Your Love Incomplete by Robert Bonomo
XVII - THE STAR
I sat in the big armchair in the back of the kitchen looking out on Koryaksky Volcano rising 3,500 meters and spewing smoke high into the sky out of crater just below its peak. That bitter cold day marked the first eruption in many years for the massive volcano that was the backdrop for the village of Elizovo, Kamchatka where Marina lived. The sun was crisp and the icy air passed through the old wooden window but the heat rising from the radiator seemed to compensate leaving me comfortable in the chair. A chicken was roasting in the oven and I was drinking a beer. It was the end of January 2009 and I’d been in Kamchatka for almost six weeks.
Kamchatka was beyond the pale where the simplest things became adventures. Iced roads and sidewalks made every journey perilous, the language and alphabet were a complete mystery and prices for most products exceeded those of New York. Even the Internet was billed at about $0.10 a megabyte and every few days my balance would run out and I had to go to a store and put money in ATM machine to charge my account.
I had given up my phone and most communication with the outside world as I told Larissa and Karina that I had gone back to California for good. I had no idea who wanted to get in touch with me as I only checked the email for my blog which was under a pseudonym. I realized that so much moving around in the world had left me almost entirely alone with practically no family and few if any friends; Marina was all I had and I was falling more and more under her spell.
The words and smiles never ceased. The mystery and attraction resonated between us from the moment of our first awkward embrace at the rundown airport in Kamchatka. She let me slowly unfold enough of my turbulent story to give her the basic outline of what had happened without demanding humiliating details. In her home, in her body and in her soul I found more peace and joy then I could have ever imagined but from the moment of my arrival the clock weighed upon us.
My flight back to New York was scheduled for January 15, 2009 but it felt far too soon so I extended it to the 21st of February. We were in our second month together and I had no desire to leave her or the terribly beautiful Kamchatka peninsula. The sunset left a pink light on the snow covered volcano and I began reading while waiting for Marina to come home. In Kamchatka I read like I hadn’t read in years and my mind functioned with exceptional clarity. With over a meter of snow on the ground the silence at dusk became like a therapy to calm my nerves which were occasionally rattled by the memories of my hasty departure from New York.
I took the chicken and placed it on the serving plate with roasted potatoes and soon after I could hear her at the door. I kissed her ice cold face, looked into her dark chocolate eyes and brushed back her damp, sandy blonde hair. She took off her boots and thick winter coat and I caressed her firm body. “Oh, that smells so good; how lucky I am.” The apartment was dark and she turned on the hall light and petted her Labrador Leo who scuttled up to her jumping up and down while her obese black cat Moshe looked on from a distance.
I opened another can of beer as we sat down to dinner, “It’s Thursday, we can start drinking.” She gave me a sideways glance as I poured. I hadn’t lived with anyone for a long time and I had to come to terms with the fact that most people didn’t drink every day. After dinner we took the dog for a walk in the -20°C night and Leo ran off without a leash to roll in the snow. The rundown buildings and shipping containers turned into garages gave the village a very dystopian feel.
The bedroom was cold as the radiator never got very warm and we could see each other’s breath as we spoke. We pulled the electric blanket over us and held each other tight as we fell off into sleep. The sun didn’t come up until well after nine in the morning and I savored the time before sunrise drinking coffee and reading newspapers online before beginning to write. I became disciplined about the blog and wrote a new article every week making sure it was published on Thursdays while Wild Bill got my articles placed on many of the alternative media websites. Writing became my job and I interacted covertly on many sites through my alter ego, Parker the Barker.
New York was difficult to escape entirely and its anxiety would at times creep back under the door to haunt me, but Kamchatka acted as a decompression chamber to gradually disconnect me from the matrix of stress and money. I didn’t talk about my advertising career with Marina and we discussed my articles on the blog as if they were my job, the same way she explained to me her cases from the hospital.
It was the weekend of Valentine’s Day and we had rented a cabin at a small installation with a big swimming pool filled with hot thermal water. There were woods behind us and Marina’s brother Kostya and his wife Yilena had also rented a cabin next to ours. Kostya and I were outside making a fire on the barbeque while the ladies stayed inside preparing the meat and vegetables. Kostya and I huddled around the fire fanning it while drinking beer in the cold dusk. Kostya was in his mid-thirties and had a shop that sold food and alcohol which was a high margin business in Kamchatka since everything had to be shipped in by boat or flown in. Kostya warmed his hands on the fire and asked, “So, Arthur, what do you think of Obama?”
“I can’t say I think much has changed; it’s about same as changing Putin for Medvedev. People are sheep and they believe what they are told and it rarely crosses their minds to consider how similar their choices are.”
“But it can’t be worse than Bush?”
“I’m not really sure it would’ve made any difference if Bush had stayed on for another four years. Wall Street still runs Washington and Israel is still the focus of foreign policy- nothing has changed.”
“What do you think of these two running our country? Beavis and Butthead, as I like to say.”
“I have no idea, really. I’ve been her a little over a month and I don’t speak the language at all. It’s so different here, you can’t imagine how much different. Ask me in a few years.”
“You want to stay a few years?”
“I don’t know. For the moment I like it. It’s very wild and it feels like you can be free here.”
“Yes, but this horrible government we have, all they do is rob from us and harass us with paperwork and fines. If we only had a better government maybe so many people wouldn’t leave.” The more I learned about Russia the more it remained an enigma, but living among the ruins of the Soviet regime did reinforce my nascent anarchist tendencies.
Marina and Yilena came out with the meat and we put it on the fire while they went back inside to make salads. “Kostya, have you and Yilena ever thought of emigrating? You don’t have any kids yet, it would be relatively easy.”
“We’re seriously thinking about going to Canada. We both speak English and Yilena is a research scientist and has just finished her PhD, but she’s only making about $800 a month, less than a corporal in the army or a shop attendant and I’m sure I can figure out some kind of business to do once we get to Canada. There’s no future for her here. In Vancouver there’re lots of Russians from The Far East and we have some friends there who really like it. We’ll see.” He brought the first batch of meat in and I stood by the fire, turning the pork, looking at the stars, enjoying the cold and feeling very free. We had a light hearted dinner drinking vodka and eating lots of meat and salads. They were very hospitable to me, never asked probing questions and speaking in English enough to keep me in the loop of the conversation.
That next afternoon Kostya and Yilena went for a walk with the dog and Marina and I went for a swim in the pool. The water was heavy and very warm and I could almost feel its thickness while I looked out across the snow drifts onto surrounding the hills. Marina swam close and held my hands. We had a strong physical connection that was, for the first time in what seemed a long time, very healthy. It wasn’t a power trip but a way of expressing how we felt for each other, which after a few years in New York seemed almost kinky.
“What are you thinking about?” She asked
“Do you really want to know?”
“Yes.
” I didn’t want to dump a lot of my problems on her but she was already more than just a lover; she had become that kindred spirit I had searched so long and hard for. I held her hand which always left me fascinated with its delicate, harmonious form; the most beautiful hand I’d ever seen and worthy of a woman who had both Sun and Ascendant in Gemini.
“Well, all is not well business wise. I could tell you that it was because of the financial crisis but that wouldn’t really be true. I made a lot of mistakes and had a problem with some of my partners, so, for the moment, things aren’t too good. Let’s just enjoy this time together and see what happens.”
“Arthur, I knew something was wrong; I could tell that day you were in a hotel. Don’t worry, if we’re happy together and want to be together all will be okay; we can invent something. Please don’t think I want to be with you to go to America; I really don’t care where we live. I actually like it here, as strange as that may seem.”
She put her arms around my neck and we watched the sunset over the mountains as the white snow became pink in the dusk. I leaned against the side of the pool as the steam floated across the water, “I want to tell you I feel wonderful here with you,” I told her, “I can honestly say I never thought I would ever get so lucky as to meet someone like you, and you’re so beautiful.” And she was. I never tired of looking at her. The form and the essence made a perfect marriage: delicate yet firm, tender but never clingy, smart but not pedantic. She gave me a kiss and a broad smile.
“You are too kind. But it’s shocking how much we really seem to know each other. Sometimes when I wake up and watch you sleeping I feel like we’ve been together for years. I love talking to you and I feel I can really say what I’m thinking or I can just relax and listen to you go on about whatever seems to be running through that strange mind of yours.”
“Ha, wait till I start repeating myself. I would really like to continue writing. It feels so good, like what I was supposed to do. We’ll see what happens, like you say, maybe we can invent something. I’m so glad I met you now and not before; I wouldn’t have been ready.”
“I want to have your child. You need a child and I want to have it.” It took great strength not to try and create a child then and there. It was very strong. The half moon waxing took over the night and we kissed and held each other.
“Let’s take a jump in the lake.” She proposed.
“You’re insane! We’ll die.”
“Come on, don’t worry, you’ll survive. It’s good for your health.” We walked out of the pool in just our bathing suits with steamy flying off us in the -20°C air and made our way to a dock by a small lake. There were steps down into the water where a big whole had been cut out of the ice. She, without hesitation, jumped in and dunked her head motioning for me to do the same. It took all my manhood, pride and something else to get me to follow her. The water was so cold I truly thought something snapped and I had died as my body crashed into the icy water. Unlike her, I made a grimace of the utmost pain and a beeline for the steps while she slowly followed me laughing. I was moaning as I ran back to the hot pool but once in the warm water the stinging feeling was magnificent.
“You know God likes things in three’s. You want to try again?” I shook my head and she smiled.
My ticket to New York was for the 21st of February but I was hesitant to go back to New York as there was nothing to go back to- I had been stripped clean. I had stopped paying my credit cards and all had gone dark. The only things I had in the world were a bag of clothes, a computer, and now about fifteen grand in cash. I had bought her a new oven, a new refrigerator, a fur coat for winter and tried to pick up as many expenses as I could. I was living like I had an income.
One day searching on the Internet I found an old girlfriend I’d had in Spain, Lola. She was about my age and we’d had a very intense relationship which became a very nice friendship. I hadn’t spoken to her in a few years and I caught up with her online and gave her a vague idea of what was going on with my life and she invited me to come to Spain. She came from a well to do rural family in Murcia and they had a very large farm with a wonderful house that was almost always empty. She told me I could stay there as long as I wanted to get myself together; it was the perfect solution to the nightmare of going back to New York. The next day Marina and I went to the capital of Kamchatka, Pertropovlask, and changed my ticket to Madrid with the return back to Kamchatka. Not having to go back to the States did a great deal to raise my spirits even though what awaited me in Spain was not entirely clear.
Being in Kamchatka for an extended period had cut me off from civilization in a way I had never thought possible. Culture had always been a refuge, an idyllic safe place, but living amidst such imposing and awe inspiring natural surroundings culture became much more trivial. The cities and villages looked ridiculous beside the giant breathing volcanoes and man and his paraphernalia appeared silly next to the immense potential of natural violence lurking every where I looked. No city, no matter how impressive, could ever compare with the sublime beauty of Kamchatka. Marina fit in perfectly wearing her beauty and grace as unselfconsciously as the volcanoes reflecting the sunsets.
The following week she had a day off and we went skiing in the morning. The station was just a few kilometers from her apartment and there was an old rope lift that pulled us up the slopes. It was a sunny day, not too cold, and we could see the ocean to the east and the volcanoes to the north and the south. She was as good skier, much better than me, and watching her move elegantly down the difficult descent was impressive as I tried to follow her but was unstable at her considerable speed. She came to a quick stop and I slid in awkwardly behind her excited at having made the difficult descent. She lifted her goggles as I caught my breath, “Not so bad, you just need to loosen up a bit.” She let me rest for a moment before taking off again, elusive and graceful while I waited and admired her before beginning the pursuit to the bottom of the mountain.
Again we began the long ascent being pulled by the rope up the mountain and carefully making sure the skis didn’t cross each other as they slid up the hill. “What are you thinking?” she asked.
“It’s just hard to believe I’m here, so far from everything. The longer I stay, the farther away it seems. I don’t want to go back. I want to stay here with you.”
“Too bad about the visa and having to leave after three months, but you can come back in July, the summer here is very nice here. The worst time is the spring during the long thaw when everything is wet, better to be in Spain. I really want you to come back and I’ll wait for you. We’ll figure something out and if you still want me, I’ll be here. Please don’t worry about your business problems; we can survive. In Soviet times we had no money but people were more content. Now, everyone is buying cars and traveling but I don’t think they are any happier, in fact, I think they’re less happy. At least in Soviet times there was some purpose to life, some meaning, but now it’s just materialism and that’s no way to live.”
“You preferred it before?”
“I don’t know really. It just seemed simpler, clearer. Now things are very confusing and complicated.” We reached the summit and had to toss the stick that pulled us towards the pulley as we turned down the slope. It was our last run and I pushed myself to go faster and tighter. The tension of the turns and the icy snow sent me as fast as I’d ever skied until I was almost out of control, finally coming to a big powdery stop at the bottom of the mountain. We had sandwiches and tea then drove to a banya that we had reserved near the slopes.
I’d never been in a Russian banya before and this one had three rooms- a dressing room that had a fridge for beer, a second room with big barrels of cold and warm water, and finally the steam room itself with hot rocks heated by a wood stove. We both lay on the wooden benches with cloth hats to protect our heads from the heat. She was so beautiful completely nude and I watched her until I could barely b
reath and had to exit into the room with the big barrels of water where she, still without clothes, poured a bucket of cold water on my head that put a shock through my body. I did the same for her and then we went into the dressing room, put on robes, drank some beer and stepped out into the dusk to smoke a cigarette. I thought we were done but she reminded me that God liked things in threes so two more times we explored the extremes of hot and cold, finally finishing with a flurry of beers and an incredible calm in our bodies. We then stepped outside into the dark clear night with robes and slippers and the temperature at -15°C to smoke. Being a few kilometers outside the village the stars shown exceptionally bright with Sirius more intense than I had ever seen it.
That night Kostya and Yilena had invited us for dinner and it turned out to be a feast to match our formidable hunger. Yilena was a very good cook and the table was filled with plates of squid, halibut, and several salads. We ate and drank with vigor and once everyone was quite drunk, Kostya took out his guitar and I leaned back and listened to all three of them sing wonderful sad songs. Marina and I stumbled home over the ice and slept like logs.
My last week crept up on us like a ghost. I sat in the big chair in the kitchen and watched the snow fall wondering if I would ever come back. I certainly wanted to, but I was haunted by the idea that Marina might think I was just running away, which I was. I knew that I had arrived in Kamchatka as an escapee of New York hoping Marina would somehow be all she seemed to be but she turned out to be much more. But how was I going to support myself and contribute? I understood almost immediately that even though I was pretty good at languages learning Russian at my age would have been close to impossible.
I had tried to get a few free-lance media buying gigs while I was there but the fates didn’t seem to want it. I would confuse times zones and miss conference calls or my Internet connection would go out in the middle of an important conversation. I had been at the height of my career and had lots of good contacts yet I couldn’t bring myself to fight to save it and destiny didn’t seem to want it either. I had exactly $14,000 left which was much less than I’d hoped to have at that point. I’d blown more than fifteen grand in three months and I was afraid Marina was thinking there was more where that came from. I sat in the big chair and watched the day end as the snow kept falling unable to figure out what to do when suddenly my body began to remember the horrors of New York. I had a beer and sat with the lights out as the big snow flakes gently floated in the twilight. My flight was the next day and I was going to take her to dinner that night but I needed to start packing and I was still unsure. I heard the key in the door and the dog’s paws began slapping at the floor. I felt stuck in the chair as she made her way to the kitchen.
“What’s wrong?” She asked as she came in and gave me a kiss.
“I don’t know, just trying to figure things out.” She nodded and poured herself a beer.
“Is there something you want to tell me?” She didn’t seem so much afraid as concerned and I realized I was hoping she would ask me to come back. I needed her to suggest it, to offer it, so I didn’t feel like I was just using her.
“I’ll be here, Leo will be here, and even Moshe will be here.” She pointed to the overweight cat that was again eating, “We’ll be waiting for you. Is everything okay in Spain where you are going? You have a place there?”
“Yes, that’s all okay. I confirmed everything.”
“I’m going to miss you so much, what day is your ticket back?”
“May 25th.”
“When you come back we can spend a lot of time at my dacha. I like to spend my summers there and you’ll love it. I have a garden and a banya. It’s my favorite time of the year and by the time you get back most of the hard work will be done so you can just relax and enjoy.”
“Look, Marina, I’m not going to have much money when I get back and I haven’t been able to get much going as far as new jobs, so, I don’t know. It won’t be like these last few months, I mean, money wise.”
She smiled tenderly. “We’ll have potatoes, and carrots, and tomatoes from my green house; we won’t starve. Please dear, forget about money, okay. Promise?”
“Okay.” I gave her a hug and all the stress of the previous hours ran out of me. I packed a carry on bag and that was all I took with me along with my computer. Everything was going to go into that carry-on because I wanted to travel very light. I left my big bag with her, including most of my clothes and $11,000 as I took only $3,000 with me. As I closed the bag I felt my worries leave and the excitement of a new journey and chapter in my life beginning. We had dinner at a restaurant then went and said good bye to Kostya and Yilena and wound up staying there half the night.
With a tremendous hangover she drove me to the airport in Kamchatka, the Russian police with their big hats guarding the entrance. She cried for the first time while I was with her when we parted at the gate and it wrenched at my heart but it also kept her close to me. When there were doubts, fears, or second thoughts I would always remember her tears.
Leaving Kamchatka was like leaving the wilderness and coming back to civilization. Once in the main terminal in Moscow I could feel the culture start to pull on me, even more so on the flight to Madrid when I finally heard a language I could understand. The old life was trying to suck me back in but I remembered her at the gate and fell asleep as I crossed Europe heading west not knowing what awaited me.
I sat in the big armchair in the back of the kitchen looking out on Koryaksky Volcano rising 3,500 meters and spewing smoke high into the sky out of crater just below its peak. That bitter cold day marked the first eruption in many years for the massive volcano that was the backdrop for the village of Elizovo, Kamchatka where Marina lived. The sun was crisp and the icy air passed through the old wooden window but the heat rising from the radiator seemed to compensate leaving me comfortable in the chair. A chicken was roasting in the oven and I was drinking a beer. It was the end of January 2009 and I’d been in Kamchatka for almost six weeks.
Kamchatka was beyond the pale where the simplest things became adventures. Iced roads and sidewalks made every journey perilous, the language and alphabet were a complete mystery and prices for most products exceeded those of New York. Even the Internet was billed at about $0.10 a megabyte and every few days my balance would run out and I had to go to a store and put money in ATM machine to charge my account.
I had given up my phone and most communication with the outside world as I told Larissa and Karina that I had gone back to California for good. I had no idea who wanted to get in touch with me as I only checked the email for my blog which was under a pseudonym. I realized that so much moving around in the world had left me almost entirely alone with practically no family and few if any friends; Marina was all I had and I was falling more and more under her spell.
The words and smiles never ceased. The mystery and attraction resonated between us from the moment of our first awkward embrace at the rundown airport in Kamchatka. She let me slowly unfold enough of my turbulent story to give her the basic outline of what had happened without demanding humiliating details. In her home, in her body and in her soul I found more peace and joy then I could have ever imagined but from the moment of my arrival the clock weighed upon us.
My flight back to New York was scheduled for January 15, 2009 but it felt far too soon so I extended it to the 21st of February. We were in our second month together and I had no desire to leave her or the terribly beautiful Kamchatka peninsula. The sunset left a pink light on the snow covered volcano and I began reading while waiting for Marina to come home. In Kamchatka I read like I hadn’t read in years and my mind functioned with exceptional clarity. With over a meter of snow on the ground the silence at dusk became like a therapy to calm my nerves which were occasionally rattled by the memories of my hasty departure from New York.
I took the chicken and placed it on the serving plate with roasted potatoes and soon after I could hear her at the door. I kissed her ice cold face, looked into her dark chocolate eyes and brushed back her damp, sandy blonde hair. She took off her boots and thick winter coat and I caressed her firm body. “Oh, that smells so good; how lucky I am.” The apartment was dark and she turned on the hall light and petted her Labrador Leo who scuttled up to her jumping up and down while her obese black cat Moshe looked on from a distance.
I opened another can of beer as we sat down to dinner, “It’s Thursday, we can start drinking.” She gave me a sideways glance as I poured. I hadn’t lived with anyone for a long time and I had to come to terms with the fact that most people didn’t drink every day. After dinner we took the dog for a walk in the -20°C night and Leo ran off without a leash to roll in the snow. The rundown buildings and shipping containers turned into garages gave the village a very dystopian feel.
The bedroom was cold as the radiator never got very warm and we could see each other’s breath as we spoke. We pulled the electric blanket over us and held each other tight as we fell off into sleep. The sun didn’t come up until well after nine in the morning and I savored the time before sunrise drinking coffee and reading newspapers online before beginning to write. I became disciplined about the blog and wrote a new article every week making sure it was published on Thursdays while Wild Bill got my articles placed on many of the alternative media websites. Writing became my job and I interacted covertly on many sites through my alter ego, Parker the Barker.
New York was difficult to escape entirely and its anxiety would at times creep back under the door to haunt me, but Kamchatka acted as a decompression chamber to gradually disconnect me from the matrix of stress and money. I didn’t talk about my advertising career with Marina and we discussed my articles on the blog as if they were my job, the same way she explained to me her cases from the hospital.
It was the weekend of Valentine’s Day and we had rented a cabin at a small installation with a big swimming pool filled with hot thermal water. There were woods behind us and Marina’s brother Kostya and his wife Yilena had also rented a cabin next to ours. Kostya and I were outside making a fire on the barbeque while the ladies stayed inside preparing the meat and vegetables. Kostya and I huddled around the fire fanning it while drinking beer in the cold dusk. Kostya was in his mid-thirties and had a shop that sold food and alcohol which was a high margin business in Kamchatka since everything had to be shipped in by boat or flown in. Kostya warmed his hands on the fire and asked, “So, Arthur, what do you think of Obama?”
“I can’t say I think much has changed; it’s about same as changing Putin for Medvedev. People are sheep and they believe what they are told and it rarely crosses their minds to consider how similar their choices are.”
“But it can’t be worse than Bush?”
“I’m not really sure it would’ve made any difference if Bush had stayed on for another four years. Wall Street still runs Washington and Israel is still the focus of foreign policy- nothing has changed.”
“What do you think of these two running our country? Beavis and Butthead, as I like to say.”
“I have no idea, really. I’ve been her a little over a month and I don’t speak the language at all. It’s so different here, you can’t imagine how much different. Ask me in a few years.”
“You want to stay a few years?”
“I don’t know. For the moment I like it. It’s very wild and it feels like you can be free here.”
“Yes, but this horrible government we have, all they do is rob from us and harass us with paperwork and fines. If we only had a better government maybe so many people wouldn’t leave.” The more I learned about Russia the more it remained an enigma, but living among the ruins of the Soviet regime did reinforce my nascent anarchist tendencies.
Marina and Yilena came out with the meat and we put it on the fire while they went back inside to make salads. “Kostya, have you and Yilena ever thought of emigrating? You don’t have any kids yet, it would be relatively easy.”
“We’re seriously thinking about going to Canada. We both speak English and Yilena is a research scientist and has just finished her PhD, but she’s only making about $800 a month, less than a corporal in the army or a shop attendant and I’m sure I can figure out some kind of business to do once we get to Canada. There’s no future for her here. In Vancouver there’re lots of Russians from The Far East and we have some friends there who really like it. We’ll see.” He brought the first batch of meat in and I stood by the fire, turning the pork, looking at the stars, enjoying the cold and feeling very free. We had a light hearted dinner drinking vodka and eating lots of meat and salads. They were very hospitable to me, never asked probing questions and speaking in English enough to keep me in the loop of the conversation.
That next afternoon Kostya and Yilena went for a walk with the dog and Marina and I went for a swim in the pool. The water was heavy and very warm and I could almost feel its thickness while I looked out across the snow drifts onto surrounding the hills. Marina swam close and held my hands. We had a strong physical connection that was, for the first time in what seemed a long time, very healthy. It wasn’t a power trip but a way of expressing how we felt for each other, which after a few years in New York seemed almost kinky.
“What are you thinking about?” She asked
“Do you really want to know?”
“Yes.
“Well, all is not well business wise. I could tell you that it was because of the financial crisis but that wouldn’t really be true. I made a lot of mistakes and had a problem with some of my partners, so, for the moment, things aren’t too good. Let’s just enjoy this time together and see what happens.”
“Arthur, I knew something was wrong; I could tell that day you were in a hotel. Don’t worry, if we’re happy together and want to be together all will be okay; we can invent something. Please don’t think I want to be with you to go to America; I really don’t care where we live. I actually like it here, as strange as that may seem.”
She put her arms around my neck and we watched the sunset over the mountains as the white snow became pink in the dusk. I leaned against the side of the pool as the steam floated across the water, “I want to tell you I feel wonderful here with you,” I told her, “I can honestly say I never thought I would ever get so lucky as to meet someone like you, and you’re so beautiful.” And she was. I never tired of looking at her. The form and the essence made a perfect marriage: delicate yet firm, tender but never clingy, smart but not pedantic. She gave me a kiss and a broad smile.
“You are too kind. But it’s shocking how much we really seem to know each other. Sometimes when I wake up and watch you sleeping I feel like we’ve been together for years. I love talking to you and I feel I can really say what I’m thinking or I can just relax and listen to you go on about whatever seems to be running through that strange mind of yours.”
“Ha, wait till I start repeating myself. I would really like to continue writing. It feels so good, like what I was supposed to do. We’ll see what happens, like you say, maybe we can invent something. I’m so glad I met you now and not before; I wouldn’t have been ready.”
“I want to have your child. You need a child and I want to have it.” It took great strength not to try and create a child then and there. It was very strong. The half moon waxing took over the night and we kissed and held each other.
“Let’s take a jump in the lake.” She proposed.
“You’re insane! We’ll die.”
“Come on, don’t worry, you’ll survive. It’s good for your health.” We walked out of the pool in just our bathing suits with steamy flying off us in the -20°C air and made our way to a dock by a small lake. There were steps down into the water where a big whole had been cut out of the ice. She, without hesitation, jumped in and dunked her head motioning for me to do the same. It took all my manhood, pride and something else to get me to follow her. The water was so cold I truly thought something snapped and I had died as my body crashed into the icy water. Unlike her, I made a grimace of the utmost pain and a beeline for the steps while she slowly followed me laughing. I was moaning as I ran back to the hot pool but once in the warm water the stinging feeling was magnificent.
“You know God likes things in three’s. You want to try again?” I shook my head and she smiled.
My ticket to New York was for the 21st of February but I was hesitant to go back to New York as there was nothing to go back to- I had been stripped clean. I had stopped paying my credit cards and all had gone dark. The only things I had in the world were a bag of clothes, a computer, and now about fifteen grand in cash. I had bought her a new oven, a new refrigerator, a fur coat for winter and tried to pick up as many expenses as I could. I was living like I had an income.
One day searching on the Internet I found an old girlfriend I’d had in Spain, Lola. She was about my age and we’d had a very intense relationship which became a very nice friendship. I hadn’t spoken to her in a few years and I caught up with her online and gave her a vague idea of what was going on with my life and she invited me to come to Spain. She came from a well to do rural family in Murcia and they had a very large farm with a wonderful house that was almost always empty. She told me I could stay there as long as I wanted to get myself together; it was the perfect solution to the nightmare of going back to New York. The next day Marina and I went to the capital of Kamchatka, Pertropovlask, and changed my ticket to Madrid with the return back to Kamchatka. Not having to go back to the States did a great deal to raise my spirits even though what awaited me in Spain was not entirely clear.
Being in Kamchatka for an extended period had cut me off from civilization in a way I had never thought possible. Culture had always been a refuge, an idyllic safe place, but living amidst such imposing and awe inspiring natural surroundings culture became much more trivial. The cities and villages looked ridiculous beside the giant breathing volcanoes and man and his paraphernalia appeared silly next to the immense potential of natural violence lurking every where I looked. No city, no matter how impressive, could ever compare with the sublime beauty of Kamchatka. Marina fit in perfectly wearing her beauty and grace as unselfconsciously as the volcanoes reflecting the sunsets.
The following week she had a day off and we went skiing in the morning. The station was just a few kilometers from her apartment and there was an old rope lift that pulled us up the slopes. It was a sunny day, not too cold, and we could see the ocean to the east and the volcanoes to the north and the south. She was as good skier, much better than me, and watching her move elegantly down the difficult descent was impressive as I tried to follow her but was unstable at her considerable speed. She came to a quick stop and I slid in awkwardly behind her excited at having made the difficult descent. She lifted her goggles as I caught my breath, “Not so bad, you just need to loosen up a bit.” She let me rest for a moment before taking off again, elusive and graceful while I waited and admired her before beginning the pursuit to the bottom of the mountain.
Again we began the long ascent being pulled by the rope up the mountain and carefully making sure the skis didn’t cross each other as they slid up the hill. “What are you thinking?” she asked.
“It’s just hard to believe I’m here, so far from everything. The longer I stay, the farther away it seems. I don’t want to go back. I want to stay here with you.”
“Too bad about the visa and having to leave after three months, but you can come back in July, the summer here is very nice here. The worst time is the spring during the long thaw when everything is wet, better to be in Spain. I really want you to come back and I’ll wait for you. We’ll figure something out and if you still want me, I’ll be here. Please don’t worry about your business problems; we can survive. In Soviet times we had no money but people were more content. Now, everyone is buying cars and traveling but I don’t think they are any happier, in fact, I think they’re less happy. At least in Soviet times there was some purpose to life, some meaning, but now it’s just materialism and that’s no way to live.”
“You preferred it before?”
“I don’t know really. It just seemed simpler, clearer. Now things are very confusing and complicated.” We reached the summit and had to toss the stick that pulled us towards the pulley as we turned down the slope. It was our last run and I pushed myself to go faster and tighter. The tension of the turns and the icy snow sent me as fast as I’d ever skied until I was almost out of control, finally coming to a big powdery stop at the bottom of the mountain. We had sandwiches and tea then drove to a banya that we had reserved near the slopes.
I’d never been in a Russian banya before and this one had three rooms- a dressing room that had a fridge for beer, a second room with big barrels of cold and warm water, and finally the steam room itself with hot rocks heated by a wood stove. We both lay on the wooden benches with cloth hats to protect our heads from the heat. She was so beautiful completely nude and I watched her until I could barely b
That night Kostya and Yilena had invited us for dinner and it turned out to be a feast to match our formidable hunger. Yilena was a very good cook and the table was filled with plates of squid, halibut, and several salads. We ate and drank with vigor and once everyone was quite drunk, Kostya took out his guitar and I leaned back and listened to all three of them sing wonderful sad songs. Marina and I stumbled home over the ice and slept like logs.
My last week crept up on us like a ghost. I sat in the big chair in the kitchen and watched the snow fall wondering if I would ever come back. I certainly wanted to, but I was haunted by the idea that Marina might think I was just running away, which I was. I knew that I had arrived in Kamchatka as an escapee of New York hoping Marina would somehow be all she seemed to be but she turned out to be much more. But how was I going to support myself and contribute? I understood almost immediately that even though I was pretty good at languages learning Russian at my age would have been close to impossible.
I had tried to get a few free-lance media buying gigs while I was there but the fates didn’t seem to want it. I would confuse times zones and miss conference calls or my Internet connection would go out in the middle of an important conversation. I had been at the height of my career and had lots of good contacts yet I couldn’t bring myself to fight to save it and destiny didn’t seem to want it either. I had exactly $14,000 left which was much less than I’d hoped to have at that point. I’d blown more than fifteen grand in three months and I was afraid Marina was thinking there was more where that came from. I sat in the big chair and watched the day end as the snow kept falling unable to figure out what to do when suddenly my body began to remember the horrors of New York. I had a beer and sat with the lights out as the big snow flakes gently floated in the twilight. My flight was the next day and I was going to take her to dinner that night but I needed to start packing and I was still unsure. I heard the key in the door and the dog’s paws began slapping at the floor. I felt stuck in the chair as she made her way to the kitchen.
“What’s wrong?” She asked as she came in and gave me a kiss.
“I don’t know, just trying to figure things out.” She nodded and poured herself a beer.
“Is there something you want to tell me?” She didn’t seem so much afraid as concerned and I realized I was hoping she would ask me to come back. I needed her to suggest it, to offer it, so I didn’t feel like I was just using her.
“I’ll be here, Leo will be here, and even Moshe will be here.” She pointed to the overweight cat that was again eating, “We’ll be waiting for you. Is everything okay in Spain where you are going? You have a place there?”
“Yes, that’s all okay. I confirmed everything.”
“I’m going to miss you so much, what day is your ticket back?”
“May 25th.”
“When you come back we can spend a lot of time at my dacha. I like to spend my summers there and you’ll love it. I have a garden and a banya. It’s my favorite time of the year and by the time you get back most of the hard work will be done so you can just relax and enjoy.”
“Look, Marina, I’m not going to have much money when I get back and I haven’t been able to get much going as far as new jobs, so, I don’t know. It won’t be like these last few months, I mean, money wise.”
She smiled tenderly. “We’ll have potatoes, and carrots, and tomatoes from my green house; we won’t starve. Please dear, forget about money, okay. Promise?”
“Okay.” I gave her a hug and all the stress of the previous hours ran out of me. I packed a carry on bag and that was all I took with me along with my computer. Everything was going to go into that carry-on because I wanted to travel very light. I left my big bag with her, including most of my clothes and $11,000 as I took only $3,000 with me. As I closed the bag I felt my worries leave and the excitement of a new journey and chapter in my life beginning. We had dinner at a restaurant then went and said good bye to Kostya and Yilena and wound up staying there half the night.
With a tremendous hangover she drove me to the airport in Kamchatka, the Russian police with their big hats guarding the entrance. She cried for the first time while I was with her when we parted at the gate and it wrenched at my heart but it also kept her close to me. When there were doubts, fears, or second thoughts I would always remember her tears.
Leaving Kamchatka was like leaving the wilderness and coming back to civilization. Once in the main terminal in Moscow I could feel the culture start to pull on me, even more so on the flight to Madrid when I finally heard a language I could understand. The old life was trying to suck me back in but I remembered her at the gate and fell asleep as I crossed Europe heading west not knowing what awaited me.