out of my mind. It is better to think about the past.

In Siverskaya, there was a rather long street, Tserkovnaya Street, that ran from the flour mill, past the Peter and Paul Church, to the far bridge that crosses the river. The street rose from the Oredezh and descended to it, too, where the river made a jog. Our squadron was marching along that road. It was not a large squadron but it was fully military and excellently outfitted. In front was a banner with a two-headed eagle, behind that were a bugler and a drummer, and, behind them, the squadron itself. The road was level for most of the way, so one could maintain a measured pace. The banner fluttered, the bugler blared, and the drummer, accordingly, drummed. And so: I was that drummer. Papa bought me the drum for Siverskaya’s marches: it was real, stretched with animal skin. Unlike a toy drum, it produced a lingering, resonant, and simultaneously deep sound. And it was such a nice, sweet feeling for me to drum then: tram-tararam, tram-tararam, tram-tararam-pam, tram-pam-pam.

Retired generals approached the fences of their dachas when they heard us. They saluted us. For the occasion, the generals wore faded service caps with cockades, to which they placed a hand. Everything below – quilted robes, knitted vests, and other nonmilitary effects -was hidden behind the fence. The generals’ eyes followed us for a long time because their youth was passing by before them. There were tears in their eyes.

Where were we going and why? I cannot answer that at all intelligibly now, just as I apparently could not have answered then. Most likely, this was the happiness of simultaneous motion, a sort of triumph of rhythm. Not the trumpet, not the banner, but the drum made our small flock into a squadron. And it lent our procession something that pulled the walkers from the earth. The drum resounded in one’s chest, seemingly at the very heart, and its power bewitched. It entered our ears, nostrils, and pores along with the warm July wind and the sound of pines. When I had occasion to be in Siverskaya years later (in late autumn, completely by chance), I discerned distant drumming in the rain.