A Replacement Life (18 page)

S
lava was at the office early on Monday, his only companion Mr. Grayson dipping his bow tie into a buttered bagel. He waved cheerfully at Slava.

When he heard Arianna arrive, he crawled above the divider. She looked up and smiled.

“We didn’t talk yesterday,” he said.

“I wasn’t really around for yesterday,” she said. “I went at it too hard on Saturday night. I got home at four? I slept till noon.”

“Oh,” he said. In his mind, Arianna had waited at home for him to be ready to see her again. He disparaged his callowness.

“What’s the matter?” she said.

“Nothing, nothing,” he rushed to say. They shared an awkward silence.

A cough sounded beside them. Avi Liss was standing by Slava’s desk clutching a pile of printouts. “I’m sorry, lovebirds,” he said. “May I speak? Layout wants to know if Sheila’s going to let you cut the Vatican section. Then baseball can run long.”

“Sheila’s in the desert doing a detox,” Arianna said matter-of-factly. “There’s an infinity pool.”

“I’m sure you know all about it,” Avi said.

“They have this massage?” Arianna went on. “Six people work on you at the same time.
Twelve
hands.”

“When you figure it out, just let them know directly?” Avi said.

“And Louboutin is opening a boutique there next fall,” Arianna said. “Do you know, with the red sole?” She disappeared from view and lifted one of her heels above the divider, the sole demonically red. That was all you could see: the heel with its vanishing tip, the pale knob of the ankle, and the web of the toes pinched by the toe box. She was wearing a dress—anyone passing by Arianna’s cubicle could get an eyeful.

Avi and Slava remained rooted in place, bovine. The heel disappeared and Arianna vaulted
back into view.

“I have to go,” Avi said hoarsely and stalked off.

Slava tried to tamp down the system-wide expansion in his groin. “What was that about?” he said, a little hoarse himself.

“Avi the Jew thinks I’m a JAP. I don’t want to disabuse him.” Her eyes flashed insolently. He was learning the meaning of her expressions. This one meant: I don’t care, but I do. He felt a tweak of satisfaction at this penetration of her invincibility, then instantly felt guilty for it.

“Thanks for defending me,” she winked.

Slava stared, dumbfounded. It hadn’t occurred to him that she could require defending. She held her expression a moment, then laughed. She was joking.

Slava had spent Sunday translating his letter for Israel into Russian, so Israel
could hear what Slava had written. “Well, you certainly don’t know how to speak Russian,” Israel said, “but it sounds like you might know what you’re doing with English. It’s beautiful. Who’s the girl?”

“Your sister,” Slava said. “So to speak.”

“I’m saying who is the real-life model.”

“No one,” Slava said. “My imagination.”

“She sounds fierce. Must be one of ours.”

“She’s not one of ours,” Slava said.

“So it is someone!” Israel laughed. “Got you. Oh, you snot-nose. I can barely walk the block, but I can still run circles around you.”

“There’s an American expression, Israel: ‘You get more by honey than vinegar.’ Try it sometime.”

“My God, you’re a stiff berry. I hope you find an American girl, Slava. It’s easier for you than it is for us, but it’s hopeless for you all the same. But less so for your children, especially if you go with an American girl. And then your grandchildren won’t even know where Minsk is, good riddance.”

Slava acknowledged the lecture.

“So, did you talk to your grandmother?” Israel said. “It was her: staring at Shulamit, gulping the milk.”

“In a way,” Slava said.

“Next time you see her, say hello from me. You tell her that before that hooligan Yevgeny Gelman got his claws into her, she had another admirer on Karastoyanova. I wish you to find a woman like her, Slava.”

“And what is that like?” Slava said.

“She wasn’t an easy person. She held grudges for decades. People she didn’t like? She minced no words. And she never did anything she didn’t want to. But her heart was big. I’ve
never met a woman who loved that way, and I include in that assessment my dear departed Raisa. There wasn’t a false bone in your grandmother’s body. For better and worse.”

“That is the opposite of my grandfather,” Slava said. “What did they see in each other?”

“Marriage is a mystery,” Israel said. “In the end, logical explanation is impossible. Tolstoy was wrong: It’s the happy families that are happy in all different ways, and the unhappy families that are unhappy in the same depressing, predictable fashion. It’s a small miracle, every time, when two people can make one life.”

“So it’s out of your hands,” Slava said.

“No, no,” Israel said. “Quite the opposite. You have to work at it.”

“Then I don’t understand,” Slava said.

“I am almost dead,” Israel said, “and I still don’t understand.”

Throughout the day, Arianna a suddenly awkward presence on the other side
of the divider, Slava glanced at the telephone, willing it to ring with Grandfather’s number. By now he would know that Slava had written a letter for Israel. So, call. When you didn’t want to hear from him, he found you, and when you did, he was mum.

Slava lifted the receiver, listened to the dial tone, returned it to the cradle. The phone looked like something Grandfather would appreciate: a spaceship console dressed up as a regular old touch-dial. Slava didn’t know what function most of its buttons performed. Conference, transfer, something called ABS. Was that the button for phone records? His limited purview at the magazine was sufficiently served by one through nine. He snapped the phone out of its nest and bashed the buttons.

“How is he?” Slava asked Berta when she picked up.

“He talks at night,” she said impassively.

“Saying what?”

“Negotiating, counting. I don’t know. It’s impolite to listen.”

“I’m sorry it keeps you up,” he said.

“It’s my job,” she said. “We honor our old people.”

They stalled in an uncomfortable silence. After an eternity, Grandfather picked up the bedroom phone. “So?” he said. “Hello.”

“Nothing. How are you?”

“The doctor says it’s normal.”

“What’s normal?”

“Talking to God in your dreams after . . . you know. A passing. I wake up, I don’t know what planet I’m on. It’s like I have two bodies. Everything falls from my hands. Easy for him to say normal, he’s not the one feeling it.”

“I’m sure it’s temporary,” Slava said.

“That’s what he said, ‘temporary,’” Grandfather said. “As temporary as life or what?
Tfoo
, may these doctors get covered up to their heads. I heard you wrote something for Israel.”

Slava smiled to himself. “I did,” he said.

“That poor man. His wife—isn’t. His son—the roof went on his head. Man has two valor medals, shrapnel in his body, and he lives alone in an underground cubbyhole. You can’t compare his apartment with mine.”

“Yes, he didn’t pretend to be a vegetable,” Slava said. “It’s cozy, actually. Like
The Master and Margarita
.” He mentioned the book as an alliance with Israel. His grandfather didn’t read.

“I read the first and last page of that one. His apartment isn’t as nice as this one. Look at the size of my kitchen.”

“And you’ve got a woman cooking your meals. He heats soup from a can.”

“Exactly.”

“You live much better than he does.”

“We do what we can, Slava, we do what we can.”

“You’re really clever and he’s dumb,” Slava said. He upbraided himself for his orneriness. Not practical if he was calling with a need. He had to think like Grandfather.

“I always tell him at the doctor’s office, ‘Let me help you think about these things.’ But he doesn’t have the mind for it, he says.”

“You think he’s telling the truth?” Slava said.

“Why wouldn’t he be telling the truth?”

“Does everyone tell the truth?” Slava said.

“I do. I’ve got nothing to hide.”

“Oh, I see,” Slava said.

“Listen, a little birdie flew in here today,” Grandfather said.

Slava brightened. Maybe he wouldn’t have to ask.

“Said Vera Rudinsky is meeting some friends for dinner.”

“Oh,” he said, surprised to hear Vera’s name. Since the funeral party, Arianna had filled his mind. “And what kind of bird was this?”

“The kind that knows what it needs to know. She wants you to meet them. The friends.”

“She’s a vulgarian,” Slava said unconvincingly.

“She’s not Bulgarian, she’s one of us. That girl has an ass like a tomato. I saw the way you were looking at her—everyone saw. I’m not saying you have to marry her. Go spend an evening together. Do you know how to do that?”

“You’re too depressed to go outside, you’re playing matchmaker?”

“I get done what I need. So what, you called to ask how your grandfather is?”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m a couple of days older than you. You want another name.”

“And what makes you think that?”

“Because you’re my grandson,” the old man said with satisfaction.

“And a grandson of yours—”

“Takes opportunity by the balls.”

“What is the opportunity here?” Slava said. He didn’t hear an answer and asked again.

“Helping people,” Grandfather said.

“Your specialty,” Slava said.

“Yes, my specialty,” he mocked Slava. “Oh, hike up your skirt already. You’re flirting a little too long. Do you want a name or not?”

Now Slava made him wait. “Yes,” he said finally.

“Then why all the foreplay? Some of us have a limited time on earth. Go out with Vera tonight, I’ll give you a name tomorrow. Just let me know if I have to call you at her apartment.” He started laughing wickedly. “I was your age, she’d be old news already.”

“I don’t need you,” Slava said without conviction. “I’ll ask Israel. He’ll give me names. Your neighborhood is full of people who want money for free.”

“Do it,” Grandfather said. “Just watch you don’t say something to the wrong person.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I have to go, cucumber,” Grandfather said.

“That’s what Grandmother called me. Don’t call me that.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, grave all of a sudden. They were quiet while they waited for the ill feeling to dissipate. It was impossible to escape each other. Other people could throw down the phone, move to another part of the country, change their names, but Grandfather and Slava were sealed to each other like a husband and wife. They were married in the old way, without release. They would be vicious toward each other, wait till the burn settled, start in on each other again. They were deathless.

“Your grandmother would have walked under a tank for you,” Grandfather said. “And that’s the kind of girl Vera is. One of ours. A girl who will think of you first. But no kind of stupid cow, either, painting her nails all day. She’s got a salary, an apartment.”

“Is it you’re too proud to make peace yourself?”

“You don’t know
anything
,” Grandfather hissed. Slava saw the spittle flying from his gold teeth on the other end of the line. It was the face Grandfather had worn when he cut up that man in Minsk fifty years before, a face Slava had been sheltered from.

“Fine,” Slava said. “Give me a name.”

“What do you think, I’m a two-year-old?” Grandfather said, pleasant again. “Date first, name tomorrow. Good luck, Don Juan.” And with that, he hung up.

Vera called shortly after Slava had hung up with Grandfather, as if Grandfather
had given a signal. The grandfather arranged it:

Slava’s grandfather to Vera’s grandfather: “He wants to go out with Vera tonight, but can she call him? He doesn’t want to impose.”

Vera’s grandfather to Vera: “Slava wants to join you, but this one’s shy, apparently. You have to ask him.”

Vera to Slava: “What are you doing, Slava? Grandfather gave me your number. I started telling my friends about our Italian adventures. They want to meet you.”

Vera wore an amber-colored leather jacket over a cowl-necked blouse and jeans over black heels that narrowed to fine points. They clopped like hooves down the steps of her apartment building. Her hair, swept up into a wave captured mid-crash, and her eyelids, fatigued with ultramarine shadow, sparkled with synonymous gloss, lending a wanton appearance to a face that seemed still young and unformed.

“Where are we going?” he said. “You look nice.”

“Thank you, Slava,” she smiled. “Avenue I. By the banya.”

“We can take the F,” he said.

“No, no, taxi,” she said. “Call, please?” She reached into her purse and handed Slava a card. “Ask for Vova.”

Vova was a former cruiserweight, the span of his hands nearly the size of the steering wheel. A crew cut crowned the square of his head.

“Where tonight, Verochka?” he said when the young people were piled into the backseat.

“Avenue I. Lara’s,” she said.

“I’ll be taking you back?” Vova said.

“Yes, please.”

“Just call when you’re ready.”

They rode in a festive silence, the streets slick after a brief, indecisive rain.

“Your friend, does he speak?” Vova said finally.

“I’m sorry, Vovochka,” Vera said. “It was rude not to introduce him. Tell Vova something about yourself, Slava.”

“I work at a magazine,” Slava croaked.

“One of ours?” Vova inquired. “A fitness magazine?”

“An American one,” Vera said proudly.

“An American one!” Vova smacked his lips. “Important people in the car, it turns out. That gives you enough bread, working at a magazine?”

“I’m thinking about driving a taxi,” Slava said. He hated these Russian men whose kingdoms were the size of their taxicabs.

Vera elbowed Slava and gave him a cold look. With shame, he remembered that her father drove a taxicab. However, his comment had the intended effect of diminishing the
cruiserweight’s interest in further conversation.

They pulled up at a building that looked just like Grandfather’s—brick, an arched entryway wearing too many layers of paint. Slava hadn’t realized young Russian people continued to live in these neighborhoods even though they were old enough to live wherever they wanted. They sat in the car until Slava realized he would be paying. “And how much?” he inquired.