• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1017 0

They ordered the spectators to step back and pulled a box out of the van. The man efficiently exposed Grigory Petrovich’s pallid chest with its flowerbed of gray hair, and attached the defibrillator pads to his skin. The girl pressed the button on the box, following her partner’s signal. Grigory’s body jolted on the ground, lifting his feet and head, and sprawled back, lifeless. He was like one of those rubber frogs that leaped when air was pumped into them through a tube. They did it again, this time his feet shook longer, but seemingly without any relationship to the rest of his body. They tried once more for good measure, but it was clear—he was gone.

Ivan Denisovich stood, paralyzed. His extremities stiffened and froze, despite the heat, and his head buzzed. He watched the paramedics load Grigory Petrovich into the van and close the door. Someone pointed to him, and the young woman in the paramedic uniform shook his shoulder. She held a pad in her hand and asked him something. He didn’t respond. She offered him water.

He pushed away the plastic cup and whispered, “Grisha.”

She handed him a pen and held her pad pointing to the empty page. He understood, and wrote, Grigory Petrovich Shurov—May 13, 1931, Moskva, U.S.S.R. He wished he could add war hero, or something important to the line, but Grigory didn’t have any distinctions, and was too young to have participated in the war.

Ivan Denisovich climbed inside the ambulance and sat across from the zipped-up plastic bag that used to be his best friend. He tried to avoid looking at the slug-shaped object laid out on the gurney, but his eyes kept drifting to the head, because the zipper was right over Grigory’s large nose, and Ivan worried about it leaving scratches on his face.

He had to tell Valentina, but how could he? He remembered a Jewish joke where a man was sent to gently deliver the news to the wife that her husband had passed away. He rang the doorbell and an attractive woman opened the apartment door. “Is widow Abramowitz home?” he asked, removing his hat. “Why widow? I have a husband,” she replied with arrogance. “Bubkas is what you have instead of a husband,” blurted out the man, and ran for the exit.

Ivan Denisovich smiled and immediately started to weep, because he knew that no one except Grigory would have understood him joking now.

The door opened and Valentina stared at him from the dim apartment. The smell of burning canola oil enveloped the two of them like a nostalgic blanket.

“Nuuh, finally. Where’s my oaf? Parking? We’ve been going crazy looking for you. Sofia called four times.” She winked at Ivan Denisovich. “Jealous.”

Valentina’s blue eye shadow had caked over her eyelids, her hair was up in soft pink rollers, and she wore white fluffy rabbit slippers. The Queen of Fucking Everything sparkled from her apron.

Ivan Denisovich had rehearsed his lines several times on the way from the hospital, but Hold yourself together, Valentina, your husband is deceased just wouldn’t roll off his tongue.

“Valyusha, our Grishka is gone,” he gushed, and collapsed on her shoulder.

“Are you drunk? Idiot.” She shook him, trying to find his face. “What the hell you’re talking about?”

“He’s dead, Valya!” slobbered Ivan Denisovich. “Something’s burning in the kitchen.”

Valentina stood there blocking the entrance, staring not so much at Ivan Denisovich as inside herself. She pushed him out of her way and dashed downstairs, her slippers flapping against her rough bare heels.

“He’s not there,” yelled Ivan Denisovich, and followed her down, holding onto the railing.

Valentina darted to the corner and looked up and down the street, then froze, watching Ivan Denisovich’s solitary figure approach her. His shoulders sank and his face turned sullen. He opened his arms to embrace her, uncertain which one of them needed to be held more.

“No. No, no.” She pushed him away. “He can’t do this to me.” She folded her arms and pursed her lips as if plotting revenge for Grigory Petrovich’s return.

“Come,” Ivan Denisovich said quietly. “Let’s go in. You’ll burn down the house.