Ром Амор
Morphine the phantom of love
I took the cigarette in my mouth again, came up to the girl, turned around the canvas and looked at it myself again. She was absolutely right.
‘I was painting it to make money to pay my bills.’
‘What about the other paintings? You didn’t paint them for the money, right?’
‘Right.’
This time she did not try to find out the details, apparently, she learned her lesson from the previous experience of questioning me.
‘So, how many hours would you need to spend with me to pay all your bills?’
‘It depends on how many hours I’ll be able to stand you.’
The corners of her lips crumpled into a smile again.
She was very pleasant and uninhibited as company, but her numerous questions have from day one either thrown me off balance or revived my ability to smile. I thought she was a cute and goal-oriented schoolgirl, who did not lack care on her parents’ part and was probably spoiled for choice with boys’ hearts. It was not surprising: Valeria was a beautiful, fit girl with already developed breasts and good posture. Her thick golden hair would charmingly change shades as it caught the light.
We went out into the balcony, and she asked for some more wine.
‘Are you sure you’ll be able to hold the brushes steadily after the second glass?’
‘Stop it. Someone is just afraid of getting drunk first,’ she said smiling.
I was not afraid of getting drunk. Yet the wine and cigarettes had already unwound me a little. I had not had alcohol for long. The winter did not predispose to that. For many people, winter with its holiday season is the period when the level of alcohol in their blood rises, but not for me. I practically do not celebrate those holidays that transform the homes of normal people.
‘Let’s begin then.’
I removed my painting from the table and walked out of the studio for a second. When I returned, I saw Valeria sitting at the table and examining the room’s interior.
‘What’s that?’
‘An apple. We’re going to compete in drawing this apple from nature.’
Drawing an apple is an elementary exercise that demonstrates a budding artist’s basic skills.
‘What will we use?’
‘Coloured pencils,’ I took out two sheets of white paper and pencil stubs from a drawer. ‘Here you go. We’ll start on the count of three. We’ll have ten minutes all in all.’
‘I’m ready,’ my pupil assured me.
‘Three!’ I started drawing.
‘Huh? Already?! What about one and two?’ She laughed, but having seen how fast my pencil was running on the paper, she set about drawing too, only adding: ‘Cheat!’
I smiled and continued to concentrate on the lines. Four minutes in and my apple was ready. All that was left was add some volume with colours. I began colouring without rushing and glancing at Valeria’s work from time to time.
She was doing everything right: contours of natural shape, a dimple at the top, and a base at the bottom. Time for shadows. I noticed how Valerie hesitated when deciding where to place the centre of light in the drawing. She was moving her eyes from the apple to the sheet and back to the apple.
‘Why are you peeping, cheat?!’
I smiled again and got back to my drawing. The ten minutes were running out. My apple was ready, and I watched Valerie finish hers.
‘Time’s up!’
She put the red pencil aside and moved her drawing towards me. I examined it silently, looking at her work. It had the correct proportions of the object, the shape was analysed constructively; the lines, strokes and the light and shadow ratios were well combined.
‘Well done…’
‘You, too,’ Valerie said as she passed back my drawing.
I realised that this girl was not a beginner, and decided to give her a more difficult task. I added her glass of wine and a low vase with painting brushes next to the apple. But something was missing. I got up and drew the curtains over the window and balcony door. I took out a thick candle, lit it and placed it behind the glass. The red wine shimmered with ruby hues in the crystal glass and the candlelight cast shadows on the objects.
I looked at Valerie’s face and realised that she would easily take on this challenge. I had to make the task even more demanding.
I lit up a cigarette and placed it glowing into a glass ashtray that was full of cigarette butts.
Valerie took a sheet of paper from the same chest of drawers, gave me a sheet and began to draw with enthusiasm.
The cigarette smoke slowly rose in a narrow wisp, skirting the contours of the glass and flirting with the candle flame. When one cigarette burned out, I replaced it with another…
We were drawing carefully, locked in a dark room in the middle of a sunny spring day. I have to admit, it was the first time in a while that I was enjoying this activity. I even turned on the music, which helped me relax and concentrate on the drawing.
When he turned on the music, everything transfigured suddenly. The darkness, the smell of the cigarette smoke, the play of the shadows in the glass of wine, the music drifting away, the man’s sinewy hands in the shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, the scribbled curves and lines, his rare sighs, like measures of beats, his glancing and my shyness cast a spell over me and carried me away to distant shores.
I did not even dare to look at him anymore. Just the still life and my paper. If I said that I was able to focus, I would be lying.
I felt an unusual bewilderment. I found myself in a confined space, alone with a man I barely knew, who was lonely and could sometimes be rude. I thought he would try to make a pass at me. But his aloofness and detachedness for the entire next hour or two really astonished me. I realised that he was present physically, but in fact he was elsewhere, absorbed in the single source of light and the smoke around him.
We finished. The rays of the setting sun seeped into the room. The cigarette burned out. The candle went out.
He took my picture without even looking at it. In a minute, he was already helping with my coat and said that he will see me next week.
I was dumbfounded as I descended the staircase. There was something mysterious about this man… This something left me in a state of confusion and unusual curiosity. “Why is he alone?” this was only the first in a series of questions spinning in my head.
‘How did it go?’ her daddy asked.
‘Well.’
I was still under the spell of this new acquaintance when I got into my father’s black Audi, and we drove home.
A cigarette filled my lungs with smoke. I was holding the picture of this talented girl in my hands. It was perfect. Just as her life would be. Their car disappeared around the corner of the house. I left the unfinished cigarette to languish in the crystal ashtray on the balcony.
Chapter 6
The teal blue sea, bringing forth dozens of waves that rise and fall in furling white crests, with tossing blows battles the grey creation of man. Three hungry gulls scan for prey at the beginning of this pier, not heeding their ilk soaring upwards to the single beam of light. The birds are flying towards the sun amidst the cloud-bound, menacing sky. They do not suspect that a storm would soon break forth and flying would become unbearable.
On the other end of the pier, a couple in love is in hiding, whispering something to each other. A man in a tweed coat, wet from the salty water, is hugging a woman with chestnut hair blowing in the wind. Squeezing her with his embrace as if something is predestined to separate them any moment now. He is embracing her as if for the last time. For the last time, their eyes look at each other while his lips utter words dissolving in eternity three minutes before the storm.
‘How much is this painting?’ asked a middle-aged man in a black tweed overcoat. His left hand was hiding inside the coat pocket while his right hand was holding a black hat that was actually pointing at the painting.
‘Which one?’ I promptly replied.
‘With the couple on the pier,’ he said bending towards it as if trying to identify the protagonists.
“Three Minutes before the Storm…” ’ I said realising which one it was as I tried to calm the storm billowing inside me. I added: ‘It’s not for sale.’
The man scrutinised me with his big black eyes, with his left thumb and forefinger stroking his greying black moustache from top to bottom, and then looked back at the canvas.
‘I’ll give you ten thousand for it.’
‘I think you didn’t get me, it’s not for sale,’ I said as I cleared my throat to disguise my trembling voice.
‘No, I think’ – he looked at me over his shoulder – ‘you didn’t get me. I’m talking about ten thousand dollars.’
I pinched the edges of my lips and I stood up to him, looking right into his face: what type of a man was this who was willing to pay for one of my paintings a sum that an average artist barely made in months? At first he returned my look, and then, as if on command, we both turned to the painting. I do not know what he saw in this combination of paints and torment. I cannot even imagine why or for whom he was willing to splash out such a hefty sum. One thing I knew for sure, I could not just part with it. I silently looked at the painting and all I could see was my beloved and I standing at the edge of the precipice. I was experiencing the same emotions, calling for help to the sole and last ray of light streaming from the sky. I recalled how powerless we are before the elements, nature and the skies. Before those forces that furtively watch us from behind the clouds, casting our lots.
‘The painting is not for sale,’ I said slowly.
‘Then what is it doing here?’ asked the man as if a match sparked and immediately went out, following up with a new sum of twelve thousand now.
‘No,’ I refused again.
‘Fifteen.’
‘Unfortunately, no.’
The man looked at me in incomprehension, then looked around at the other sellers, the other paintings, and back at me. He did not move and was about to say something when I said:
‘Maybe you would be interested in any other of my works?’
‘Are you the author?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then I think it would not be difficult for you to paint something similar one more time. I appreciate your other works, but I only wish to acquire this one.’
‘I understand,’ I said like a troublesome kid and looked down, ‘but I won’t be able to.’
‘Able to what?’ he frowned as he tried to make out my quiet, dry voice.
‘I won’t be able to paint another one…’
‘So, you find my offer to be too low,’ – I was mistaken to think that this man would be able to feel the full extent of this painting’s importance to me – he nodded and continued to bargain: ‘Fifteen thousand.’ He stroked his beard with anticipation, putting my principles to the test.
‘Unfortunately…’
‘Damn it! How much do you want for this piece of art?!’ he burst out in irritation.
‘I can’t sell it to you, or anyone else for that matter.’ I was still looking at the ground.
‘You know, artists are very strange people,’ intervened Gennadiy Vasilevich, ‘they paint for others, but when it comes to parting with them, it is as if they were giving away part of themselves. And the fact of the matter is that they are not always ready to give away a part of themselves, however weary they have grown of it.’
The man heard out Gennadiy Vasilevich and tried to overcome his irritation.
‘Well, I have offered a fair price for this work. Fifteen thousand US dollars. I am quite confident that most of you have never even seen such money in your dreams!’
Gennadiy Vasilevich put his arm around the man’s shoulders and moved him away towards his stall: ‘You have to understand, Vladimir is a very special person.’
‘Why should I understand? If he’s here, then he’s surely selling something. And why on earth would he refuse such a generous offer?’
Gennadiy Vasilevich did not attempt to explain to the buyer again why he won’t be able to acquire “Three Minutes before the Storm”.
‘Here, take a look at my works, I believe you will appreciate them and find value in them, too.’
However, the man in the black tweed coat only glanced at Gennadiy Vasilevich’s paintings and barely a few seconds later said: ‘Thank you, but there is nothing in these works that would interest me.’ He looked in my direction again and shouted: ‘You shouldn’t have turned down such an excellent offer.’ He put on his hat and slowly walked away.
‘You’re a weirdo, Vova, a total weirdo.’ Gennadiy Vasilevich patted me on the back shaking his head. ‘Just now you were not only offered a huge sum of money, which you turned down, but also the chance to come one step closer to your freedom. Freedom from your thoughts that ensnare and gnaw on you from the inside. These thoughts are very similar to those that have been pursuing me for many years.’
‘If they are truly similar thoughts, as you say, is it possible that you would have accepted his offer if you were in my shoes?’
‘If I were forty, yes. You are still at an age where you can let the full force of life into your days and change your way of being.’
I lit a cigarette and, without uttering a word, contemplated all of what had been just said.
‘Our thoughts bring our end. And in your case, your seven painted memories are only speeding it,’ he added.
I remained silent, blowing the cigarette smoke.
‘You are bound by your past, Vova. You are destroying yourself. Listen,’ he said as he shook me by the shoulders, ‘get rid of them and your life will be easier. You’re still young. Don’t take that path. I’ve been there. It’s a dead end.’
‘Why?’
‘Because one wonderful spring morning in your old age, you will wake up and realise that you are completely alone. You will understand that when your lifeless body will be lowered into the burial pit, there will be no one there. No one will shed a tear or shudder at your disappearance. Your friends, the ones you could have relied on, would have either passed away or would simply not come to say goodbye. Moreover, your memories of love will die along with you. Do you hear me? All your memories that surge in your heart will go along with you. And what will be left?’ – he went on with his train of thought calmly – ‘I’ll tell you what will be left. Your seven paintings, that’s all. However, if you can’t let them and your memories go, nothing but oblivion awaits them. Paintings don’t live without owners. Hiding away in attics, they’re useless.’
‘So, what should I do?’
‘Sell them or throw them,’ Gennadiy Vasilevich advised with insistence and walked to his stall.
‘This one? Three thousand hryvnia,’ he responded to the enquiry of a passer-by, ‘You’ll take it? Sure, I’ll pack it for you straight away.’
Seeing how he was selling another one of his paintings, I simply packed my seven works in their covers and left. I had to ponder all what had happened, the old man’s advice, my own feelings, everything.
Once home, I lit a fire in the fireplace, grabbed the unfinished bottle of wine and poured myself a glass. My seven paintings leaned against the old armchair like seven sirens calling to my soul.
Nevertheless, the old man was right: it really was not that easy for me to part with these paintings. They were the thread that tied me to the past. Each of them preserved the deep feelings of the love Marina and I shared. Some we had even painted together. Can the sincerity and the warmth of memories be ever really sold?
‘You’ll ruin it again!’ I shouted teasingly as soon as her brush touched the canvas.
‘Stop it, I won’t,’ my beloved would say as she tinkered around the easel fully concentrated on a small part of the canvas. ‘I would just like to add some shades to your grass.’
‘Hey, it’s my watercolour. And so are the shades!’ I said as I leaped from my chair grabbing Marina, putting her over my shoulder and carrying her away from the easel. Startled, she screamed, waggling her legs, menacing to paint all over my T-shirt.
‘Let me go, Vova!’
I carried her all around the flat.
‘Did you have your fun?’
I put her down.
‘Yes,’ I said in satisfaction as I caught my breath.
And at that very moment, using the brush that she was still holding in her hand, Marina started painting all over my face: I was turning into a cat with a green beard. She was laughing. Oh, how divine were her peals of laughter! I would have let her pour a whole jar of paint on me only to see her as happy. I stood motionless charmed by her laughter. Completing her work, having turned me into Shrek, she pressed herself to me and kissed me on the lips.
‘Well now, beware, I’ll show you now!’ I grabbed her in my arms and carried her into the bedroom. At first, she asked me to leave her alone. But later she could not resist anymore, begging me to punish her more and more. We started making love…
The flame crackled as it consumed the wood, while I greedily finished the wine. I would not dare get rid of the paintings; perhaps I am just a bit too thin-skinned. Deprived of his freedom shall be he who truly loves.
I took a box from the cabinet. It once stored cookies and now holds our memories. She started keeping this memory box on the first anniversary of our love. I, a thirty-three-year-old successful businessman, was just only considering offering my hand and heart to this girl. On the inner golden side of the lid, an inscription glistened: “To those brought together by destiny”.
The box held around two dozen Polaroid photographs, the Valentine’s Day card I gave her, my boutonnière from our wedding, the pearl necklace I offered her. Oh, how beautiful she looked with the rows of pearls framing her graceful neck… How anxious I was proposing to her, offering my hand and heart to her on Valentine’s Day.
Catching the glow of the fire, my wedding ring glinted with gold reflections. I still wore it. It had become an extension of me. Outweighing all photographs and gifts. The eighth thread tying me to Marina.
I took out the photographs and started looking through them. I knew each one by heart. I could repeat every word uttered in those moments flooded by the camera’s flash.
On this one it is the first time Marina got behind the wheel of a car that I had bought her. On that September day, she nearly crashed the brand new Aston Martin. Driving was not her forte, and like many other women she did not have a particular passion for cars. It’s a pity that the car had to be sold. It was really her style. Yet Marina did not really care much about how people perceived her. Her main virtue was compassion. She believed it was shameful to drive luxury wheels while majority in this country could barely make ends meet. Although, in my opinion, another reason why she rejected my gift was that she loved riding in the city tram. In this lovely time-wrought tram around Podol. The tram that slowly and deliberately moved along the old and narrow streets of one of the most beautiful cities on earth.
Often, something would spring to her mind, and on a day off she would drag me by the hand to the tramway stop. We would jump into the red and yellow tramcar and slowly accompanied by the beat of rails and mechanics, take a ride down the memory lane of her childhood. It was a tribute to the time when the parents of little Marina would take her to kindergarten and school in a tramway just like this one. Those memories were so sweetly preserved in her memory that it sometimes seemed that her longing for banging mechanical parts was stronger than her love for me.
She would always grab some change for such rides and pay the ticket for both of us. As if taking me out on a date. I would always joke that I had to repay her quite dearly afterwards for one such ride.
A young woman’s standing in a red knitted dress with her back to the viewer and a man’s hand in the frame: we were at her birthday. Blowing out the candles on the cake, she would make a wish to become my wife. I would have continued to make her dreams come true, if only God had given us more time. Perhaps, we would have been able to explore a thousand more universes for two, but we would never find out.
She has left me all alone in the fathomless universe of solitude.
No, I am not ashamed of it. I have even come to love this feeling, for beneath it lurks the opportunity to spend time with her. Even sitting here, spending this evening by the fireplace, I am not so alone after all, as long as the sparks of love for my wife continue to warm my heart.
When you are alone, you cannot figure it out straight away. Sometimes our daily lives swamp us so fully that even if we are in a love relationship with someone, we remain alone. Many a couple experience such a feeling in their family life when the breadwinner who provides the material amenities is engrossed in the mission of providing for the family. Such a menace loomed over us, too. In the first year of our love, I was still managing a bunch of quite successful projects in Russia and Europe, and, as a result, was spending many days and nights away from home.
When I was still a very small boy, I dreamt of travelling around the world and making big money. It took me a few years to achieve it. My dream came true when I was appointed executive director of one of the biggest Ukrainian companies. It was that year that we met.
Upon arriving in Kyiv from the airport, I would always pay visits to relatives and friends. But it was not the only reason for overcoming such great distances. It was in this city that I was able to find myself. During my walks in Kyiv’s parks I would find this unity.
One warm spring day, as I was whiling away before a meeting with an important state official, I strolled in a magnificent park stretching over the Pechersk hills. Women and men confidently swept by in business suits without outerwear. I, not having considered the weather conditions for that day, was suffocating in my beige overcoat, until I took it off and slung it casually over my arm. Thus, as I was strolling and lost in thought, I realised that I am already over thirty, and being constantly between Vienna and Riga or Moscow and Kyiv, I had remained a bachelor. It was time to live not only for myself or for my father and mother, but it was time to become a father and a husband. They may well be unusual thoughts for a guy, but these were exactly the thoughts that were on my mind on that day, the day when she crossed my path.
Suddenly all these thoughts about family and marriage came into focus. I saw her. A young woman in a beautiful light blue dress with golden brown hair. My steps slowed, and I could barely contain my desire to brush against this angel. Struck by her beauty and grace, I was too lost for words to be the first to strike up a conversation. Not to mention that chatting up girls on the street is not something I was brought up to do. At first she seemed unattainable, like a distant star to a pilgrim. Walking towards each other we simply parted ways without saying a word.
I could not but turn around, my eyes demanded more, my heart started beating faster. “I turned around to see whether she turned around to see whether I turned around.” Alas… The young woman marched on slowly and confidently, taking in the warm day. I did not know how much longer I would have to wait for my audience with the official, so I decided to follow the stranger. I turned around immediately and started following her slowly, and I was ever more charmed by her gait. She was so light, just like a bird in flight. Watching her thus for a few minutes, I realised that possibly she, too, was waiting for someone. Suddenly, she turned around brusquely and, with an unperturbed attitude, started walking towards me quickening her step. I wanted to say something again, but chickened out. This time, as we had twice passed one another, I was able to get a better look of her face, cherry-coloured lips and emerald eyes.
‘My name’s Marina, and I know that you’ve been watching me,’ I heard a woman’s voice say.
I stopped. It seemed that she was giving me another chance to make the first move, but I, a fool, missed this chance being at a loss.
‘I’m Vova, pleased to meet you.’ Our eyes looked at each other and our hands touched for the first time. ‘Why don’t we have a cup of coffee?’
‘I’m engaged, but why not.’
It was as if someone had poured a bucket of hot and then cold water over me. My smile resulting from touching this young woman almost disappeared. But there was no room for disarray anymore. I quickly remembered a good restaurant located in the vicinity and we headed there.
Fortunately, Marina turned out to be very sociable and spontaneous. The barrier that sometimes arises when meeting a new person was as if demolished by a bulldozer. Only two minutes into our walk towards the place that served excellent French snacks and hot Belgian chocolate, we had burst into peals of laughter. That day I found an incredible lightness of being. A stranger had offered me this happiness in less than five minutes.
‘Good day, Vladimir Romanovich,’ the restaurant manager greeted me obligingly as we came in. I felt like a Communist Party bigwig in the times of the Soviet Union.
‘They even know you by name here, Vladimir Romanovich. Do you moonlight as this establishment’s promoter?’ said Marina jokingly.
‘Well, I have no choice at times,’ I said playing along.
We were seated at my favourite table, at the window on the second floor. I was a friend of the restaurant’s owner and we often had lunch together at this table in between the daily hustle and bustle.
‘So what do you do?’ asked my new acquaintance with sparked interest in her eyes.
‘I’m a test pilot.’
‘Test pilot?!’ she burst out delighted.
‘Not really, I was just making a joke, in fact I am just an employee in a big company.’
Her enthusiasm died down.
‘And you?’
‘I work in marketing, but my heart is not in it, I like painting. That is why I create designs for various products.’
Marina named a few brands noting that their designs were developed with her help.
‘Quite interesting,’ I remarked.
‘In fact, not quite. I’m actually thinking of quitting my job.’
‘How come?’
‘This job simply steals too much time from me, and I have none left for my hobby.’
‘Interesting. I hope you’re not drawing in children’s colouring books?’
‘No. I prefer Japanese manga, if you know what I mean.’
We both laughed. She was pretty damn witty too.
‘What’s your hobby?’
‘I earn money.’
‘Boring.’ She deliberately yawned.
The waiter brought us the menu. My acquaintance was lost before all the choices. Whereas I was replaying in my head her saying that she was engaged, looking at her fingers that displayed a couple of nice rings. I could never remember which finger wedding rings went on, as I was not an expert at these things.
‘Could you suggest anything?’ she asked as she flipped through the menu.
I readily responded to her request and after enquiring about her preferences, I recommended my favourite dessert. The order was made.
‘Marina, has anyone ever told you that you were very beautiful?’ I let the sentence slip thinking: “Why did I ask something like that, what a fool, of course she has been told.”
‘Thank you.’ The girl accepted my inept compliment. ‘The weather is excellent today,’ she said looking through the window flooded with the sun and enquiring about what I was doing in the park.
‘Taking a walk. The weather is gorgeous indeed. And you?’
‘My office is nearby, and it is lunch time,’ she said as she flapped her lashes and looked at her watch, ‘was lunch time.’
‘Do you have to go?’ I asked barely able to conceal disappointment in my voice, fearing that someone might be waiting for her and that our time together could end here and now.
‘No. I have agreed to have a cup of coffee with you. And they still haven’t brought us our coffee,’ said the beautiful woman reassuring me.
‘That’s good.’
Actually, on that same day I experienced a feeling that is widely known as love at first sight. Marina was divine. Her looks, voice, manner of speech and being. I was spellbound from the very first minute. And each subsequent minute with her I felt growing attraction. It was a string of electrical charges between two people, a string that bound, warmed and drew two hearts to each other.
We drank hot chocolate, talked, nibbled on sweets, laughed. And our conversation became more casual. As I walked her to her office, I finally mustered the courage to ask: ‘Marina, when we first met, you said that you were engaged, is that true?’
She stopped, took off a ring from one finger and put it on the other hand.
‘No, it was a meaningless phrase.’ Marina turned her face away and then looked at me with great tenderness and faith. I decided not to delve into the details of why she had said that, I was just happy to have such an opportunity. I did not let the opportunity slip away and immediately asked her on another date.
I took our first photo out of the box. We were strolling on Khreshchatik on our second date and she dragged me into a photo booth where you sit and grimace while it clicks away giving out an entire strip of photos. I obviously looked like an idiot on most of the photos. But these are precisely those photographs that captured on film her incredible laugh.
Today I would give anything to merit this woman’s laugh.
The fire in the fireplace was flaring at times and then subsiding. It was time to throw in some more wood. I sat back in the armchair and threw back my head.
‘Why did you go?! Why did you leave me?! Marina, Marina…’ My eyes were filled with sadness and my blood spread a fire in my body that was burning my heart.
I was alone and I wasn’t. Physically the apartment is at my disposal. But I know that her presence always accompanies me. And perhaps, even now, this quiet evening, she is feeling sorry for me, calling on the fire to warm me as she can no longer do herself.
The bell rang. I got up to get the door.
‘Valeria?’
‘Hello,’ said a girl wrapped in a scarf waiting at the doorstep. ‘I apologise for not calling first but I don’t even have your number.’
‘Come in,’ I said.
‘I’ll only be a second. I might have forgotten my clutch here.’ She looked around, bent down and from behind the couch pulled something that belonged to her. ‘Here it is. It appears that when I was leaving, I was in such a rush that I dropped it. Are you okay? You look preoccupied. Is anything wrong?’