Yelena Moskovich - The Natashas

“Do you like them?” Béatrice asked.

Polina reached out and traced their curves. She slid her fingertips down, in a soft rhythm over their petal-like skin.

“You are real as well, Béatrice,” Polina said.

Polina reached down to touch Béatrice’s face. She stroked her ear, then brought Béatrice’s face forward.

Face to face, Polina kissed Béatrice.

“I want to see your body,” Béatrice said.

Polina looked up.

“Will you show me?”

Polina stood up from the bed. She stepped back into the darkness. Béatrice heard the stiff cotton fabric moving, then she felt the coat fall to the floor.

Polina stood naked at the side of the bed. Her arms were loose at her sides. Béatrice sat up and moved closer to see. She observed the dark clouds upon Polina’s skin. She grazed her fingers over Polina’s stomach, then the curve of her breast, then down her waist, then her hip bone. Polina turned around, and Béatrice continued. Her back. Her tail bone. The curve of her butt cheek. The plane of her thigh. Polina turned back around.

The skin everywhere on Polina’s body was bruised. Across her pubic bone, like a constellation, were tiny wounds, inflicted and re-inflicted, closed over, reopened and closed over again, the skin toughened into small scars. Béatrice’s hand dropped into the darkness.

Polina drew back a piece of her hair behind her ear with her fingers. For the first time, Béatrice could see what she may have looked like as a little girl; quiet, careful, and all-knowing.

“Nothing hurts,” Polina said.

Béatrice reached up and pulled Polina towards her. Their faces pushed into a depth their kisses chased after.

Polina’s cheek came down on to one of Béatrice’s bare breasts. She licked the nipple there slowly in a circle. Béatrice felt her pelvic muscles pull through her, all the way down, as if trying to pull the tip of Polina’s tongue there.

Béatrice took her hand and guided it between her legs, then took her own hand and smoothed it up Polina’s thigh and slid inside. Polina tightened around Béatrice’s fingers and pushed her own deep inside Béatrice.

Out of the darkness, Béatrice and Polina inhaled so deeply that they thought the whole room would be sucked in and crumbled between their mouths. All their muscles clenched into their roots.

They grabbed each other’s backs with their fingers and palms and nails and held on as tightly as they could.

It was almost dawn, but the two women lay in bed together, quietly giggling. Béatrice ran her fingers over the scars on Polina’s pelvis and whispered, “Nothing hurts.” Then Polina smiled and whispered back, “Nothing hurts.”

Nothing hurts.

Nothing hurts.

Not waiting or wishing

Not touching or kissing

Not asking or needing ,

Not breathing or pleading .

Not thinking or speaking ,

Not ageing, or receding!

Nothing hurts!

Nothing hurts!

“Nothing hurts!”

The two women chanted joyfully together until the sun began to rise and a small black bird on the branch outside opened its short beak and began to sing the first note of morning.

At the sound of the bird, the two women’s voices turned into a murmur.

“Except for—

Re… mem… ber… ing. Re… member… ing. Remembering.”

Their eyes closed and they fell into a peaceful sleep.

The Head Natasha puts the heavy chain with the keys on it back into her pocket. She steps into the centre of the room. All the Natashas have been waiting for her.

“Okay, girls—who here has ever been sailing?” The Head Natasha announces.

All the Natashas rub their tongues back and forth in their mouths as they think.

“Me!” the lanky Natasha exclaims, “…I think…”

“You’re not sure?” the Head Natasha asks.

“Well, I mean I couldn’t really tell ’cause I was sorta laying down in that space you know… below the floorboards.”

“O yeah, I know that space…” the red-nailed Natasha nods, “but my boat was like a fancy boat.”

The Natasha with milk-crust on her lips butts in. “No way, no how honey, keep dreamin. No one puts something dirty on a clean floor, know what I mean.”

“She’s gotta point…” Natasha says, holding her journal.

“Wait, I believe her, it’s SCIENCE. Sounds sound differently according to the space they’re in. That’s what EINSTEIN said,” says another Natasha in a British accent.

“Einstein did not say that…”

“Einstein was a Jew!” the lanky Natasha squeaks, “…like me!”

“…It’s in the books, like Sputnik, anyways that’s how Vasya got into space and howled at the moon like it was a she-dog…”

“You’re a she-dog,” the sleepy Natasha drones.

“Least I was brought in on a fancy boat, you’re just jealous cause they had to wrap you in a carpet and stuff you like a roll in the back of a truck for nine hours. Then, you were so dumb, you cried and cried ’cause you thought you’d never be able to walk again all ’cause you couldn’t feel your legs! But after a couple days, the feeling in those legs came back. See, this is what I mean, you don’t even know how the musculatory system works!”

Natasha daggers her finger forward and announces, “Well, you’re so stupid, they told you you’d go pick oranges in su-sunny Turkey for a thousand dollars a month, and now you’re su-stuck in this pit and you got people pickin YOUR oranges and it’s basically FREE, good thing too ’cause they’re r-r-r-ROTTEN!”

Natasha’s pupils dilate.

“Oh! Well! They promised you’d dance at rich-people-tables, but after they saw your Baba-Yaga-body , they decided you’re better face-down lik’an old rug!”

“Talk ’bout old rugs! You’re so worn out , they make you lie down, then get a fresh girl on top, so she won’t get dirty.”

“Yeah, well you’re so dirty, they had to leave you in the river to soak, permanently !”

“Oh shut-it, you’re the one with bleeding gums.”

“Yeah, that’s gross.”

“Least I’m not vulgar .”

“OH —y ou’re so vulgar , they had to tie your legs together so you’d quit airing it out!”

“And you-you-you’re so ugly , they were throwing a fist or two at your face, hoping to fix it up!”

“ You’re so ugly, they had to move on to your sister!”

“…Then they realised it runs in the family!!”

“HA HA HA.”

“And that’s why they had to zap your babies, the world can’t handle any more of that face.”

“Zap zap zap!”

“Look who’s talking, they scraped you clean like a melon, and now you don’t even get your periods!”

“What’s so good about periods? Don’t get time off for ’em anyways. They’re just a pain in the uterus!”

“You’re so stupid you don’t even hear yourself. If you don’t get your periods, that means you’re not a LADY any more!”

“Yeah, least I’m still a LAY-DEE…”

“Me too!”

“You—You’re just…”

“…an old rug!”

“Stinky laundry!”

“A mushy orange!”

“Girls girls!” the Head Natasha raises her hands in the air, then brings them to her temples. “You’re giving me a headache.”

All the Natashas sink their eyes down to the floor.

“Okay, okay, don’t pout. Now. It’s obvious none of you have ever been sailing because in order to go sailing you need a rich boyfriend. Bowl of fresh grapes on the deck. Designer bikini. No bruises on your body. No ingrown hairs. No scratched-off scabs. Get what I mean, ladies?”