Moscow Noir

Kiev Station

Translated by Mary C. Gannon

“What’s the story on your pal?”

“He was born, he suffered, he died.”

—Dialogue from Heist, a film by David Mamet

If you ride out from the center of the city on the Filevskaya line, a minute before Kievskaya, the train, whistling and puffing, slows down and emerges out into the light on the subway bridge. Your eyes try to take in the sharp bend in the river, the angular, protruding architectural ruins along the embankments, and the broad flat facade of the White House, its flanks a bold invitation to gunfire from weapons mounted on tanks.

On this day the picture seemed to be smeared like bad reception on a TV screen with whitish rain showers, frequent and driving. I frowned and hunched my shoulders, anticipating the discomfort, but when I crawled out from underground into the station, it had already stopped. The darkened asphalt breathed out a bathlike moisture, passersby shook off their umbrellas fastidiously, and the returning sun was multiplied in puddles.

I glanced at my watch and walked down the street, slowly making my way over to a fountain that looked like the remaining evidence of the recent shower; I wanted to turn it off. Some people had already sat down, sticking backpacks and plastic bags under their behinds, on the steps of this stunted amphitheater. Others peeled off their jackets or simply shook the water from their soaking heads; this hot spot for the young filled up quickly. I remembered that I had waited for Yanka here; I remembered that, stretching my hood as far as it would go and trying to light up underneath it, I had regretted my choice of meeting places. When the St. Petersburg girl had finally arrived, I took her to the new pedestrian bridge, where we blended in with other couples.

Together with them we staggered through the stuffy glass passageway from one side of the bridge to the other—I pointed with my finger, explaining that this was probably the only place in the city where you could see, more or less up close, four of the seven Stalin skyscrapers at once. Nodding at the MID building with a coat of arms on it, I explained that according to the original design it was to have been the only one without a spire. At the last minute Stalin announced that it looked too much like an American skyscraper that way. It was too late to change the design—the building was almost finished; but who would be the one to contradict Stalin’s wishes? So they ran a gigantic metal rod through the top floors, and placed a ridge-roofed tower on top of that, painted to look like stone. After Khrushchev unmasked the cult of personality, he was reminded that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to remove this idiotic detail of Stalin’s gloomy legacy. Nikita snorted and ordered that it stay right there, as a monument to the tastelessness of the generalissimo.

On the left side we moved onto a path that led along a high, grassy slope past the Turkish embassy toward the Borodinsky Bridge. Europe Square was now below and opposite us.

I like this place.

Here, the river and the open space in front of Kiev station leave a large expanse open to view. Here, you can really see the sky, which is rare in this capital city that squeezes you between enormous stone slabs. The view that spreads out before you here—the Gothic silhouette of the university on a distant bluff to the left, the palisade of mighty pipes on top of the Radisson, the spire of the Hotel Ukraine perpendicular to layers of lilac clouds—is one of those typical and utterly urban landscapes that create the face of a city, which Moscow, monstrous and vague with its eroded individuality, so lacks.

That’s what I said to Yanka, trying to show her the city from its most presentable perspective, trying to be amusing and casual, not pressuring her. I knew my role and my place. When I met her a year before in her native Petersburg, I invited her out of politeness (but not only that, not only …)—I invited her (that is to say, them, her and Igor) to “visit us in our capital with no culture,” promising to show them around and entertain them. Of course, they didn’t jump at the opportunity—not because they had anything against me, but because in the absence of any other attractions in the city, the prospect of hanging out with me was not sufficient inducement to overcome a distance of six hundred kilometers. Then, suddenly, Yanka found a reason—the wedding of a college friend. The event was to take place over several days (the newlyweds belonged to circles that had money to waste on lavish parties). But the other guests weren’t really to Yanka’s taste; and that’s when she remembered me.

Exceedingly pretty, with a slight, charming unevenness in her features, and with that rare combination of intelligence and spontaneity, that balance of self-assurance and sincere goodwill that you sometimes find in people from very well-to-do families—smart, prosperous, and affable; that was Yanka.

During those three days, I mobilized all my meager resources of joie de vivre and sociability. My guest was as open and friendly as ever; she listened attentively and meekly tasted the shark at Viet-Cafe, but on the whole she seemed fairly indifferent. As I later became convinced, people who feel that they are equal to life’s demands don’t experience an excess of curiosity about the range of its phenomena: they already know exactly what they need from it.

I had absolutely no chance of ever landing on the list of things that those people wanted from life. Back then I hadn’t abandoned my rock and roll efforts. Officially, I was supposed to be a journalist, which is how I presented myself (I was a freelancer). I was also acquainted with progressive, and sometimes even high-profile people; and I was, after all, a Muscovite. Theoretically, I belonged to practically the same circle as my female contemporary from the Petersburg theater crowd; the sense of insurmountable social and psychological distance was completely unfounded.

I felt not only a distance, though—I felt an abyss. In our relations, which seemed on the surface to be relaxed, there was something reminiscent of a conversation in the lingua franca of a Norwegian and a Malaysian who sit side by side on a flight in a transcontinental Boeing; however well-disposed they might be toward each other, they are still from different worlds. At that time, a little over four years ago, I had only begun to guess about the nature of that difference.

Yanka’s generosity of spirit, which so impressed me at first, gradually began to disturb me. It was difficult, if not impossible, for me to share a perspective in which the world appears to be acceptably, if not optimally arranged.

I became suspicious of Yanka’s self-sufficiency. I understood perfectly the origins of this feeling, since I’d had the opportunity to glimpse from afar the reality which the girl had inhabited for a long time already—the reality of her beloved theater, where she was highly regarded, with its well-established, intimate, exclusive company of actors. The same company was home, as well, to Igor; an amicable, handsome, easygoing guy who had a promising career ahead of him. In short, this world was so harmonious that at a certain moment it began to feel absolutely artificial to me.

Then I understood that I was merely deceiving myself. All I really wanted to do was expose the futility of affluence—so that I would see one advantage in my own deprived and uncomfortable existence. The advantage of authenticity.

A not uncommon compensatory trick.

Actually, all lives are equally real or unreal. The quality of everyday private and public loathsomeness in one of them affords no metaphysical bonuses to others.

It’s just that for some people, everything in life works out. For others, it doesn’t. And you can’t draw any moral lesson from it. Other than: Grief to the vanquished.

I looked at my watch again and frowned. I couldn’t do anything about my habit of turning up early for every appointment, whether important or completely inconsequential; even appointments with people who never show up on time anywhere in their lives.

And really, what’s the hurry?

“But you can always try—”

“Look, Felix, Yanka was a very gregarious young woman. She could have met up with anyone … Plus, it’s been over a year already.”

“Maybe you’ll think of someone else.”

“Oh, I don’t know … Well, there was Pasha from Moscow—she met him shortly before that, I think …”

“Who’s this Pasha guy?”