Мариам Петросян - The Gray House

It's as if I'm empty, Grasshopper thought. Everything that was inside me flew away. This empty me is the only thing that's left. And it feels good.

Wolf grabbed his sweater.

“Hey! Careful, or you’ll fall down. You look like you’re drunk.”

“I feel fine,” Grasshopper mumbled. “I feel good.”

The wind mussed their hair. The aerial wires crisscrossed the sky. The sparrows, no more than fluffy balls when seen from here, used them as swings. Wolf's nose was on the verge of breaking out in freckles.

It's the scent of summer, Grasshopper realized suddenly.

The summer was coming for real.

The dorm was busy poring over the box of photographs.

“Look!” Humpback shouted as they entered. “Look at what Max-’n’-Rexes hauled in.”

They moved in closer. The photographs were of the seniors. They hadn't been made in the House. Siamese pointed at one of the photos.

“Remember this gate? How it jumped off the hinges because Sausage was swinging on it?”

“And here's my head!” The other Siamese pointed at an indistinct blob in the corner. “You can see our window, right there!”

They crowded around, greedily searching for snippets of something familiar in the world populated by the seniors. And finding them. Behind the backs, over the shoulders, here and there, in bits and pieces. And then trying to connect those bits, weave them into a cloth.

Grasshopper went to sit on the bed. He didn't like such discussions. He'd skipped the first summer trip, and the time when he did go, they got sent to a fancy spa where the staff was so intent on providing a quality experience that there was no possibility of any unregimented fun. It was very nice, but you can't enjoy the swimming pools and the gyms and even real horseback riding when there's a whole army of insistent helpers always tagging along. Everyone, or at least everyone whom Grasshopper heard rehashing it over and over again, agreed that in the entire history of the House they never had a summer break as lousy as that one. Actually, if not for them, Grasshopper might even have imagined that he'd had a great time. But the House people were, if anything, traditionalists. There were only two places that were acceptable to them outside the boundaries of the House: a disused ski area somewhere in the mountains, and the old resort on the shore. Nothing else even came close. The distinction “House” was extended to those places as well, they were its annexes, its feelers stretched an unfathomable distance. Grasshopper knew both of these Houses as if he himself had visited them many times. He even had a preference for the one by the sea. The oldest one. Creaking and wheezing, with its sagging beds and warped wardrobes, its water-stained walls and ceilings, its flapping floorboards, with one shower stall for each four dorms and constant queues to use the toilets.

“The ceiling dripped in our room!”

“Elephant sat on a chair and broke it, remember?”

“Sport banged on the wall to shut up the guys in the next room and punched a hole clean through.”

“Remember the centipedes in the bathroom?”

“Centipedes? How about silverfish and water beetles?”

The boys tossed the phrases like footballs, reveling in the flaws of the Other House, and Grasshopper was listening to them jealously. The Other House, the little brother of This House. There might even be some secret connection between them. Maybe they exchanged things. Rats, or ghosts, or something else interesting. You could see the ocean from the windows of the Other House. And at night you could hear it. There the counselors immediately fell in love with the tanned girls on the beach and forgot about their responsibilities, and when it rained the building leaked, so they all locked themselves in, like a tortoise retreating into its shell, cursed the weather, and played cards through the night—juniors, seniors, counselors, all. They played and listened to the jingle of the drops hitting the pans placed under the holes in the roof.

“Did you steal them from the seniors?” Grasshopper asked.

Siamese blinked at him.

“So? They've got loads of them, and we didn't have any. At least now there's this.”

“I didn't mean that. I just asked. Where's Stinker?”

“Got called to the principal,” Magician said. “didn't you notice how quiet it was?”

Stinker wheeled in, flashing the badges that covered him from the neck all the way down to his knees.

“Hear that?” he squeaked, gasping. “There are fourteen packages in the principal's office, and loads of letters! But to hell with the letters. The important thing here is the packages. All of them mine!”

“Would those be the responses to your letters?” Humpback ventured.

“None other!” Stinker made a circle around the room, spokes glistening. “I ask you, have you ever heard anything this outrageous? They're not letting me have them. Asking who sent them and why. How's that their business? They were sent to me, which means they're mine. So it follows they must hand them over.”

“So you turned around and left, just like that?” Wolf said.

“As if! I made a scene. Now I need some time to recuperate, and then I’ll go back and make another one. Except I need a poster. Mind drawing it for me?”

Grasshopper laughed.

“Nothing funny about it,” Stinker said indignantly. “This pile of useful stuff is rotting away in the principal's office. Not funny at all! Come on, quick... Get to the drawing! And writing!”

He wheeled over to the nightstand and rustled some papers.

“don't we have a large poster board? I don't get it. It's like the most useful thing to have around.”

“We could use a bedsheet,” Magician piped in with enthusiasm. “We can cut it in half... We’ll need a couple of sticks for the handles.”

“One handle is enough,” Stinker said sharply. “I'm going to need my other hand to blow the trumpet.”

They sat on the floor in front of the remains of the sheet and nibbled on the brushes thoughtfully.

“Something along the lines of don't Tread on Me ,” Stinker insisted. “Or Hands Off ... something or other.”

“Or maybe Packages for the Owner ?” Humpback suggested.

“We could do that too,” Stinker agreed reluctantly. “Even though it sounds trite.”

Beauty fondled the paint cans. Elephant drew a sun on the floor. Wolf got to writing Packages in blue paint.

“Careful. Keep it on the line,” Stinker fretted. “Make the letters bigger.”

“We could just pick the lock,” Siamese Rex said, “and carry everything away. At night. Then we wouldn't need to write anything.”

“No way! Stealing something that's rightfully mine? No, they must hand it over themselves,” Stinker said, smoothing out the sheet. “They're bound to regret their decision. They're going to beg me: ‘Come, oh, come and take them!’”

“Fourteen packages,” Magician sighed reverently.

“See what I mean? Totally worth the effort.”

Once the slogan Packages for the Owner was ready, Magician demanded they make another copy, for him. Wolf said that two identical banners was boring, and in the time it took the “Packages” one to dry they wrote Down with Dictatorship on the other half of the sheet, and also Hands Off Student Property on a poster board. Then they glued handles to the sheets.

“Faster! Faster!” Magician urged.

“Can we come too?” one of the Siamese asked.

“Later,” Stinker said sternly. “You're the second line. For when we get exhausted. Then it will be your turn to shout ‘Shame!’ and rattle something.”

Beauty suddenly grew agitated, stuttering excitedly, “Four apples! Four! That's a lot!”