Los Angeles Noir - Denise Hamilton [88]
“A nightmare!” said Sofia Arkadievna, rolling blinis onto her plate. “Look what those blood-thirsty Chechens are doing again! There’s no end to it … Sour cream or jam?”
“I’ll take the Nutella,” replied Ivan Denisovich, sitting down.
The screen flashed scenes from Grozny, where another car had been blown up and charred corpses were strewn across the pavement. Women in flowery babushkas wept, wiping away tears with dirty rags.
“Beasts. They are not human!” exclaimed Sofia Arkadievna, and sauntered over to the refrigerator. “How can they live like that?”
“It’s their home.”
“You want some juice?” She ignored his remark.
“Neh, my stomach is gurgly.” Ivan Denisovich glazed the inside of a blini with a generous layer of Nutella and slowly rolled it around the fork into a tube.
Home. What a strange word. Its meaning confused Ivan Denisovich. His mother died long ago, just before the war. And his father, after being liberated from Dachau, was sent directly to the Gulag, where he died after three months of hard labor. Funny how memory worked. The thought of home triggered the image of his exhausted father. Did he know that Ivan, then age fourteen, was also shipped to Siberia, as the son of a traitor of the people? It all seemed to have happened only yesterday, and at the same time in another life.
Ivan Denisovich remembered how after his release from the camps, he stood at a railroad station with a small backpack. The newspaper he had wrapped around his feet instead of puttees ripped inside his boots, but he was accustomed to the feeling. He had lived like that for two years, never fully warm. The sound of the approaching train pierced the Arctic silence. He bought a ticket to Kazakhstan, because it was hot, and ex-politicals were allowed to live there. He didn’t have any aspirations; he was sixteen but didn’t feel young, or excited at the long life ahead. He just wanted to be warm and have a place to sleep, any place, as long as it was only his, without cellmates.
Ivan Denisovich looked around the room, and it seemed eerie that he was sitting in Los Angeles, half the globe away from where he started.
“Ivan, where are you? I’ve been talking to you, and you’re like a zombie.” Sofia Arkadievna shook his shoulder. “What is it? Get out of your head, all I have to say. I have an assignment for you, dearie.” She pushed a piece of paper across the table. A little furry kitten with a pink bow stared at Ivan Denisovich from the top of the to-do list. Sofia Arkadievna would not allow him to sit in front of the television all day. He had what she called responsibilities. Canned tuna and oatmeal, that’s what his life had become.
“Later.” He stuffed the list into his pocket and walked over to the couch to watch TV.
“Pick up the phone, my hands are wet!” yelled Sofia Arkadievna from the kitchen. Ivan Denisovich must have dozed off again, because he didn’t hear the ring.
“Vanya?” Grigory Petrovich’s familiar baritone flowed benevolently through the receiver. “Are you decent? Davai, get down. I’m waiting. We’re going fishing in Santa Monica. My women are driving me crazy.”
Grigory Petrovich was Ivan Denisovich’s old school friend. He had a wife and a divorced daughter with two kids. They all lived together in a two-bedroom apartment in North Hollywood. Ivan Denisovich rarely visited him at night. The household was raucous, with children running and women yelling; besides, Sofia Arkadievna didn’t like Grigory’s wife, Valentina. She found her gaudy and low-class, not to mention ten years younger. Frankly, it was just as well, because Ivan Denisovich’s eyes weren’t what they used to be, and he preferred to stay home at night.
“Why fishing?” he whispered.
“Why not? Better than sitting in front of that talking box. Think: air, waves, the sun, and girls in bikinis.”
“You can’t eat that fish, the water’s polluted,” replied Ivan Denisovich, watching his wife clear the table, all the while figuring out how to escape without telling her he was going to the beach with Grigory.
“Hell you talking about? Who cares!” roared Grigory.