18
They were sitting on their rock fishing. Rather they were attempting to fish. Tatiana was holding her fishing line in the water, but Alexander had put his down and was lying on the rock, rubbing her bare back. Ever since she had sewn herself a new blue cotton sundress, which was open from the nape of her neck to the small of her back, Alexander seemed unable to concentrate on small tasks at hand, such as hunting and gathering. He didn’t want her to wear anything else, but he couldn’t do anything else either.
“Shura, please. We haven’t caught a thing. I don’t want Naira Mikhailovna to go hungry because you won’t catch her a fish.”
“Hmm. Because that’s what I’m thinking of right now — Naira Mikhailovna. And I told you we should have gotten up at five.”
Tatiana sighed, smiling, looking out onto the shimmering river. “You said you were going to read to me. You brought the Pushkin book out here. Read to me from ‘The Bronze Horseman.’ ” She began, “There was a time, our memories keep its horrors fresh and near us . . .”
“I’d rather—”
“Read. I’ll hunt and gather.”
Alexander was kissing her back. “Put the fishing line down. I can’t take it.”
“It’s nearly six in the evening, and we have no dinner!”
“Come on,” he said, taking the fishing line out of her hands. “When do you ever deny me?” Alexander lay down on his back. “Pull up your dress and sit on me.” Groaning slightly, he paused and said, “No, not like that. Turn around. Sit facing the river, away from me.”
“Away from you?”
“Yes,” Alexander said, closing his eyes. “I want to see your back when you’re on top of me.”
Afterward, as she was still facing away from him, a released and confined and perplexed Tatiana said inaudibly, “Perhaps I could have continued to fish. After all, I’m facing the right way.”
Softly stroking the small of her back, Alexander said nothing.
Tatiana got off him. “Do you want to kiss me?” she asked.
He lay with his eyes closed. “Yes.” But he did not move. “How many days left, Tatiana?” he asked in a gutted voice.
Turning quickly away from him and to the Kama, she picked up her fishing line. “I don’t know,” she whispered, staring at the water. “I’m not keeping time.”
Then Tatiana heard Alexander’s voice from behind. “Why don’t I read to you now? Oh, here. Here’s a passage you’ll like:
“Get married? I? And yet why not?
Of course it won’t be easy sailing.
But what of that? I’m young and strong,
Content to labor hard and long,
I’ll build us soon, if not tomorrow,
A simple nest for sweet repose
And keep—”
He paused. Tatiana knew that the name of the woman in Pushkin’s poem was Parasha. She waited, her eyes glazing over from the ache in her heart. Alexander resumed reading, his cracked voice lower.
“And keep Tatiana free of sorrow,
And in a year or two, who knows,
I may obtain a snug position,
And it shall be Tatiana’s mission
To tend and rear our children . . . yes,
So we will live, and so forever
Will be as one, till death us sever
And grandsons lay us both to rest . . .”
He stopped. Tatiana heard him slam the book shut. “Like that?”
“Read on, soldier,” she said, her trembling hands gripping the fishing line. “Read bravely on.”
“No,” Alexander said from behind her. Tatiana did not turn to look at him. Instead, staring out onto the languid river, she continued from memory:
“Thus ran his reverie. Yet sadly
He wished that night the wind would still
Its mournful wail, the rain less madly
Be rattling at the windowsill . . .”
Alexander and Tatiana did not speak again until they returned to the cabin.
After coming back from Naira’s in the late evening, Alexander built a fire, Tatiana made some tea, and they sat, Tatiana in a lotus position, Alexander next to her. He was very quiet, she thought, quieter than usual.
“Shura,” she said softly, “come here. Put your head on me. Like always.”
He lay down, his head in her lap. Gently, tenderly, full of aching affection, Tatiana stroked his face. “What’s the matter, soldier?” she whispered, bending to smell him. Tea and cigarettes. She cradled his head between her thighs and her breasts, kissing his eyes. “What’s bothering you?”
“Nothing,” he replied. And said nothing else.
Tatiana sighed. “Want to hear a joke?”
“As long as it’s one you haven’t told Vova.”
Tatiana said, “The paratroopers go to the parachute packer. ‘Hey,’ they ask, ‘are your parachutes any good?’ ‘Well,’ he replies, ‘I’ve had no complaints.’ ”
Alexander almost laughed. “Funny, Tania.” He jumped up away from her and took her cup. “I’m going to smoke.”
“Smoke here. Leave the cups. I’ll take care of them later.”
“I don’t want you to take care of them later,” he said. “Why do you always do that?”
She chewed her lip.
Before he walked away, Alexander said, “And why do you always have to serve Vova? What? Are his hands broken? He can’t serve himself?”
“Shura, I serve everybody.” She paused and said quietly, “You first.” She looked up at Alexander. “How would it look if I served everybody but him?”
“I don’t give a shit how it would look, Tania. I just need you not to do it.”
She didn’t answer. Was he displeased with her?
Tatiana continued to sit in front of the flickering flame with her legs crossed. It was dark except for the circle around the fire and the waxing half-moon in the sky. The air smelled of fresh water and burning wood and night. She knew that Alexander was sitting on the bench by the house, slightly behind her, and that he was watching her. He was doing that more and more often. Watching her as he smoked. And smoked. And smoked.
She turned to him. Alexander was watching her, and smoking.
Rising, Tatiana walked to him and stopped at his legs. Stepping on his feet, she asked shyly, “Shura . . . want to go inside?”
He shook his head. “You go ahead. I’ll sit here for a while and wait for the fire to burn out.”
Tatiana looked him over, studied him, searched his eyes, his lips, his slightly unsteady hands.
Chewing her lip again, she didn’t move.
“Go ahead,” Alexander repeated.
Coming closer to him, she pulled his legs apart and knelt on the ground in front of him. His shallow breathing became more rapid. Looking up into his face and rubbing his legs, Tatiana said, “What do I love?”
Alexander didn’t reply.
Tatiana prodded him again. “What do you love?”
“Your soft mouth on me,” he said thickly.
“Mmm,” she said, undoing the ties on his trousers. “Is it too dark? Or can you see?”
“I can see,” he said, taking hold of her head as she took hold of him.
“Shura?”
“Mmm?”
“I love you.”