MOSCOW, September 25, 2005 -- Sergei is gone, but not forgotten. I have a swollen and bloody nose and a bruised knee to keep me reminded of him.
After fixing Zhorik’s favorite supper of skillet peach/pork barbecue and plying ourselves with vodka before his departure last night, Andrei and I had sex – the second time since his arrival. Actually, the night before all the monkey-business with Sergei began, we re-enacted my position as filling in a naked sandwich – me in the middle with one of their huge, uncut twin cocks in each hand. Just like old times.
But unfortunately, as you now know, it didn’t last long.
After last night’s supper and vodka, Sergei and I accompanied Zhorik to the nearby Belarusskaya metro; and then Sergei took off in one direction – toward the slots, I assumed – and I bought three cans of Street before coming home for my sex bout with Andrei.
I was awakened about midnight with the return of Sergei. A minute later I heard crashes in the kitchen. I got up to see what was going on and the floor of the kitchen was covered with broken glass and dishes.
I was furious. I grabbed Sergei by the coat: “Get out of here!”
I pushed him toward the door, where we had a full-fledged pushing match. A moment later I found myself face down on the hallway floor with a pool of blood under my nose and sharp pain in my nose and right knee.
Anton scurried from his room to help me up.
He grabbed an old pillow case, held it to my nose and led me into his room, then got the two cans of Street out of the freezer – one for my nose and one for my knee.
The house phone rang. “Don’t answer it,” I told Anton.
It continued to ring. Anton took it off the cradle.
A few minutes later the doorbell rang. And rang. And rang. Eventually there was a conversation through the door.
“He wants his passport.”
“Ask him where it is.”
He let Sergei in; there was a conversation, and Sergei left with his passport – after, we discovered, busting the doorbell.
The sleep that followed was troubled. Andrei woke up and I told him what had happened. He couldn’t go back to sleep and switched on TV.
About 5, the house phone rang. Sergei: “Open the door, please.”
With him was another young guy, a 16-year-old named Igor, I found out later. Not bad looking but not irresistible, either.
The hurricane had passed. Sergei was his occasional sweet, loving self. “I’m going home for good,” he said. “Can you give me money for the bus?”
“How much is it?”
“800 rubles.”
I gave him 1000.
He pulled me into our room: “Dane, I wanted the $ 100 to send to Denis so he could come here. I borrowed the $ 100 from you become some guy was going to give me $ 100 for having sex with him – like a prostitute -- but it didn’t work out. I didn’t tell you because I wanted to surprise you.”
“Honey, under the circumstances, it would have been better to tell me.”
“But I wanted it to be a surprise! I wanted to see the look on your face when he showed up, and you thought he couldn’t come back for two or three years.”
The enormity of my mis-judgment began to sink in. What had I done?
I hugged and kissed him.
“Forgive me,” I said. “Forgive me,” he retorted.
We held each other. “I love you, Dane. I didn’t do that to you,” he added, pointing to my nose.
“Who did?”
“You were against the door when I slammed it and the door knocked you down.”
There was a pause.
“Expect Denis soon, he said.”
“When?”
“After he’s had time to get his passport.”
He said goodby, and was gone.
I am both relieved and sad. Relieved because life with him is a constant whirlwind except when it’s a hurricane. He is unpredictable and demanding and stressful.
Sad because he is a volatile, tempestuous, tormented, self-destructive child. He can never be happy for more than a few minutes at a time. I’m reminded again of Misha. I wasn’t able to help either of them.
Wherever he goes, he creates his own maelstrom. He is now estranged from everybody – Andrei, his sisters, and now me. Everybody except Zhorik, who is of course living with me.
“He’s a fool. A complete fool,” Andrei said after he left.
Yes, he is, but beneath his private torment, a loving and kind one. Even as he was shooting himself in the foot, he was thinking of my happiness – how surprised and happy I would be to see Denis again.
How I want good things to happen to him! I don’t think they will, and even if they did, he would manage to squeeze disaster out of them.
My tears are at least washing the blood out of my busted schnozz!
My Peter fantasy – or should I say my fantasy Peter? – was at the Institute of Diplomacy lesson yesterday, but my wily plan to invite him for a beer afterward was thwarted by Zhorik’s travel itinerary. I had to get back in time to fix his barbecue pork chops and give him the money for his trip to St. Pete.
But the first lesson in the Level 4 English File textbook is about “best friends.” I found out that he has had one for about ten years, but they’ve had lots of problems; and that he has another more recent one and they’re getting along better.
I wonder if that’s “best friends” or “boyfriends.” He wears a simple silver ring that doesn’t look like a Russian Orthodox “rescue and save” ring. I walked with him down the four flights of stairs from our classroom. He was going directly home, which I found out is on the orange metro line quite a distance from the city.
He’s rather shy, and seems very gentle and sensitive. Russians have a charming custom of obligatory handshakes when they meet or part. We held each other’s hand longingly and lovingly when we said goodby.
He smokes and sometimes watches football matches. His favorite team is Moscow’s Dinamo. Other than that, nothing has happened to throw cold water on my fantasy.
But if Denis is coming back, do I need one?
Khodorkovsky’s plans to run for the duma, the Russian congress, have been quickly doused by the lightning-like appeal process that – prior to his announced plans – had groaned along like a glacier before global warming.
With the rejection of his appeal, Khodorkovsky can no longer legally run for political office. Earlier plans to persist with a “people’s election,” in which voters would be asked to sign his name on the ballot, were rejected by Khodorkovsky, his lawyer said, because he feared “repercussions against the activists.”
His election team has announced that another as-yet unnamed liberal will seek the duma seat from the university district in which Khodorkovsky had planned to run.
Two “serious explosions” on the metro have been thwarted by “vigilant passengers,” according to the Moscow metro chief, who provided no additional details.
There are constant metro reminders to report any abandoned bags in the metro. The Pushkin Square explosion several years ago came from just such a bag. Did a “vigilant passenger” stumbled across a derelict shopping bag?
The metro official announced that a chemical and biological weapons detector will be installed at the Belarusskaya Metro Station – my metro station! – in the near future. Does that mean the aborted bombings, if there really were any, were aimed at the station I use several times a day and which is practically in my back yard?
There was a minor bombing there several years ago, and daily there are scores of grungy-looking newly-arrived passengers from the adjacent train station bearing suitcases, bags, and backpacks. Did one of them leave a bag full of explosives on the metro platform?
There is even talk of installing metal detectors in all metro entrances. Can you even imagine how that would screw up attempts to move Moscow’s 8.5 million passengers a day? How much are we willing to give up in the name of security?
Quite a bit, Americans have proved. You have sat by and watched as the so-called Patriot Act -- the euphemistic label attached to what should have been recognized as the Treason Act – deftly pick-pocketed your freedom, and you will soon have an identity card of your very own bearing all the information your government has about you, which you must always carry with you to submit to the police when they stop you randomly on the street.
Remember, I am living in your future.
So what’s one more metal detector?
