Edward Limonov - His Butler’s Story (1980-1981)

After spending about an hour with her at her place and drinking several cups of instant coffee without sugar, since Mary Ellen didn't offer me anything else, I took my leave, solemnly promising to think about her offer and decide during the week. I also recommended that she think about it too and make her own decision. Riding down on the elevator with a well-dressed elderly woman and listening to the soft music emitted from somewhere in its ceiling, I talked myself into moving in with Mary Ellen, citing to myself the example of the "real opportunist." A real opportunist, Edward, I said to myself, would move in with Mary Ellen without hesitating, and fuck her with his eyes closed. And so must you!

I called Mary Ellen several days later and told her I was ready to move in if she hadn't changed her mind. "As a roommate," I emphasized diplomatically.

"Fine," she said. "You can move in anytime from tomorrow morning on, or any other day." I said tomorrow, of course; I was impatient, and immediately went back to my hotel and started getting my things together, books for the most part. I only had one suitcase, so I packed the books in shopping bags with handles.

I must have looked like a bag lady when I climbed onto the bus going down Broadway the next morning with two of my sacks, both very heavy. But what could I do — I didn't have any money for a taxi, nor anyone who could have helped me move, so I was forced to move my things piecemeal by bus.

Carrying my shopping bags, I made my way past the self-important doormen in braid with a timidly defiant expression on my face and went upstairs to Mary Ellen's floor. To my floor, I thought proudly, as I pressed the buzzer. She didn't answer for a long time, but then she finally opened the door. Her face was sleepy and, it seemed to me, a little guilty.

"Did something happen?" I asked, already aware of what it was.

"I'm terribly sorry, Edward. My father just called from Washington and said you can't stay here; he's against it. I called you at the hotel, but you'd already left…"

I stood in the doorway like an idiot with my shopping bags. I didn't even lose my temper, since I've grown quite used to fate's little tricks. I just borrowed five bucks from her, left my shopping bags, telling her I'd be back for them later, and hopped onto the elevator. She called after me that she was sorry about it and apologized and something else, but I couldn't hear anymore. Outside it was a blindingly sunny autumn day and the wind was blowing some flags, although, since I was in a hurry to find a bar, I don't remember exactly what kind they were — whether the flags of countries or just for decoration.

I had to call Jenny from the bar several hours later, since I was drunk and didn't have any money with me. Jenny arrived in a taxi with Bridget, and they took me away. "Bad boy!" Jenny said several times with a maternal smile. The bartender was pleased it had all worked out without his having to call the police, and I felt like my relatives had come for me. It really is a good thing to have relatives, and know they won't leave you in the lurch, even if you have been a "bad boy." And as we rode in the taxi back to the millionaire's house, the sun was still out, and the wind was still blowing the flags, whatever they were.

In order to compensate for my failed attempt at moving, I soon afterward resolved to get off welfare. As I say, I was anxious for evidence of my progress in life. I remember with what astonishment and delight the clerk at my welfare center on Fourteenth Street looked at me — as if I were somebody who had just come back from the dead — when I informed her of my intention to give up welfare assistance, since I had found a job and was now able to support myself. That probably didn't happen very often. The black clerk shook my hand and wished me luck in my new life, and I gazed for die last time at the immense sea of my now ex-comrades in misfortune sitting in the large hall waiting for their appointments. Goodbye, comrades! I thought cheerfully, as I strode out the door.

Okay, I thought, we're on the next level now. I was the only one who realized it of course; the people on Fourteenth Street carrying on their unruffled trade in plastic sandals, polyester dresses, and suspiciously large cans of tomato sauce certainly had no idea that I was already on the next level, that I had climbed up a little bit from the bottom where I had been. I couldn't even share my happiness with Jenny — I'd concealed the whole welfare business from her.

Is that something I should do on the next level? I wondered, passing by a porno theater. It was, and I went in and watched a porno film. Even on the new level I still had some of my old bad habits. The porno film turned out to be shitty.

It's always the way that either nothing happens, or if something does, then the first event is immediately followed by a second and then a third; obviously they come in batches. A couple of weeks later Jenny and I went to Southampton for Jennifer's and Dr. Krishna's wedding. Not only was he a crazy Indian for marrying a twenty-year-old girl, but a rich one as well, and the wedding therefore took place in a large restaurant with an ocean view.

Looking back at that momentous occasion from the present, I can see that the wedding was one of the most boring, but at the time it seemed to Limonov, with his then great yearning need for throngs of people, to be grandiose and significant. I even managed to be, if not at the center of attention, then at least on its periphery, since I was by no means the least attractive man in that crowd and could actually dance better than anyone else, which earned me the attention of the ladies and I suppose the bitter resentment of the men. I was dressed, I remember, in my white suit. The day was sunny and warm, fortunately, although I had in fact been following the weather reports for a week, afraid it would turn cold and I wouldn't be able to wear it, the only impeccable item in my wardrobe. The lively, smiling Limonov, surrounded by ugly girls and women, and as breathless from dancing as a young virgin at her first ball — you know, Natasha Rostov. "Are you a designer perchance?" asked a fifty-year-old-lady, puffing away at her cigarette and rendered even happier and more interested when I told her I was a writer. Another lady of the same venerable age took me for a ballet dancer; obviously, such ladies think that all Russians living in the United States are ballet dancers.

What can I say? I was flattered by their attention, and although it would have pleased me even more to be surrounded by a flock of young actresses and models rather than by a motley crowd of slightly crocked married women jealously watched by their paunchy and sullen better halves sitting at their tables with loosened ties, or by a crowd of Jenny's pimply friends selected as if for their complexions, a gaggle of twenty-year-old girls of various sizes, even those groups stimulated me somehow, although I realized it was all very silly. This is silly, Edward, really silly! I thought to myself, and then grabbing my next partner, I rushed onto the dance floor, desperately seizing from life whatever it was capable of giving me that day, and in fact did give me. The orchestra (certainly Krishna had hired an orchestra) was a jazz ensemble, with saxophones, drums, and a piano — what else; I couldn't expect him to invite Richard Hell and his group, could I? The orchestra liked me too, and even started to accompany me, keeping time to my movements.

I used to have a Polaroid picture taken that day by Raj, a relative of Krishna's, in which I am sitting at a restaurant table in my white suit with the sea behind me and a happily romantic expression on my face. I later gave that picture to Elena, who no doubt has lost it, which would be a pity. Behind me you can make out the head of a woman, or her hair at least; mat's Andrea, the girl I danced with the most that evening and who won me, having prevailed over all her rivals. That is, I fucked her, or more accurately, she fucked me, or even more accurately, we fucked each other a few days later. I was at the wedding with Jenny, after all, and had come in the same car with her, which she drove. Besides, I had no intention of abandoning her that evening or of hurting her; I still cared about her, and anyway it was enough that I had hardly danced with her that day. Andrea and I merely exchanged phone numbers.