Arseny did not lower his eyes as he gazed at Ustina. He was surprised that they did not find it difficult to withstand each other’s gaze, that the thread stretching between them was more important than the feeling of unease. He delighted in her red glow. And how the linen thread holding her cross rose and fell on her collarbone in time with her breathing. This was the only thing remaining on Ustina that was her own.
In the evening they ate the porridge, to which Arseny added flax oil. They sat by the hearth, holding clay dishes on their knees. The last time he had sat like this was with Christofer. Arseny inconspicuously watched the play of light on her hair, so akin to flame. It was braided now and looked completely different. Ustina stretched her lips amusingly as she brought the wooden spoon (carved by Christofer) to her mouth. It was like a kiss. A kiss for Christofer. Arseny remembered how those spoons had been carved: also in winter and also by the stove. When he looked at Ustina yet again, she was sleeping.
He carefully took the dish and spoon from her hands. Ustina did not awaken. She continued to sit, composed and restlessly, as if she were surmounting, in her sleep, some difficult journey known only to her. Arseny put Ustina to bed on the bench. He gently lifted her from the chair, trying not to awaken her, and was amazed at her lightness. Her head rested, thrown back, on Arseny’s arm: he held out his elbow to support it. He saw the veins on Ustina’s temples through her translucent skin. And sensed the scent of her lips. Thy lippes are like a rose-colored rybende. He pressed his cheek to her forehead. He gently laid her on the bench and covered her with a sheepskin.
Arseny sat at the headboard and looked at Ustina. At first he sat, arms folded on his chest, then with his palm pressed against his chin. Sometimes a light tremor crossed Ustina’s face. Sometimes she cried out. Arseny ran his palm across her face and she calmed.
Sleep, sleep, Ustina, Arseny whispered.
And Ustina slept. The linen under her gathered in folds. Her cheek touched the bench’s wood. Arseny carefully lifted her head to smooth the folds. Without waking up, Ustina took Arseny’s palm and laid it under her cheek. He had to bend and support his right hand with his left. A few minutes later, Arseny began feeling pain in his back and in his hands, but this was pleasing for him. It seemed to him that he was removing part of Ustina’s burden through his slight suffering. He did not even notice himself dozing off.
He awoke from the ticklish motion of eyelashes along his palm. Ustina was lying with her eyes open. A flicker from the coals in the stove reflected in her eyes. Arseny’s palm was wet from her tears. He touched Ustina’s eyelids with his lips and sensed their saltiness. Ustina moved over as if she were freeing up a space for him:
I got frightened in the darkness.
He sat alongside her on the edge of the bench and she laid her head on his knees.
Stay with me, O Arseny, until I sleep.
Through his clothing he felt the warm breath that came with her words.
I will stay with you until you sleep.
I have nobody but you. I want to firmly embrace you and not let you go.
I also want to embrace you because I am afraid alone.
Then lie down with me.
He lay down. They embraced and lay that way for a long time. He lost track of time. He trembled with fine trembling, though he was all sweaty. And his sweat mixed with her sweat. And then his flesh entered her flesh. In the morning, they saw the linen had become crimson.
A new life had started for Arseny, a life filled with love and fear. With love for Ustina and with the fear she would disappear just as suddenly as she had arrived. He did not know exactly what he feared: a hurricane maybe, lightning, fire, or an unkind glance. Perhaps all of them together. Ustina was not separate from his love for her. Ustina was love and love was Ustina. He carried it as if it were a candle in a dark forest. He feared that thousands of greedy night-creatures would fly toward that flame all at once and extinguish it with their wings.
He could delight in Ustina for hours on end. He would take her hand and, slowly lifting a sleeve, feel the barely perceptible golden hairs with his lips. He laid her head on his knees and drew a fingertip along the spectral line between her neck and chin. Tasted her eyelashes with his tongue. Carefully took the kerchief from her hair and let her hair down; braided it. Unbraided it again and slowly ran a comb through it. Imagined her hair was a lake and the comb was a boat. He saw himself in that comb, gliding along the golden lake. Felt he was drowning and feared being saved more than anything.
He never showed Ustina to anyone. When he heard a knock at the door, he would throw Christofer’s sheepskin on her and send her to the next room. Casting a glance at the benches, he would search for anything that could betray Ustina. But there were no such things. There was really nothing feminine in Christofer and Arseny’s housekeeping. He would open the front door once he was convinced the door to the neighboring room was firmly closed behind Ustina.
Ustina sat there soundlessly and Arseny examined his patients. His appointments had become briefer, something his visitors noted. Arseny no longer kept up his end of conversations. He examined and palpated diseased flesh without uttering superfluous words. Listened to grievances with concentration and gave instructions. Accepted commensurate payment. After all the medical words had been said, he looked at the guest, marking time. Patients associated that with the doctor’s increasing busyness and treated him with even more respect.
Nobody knew about Ustina. She hardly ever showed herself in the yard and nothing was visible from outside through the small windows stretched with bull’s-bladder. Strictly speaking, nothing was visible when looking through them from inside, either. So even if someone took it upon himself to peer through Arseny’s window, he would not learn much. But of course nobody peered in.
Once, during an appointment with a sufferer of male impotence, Ustina sneezed on the other side of the wall. Not loudly but she sneezed; the room was, after all, cold. The patient looked questioningly at Arseny and asked what the noise was. Arseny responded with an uncomprehending glance. He suggested the visitor not distract him from the problem, otherwise he would never figure it out.
Never, Arseny emphasized, and then recommended eating more carrots.
As he was seeing his guest out, Arseny trod deliberately loudly but Ustina did not sneeze again. When she finally came in, Arseny asked that in future she sneeze into the inner part of the sheepskin because fur muffles sounds.
That is what I usually do, Ustina said. But this time it happened so suddenly that I simply did not have time to cover myself with the coat.
Arseny’s interactions with visitors took on a certain absentmindedness. It became ever more noticeable that Arseny’s thoughts were in other places. If his visitors had known of Ustina, they would have placed his thoughts in the next room. But they would not have been completely correct.
Arseny did not simply think about Ustina. He was submerging, little by little, into a distinct, complete world consisting of himself and Ustina. In that world, he was Ustina’s father and her son. He was her friend and brother, but most of all, her husband. Ustina’s orphanhood left all those responsibilities open. And he took them on. His own orphanhood offered the exact same responsibilities for Ustina. The circle was closing: they were becoming everything for one another. The perfection of that circle made anyone else’s presence impossible. They were two halves of a whole and any addition seemed not only redundant to Arseny but also inadmissible. Even for only a minute and without obligations.