Only the phrase ‘if only you knew…’ would not let go of her, even at night.
They invited me to a bathhouse for a colleague’s birthday. Six doubles, a long table, Nekrasov with champagne. Each of us was given a girl “from the staff.” Mine was a fresh-faced nurse. I wrote on a napkin: “What will you get for seducing me?” She answered: “Nothing.” I told her I loved my wife and would pay compensation.…
I was given an assignment. Nobody promised it would be easy. He wrote to me on a napkin, and I said “nothing,” and I wasn’t lying. Then he left and I stayed at the table: for him, or for the cameras. I no longer know myself. I washed the tear off with the perfume, but I couldn’t wash off “if only you knew.”
I only ran the program: “Glasses up, bottoms up, and now show us how you’ll display your goods!” The girls played along, the doubles kissed, the cameras rolled. One guest pretended something was in his eye. I wrote in the protocol: “non-standard reaction.”
He’s been freed from the doubles’ dormitory. He no longer signs as “Bukashin.” But the fate of Voinovich’s hero, who ruled the country from orbit, creeps closer. There’s one difference: there, the Genialissimo circled Earth alone; here, there is a woman beside him. The third one now. When will it all stop?
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