For that reason, Toma was certain that Pavel Alekseevich loved her more than Tanya. Her understanding of fairness, whereby everything was distributed equally by weight, size, and quantity, had remained with her since infancy, although occasionally it was shaken by suspicion that things were not that simple. But Toma had always preferred simple things to the complex . . .
In the Kukotsky household there was no talk of fairness. And nothing was divided equally. At dinner everyone was apportioned two meat patties. But Tanya frequently refused the second. Vasilisa did not eat meat at all. For a long while Toma thought that Vasilisa was not given meat “out of fairness,” that is, because she was a servant. Later it turned out that Vasilisa herself did not want the meat. But, after having spent several months in their household, Toma stalked Vasilisa and uncovered that she had her own special food that no one else in the house ate: in her pantry she kept dried white bread cut into tiny pieces, which she ate in the morning, in secret from everyone. Which meant that there was a certain kind of fairness here. Toma once crept into the pantry and found the bread wrapped in a rag and tried a piece: it was absolutely tasteless. There was absolutely nothing special about it at all.
Living with her mother and brothers, Toma had constantly been involved in divvying things up: her little brothers always grabbed the larger and better pieces, and they fought constantly over food. Her mother also argued with everyone on various counts, and the arguments—even fistfights—were always over fairness. With the Kukotskys everything went contrary to fairness, which amazed her, especially at the outset. In the summer at the dacha Pavel Alekseevich would drop the first strawberry from his own plate onto Elena Georgievna’s, and she, laughing, poured her berries onto the plate in front of Vasilia, who would get upset.
“I’m not going to eat your slush! Give it to the children . . .”
Just as with meat patties, Tanya did not care for strawberries, and the berries would end their circular journey around the table on Toma’s plate . . .
Now, though, after Zhenya had appeared in the household, Toma finally came to understand the joy of giving. It was amusing that Toma experienced this for the first time at the same dacha with the same first strawberries grown in their “own” garden. There were only eleven of these first, red but not quite fully ripe, berries from Vasilisa’s planting, which Vasilisa placed proudly on the table one Sunday morning, saying: “The first are yours . . .”
Pavel Alekseevich gave everyone two berries each, placing the very last one on Zhenya’s plate. Once again, just as when Toma had been a child, the berries went from plate to plate. Pavel Alekseevich placed one in his mouth and another in Zhenya’s. Zhenya popped her berries into her mouth, comically screwing up her face but smacking her lips in delight . . .
Vasilisa muttered something that sounded as if strawberries were also included in her fast. And here, watching Zhenya’s gastronomical pleasure written on her berry-juice-smattered face, Toma understood how she would get more enjoyment watching the child eat them than eating them herself . . .
And so it happened, unnoticed by all, that Toma came to love Zhenya, her niece, as she called her . . .
The little girl was living at her grandfather’s house for a second year. Pavel Alekseevich thought that the child should be with them until Tanya got her life in order. And so it came to be that last year’s dacha season had stretched over a whole year. Tanya was not able to move to Moscow. She had come to visit rather frequently for several days at a time, but only now, toward the beginning of July, had things begun to settle down. Just before retiring, Pavel Alekseevich had managed to obtain rights to a one-room apartment in a new academic cooperative building—for Toma. The former girls’ room returned to Tanya’s ownership, although, truth be told, the ownership was not hers alone, but her family’s, together with Sergei and Zhenya.
The separate apartment Pavel Alekseevich had managed to arrange and pay for with his own money was a fairy-tale fantasy come true for Toma. The building was not entirely completed, but she had already made several trips to Leninsky Avenue, the far end, and walked around the already finished construction and even stood alongside the entrance to her future front door. She had been given an estate, her own island, as a result of which she reevaluated in her head everyone around her in relation to herself: her own worth, it seemed to her, had grown immeasurably . . . Among her coworkers, especially those her age, she knew no one who possessed a similar treasure. What was more, she still could not understand why the apartment was being built for her, and not for Tanya, their own daughter, who, in addition to everything else, had a family of sorts of her own.
Certainly, the same idea had occurred to Pavel Alekseevich before it had to Toma. Moreover, he had discussed it with his daughter during one of her visits to Moscow. He had begun the conversation precisely by proposing to Tanya that they build a two-room apartment for her family. But Tanya, without a minute’s hesitation, had refused: her sole motivation for returning to Moscow was “our old girls, who are falling further into decline, and I’m moving here in order to take care of them . . .” Pavel Alekseevich was hurt by Tanya’s condescending use of the word “old girls” in reference to both Elena and Vasilisa . . .
Breaking with Piter was difficult: Sergei had had a breakthrough, and he was mastering one instrument after the next, playing unusual chromatic double-voice pieces on a handmade double recorder, then trying his hand at the basset horn, then, finally—following in the footsteps of Roland Kirk—he got caught up in the completely exotic musical practice of playing two saxophones at once. And he succeeded at all of it. His musical path spiraled upward, and with increasing frequency Sergei extracted his own compositions from this musical rumble. After long drawn-out doubts, Garik began playing one of his compositions—“Black Stones.”
Tanya worked a lot: her black stones were becoming stylish, in part with the help of Poluektova, who had come from Perm for the holidays. True, during her visits Sergei, Tanya, and Zhenya would have to move to the workshop, which Poluektova herself did not insist on: jealousy was not in her repertoire. She even liked Tanya, and her own life in Perm was on a steady rise. Her classes were considered the best, she had moved from stage repertoire teacher to choreographer, and her love affair with the most talented of the school’s graduates lent her energy, spirit, and a certain dose of good nature that was entirely out of character. Tanya presented Poluektova with a pair of her creations, and the latter modelled them very successfully at the Mariinsky Theater, where she had danced before retiring, and the entire corps de ballet lined up for Tanya’s jewelry. Tanya barely managed to keep up with the orders. Tanya herself had become an item as welclass="underline" she and Sergei were constantly invited to all the hip events, from theatrical premieres to closed at-home concerts. Tanya now wore short black dresses, and her dyed brown hair, which grew with amazing speed, she wore long: after two years it covered her sharp shoulder blades. Tripping constantly along music’s shore as though along the sea’s edge, her body was poised and transmitted a kind of hidden movement even when she stood completely still. But the main event was taking place in the dark and where no one could see: Tanya was pregnant, thrilled immeasurably, and so far had said nothing about this to anyone, except Sergei—not even to Pavel Alekseevich. It was decided that her last two months free of household responsibilities she would spend together with Sergei touring Crimea and the Caucasus Mountains; after the tour ended they would travel to an international jazz festival in the Baltic region, and then, after quickly packing their rather impoverished stuff and drawing the line at the end of their Petersburg life, they would move to Moscow—to give birth to a son, raise Zhenya, and take care of the old folks. That the difficulties in all this promised to be enormous only fueled Tanya’s resolve: she was so full of happiness and strength, so fearless and carefree, that she even rushed time a bit. Which in no degree got in the way of her finding pleasure from day to day . . .