Part One – There
(Eastern Hemisphere)
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX – SRITO. SYSTEM-TECHNIQUE AND LIFE
In September, still full of summer lyrical feelings, I entered the building of the Ministry of Health, wondering what fate had in store for me. I remember that I was kicked from room to room for a long time – no one understood what I was doing here and what I wanted from them. Finally, using the code on my referral (document), they determined how to find the request and began calling the proposed Institution. It turned out to be the Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics (ITO). There, they did not understand anything too and refused to accept a physicist. “Are you out of your mind,” said the receiver? “We accept doctors, not physicists!” But gradually the matter began to become clearer.
In those years, it became fashionable to introduce electronic calculating machines, or simply computers, into all sectors of the economy and production. It was called system engineering or system-techics. No one knew how to do this and how to combine giant machines (personal computers did not exist yet), occupying entire building, a computer center, with the work of a workshop or operating room. But they had tried. And on this shaky soil, as usual, many rogues bred, who felt an easy income and warm places.
This was my first boss Roman. Of course, he had a middle name and a last name, but everyone around him called him by his first name. This was common practice in Georgia. Everyone addressed the deputy director of the institute, Doctor of Sciences, by his childhood nickname – Chichiko, which meant little man or baby, although in an official setting they called him by his first name and patronymic – Albert Titianovich.
But let’s return to Roman. First of all, he was an asshole. He spoke candidly of how he jumped out of an overturned car rolling down a hill, leaving his little son in it. I was amazed by his argument,
“What’s the point of dying together? Otherwise, there will be someone to look after the disabled child.”
Secondly, he was a sycophant: he licked any superior’s… everything that was licked and even spoke to him slightly bent over, like a waiter at the table of a rich client. He behaved arrogantly and coldly with his subordinates and during greeting he always had extended two fingers to them. But, apparently, he sensed that system engineering, in which no one knew a thing is a profitable feeding trough. After graduating from medical school, he received his PhD on the model of traumatic shock in canine. I’ll tell you – you won’t believe it! From time to time, Roman did some kind of experiment on dogs in the operating room of the vivarium. For example, he studied how this or that blood parameter changes during injury and was contributing an article to the journal of experimental medicine. Once I witnessed how he, having roped a dog’s muzzle and tied a dog to a table, cut open its abdomen with a scalpel and hit its insides with a hammer. After the first blow, I cursed him and left. He then laughed at my cowardice and stupidity,
“This is science. Using the dog model, we, defenders of humanity, learn how to save people in case of serious injury, especially in war.”
I suspected that Roman was lying, covering up his sadism with scientific benefits, and reproached myself for cowardice, that I simply left, and did not punch him in the smug face. But I doubted it, having been brought up to react only after thinking it through.
In addition to the boss and me, four people worked in the newly created laboratory. All with higher education, got a workplace through connections.
The smartest was one girl, Zhenya, who graduated from the Cybernetics Department of our university. She lived completely alone (her parents had passed away) and she seemed slightly crazy. Plump, awkward, with thick glasses, unkempt hair and nails, she spoke in a very thin and quiet voice, like a mouse. Zhenya was hired at the request of the head of the pathology department. Zhenya’s mother, who fled Moldova during the WWII and remained in Georgia, worked as a housekeeper in a wealthy house of a lady who became that head of department. Everyone at the institute felt sorry for the girl and often treated her to home-cooked food after a festive lunch. She was not shy, she always took it, rejoicing at how thoughtful people were, and in return offered to clear the table and wash the dishes. Usually she was allowed it…
All day long Zhenya sat at a book on systems engineering, reading about algorithms for optimizing solutions and creating artificial intelligence. But sometimes she suddenly raised her head and spoke into space:
“You know, Einstein was married to his cousin.”
Or,
“Imagine, men gave their lives for the right to spend a night with Cleopatra!”
Interested in mental disorders since my childhood, I decided to “experiment” on Zhenya. I showed her a damaged device, the hand of which was shaking and moving due to a slight shock.
“Look,” I said, “When a fan is turned on in the room, electromagnetic induction deflects the hand along the scale of the device.”
Zhenya looked at me and the device with disbelief, and turned the fan on and off several times.
“I understood,” she smiled broadly. – You were kidding me. It’s not the fan at all, but the wind. The arrow deflects when the door is opened, regardless of the fan.”
I’m still wondering what it was – incredible naivety or subtle sarcasm?
Two other employees, Lea and Lamazi, were complete ballast in the scientific department. Lea was a teacher of Georgian literature by training. She worked a half of a day, and at one PM she already went home. Although, what did it mean – “she worked”? She did nothing but knit continuously, and she could not have done anything in this area even if she wanted to. Theoretically, she could translate an original scientific and technical article from Georgian into Russian, but texts requiring such translation did not exist in nature at that time.
Lamazi, which means pretty in Georgian, was a beauty, but had a thick butt and crooked legs. She was terribly embarrassed by them and always shuddered when she saw a man behind her. Lamazi graduated from the biological department of the pedagogical institute and found refuge from the rural school in our shelter for system-technique. She carried out the functions of a secretary-typist, without any stress. Well, to make coffee for Roman, or to type a page. That’s it.
Avtandil was the last in our group of “valuable” employees. As a graduate of the Polytechnic Institute, he worked as an engineer, but what he did in system engineering was a mystery. He could easily change light bulbs, connect wires, fix the lock on the door, but algorithms, programming and its implementation in medicine were far from his understanding. Outwardly, he was a handsome, interesting young man with prominent brow ridges and a heavy lower jaw. He looked like a bouncer, but at the same time he was very afraid of his superiors and fawned over Roman. One day, in a fit of revelation, he admitted to me that his uncle worked for the Nazis during the occupation and fled with them to Germany. I was not entirely sure that this was the truth and not a provocation, although in Avtandil’s manners, I fully imagined him as a servant of evil forces.
Here is a brief description of the composition of our Kunstkamera, in which I worked for two years. Sometimes I feel ashamed that I didn’t turn around and leave after a week. My fictitious position was obvious. But my Mom, with whom I shared my doubts, insisted that smart people don’t behave like that. They don’t cut connections, don’t make hasty decisions, but move to a prepared in advance place. This sounded anecdotally, like advice to women from the ancient Hindu treatise on love “The Peach Branches”: “After detailed and varied positions during two weeks of copulation, move on to a new, prepared in advance partner.”
But, since there was no smell of a “new partner”, I still had to “copulate” with the system engineering laboratory of the Scientific Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics – SRITO. “Or I hadn’t!” I added in my mind.
The Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics of the Republic was headed by a certain medical functionary. Of course, he had a PhD, but not a doctor of science (double PhD) and even not the head of the department, but simply a doctor in the pediatric trauma department. The main figure of Georgian orthopedics and traumatology was Academician A. I think that he was one of the few in Georgia who was a deeply knowledgeable specialist in his field with extensive experience in metropolitan centers and great business acumen. It was it, which allowed him to publish an article about new methods of treating bones with an apparatus like the Ilizarov’s device, and, when Dr. Ilizarov applied for a state prize, academician A. grabbed half of it.
There was a lot of gossip about this, but later, from a private conversation with the academician A, I realized that this was true, and the academician was an experienced racketeer.
But medical knowledge could not be denied to him. When he came from time to time to our institute, everyone became agitated. However, the academician’s main work was at the Medical School and its clinic, so the Ministry preferred to keep its puppet at the helm of power here.
The deputy directors were much more representative doctors than the director. Both are doctors of science, more developed and intelligent, but apparently had not fully reached the local establishment.
One of them, Deputy Director for Science, Chichiko, was an important character in the memories of my first job. Later I will tell you a separate interesting story with his participation (perhaps it will be an insert story).
Our family had known Chichiko’s family, that is, Albert Titianovich Kartvelidze, for generations. Their family, having moved from Gori, where Dad-Titian successfully practiced medicine under the management of his wife Ada, purchased a large apartment not far from the house of Neiman’s grandfather. Chichiko’s younger sister, Tinatin, was a classmate of my Aunt Lea, and young Albert himself was her crush in her youth. In addition to his attractive appearance, he had a penchant for science and often preferred studying at home to walks with the lively Lea. I am familiar with this behavior from my friend Sasha, whom it was sometimes impossible to get out of the house. “I must study,” he often said, and then all arguments became useless.
Aunt Ada protected her son from “twirls” like my aunt. And also, I think, she did not consider a girl from a Jewish family a suitable match for her son. Alas, even in our time, the most inventive security cannot always prevent a terrorist attack. One of Albert’s girls got pregnant, and he married her to avoid a scandal. The girl, by the way, was also from a very wealthy medical family, a student at a medical institute, and subsequently, like Chichiko, became a doctor of science and professor. But Mom-Ada had a strong character. When her daughter decided to marry an “upstart” from a “Glekh” (peasant) family, namely cardiologist Omari Mgeladze, who also became a doctor of science and professor, relations with her were interrupted for many years.
What can we say about this “shameless woman who cunningly got under the poor boy”? She had lived all her life behind a wall, in a room, on the same balcony. Small children, a boy and a girl, were not allowed to see her, and she could only hug them furtively. Over time, she developed a very tense relationship with her son, who had a low opinion of his mother. The daughter gradually softened her heart and achieved the right to visit her mother whenever she pleases. Maybe she had a strong character, like Grandma Ada. In any case, following in her mother’s footsteps, she became a pathologist, and together they looked through the eyepieces of microscopes in the dead of night. By the way, night was not a metaphor, and nor a time for secret dates. The Kartvelidze family maintained an unusual regime: they slept twice a day for three to four hours. Chichiko read somewhere that this was the method of Napoleon, whom he greatly respected and even ordered oil portrait of the emperor. I can testify that the entire family was very successful in their studies and PhDs. I taught physics both children during their senior years, preparing them for exam to enter the medical institute; both memorized the lessons literally by heart, were good at solving problems, and, having achieved gold medals, entered the medical institute, passing only one exam, physics, with excellent marks.
But let me return to Chichiko. When I started working at SRITO, I was happy to learn that I had in him quite a significant patron. He was Deputy Director of the Institute for Scientific Affairs. Of course, a more significant post belonged to the Deputy Director for Medicine, or the Chief Physician. The importance of such a post in Georgia depended on the distribution of patients, and, consequently, income, since most people paid surgeons for operations, and ward doctors also upon discharge. But there was also more risk, because they could have been imprisoned for this. One day the head doctor was arrested. Many were worried and pitied him. Chichiko put it this way,
“Don’t worry, he’ll pay himself off. He has three houses, each with three bedrooms. If everything is confiscated but a single mattress from any bed, it would be enough for three generations!”
But at meetings the head physician was mercilessly branded, winking at each other. I tried to avoid these and all other meetings. The deceitfulness of politics was much more disgusting than any of the most obscene jokes, in which Chichiko was an expert.
Chichiko’s patronage amounted to keeping me from conflict with the party or Komsomol authorities.
“Don’t get into trouble!” he said, “Everyone thinks the same, but it’s those who speak a lot who get into trouble. If you don’t want to come to a demonstration or meeting, don’t come. But pretend to be sick, bring a doctor’s certificate, and don’t demonstrate your true attitude towards the authorities. It’s even better to joke about sex than about politics. Both safer and more enjoyable.”
In a certain sense, Albert Titianovich was right. One day in the fall, after graduating from university and rest at the resort-camp in Kobuleti, I received a summons to the military registration and enlistment office. Usually, this did not bode well, but it was written on the agenda: to clarify the data. And I bravely went to clarify them. A major sat in the section for reserve officers.
“Ah, Neumann,” he said, “take a seat.” One military specialist wanted to talk to you. He’ll be here any minute.”
It sounded incomprehensible, but since he wanted to talk, let’s talk.
At that moment, a black-haired man in civilian clothes, of average height with inexpressive features, entered the room. The major jumped up from his chair and greeted him, and then suggested,
“Be seated in my place, while I go and have lunch.”
We were left alone.
“Are you Nikolai Neiman?”
“That’s right, sir.” I answered in a military manner.
“Leave it alone,” said the stranger, “We’re just talking. And my name is Vladimir Petrovich, I’m from military intelligence,” and he handed me the green military ID of reserve lieutenant colonel Vladimir Petrovich Abashidze.
“But this is no longer true,” it flashed through my mind, “If he is a military man in service, then his ID should was. And where from? The only suitable answer was the KGB. I had no idea what color military ID cards the KGB officers had, and what they needed from me, but I assumed that this was a continuation of my “Fanny and Resourceful game” with Vitaly Sergeevich in Kobuleti. In this case, it was better to pretend to be a dunce than to continue to show off.”
Perhaps Rabinovich’s behavior at the trial and Chichiko’s lessons were not in vain.
“Military intelligence is great!” I said, “I have always envied people with excellent memories.”
A blush touched the officer’s cheeks.
“You know languages! თქვენ ქართული ხომ ლაპარაკობ (After all you speak Georgian). I know that you also pretty fluently speak English.”
“You are confusing me with someone else. I realized that you said something in Georgian and then in English. But what exactly…” – I spread my hands.
The unexisting Vladimir Petrovich blushed.
“Do you drive?”
“No.”
“Are you good at shooting a pistol? Can you hit in ten?”
“Why, I’m unlikely to even get into the four because of my vision.”
“Do you know combat sambo techniques?”
“I haven’t learn it,” I took a deep breath, “I had to leave the sport section.”
The officer was already looking at me with undisguised irritation.
“Okay, but your knowledge of physics and mathematics…”
“They allow me to solve school problems, and nothing more,” I answered with downcast eyes.
“What do you do at work?”
“I am introducing advanced Soviet electronic computer technology into advanced Soviet medicine.”
Now my interviewer took a deep breath. He knew well what Soviet stuff was really advanced.
“Okay,” he said, “Fill out this form and you are free.”
The document, which consisted of many pages, was called “Questionnaire for a reserve officer going on a business trip abroad.” For quite a long time I filled out its columns with answers like “I don’t know”, “I don’t have”, “I cannot”. At the end of the questionnaire, Vladimir Petrovich asked to add the phrase, “Neither I nor my family intend to leave for permanent residence in Israel in the near future.”
I stared at him with a puzzled look.
“I understand,” he added, “You are not married, and you do not have your own family, and you cannot sign for other relatives. Okay, write only about yourself.”
That’s what I wrote and signed. I signed it with a light heart – it was true.
Our conversation had no continuation. But delicately questioning of friends showed that they had not undergone such interviews, or maybe they simply did not want to share? I still don’t know whether it was Vitaly Sergeevich’s recommendation to the analytical department or somebody else to somewhere else?
As it usually happens, oddities along the path of life come in flocks. A strange job, far from my specialty, an unusual interview at the military registration and enlistment office and a completely unexpected meeting on the street. Remember the girl Yana, whom I met in Batumi?
I surprisingly ran into her again near the Palace of Sport. Her luxurious black curls fluttered in the wind like the pennant of a pirate frigate. She was returning home from the Polytechnic Institute after lectures, and I was returning from the computer center. Our paths crossed, and I was boarded like a caravel.
“Hello, Nick! Did you have good time at the sea?”
“Hello Yana! Sure, I did. And did you enjoy the boat cruise?” I asked, remembering my childhood voyage on the “Admiral Nakhimov”.
We walked towards the City Zoo, vividly exchanging impressions, as if we had had a voyage on the boat at the same time. Then we went up to the university and sat down on a bench in an old park.
“Who was that girl in the white dress?” Yana asked me with a fade in her voice, “Your bride?”
“Why the bride? Because of white dress?”
She nodded.
“No, just a friend.”
Some exclamation escaped from her clenched lips, and she suddenly grabbed me by the neck and pressed herself against me, like a child to a lost and suddenly unexpectedly found teddy bear. Then we were kissing under the thick park elms, and I walked Yana home.
“Come with me this weekend to my classmate’s birthday,” she invited, “We’ll dance.”
I agreed, wondering how Lena was able to recognize Yana’s jealousy from a distance.
And the next evening my first city romance began. As the old joke says, dancing doesn’t bring you to good things, and after the evening Yana confidentially reported that mom had now gone on vacation with dad, and we could play parents at her house. She didn’t make a mistake at all; she enjoyed playing intimate relationships, but, alas, she was a very bad actress. Sex was a completely unnecessary detail in her play. If it weren’t for my experience with Lena, a new relationship would simply suppress the man in me or, at least, instill a severe inferiority complex. At the most interesting moment, Yana, depending on the direction of her gaze, said,
“I’ve been telling my dad for a long time, it’s time to whitewash the ceiling!”
“A-a-ah…”
“…or I’ve been telling to mom…”
“O-o-oh!”
“Pillowcases don’t match the sheets!”
“That’s it! What were you talking about?”
“It turns out, that you had not paid attention to my words?”
At that time, Sasha and I were very close and discussed the details of intimate relationships from our limited experience. He admitted to me that he also encountered such physical indifference to sex, insurmountable by any erection and caresses. But one way or another, after some time, Yana’s parents returned from vacation, and our games into house and family had stopped. Several times I brought Yana to Sasha’s empty apartment, but she had trouble understanding why we were tumbling around here. Either you need to get married and play mom and dad at home, or not bother with nonsense.
But, apparently, I hadn’t yet enough tumbled around, so we peacefully went our separate ways. A year or two later, Yana’s mother divorced and took her daughter to Germany, where the girl married and had three boys. I hope she and her husband have the same views on whitewashing the ceiling and coloring the bed linen.
Anton and I decided to learn programming languages and memorized COBOL. What did it give me? I learned to write some simple programs on my own, spend hours debugging them, printing them on punched cards, checking the print, and running them through a giant computer at night (Oh, romance!) And the output was a table that I could draw by hand or type on a typewriter in half an hour, containing God knows what dubious statistics.
Gradually I got to know all the employees of the institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics. Chichiko advertised for me, praising my teaching abilities, at conferences I asked the doctors some questions, in short, my environment became more and more friendly. I became friends with the old professor Okropiridze, who always criticized doctors for standard thinking, and not an individual approach to each case. Once a young surgeon fought with him, defending a certain technique.
“I myself read it in the brochures “Manual for the Beginners in Traumatology” and “Hand Trauma” that this is the best method!” he said, having exhausted his arguments.
“It was me, who wrote these brochures myself!” the professor laughed, “But you still need to think – the best in general or the best in this particular case!”
One day I was visited at work by my friend Misha, who once in a pioneer camp auditioned for the role of a gladiator in my carnival production. He grew up as a sporty guy and every winter he went to mountains in Bakuriani to ski. That winter he sprained his ankle and came to consult a specialist. Misha started with me. He told me in detail how the injury occurred. His main complaint was that it was painful to go uphill with his feet (and skis on) turned sideways.
“Let’s go and consult with Professor Okropiridze,” I suggested.
He was just sitting in his office and writing another brochure for aspiring doctors.
“Ah, young physicists, you are welcome!” he greeted Misha and me.
I told him that my friend had sprained his ankle, complaining of pain and asking for advice.
“When did it happened?” asked the professor.
“A week ago.”
“Does it hurt constantly?”
“No,” said Misha, “Only when I walk like this,” he turned both feet to the left and walked, pulling one leg towards the other.
Obviously, he wanted to depict going up a mountain with his skis on, but the professor knew nothing of this and looked at the patient with a confused look, trying to determine whether he was being played.
“Can you walk normally?” he clarified carefully.
“Certainly I can!”
“And it doesn’t hurt?”
“No!”
“So walk only this way!” the professor was delighted.
One day, an excited man burst into the institute with a German shepherd in his arms. His beloved dog was hit by a car and was probably dying.
“I’m begging you, help!” he wailed, “I’ll pay double.”
Chichiko, the deputy director for science, heeded his tearful pleas and sent a man with a dog and a young doctor to the vivarium, where there was a small operating room for experimental animals. The doctor administered anesthesia, operated on the dog and fixed its broken bones with plates and rods.
The satisfied owner paid the Dr. a significant amount and brought to Chichiko even more money.
“Wow!” he was surprised, “Add another hundred and go – choose a ward for your dog!”
The Ministry of Health announced the sale of tourist vouchers to Siberia. Eli, who worked at the Institute of Psychiatry, and his brother-in-law, Izya, a chemist from the Burn Center, got ready to go. They invited me to make a company with them. It was an atypical time for vacations, spring. But Izya, a great erudite and encyclopedist, argued that the poppy fields to the horizon in the spring in Siberia are stunning, as is the omul returning to Baikal from the autumn spawning. In fact, Izya wanted to visit his eldest son, who remained in Novosibirsk after his father’s successful synthesis of the first Soviet penicillin in Academic Town (a type of scientific campus in Novosibirsk).
Izya was known to me not only as Eli’s brother-in-law, but also as a private chemistry teacher of Chichiko’s children. We were all neighbors who lived a couple of blocks away from each other, and we often met on the streets and in stores.
One day, at Izya’s entrance, I met Lieutenant Colonel Kunin coming out of Izya’s apartment with a briefcase. We greeted each other. I was cheerful, he was embarrassed.
“Do you know our teacher from the military department?” I asked Izya.
“Sure! I translate pornographic magazines for the entire headquarters!”
Wow! It turned out that Izya, a polyglot, an expert in Scandinavian languages, earned money by translating, and what!
“Will you show me the magazine?”
Izya took out a recent magazine, on the cover of which there was a huge penis biting into the vagina, and some kind of slogan.
“Make love, not war!” Izya translated from Danish into English.
It sounded like “Have love, but do not produce war!”
“Fuck, but don’t fight!” I summarized.
“Well said,” Izya praised. “And the officers complain that my scientific translations spoil their erections. Would you mind editing the texts?”
“Of course, I don’t mind it. May be officers send me the students?”
Izya laughed:
“Somebody’s talking about something, but the lousy one is all about the bathhouse! Let’s find you more students. It’s a pity that you and Eli don’t teach in Georgian, I would have filled all your vacancies with students.”
But to Siberia with friends, as well as to the sea with Eli, Roman, my boss, did not let me go. Our laboratory allegedly did not make a report on the work for this year, and fresh forces (meant – I) had to make it up. Roman showed me what Zhenya had scraped since last year. It was a thick pile of sheets on which her book on decision-making algorithms was retold with clumsy childish handwriting.
“Amazing!” I exclaimed, “And you, Roman, say that the report has not been made.”
“But there is not a word about the method of expert assessments in it. There is nothing about the creation of tables by an electronic computer (in reality – the garbage that the computer printed out for me), not to mention the list of references used. All this you have to complete.”
What a disaster! I had to write. It wasn’t enough for them to have an outline of a decent book, so we will add rubbish to them from ourselves. The most fun was the bibliography. It included all the books known to us in areas needed and not needed for programming. But this is in Russian, and good manners, or as they joked, “the rules of a good mauvais ton” required links to articles in foreign languages. Without thinking twice, I took the next Izya’s magazine “Pik og Fisse” and rolled all the titles of the articles and captions under the pictures into our detailed list. I was sure that I was the last person on Earth who had read and would ever read this report.
And Eli went to the sea with Zhanna. Actually, the three of us were planning to go away for a week. But I’m stuck on translating Izya’s journal into the format of a laboratory report of the work done. And I’m afraid this had led to unpredictable consequences.
Of course, they shouldn’t rent a room together without the intention of sleeping together. Zhana was a beauty, and I would at least try. We, of course, were very good comrades, and in the opinion of the older guy, Izya, this completely excluded sex between us. I often argued with him, and he was amazed at how it was possible to fuck a comrade?!
With Zhanna, as with many girls in our class, we could have completely frank conversations about almost any physiology. One was asking, other was answering. Once, Zhana and I, after college, discussed erogenous zones,
“Well, I don’t have them on my breasts at all,” she said.
I looked at her incredulously.
“Well, of course! Why would I lying?” and since she was a very straight person, she added without hesitation, “You can check it yourself.”
I, was not believing my ears, carefully touched her girlish breasts.
“Don’t worry so much!” said Zhanna, “You’re not touching the eyes: squeeze, stroke, rub the nipples, all this is like a poultice for the dead.”
I already had visually a strong erection.
“What’s the trick? How do you stand it?”
“I don’t tolerate it one bit – I almost don’t even feel it. And the “trick” is…” she thought for a second whether to share with me, but then she decisively shook her haircut and said, “That for some reason the pectoral erogenous zones are on my back.”
“Well, yes?!” I was amazed, “May I? …”
I moved closer to her and hugged her, stroking her back with both hands. Zhanna smiled, looking at me and suddenly shuddered several times, as if she was being tortured with electric shock, and then, trembling all over and breathing heavily, she leaned back.
“That’s it! Stop it! Mom will be back from work any minute. But I can’t stand it anymore, and neither can you, look what’s happening with you.”
“Maybe we should try it sometime?” I suggested carefully.
“Maybe,” said Zhanna, “If I want, I’ll let you know right away,” she laughed, “And you, by the way, could also court me – invite me at least once to “Physicist Day”, since you are a celebrity there.”
“When did you start talking about this? I had no idea you were interested in this. Sure! In a month I’ll come, pick you up and take you to a concert like my lady!”
Zhana really liked “my lady”,
“In the meantime, we may go to the seaside with a company!”
That’s how this idea arose, but no one except three of us could go, and then Roman didn’t let me go either. And the trip turned into a terrible quarrel between Zhana and Eli. When they both returned home, their relationship was like that of a cat and a dog. They didn’t want to see each other, talk, and each told me a bunch of stupid things about the other.
“Can you imagine, every day Eli threw his filthy wet swimming trunks onto my little white panties and bra, neatly hung on the chair near the bed?”
“This thorn, Zhana, did not give me any freedom of action, she only wanted me to fulfill her wishes!”
How I regretted that I was not there to fulfill her wishes. I was sure that we would not have had a fight. Although, it was obvious that in this case this trip would end in pregnancy and a host of problems arising from this.
I did everything I could to reconcile my close friends, and soon shuttle politics and constant persuasion softened both of them. Or maybe Zhana just found herself an idol. The confrontation was over. But I never had a chance to look at Zhana’s white panties, neatly hanging on the chair near the bed.
True, I had one more chance in my life to get close to Zhana, but then I shitted everything around. Literally.
In September, Zhana spent the nights in her aunt’s new apartment. She went on vacation and was afraid that the lifeless apartment would be robbed.
One hot evening I was getting ready to go to the bathhouse. In the summer, many people wanted to bath, even late at night, and the baths were closing at nine. But when the management left, the watchman opened the rooms and let clients wash for a ruble. This was where Zhana told me,
“Take me to my aunt. You can bath there. In the evening there is always water: both cold and hot. Let’s drink tea and chat. Agree?”
Of course, I immediately agreed. Without any conditions or reservations. Zhana couldn’t stand them.
“You, Nick, are always thinking and weighing everything. You can never say “yes” or “no” right away,” she said.
I laughed,
“Ask me the right question and I’ll immediately answer you “Yes!”
But at that moment I didn’t have any second thoughts. A friend was just going to visit a friend to chat. And at the same time to bath.
It was cozy in her aunt’s apartment in a prestigious city district. I decided to take a shower right away, and then drink tea and chat.
“Don’t close the door, we’ll talk,” Zhanna suggested.
“Okay,” I said, “But if you want to rub my back, get into the bath with me right away.”
“We agreed,” Zhanna supported, “I’ll just set the table.”
And I suddenly realized that this was not a joke. That she gives me five minutes to wash off the sweat and dust and wash everything that is necessary before her arrival. And that when she presses herself against me, naked, and rubs my back, I will already be electrified, and when I stroke her back in response, the trembling of her body will be transferred to mine and, lifting her by the buttocks, I will get with my ready to explode Pik into her pink and fluffy Fisse. These imaginary scenes gave me a terrible feeling in my stomach, and I realized that I had to immediately jump from the bathtub on the toilet bowl.
The diarrhea squeezed me with the terrible force. But the worst thing was that even in a good district of a city the bathroom was combined with a toilet, and air fresheners had not yet come into use. Therefore, all my wonderful fantasies, mixed with the miasma of reality, remained behind the suddenly slammed bathroom door.
When I went into the room, Zhana looked at me with indignation and muttered,
“And you promised not to close the door… I won’t drink tea. No, it’s not about you. I don’t feel well. And I need to get up early tomorrow, and…”
In a word, I left. I promised not to be offended and to take Zhana with me to the Physicist Day concert, where I was still an honored guest. There were a couple of days left.
Two days later, in full dress, I showed up to Kolya, who lived in the yard diagonally from Zhana. As a physicist, he was also going to a concert at the university. But he was completely undressed, in his home leggings.
“Are you dressed up like Kokkinaki for the parade?” Kolya’s mother said, “You don’t know, or what?”
“Isn’t this a concert, but a sports parade?” I was surprised and pointed at Kolya’s sweatpants, “What should I know?”
“You see, Zhana is absent,” said Kolya.
“Why?” I was surprised, “We’ll be late.”
“No. Absent not at home,” he giggled somehow embarrassed and nervously, “But at all. Better go and see yourself.”
Having difficulty understanding what was said, but anticipating something bad, I rushed across the road. Our girls and boys were standing on the Yablonskys’ balcony. Seized with confusion, I flew up to the second floor and found myself in the arms of Zhana’s mother.
“Po-or we are po-or!” she wailed, “Our beauty is go-one! Damn it! It’s my fault, I didn’t let her ru-un to you yesterday! If only my girl were alive! And I’m o-old fo-ol, I talked her out of it. “Okay, mom, I can handle it myself,” she says. She went, washed her feet, put on a white dress and lay down on the bed.
“Why are you like this, daughter?” I ask.
And she,
“I want to be remembered as beautiful,” and she began to throw up with foam.
Here the poor woman went limp from loss of strength, and we carried her to the sofa.
The girls were crying, all the guys with red eyes were sniffling and blowing their noses. Edik lit one cigarette from another and constantly spread his hands, mentally repeating the same monologue,
“I come, and her mother says – she left for “Boombarash!”
“To whom?” I ask, “But it was the name of the play, “Bumbarash”. Here’s the show for you!”
I learned that instead of calling an ambulance, out of madness, Zhana was dragged around the corner to the Institute of Traumatology, where she died without regaining her consciousness. The investigation has already started, the body was taken to the forensic examination, and the letters and the diary, (it turned out, was such a thing) were with the investigator.
The following days brought only speculations and hypotheses. Yes, there was a guy. Possibly married. A doctor. Zhana visited him on duty at the hospital, and was there on her last day. It was unclear whether she stole medicine from the safe or took rat poison. She turned out not to be a virgin, but whether she was pregnant was not specified. Zhana’s diary was not returned to her mother…
All these details were discussed in our class, but they were of little use. What could they clarify? Zhana herself took what she took, for no one else could so accurately calculate the onset of the action of the poison. The reason… It was incomprehensible to me. Loneliness? Yearning? Disappointment in your loved one? For me, who knew the cheerful Zhana well, all this could not serve as an explanation for such an end. Gradually I began to believe that it was an accident, that she wanted to scare someone (her boyfriend) and, as usually happened, did not calculate the dose.
The funeral of the girl in white turned into a massive procession, but we all lost a piece of our hearts. And I always wonder wasn’t it my fault that I never became a man for her?
Autumn and cooling did not bring anything new into my boring everyday life. But once, on a gloomy day, an EI (Extraordinary Incident) occurred in our laboratory.
Head of the Lab, Roman, came to work early and found an oilcloth from a typewriter covered with dried white smudges on the sofa in his office. It was unlikely that anyone had breakfast with soft-boiled eggs on the sofa, so he assumed a simpler explanation, understandable for everyone, and began to investigate the matter. Everyone was present except Lamazi. Roman called us in his study one by one and asked us in detail when we left yesterday, what we saw, what we heard, who we were suspect, and whether we had sex on his couch. At the same time, he piercingly stared at each person, narrowing his eyes and added,
“Think carefully before you lie. This could cost you dearly!”
Every word could be heard through the glass door. Lea called Roman an idiot. Avtandil kept repeating,
“No, sir. I don’t know anything, sir. What do I think? That sperm is similar to a man’s.”
Zhenya was crying. She was very scared that someone had raped Lamazi and now it would be the turn of others. After a couple of hours, Roman got tired of playing investigation, and he went to consult with Chichiko.
“I found sperm in my office,” he said.
“Was it the first time you lost it?” asked Chichiko.
“It’s okay to joke, this could be serious. What if this is rape? Can you imagine the consequences for the entire leadership?”
Chichiko, of course, could imagine it, but he did not want Roman’s blackmail at all.
“Well, if you are firmly convinced of this, call the investigation team, and today we will consider the candidacy of a new Laboratory head, who will put the Lab in order.
Roman turned pale.
“No, I’m not at all sure. Maybe it’s not sperm at all.”
“Moreover, why do we need alarmists in leadership positions?”
“What do you advise me?”
“Make everything concerning sperm in order,” Chichiko said and sent Roman back.
Roman took this advice literally. Just in case, he locked the oilcloth as evidence in his empty safe and ordered a new cover for the typewriter. Separate covers were not available, so he had to order a cover with a new typewriter. To the question: “Anything else?” Roman replied: “Three tape recorders.” He decided to start a revolutionary automation of all procedures in the medical center. He ordered Avtandil to connect one of the tape recorders to the telephone in the laboratory, so that all conversations were automatically recorded on tape.
“This is a model of the future,” Roman explained, “Subsequently, all actions of all units will be recorded and analyzed on a computer. Only optimal decisions will be made that are unavailable in a corrupt capitalist society. And we will be first!”
Apparently Roman firmly decided to switch from the hopeless question “Who had finished or rather cum?” to the slogan “I started!”
The story with oilcloth continued in the form of tape recorders. Roman took the second tape recorder and the typewriter without a cover to his home for his personal use, and the third tape recorder, a spare one, stood in a box under a bookshelf with heavy volumes of Lenin’s works and all sort of nonsense on automation and the method of expert assessments.
The New Year holidays were approaching, Roman had already disappeared from the Lab, and I decided to borrow an ownerless tape recorder hidden under the bookcase, to take it home and record a New Year’s concert on TV. I put the tape recorder in my bag and filled the empty box with the works of Lenin for fun. Then I went to Chichiko and said,
“I’m borrowing a tape recorder from work to record a New Year’s concert. Do you mind? Would you like me to make you a copy?”
“Why the hell did I need it? Better bring a good girl. By the way, weren’t you the one who fucked Zhenya or the fat-assed beauty on the oilcloth in Roman’s office?” and seeing my indignant look, he added, “Okay, okay, one can’t even to joke anymore?! Happy Cumming New Year!”
The second of January was a day off. The table in my large room at home was constantly set in case of unexpected guests, and they’ve appeared.
There was a loud knock on the front door. I opened it, expecting to see friends, but Roman and Avtandil were standing on the threshold. Their faces were tense.
“Come in, sit down, and help yourself!” I greeted the employees.
They walked in and saw a table set and a tape recorder connected to the TV.
“Do you recognize the laboratory tape recorder?” Roman asked Avtandil.
“I recognize it, sir,” answered the sycophant.
“Citizen Neiman, I accuse you of theft of state property,” said Roman, taking on the role of state prosecutor. “Avtandil, proceed with confiscation.”
“Don’t be offended, Nick,” Avtandil whispered, “I’m just obeying the orders of my superior,” and began to pack the tape recorder.
“Roman, you apparently had too much to drink on New Year’s. I borrowed a tape recorder with Chichiko’s permission, but you, scoundrel, have appropriated one working tape recorder and have already damaged state property. Tomorrow we’ll meet in the director’s office, and you’ll be in trouble! And I, a fool, even invited you as people to the table.
Roman left without saying goodbye.
“Nick, I’m sorry. Happy New Year!” Avtandil, trying to smooth the atmosphere, handed me candy according to Tbilisi custom. This were Lenin’s books startled him up. I opened the box, and there was “How can we reorganize the workers’ office”!
The next day I went to the director. The day before, Roman called Chichiko and, having received confirmation of my words along with a reproach for relations first with a typewriter cover and then with a tape recorder, he canceled the crusade. But I could no longer stew in this cauldron. Fortunately, the director’s son, after talking with Chichiko’s son, decided to study physics only with me – even under a threat of bullet in the forehead, so the director became my patron for a while.
Of course, my conversation with him was not about tape recorders or the laboratory-cabinet of curiosities, but about the discrepancy between my specialty and work.
“What would you like to do?” asked the director.
“Regeneration,” I answered, “This is an important scientific direction, it does not require large expenses to begin with, and we have a vivarium with animals. Some measurements can be carried out sterilely in the operating room. I’ll borrow the equipment. We will discuss medical issues with Chichiko and with you – there will be articles.”
The director liked my speech. That same day I was transferred to the pathology laboratory, and I went to introduce myself to the new team.
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