Los Angeles Noir

ten minutes. Just rubbing and rubbing, rubbing and rubbing. He cleared his throat. Valentina’s daughter and grandchildren were not coming back for another two hours. Was she thinking the same? Did she know what he was thinking? He suddenly wanted to undo her dress and spill her soft large body onto the sofa.

“Oy, kak pusto! Kak strashno! Oy, Vanya, why?” She tossed from side to side over the barely rumpled sheets. “So lonely… so scary. So empty… so alien…” She glanced at him, sitting on the side of the bed. “Even you,” and she wrapped her face in the pillow to muffle her weeping.

Ivan knew he should hold her, try to calm her down, but he was overwhelmed by what had just happened, and couldn’t bring himself to touch Valentina again. The thought of embracing her warm, flaccid body whose faint perspiration had a completely foreign flavor nauseated him. He turned away, and another smell, Grigory Petrovich’s dear smell, wafted from the pillow, and he noticed a few strands of his friend’s hair on it. He simultaneously wanted to throw the pillow against the wall and bury his face in it forever.

Ivan Denisovich reluctantly patted weeping Valentina on her broad undulant back and grabbed his boxers off the chair.

The sun was down and the apartment would soon fill with children’s laughter, regardless of what had happened.

“Do you want me to stay?” he asked, pulling on his pants.

“No, we’ll manage. We always do, we have to,” Valentina sniffled, wiping her nose on the discarded T-shirt. “You ain’t Grisha, don’t even try.”

She stood up and undid her rollers in front of the black lacquer vanity that had been purchased from the same store as Sofia’s. She suddenly seemed taller, more imposing, despite her bright pink bra and underwear. Her peroxide-blond hair slipped down her round shoulders in large stiff waves.

“Nuuh, what are you staring at? Haven’t seen a naked woman?” she smirked, shaking out her curls like a girl.

“No, I’m just…” and he realized he hadn’t for some time.

“Sveta, pass the fish,” said Sofia Arkadievna to her daughter. “Oy, I still can’t get over it.” She squeezed Ivan Denisovich’s arm in sympathy.

The TV was on, a low hum in the back of the room. Sveta and her husband Alex had stopped by for dinner. Ivan Denisovich noticed they always came to eat at the end of the month, probably ran out of money. No wonder. Her husband was an idiot, spending money on stupid haircuts and designer T-shirts. He was not a husband, he was a liability.

“Pap,” said Alex, chewing the fish and mashed potatoes with his mouth open.

Where did she find this treasure? Well worth immigrating for.

“I have a name.”

“Oh, c’mon, Pap, we’re all family here.”

“Grigory was family. And you…” Ivan Denisovich shook his hand.

“Stop it, Papa. What did he ever do to you?” whined Sveta.

She was not his Svetka anymore. His Svetka who used to jump and laugh until her braids were undone. She had lost her sense of humor, as if being dull meant being smart.

“To Grisha’s soul, may he rest in peace.” Sofia Arkadievna lifted her glass filled with vodka to the brim.

Ivan Denisovich thought it strange that his wife, who didn’t like vodka and rarely drank at all, was about to chug a full glass of the clear demon.

“A good man is gone.” She put down the empty glass and inhaled on a slice of brown rye. “Let’s go see Valentina. I don’t treat her right. I should give her something.”

Ivan Denisovich realized that his wife was already drunk, and acting out of character. He gazed around the room as if he had accidentally entered the wrong apartment. He searched for something familiar, something to hold onto, and was happy to see the little yellow-and-brown throw that Sofia Arkadievna had crocheted when Svetka was born. Russian newspapers and magazines were scattered on the glass coffee table, covered with fingerprints. The blue-and-white flowery china-one of the few things they brought with them when they emigrated-held the proverbial fried cod, mashed potatoes, and beet salad. Stolichnaya vodka in Czech crystal glasses with golden trim completed the setting. The curtains were drawn, shutting out the world, and on the TV screen an old black-and-white film with Katyusha missiles blasting against the night sky annihilated Nazi troops in the field. Ivan Denisovich almost believed he was back in Russia, and for a moment felt warm inside, as if the shot of vodka had spread slowly through his veins into the most remote areas of his body, pushing out the pain. He suddenly loved everyone, even his son-in-law with his idiotic spiky hair.

“Milaya.” He hadn’t called Sofia Arkadievna “my beloved” for many years. He reached for her face and noticed she was crying. “Milaya, don’t cry. It will be all right.”

“How would you know, you old goat?” She sounded just like Grigory.

“Mama?” Sveta stared at her weeping mother from across the table. “Ma, what’s wrong?”

“Ma, ma!” Sofia Arkadievna mocked her daughter. “That’s what,” and she grabbed the platter and threw it across the room. It hit the wall just below the family picture gallery, and the fish mixed with broken china slid down the wall and landed on the polished top of the bookcase.

Sveta jumped from the table, covering her mouth with both hands, as if afraid to release any sound. The men didn’t move.

On the screen, a hazy-eyed war heroine sang “Moscow Nights” to a room full of somber officers.

“I’m sorry,” cried Sofia Arkadievna, and plunked her head over her arms on the table. “I’m so sorry, Vanya. For everything.”

Sveta made a sign to her husband to help her clean up the mess. He wanted to finish his food, but she handed him a rag and a bucket to take care of the fish on the bookcase.

Ivan Denisovich remained still. Everything in his past had to be suddenly rearranged, like a Rubik’s cube when you moved one square and the whole thing collapsed and you had to start over. Only he had no time left to put it all together again. He stood up, unexpectedly sorry for himself, picked up his keys, and walked out the door.

He reached the corner. The night was cool, but jasmine filled the air. The leaning palms looked like bottle brushes against the dark red glow of the evening sky. A young couple across the street laughed, drinking out of a brown bag and smoking. Ivan Denisovich approached them and demonstrated that he wanted a cigarette. They smiled, handed him a Marlboro, and offered to light it. He nodded in gratitude and limped away, his legs rubbery from the first puff.

Cars zoomed by, up and down Fountain Avenue. An older woman with a grocery bag struggled with her keys. A black teenager coasted on his bike, hands off the bar, just like Grigory used to, back in Moscow. A Latina beauty pulled her screaming son out of a beat-up Toyota; then a paraplegic rolled past him in a motorized wheelchair and disappeared inside an apartment building.

Ivan Denisovich shivered and regretted having forgotten his jacket. He glanced at the window on the third floor that framed the orange-tinted light from his apartment. The balcony was filled with old suitcases, geraniums in clay pots, and laundry hanging from the line. Two plastic chairs, his and Sofia Arkadievna’s, stood in the middle, facing the street. They often sat there in the evenings, drinking cold tea and watching neighbors down below. He noticed that the chair cushions were still there. How many times did he have to tell her not to leave them out overnight?

He threw his cigarette on the ground, crushed it against the asphalt with his slipper, and shuffled back home.

ROGER CRUMBLER CONSIDERED HIS SHAVEBY GARY PHILLIPS

Mid-City

Roger Crumbler considered his shave. On this his fiftieth birthday, he was pleased that while his stubble became grayer each week, he still had a head of hair-and it was still dark.

The face in his bathroom mirror had held up fairly decently for half a century. Though not for the first time he