Nadia
Moscow
Less than two weeks later, Nadia and Maxim were on a private jet headed for Moscow. Maxim refused to fly commercial, and his father owned a jet that he was willing to lend to his eldest son, especially if Maxim promised to pay his respects to the various aunts and uncles that he hadn’t visited for years.
Nadia spent the flight working on the third entry in the diary.
Along with supervising the packing of the entire house and entrusting the keys to the realty agent, Nadia had already managed to translate the second entry, which to her secret pleasure had returned to Samara’s adventures with the mysterious boy from the party.
Nadia re-read her transcription again as they flew over Warsaw, with Maxim gently snoring beside her, after a late night of drinking and dancing.
October 1st, 1985
I got in an awful row with Papa this morning. About law school again, of course. He said it was a ridiculous idea, absurd and completely unnecessary. I said nothing we do is necessary—humans only exist to follow our interests and passions, or else we might as well be cattle in the field. He said even a cow knows better than to be disobedient, and it only went downhill from there.
In the end, he said he’d cut me off and not pay a dime for my schooling, and I laughed and said I had plenty of money of my own saved from birthdays and holidays, and if worst came to worst, I could sell some of the things I inherited from grandfather.
Well, of course that sent him to the moon. I think he would have hit me if mama wasn’t there.
I’d never actually sell the important stuff, but I had to show him how serious I am. I refuse to be another uneducated housewife.
Well, it was a nightmare, and Mama practically threw my bookbag at me and told me to go to school.
I might have kept yelling, but I could see Rashel hiding behind the staircase looking miserable. She hates when I fight with Mama and Papa. Poor little thing, she hates any kind of fighting at all, even in movies. She was born into the wrong family.
So, I hopped on my bicycle and away I went.
I was annoyed even then, thinking that I should have insisted on living on campus, instead of at home. Papa always says it’s not safe, but that’s not the real reason, they just want to keep me under their thumb.
I was in a foul mood, heading to class. I put my bicycle in the racks and I was marching off to class when I heard this voice saying, “It’s too early in the morning to be that angry.”
And who did I see leaning up against the oak tree?
Ivan, from the Sokolov twins’ party.
Only he wasn’t wearing the skeleton suit anymore, just normal trousers and a leather jacket, with his hair sort of long and messy, since it wasn’t under the skull mask.
So I said, “What are you doing here?”
And he said, “I go to school here, remember?”
I said, “I never saw you around before. I think you were waiting for me.”
And he just shrugged and grinned, so I knew I was right.
I was supposed to be in my modern literature class, but in that moment, I couldn’t think about anything but how handsome he looked, with the orange and brown leaves falling down around him, with his tan skin and his white teeth and that battered old jacket.
He said, “Come on, let’s go for a walk,” and I went off with him immediately.
I could see he had a pack of cigarettes in his pocket, and I plucked them out and threw them away in the gutter. He laughed and said, “I don’t care, I quit anyway.”
“When?” I said.
“As soon as I met you,” he said.
We walked down along Ulitsa Kosygina and just like at the party, it was like neither of us could get out the words fast enough, we talked and laughed like we were old friends, about anything and everything.
He didn’t want to say too much about his parents. I think because they must be quite poor, and he’s embarrassed to say it, knowing what a spoiled little princess I am. He told me all about his little sister though, and his favorite books, and songs, and everywhere he wants to travel in the world.
