“Privet,” he says to someone who is not here.
PRIVET
LOVE
It cannot rest. It wants out.
HATE
It wants trouble. It makes trouble.
A VOICE BETWEEN THE WALLS
I told you I’d suck you off when I got out, didn’t I? Didn’t I promise you that?
KNUCKLES ON THE DOOR
One-two.
KNOCK, KNOCK
“Who is it?”
I SAID, KNOCK, KNOCK
“WHO IS IT?”
IT’S NICKY!
“Nicky?”
NICKY WHO?
“Nicky, Nicky, the key!
“The key to the door, Olga.”
THE KEY
Around your neck.
Privet.
I’M IN AMERICA NOW
The laughter is sailing.
The voice is assailing.
Small crystals of dew in the corners of the ceiling.
THE SUN IS BRIGHT AND THICK AND YELLOW
I’m outside Angelina’s apartment building. Which is my home. I feel dry and awake in the sunlight.
MY ANGEL
I pull out the keychain from my pocket. I beep it past the front door. I take the elevator up to the sixth floor.
I’M IN THE HALLWAY
There’s our door. Where Angelina and I live. Together.
I TAKE OUT THE KEY
I put it in the lock. I twist.
THE LOCK
He says, “has changed.” The man. Behind me.
HIS SKIN
It’s flush and dark against his white polo. His head is shaved. Clean, tan Dockers. Concise jaw. Full lips. Resemblances.
HE LOOKS SO MUCH LIKE HER WHEN HE’S WAITING
Focused and timeless.
CARLOS?
I stutter.
IT’S NOT THAT HE SCARES ME
It’s the amplitude of his eyes.
HE CROSSES HIS ARMS
His biceps squish against his ribs. The muscles rippling beneath the taut skin there, arms like biblical valleys. He’s watching me. His legs are firmly planted, but nothing of him is tense. He’s got all the time in the world.
LOCKS CHANGE
He says, “when people change.”
DO YOU WANT TO COME IN?
He sighs with a sigh that is undisputable.
TO SEE ANGELINA
I can’t control the heat in my cheeks.
HE UNCROSSES HIS ARMS
“I can’t.”
BROTHER, SISTER
“I’m still in Afghanistan…”
I SQUINT AND SQUINT AND SQUINT
He points to my sternum.
“It doesn’t burn?”
“What?” I ask.
“Your neck.”
THE KEY CLICKS INSIDE THE LOCK
The door slides open.
The hallway is deserted.
HI, BABY
Angelina. Hair undone. Lips parted. Eyes flowing toward me.
SHE KISSES ME ON THE MOUTH
“How was work?”
I SMELL
I tell her that I need to take a shower.
OLGA
She touches my shoulder. I turn around.
“Look what I got…”
She points to a bowl of peas on the counter.
I reach my hand in and take one pea. I put it in my mouth. It’s cold and hard and fresh.
I TAKE A SHOWER
It steams. I grip and extend my fingers in the hot water.
WITH MY HAIR STILL WET
I walk into the kitchen. Angelina is leaning over the stovetop. The pan is sizzling. On the table, the cutting board is laid out with a peeled onion cut in half. She turns around.
“Wanna help?” she says.
I DO
I want to help.
SHE SMILES
And smiles and smiles.
OR ELSE
I can’t stop looking at her mouth.
OLGA?
“Olga…” she says, “Olga…”
YES, MY ANGEL
“Come over here and help me…”
SHE PUTS HER HAND TO MY CHEEK
The other slides down to the countertop. Her hand is reaching across the table to the cutting board.
HER FINGERS TOUCH IT
Curl around it. Bring it closer.
HERE
She says, sliding it toward me.
I TAKE THE KNIFE IN MY HAND
“Well…”
WELL
My thumb makes contact with my finger around the handle. I squeeze.
PURE AND SOUND
“Olga, what are you doing?!”
MY MOUTH IS POOLING WITH COLDNESS
Un, deux, trois.
IN THE BEGINNING
There was the word.
THE KITCHEN SHAKES
Fists pounding on the walls. All the walls. Pounding. Punching. Screaming, “WAKE UP, WAKE UP, WAKE UP!!!”
YES, YES, YES
It’s not a flood.
MY VOICE
Frost against my teeth.
FOOTSTEPS
As soft as rain.
THE HANDLE OF THE KNIFE
Full stop.
TRUTH
The apartment is so quiet, it’s no longer an apartment.
The interval is so full, it’s no longer an interval.
The sea is so wide, it’s no longer the sea.
THE WAVES
I don’t want it to end, I don’t want it to end,
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Angel of resurrection, I am in gratitude.
Thank you mom, dad, Valick.
Rick Kinner, Kaisa Kinnunen, Vanja Hedberg, Scott Cooper, Divya Bala, Carrie-Anne James, Ida Skovmand, Sarra Ryma, Laure Orset-Prelet, Lauren Elkin, Derek Ryan, Nadja Spiegelman, Amélie Rousseau, Rosa Rankin-Gee, Theodore Haber, Jayne Batzofin, Silke Schroeder and Dr. Claire Finney—your care and support are part of this book.
Can’t thank my agents enough, Jane Finigan my ride-or-die advocate in Europe and David Forrer in North America.
A special thank you to Eliza, Eric, and everyone at Two Dollar Radio. You really get me. My cup runneth over.
Virtuoso A NOVEL BY Yelena Moskovich
* Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize, longlist
“A hint of Lynch, a touch of Ferrante, the cruel absurdity of Antonin Artaud, the fierce candour of Anaïs Nin, the stylish languor of a Lana del Rey song... Moskovich writes sentences that lilt and slink, her plots developing as a slow seduction and then clouding like a smoke-filled room.”
—Shahidha Bari, The Guardian
As Communism begins to crumble in Prague in the 1980s, Jana’s unremarkable life becomes all at once remarkable when a precocious young girl named Zorka moves into the apartment building with her mother and sick father. With Zorka’s signature two-finger salute and abrasive wit, she brings flair to the girls’ days despite her mother’s protestations to not “be weird.” But after scorching her mother’s prized fur coat and stealing from a nefarious teacher, Zorka suddenly disappears.
Meanwhile in Paris, Aimée de Saint-Pé married young to an older woman, Dominique, an actress whose star has crested and is in decline. A quixotic journey of self-discovery, Virtuoso follows Zorka as she comes of age in Prague, Wisconsin, and then Boston, amidst a backdrop of clothing logos, MTV, computer coders, and other outcast youth. But it isn’t till a Parisian conference hall brimming with orthopedic mattresses and therapeutic appendages when Jana first encounters Aimée, their fates steering them both to a cryptic bar on the Rue de Prague, and, perhaps, to Zorka.
With a distinctive prose flair and spellbinding vision, Virtuoso is a story of love, loss, and self-discovery that heralds Yelena Moskovich
