Dave Eggers - You Shall Know Our Velocity

"They left."

"They moved on. They kept moving. There was a lot to see."

"And the conquistadors got the land or money or whatever."

"Yeah. But the Jumping People left this one message on the cliff above their village, carved it in for the conquistadors. This basically turned into the motto of the Jumping People, even though I don't think it makes all that much sense. I mean, it does and it doesn't. Raymond admitted that this has been translated from the original Jumping People tongue, into Spanish, and back again, and then into English, so who knows how accurate it is. There was another American scholar who polished the words, I guess, a guy at the University of Chicago, so at least it sounds like something you'd carve on a cliff over a village under siege, so your invaders would see it after you've left."

"Give me the fucking message."

Hand took a breath and opened his palms, as if accepting the gift of rain. "YOU SHALL KNOW OUR VELOCITY!" he bellowed into the cold exhausted city.

Ten minutes later we found it: The Pepsi was about a hundred yards in front of us.

"Good," said Hand. "I'm numb everywhere."

There was no one at the door and we descended a wide staircase into a low-ceilinged club, with red lights and barstools of dull copper. It looked like someone's basement, converted for good times at home. In the first booth, Oksana and Katya. Katya, facing the door, brightened when we finished the stairs and strode toward them.

"I am shocked!" she said as we slid into the booth, Hand next to Oksana and me next to Katya. "Never the men come!"

"We would not," said Hand, with a drama he relished, "have missed this for the world." Then he kissed her hand.

We drank some whiskey drink they were having and Hand danced with Oksana. I didn't want to dance with Katya. It would be, I thought, like dancing with one of the parents at a wedding.

"You do not like me," she said, looking at my forehead.

"I do," I said.

"Come home with me. You are tired."

I didn't want to go home with her. But I didn't want to wait for Hand. Hand was teaching Oksana the Charleston.

"I should wait for Hand," I said.

"Hand will be fine."

"Okay."

I had no interest in Katya sexually, and she had no charm. She was coarse and made no attempt to be pleasant. I didn't know why I was going with her. I wanted to see her home, I guess, and see what she thought she'd do with me there. I signalled to Hand, now slow dancing with Oksana and her coat – she had not taken it off and it looked at first glance like Hand was dancing with it, the coat – to Cyndi Lauper, that I was leaving. He gave me a concerned look that softened into a shrug.

Outside we found a taxi and in the back I knew Katya's strong perfume, a sharp and liquid smell like apricots but alcoholic.

"What is your job?" she asked.

"I work for a contractor," I said.

"What is this?"

"A builder. Houses, offices. We build stuff."

"I see. You are tough man."

"Right," I said. "Tough man."

"And this is how you hurt your face," she said, reaching for my ear and then moving a hair from my eyes. "While building."

"Yes," I said.

"This will go away," she said, and waved the cuts from my head like she'd earlier waved off the Russians and their crimes.

She lived in a brick box, on the second floor, after a black-dark staircase up which she held my hand as we stepped over an animal, probably a dog but smelling worse, about ten minutes from The Pepsi. The coffee table was crowded with plates and glasses and what looked like schoolbooks. Above, a photograph of a man in uniform, circa 1970, mounted on posterboard and wrapped in plastic. On the couch, a huge blanket with a British flag as its pattern. There was a person under it. The son?

"My niece," Katya said. I peered around the blanket and saw the head of a young woman. I wondered where her son was, if she had a son. "Come this way," Katya told me.

She led me through a dim hallway, the color of wet sand, and into her room. A queen-sized bed, unmade. On the wall over the bed, a Hawaiian landscape, waterfalls bursting through the most optimistic green. She left the light off.

"Sit," she said.

I sat on the bed.

"Take off your clothes," she said.

"It's cold."

"Take off," she said, indicating my shirt.

I took off my shirt. When my face resurfaced she was gone. I heard running water in the hallway and it made me colder, and I thought about putting my shirt back on. Instead I took off my pants and boxers. I sat naked on the bed, wondering if my testicles were resting on something unsanitary.

She came through the door again and stood in front of me.

"What do you want here?" she said.

"Excuse me?" I spoke into her stomach.

"What do I do for you now?"

I had no idea. There had been the fleeting thought half an hour ago that at some point between the disco and here I would find myself attracted to her, or to the idea of consummating with this older tired woman. But now that I was here I felt like I was visiting my pediatrician. I shrugged.

"Lie down," she said.

I let myself fall back onto the bed. The mattress was thin and soft, styrofoam. My toes were cold and I could feel a draft, narrow but strong, come over my chins from the window to my right.

"Turn over," she said.

I did. I was warmer with my stomach on the flannel sheets. I closed my eyes and felt immediately that I would sleep here.

Thirty seconds passed while I heard the whisper of clothing behind me. The thump of boots.

I felt the bed pull at the edge and then knew her heat above me. Her knee grazed the back of my left thigh, and her right hand sunk into the mattress near my right shoulder. Her pelvis landed on me first, on the upper part of my rear, then her stomach on my lower back, then her ribs and chest met my back. Her arms mirrored and rested on mine and she laced my fingers in hers.

"Are you warmer now?" she whispered into my neck.

"Yes," I said. I was so warm.

"Just lie here," she said.

"Okay."

And we did. I expected to feel her breathing on my spine, her chest heaving, but instead knew it through her pelvis, as it pushed into the small of my back each time she inhaled. Her midriff contracted with each breath and her pelvic bone pushed into me as her breathing, audible near my ear, set the beat of my heart. Her weight was the ideal weight and I was warm and wanted her to be warm.

I woke up at 4:30 alone in the bed. I found Katya in the living room, watching TV on the floor, with her back against the couch and sunk into her niece's rounded form. She was watching men in Michigan perform elaborate waterskiing tricks at high speeds.

"And that is it?" she said.

"I have to go," I said.

"Where?"

I wanted to tell her so badly. Cairo. Cairo!

"Back to the hotel. We drive back to Tallinn tomorrow."

"Is it nice?"

"What? Tallinn?" She hadn't been there – it was like someone from Green Bay never having been to Milwaukee.

She nodded.

"It's beautiful," I said. "We didn't see much."

"Will you help us?" she said, and held out her palm.

I looked at her for a moment. Her eyes did not blink.

"Of course," I said, and began exploring my pockets. I found a packet of traveler's checks. I wondered if I could sign them over to her but guessed I could not. In my side thigh pocket there was about 5,000 kroon. I gave it to her and looked for more, checking and rechecking pockets. How much was her lying on top of me worth? You couldn't measure it. You could say it was worth nothing – that it should have been free – or you could say millions and both would make sense. Nothing was quantifiable – or rather, at some point things were so, and numbers could be spoken with confidence, but no longer.