Page 12

Earlier, Yurka had felt pleasantly drawn to Volodya, looking forward to how they’d have fun talking and doing interesting things, but the next morning, after his “Great Discovery,” the pull Yurka felt toward Volodya was agonizing.

This condition was utterly new and baffling.

Yurka figured that the best and safest thing for him to do would be not to see or spend time with Volodya at all.

If he’d been able to, that’s what he would’ve done; he might’ve even picked a fight with Volodya on purpose.

But just at the thought that he wouldn’t hear Volodya’s pleasant voice and he wouldn’t see that special, soft, tender smile—the one Volodya smiled only for him—Yurka’s heart seized up in agony.

It was as though somebody had opened his rib cage and implanted a magnet that pulled him so strongly and painfully to Volodya that it felt as if it were about to break through his ribs and tear through his muscles.

At least, that’s what Yurka felt like that entire morning; he barely managed to make it to quiet hour.

Once quiet hour started, he and Volodya went on dry land to find the willow.

After walking the entire bank by himself yesterday, finding the path was easy as pie.

Walking along it to get to the willow, though, was much harder.

The path looped and split and came together again between the trees of the thickly wooded bank, but not a single path led directly to the willow, so they had to break a new path right through the woods, getting caught in the tall weeds, pushing through thick bushes, and picking their way over tree roots sticking out of the ground.

And while Yurka, who knew the area, felt as at home there as a fish in water, he had to keep a watchful eye on Volodya.

Once, Volodya tripped on some unsteady sandy ground and almost fell off the cliff into the river, and another time he was making his way through a stand of rushes, didn’t notice a boggy patch, and nearly got stuck in it.

But no matter how hard it was to get there, it was worth it.

In full daylight the willow looked like a living tent, and they very much wanted to get into its shade, away from the awful midday heat.

The leafy branches undulated all the way down to the ground, and the trunk of the tree was hidden behind the thick green foliage.

The boys spread the pliant, feathery branches apart with both hands and ducked into the space behind them.

They found themselves in a miniature glade, covered with soft grass and delicate fallen leaves as though with a carpet.

This carpet was soft and springy and begged for them to lie down and sink into it.

“It’s light here, too!” Volodya exclaimed.

His voice sounded muffled, absorbed by the green “walls” surrounding them.

“I thought the sun wouldn’t make it through such thick foliage, but look at those sunbeams there.” And sure enough, a handful of sunbeams were slanting onto the grass, seeming preternaturally bright because there were so few of them.

Volodya had brought his radio with him.

He turned it on and spent a long time looking for a station.

When he found it, the music that came pouring out of the speaker, hissing and cutting in and out, was classical. Vivaldi.

“Let’s find another station,” suggested Yurka.

“Something more fun.

And something with better sound; on this one we can’t hear anything because of the static.”

“No, we’re going to listen to classical,” insisted Volodya.

“Ah, the hell with that! Try to find Radio Youth instead.

That’s a good station, it plays your Time Machine sometimes.” Volodya shook his head.

“Do you really not want to? But you love Time Machine!”

“And you love classical music.

Who’s your favorite composer?”

“If it’s Russian composers, then Tchaikovsky,” Yurka began, then interrupted himself.

“What difference does it make? What are you doing this for?”

“And why Tchaikovsky, exactly?” asked Volodya brightly, ignoring Yurka’s question.

Yurka realized that Volodya hadn’t brought the radio along just because.

He was trying to get something out of Yurka.

But what? Yurka didn’t understand.

So he got angry.

“Volodya, what is this?!” He frowned and reached for the radio.

“Give me the radio.”

“I’m not giving it to you!” Volodya hid it behind his back.

“Are you making fun of me? Is that it?” exploded Yurka, sure that Volodya had turned on classical music deliberately.

But what for? To torture him?

“Yur, listen, haven’t you ever thought that you could try applying to the conservatory anyway? Sure, it’d be later than the others, but what does that matter?”

“No! I told you already, they won’t take me.

I’m worthless! I’m not going to even try.

So turn it off, now! Why are you taunting me like this?!”

“I’m not taunting you.

All I’m doing is looking for a main theme for our show.” Volodya looked at Yurka with a disarmingly honest expression.

“So what’s with the interrogation about the conservatory, then?” scowled Yurka.

“Well, first of all, it wasn’t an interrogation, it was one question.

And secondly, it was just—just by the way.”

“Oh.

Just by the way.

Okay, then.” Yurka decided to play by Volodya’s rules.

“So why are you looking for something else if you’ve already decided to keep the Moonlight Sonata?”

“I didn’t decide.

I postponed the decision.

And right now is the perfect time to look for a new song.”

“No way Masha can learn something new in time,” scoffed Yurka, unable to conceal his gloating.

“She’ll have to, she’s got no choice,” Volodya said, waving aside Yurka’s comment.

“In that case, maybe we should go to the library? It’s quicker to find it by looking at the sheet music than by listening.”

“What library? No time, Yura! We have very little time left.

And if we do it this way, it’ll be pleasant as well as productive.

But if you’d just stop being mad and help me pick, the ‘productive’ would be even more pleasant.

Help me out here! I don’t know the first thing about music, you know.

Without you, I’m completely adrift!”

“That’s obvious.

Who, given all the symphonies to choose from, picks the Moonlight Sonata?” But Yurka relented.

“Oh, fine.

If you’re really completely adrift, then fine.”

“I am, completely,” said Volodya.

They settled in behind the green wall of branches hanging all the way down to the ground.

They got out Volodya’s notebook and pencil, to finish altering the script for Olezhka, but they kept getting distracted.

“‘Air’ from Orchestral Suite No.

3,” proclaimed Yurka, without waiting for the radio announcer.

Yurka recognized all the melodies from the first few notes. “Bach.”

“No, it doesn’t fit the show,” Volodya mumbled listlessly.

None of the pieces they had heard yet were a fit.

“And it won’t work anyway unless you happen to have a symphony orchestra lying around somewhere,” noted Yurka just as listlessly.

After “Air” from Orchestral Suite No.

3 ended, Yurka spoke up again.

“Pachelbel’s Canon.

It sounds stupendous on the piano, by the way.

But we can’t use it, either.

It’s too happy.”

“Really?” said Volodya, perking up.

“Wish I could hear it ...

Would you maybe play it for me?” Yurka shot him a baleful look and Volodya quickly assured him, “Joking! Joking! Although ...

I would be interested in watching Mr.

Yurka Konev in a suit, hair combed, back straight, sitting at a piano and playing diligently.” Volodya chortled.

“So this is it, huh? And now you’re never going to stop making fun of me?”

“Nope.” Volodya smiled, but saw that Yurka was starting to brood again, so he went back to rewriting the text.

“Okay, so we need a synonym of ‘store.’ They’re storing the weapon in a hole, in a hollow log.”

“‘Stick it in the hole’? Hey, that works!”

Volodya laughed.

“We’d better go with something like ‘hide.’”

Two sentences and thirty minutes later, Yurka took the pencil from Volodya and sat down on the grass.

He chewed on the pencil, lost in thought about yet another synonym.

Volodya lay down wearily on his back next to Yurka, then closed his eyes and folded his hands behind his head, yawning.

“I’m so tired, it’s bonkers.” Then he stretched so luxuriously that Yurka was infected with tiredness, too, his eyelids growing heavy, his body relaxing ...

A little more and he’d fall asleep himself ...

But he resisted.

He shook his head and lifted his eyebrows high to open his eyes.

“So I wore myself out yesterday running around the woods, and then I didn’t get enough sleep, but what made you so tired?”

“Oh, right, you probably think the troop leaders get to relax at camp just like the children, is that it? And that they don’t get tired?”

“Well ...

okay, maybe not just like the children—obviously troop leaders aren’t children—but I don’t believe for a second that you all don’t relax just as much as they do.

Because you do nothing but give commands and order people around, then you lie around under a willow, kicking back while other people do all the work.” Yurka smiled.

“What, am I wrong?”

“You of all people know how exhausting children are! My nerves are all shot to hell because of them.

And so if we troop leaders are going to get enough sleep and maintain our energy, we need extra time, sleep, and food.

Especially food!” Volodya raised his index finger.

“And this applies to all troop leaders, by the way, whether they’re experienced or not.

So whenever you see a troop leader, even the most seasoned one ever, know that he’s hungry.

And sleepy.”

“I’ve never seen you suffer from a lack of energy.”

“That’s because I’m usually angry, and I’m energetic when I’m angry.”

Yurka thought this conversation was hilarious.

He laughed and said, “So go ahead and sleep, you angry old troop leader.

Now you’ve got the chance.”

“No, we haven’t done our daily quota yet ...”

“I’ll do it. Sleep.”

Volodya didn’t take much convincing.

He closed his eyes without taking off his glasses and immediately started breathing heavily.

Seemed like he really was super-tired, seeing as how he’d fallen asleep instantaneously.

The radio was on.

Mozart’s Symphony No.

40 was rounding out the World Symphony Hour radio program.

Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.

2 opened the next program, the Russian Piano Music Hour.

The sun sank to rest on the distant treetops during the concerto’s tender second movement.

One especially bright ray flashed as it pierced the willow’s leaves and crawled slowly along Volodya’s cheek toward his eyes.

Yurka saw this and sat a little farther to the left so his shadow would cover Volodya’s face.

As he scribbled on the script, he remained almost motionless, trying not to move and accidentally let the sun bother Volodya or wake him up.

He glanced at Volodya every so often to see whether he’d woken up.

A warm breeze gusted and blew up the edge of Volodya’s shirt, revealing his belly button.

Yurka stared at his concave stomach, at the pale skin as soft and delicate as a girl’s.

Yurka’s was nothing like that.

He put his hand under his own T-shirt, touched his stomach, and confirmed it: his skin was rough.

Wouldn’t it be nice to touch Volodya’s ...

It was a passing thought, but it made it hard for Yurka to breathe, and heat burned his cheeks.

Yurka wanted to turn away and keep working on the script, but he was frozen; he couldn’t even move enough to look away ...

The heat moved from his cheeks to his jawbones.

His jaw throbbed.

Yurka now felt a hunger to touch Volodya, not just a desire.

But at the same time he was afraid: What if Volodya woke up?

Unable to control himself, without acknowledging what he was doing, Yurka stretched out a slow, tentative hand.

Volodya sighed and turned his head to one side.

He was still asleep.

He’s so defenseless , Yurka thought, bending over Volodya, arm extended.

Yurka’s fingers hovered just above Volodya’s belly button.

He grasped the edge of Volodya’s shirt, and the thought came to him unbidden: Am I brave enough?

He wasn’t.

He sighed and pulled the fabric down over Volodya’s bare skin.

He turned away.

Flustered, he sat there without moving a muscle for so long, his feet fell asleep.

On the radio, Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.

2 was ending.

It was at the last minute now, the best minute, Yurka’s favorite part; it was so innocent and good.

Unlike Yurka.

He flexed his back and shoulders and tried to get up, but—now, this was a fine pickle—when he stood up, he found that it wasn’t just his back and shoulders that were stiff.

Again! Prickly cold needles of alarm ran across his whole body.

Yurka was unable to grasp how this could be happening.

He was tormented by a nagging question: What is wrong with me?

“All done?” came Volodya’s voice suddenly.

Yurka jumped.

“Who, me? No, I was just over here ...

uh ...” He hastily pulled his T-shirt down past his waist.

“What do you mean?” Volodya was confused.

“You didn’t finish rewriting it?”

“No,” Yurka said warily.

He leaped to his feet and whirled away from Volodya.

He was too ashamed to look at him.

Yurka tried to do some breathing exercises to calm down.

A deep breath in and a slow breath out.

In ...

out ...

in ...

out ...

It didn’t help.

Volodya didn’t speak.

Yurka was beset by thoughts, each one worse than the last: Not this again! Why? What if he noticed? But he couldn’t have; he didn’t open his eyes.

But what if he did anyway? What then? I’ll say I remembered those magazines.

It won’t look good but at least he’ll understand , Yurka decided.

But then he grew angry again.

But I didn’t even do anything.

All I did was think.

I’m pretty sure I have the right to think what I want! Then he started trying to calm himself down.

Volodya couldn’t have seen, he couldn’t have found out.

Still, calm eluded him.

What was it he’d heard from the guys from his building? He needed a cold shower? Yurka spat in frustration and started getting undressed.

Volodya, meanwhile, sat up and looked at him skeptically.

“Yur, what’s up?”

“I’m hot,” Yurka tossed back over his shoulder, falling over himself in his hurry to jump into the water.

They listened to the radio as they made their silent, leisurely way back to camp.

One piece had ended and the next one had begun, and from the very first notes it jarred all thoughts out of Yurka’s head.

He could feel that he knew it, not in his brain, but in his body, and that he knew no other music the way he knew this.

It was as though he heard a beloved, half-forgotten voice, not a piano.

His heart went so tight it was painful to breathe and his face drained of color.

He stopped short.

Volodya, who had kept walking for a few steps, turned around but didn’t say anything.

“Do you hear?” whispered Yurka.

His voice was hoarse and even a little frightened.

“Hear who? We’re by ourselves.”

“Not who, what—the music.

This is it, Volodya! Just listen to how gorgeous it is.”

Volodya held the radio up high until all the static was gone and stayed that way.

He didn’t move a muscle.

The boys listened intently, afraid to breathe.

Yurka smiled sadly as he looked down at his feet.

Spots of red on both cheeks replaced his momentary pallor.

Yurka saw Volodya notice this out of the corner of his eye, but he wasn’t paying enough attention to process how strange and piercing Volodya’s gaze was.

Yurka wasn’t paying attention to anything at all.

He was entirely absorbed in the sounds, first delighting in them, then tormented by them, being warmed and scorched in turn.

“That really was gorgeous.

Calm, harmonious ...

,” said Volodya once the composition had ended.

“What was it?”

“Peetch,” whispered Yurka grandly.

He hadn’t looked up yet.

He couldn’t even make himself lift his head, much less move from the spot.

“Peach?”

“Peetch—Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky.

His Lullaby, the second of his eighteen pieces for piano.” Yurka spoke like a robot, without a single emotion.

Volodya, on the other hand, grew animated: “You know what—that Lullaby is perfect for us.

You were right when you said no nocturnes! This is just what we need! And it’s a good thing it’s Tchaikovsky.

His music’s guaranteed to be in the library.

We have to go look right away ...”

I hated it so much, and loved it so much ...

, thought Yurka, still deeply shaken.

It was the one, his competition piece, the piece that had destroyed everything.

But it wasn’t the reminder of his failure that was tormenting him.

What was suffocating him now was his memory of how happy he had been when music was part of his life, when it was the most important, most integral part.

But what hurt even more was the reminder that it would never be that way again.

Without music, there wouldn’t be anything at all.

There would be no “future.” What awaited Yurka without music was merely “tomorrow.”

“Okaaaay,” Volodya said, in such a strained voice that Yurka looked up.

“Yura, here’s the thing: I’m sick of pretending I don’t notice what’s going on.” Yurka choked: What had Volodya noticed? What?! But Volodya didn’t beat around the bush, continuing, in a worried tone: “The day before yesterday you ran away from me through the forest, yesterday you went around pale as can be, today your breathing is labored and your face has this unhealthy flush ...

Since you’re not going to tell me what’s happening to you yourself, I won’t ask anymore.

I just want to suggest that maybe we go see Larisa Sergeyevna?”

“No, no, we don’t need to.

I’m fine, I just got some dust in my eye.

I’ve got allergies.

Didn’t you know that?” Yurka spoke without thinking—anything to change the subject.

“But allergies don’t manifest that way ...

,” Volodya tried to object.

“I’m especially sensitive.

Come on,” said Yurka, then turned and rushed ahead.

Volodya followed him.

They were more than halfway along the winding path when Volodya mumbled hesitantly that he was afraid the battery wouldn’t last long and turned the radio off.

A heavy silence descended.

Even the birds had gone quiet.

Volodya kept opening his mouth and then closing it again without saying a word, as though he were trying to ask about something but couldn’t work up the nerve.

As they approached the dock he finally managed it.

“So about that Lullaby ...

is there maybe some important way it’s connected to you? Don’t take this the wrong way, but ...

going white like that because of music ...

it’s strange.”

“Volodya, I already told you everything about myself.

There’s nothing else.

Why are you harping on secrets so much? It’s like you have a whole cupboard full of them!”

“You know all my big secrets now, too.

But I have others, of course.

Just like everybody else.”

“Then tell me the worst one!”

Volodya paused.

After a moment he said hesitantly, “I’ve never had a friend like you before, and I probably never will again.

And also, lately I’ve been seeing myself in you, so ...

Well, like I was saying, I avoid people.

There’s a reason for that, of course ...”

And he went quiet.

Clearly, he wanted to tell Yurka something that was genuinely important.

Yurka could not only hear it in his tone of voice but read it in his tense posture and his clenched fists.

His burning curiosity began to eclipse the alarm and sadness that had been brought on by hearing the Lullaby, and the longer Volodya remained silent, the more his curiosity overshadowed them.

“Well?” Yurka, tired of waiting, couldn’t stand it anymore.

“I’m like Tchaikovsky!” Volodya flung out.

“Like Tchaikovsky? How?”

Volodya turned and looked Yurka right in the eye.

So directly that it made Yurka uncomfortable, so he blinked.

But then Volodya’s pensive mood seemed to evaporate all at once.

He turned back into his businesslike, condescending troop leader self and announced firmly, “I like music.”

“Well, duh, of course you do.

Gee, thanks for the revelation!”

“Yur, come on, be serious: Do you really not know?” Volodya laughed.

But his laugh was strange, hysterical.

“Know what?”

“About Tchaikovsky ...”

“What don’t I know? I know everything: where he was born, where he lived, how much he wrote, what he wrote ...

Oh! Here’s something interesting: his last piece, Symphony No.

6, is called the Pathétique.

‘Pathétique’ means full of deep emotion, about life and death,” he explained, unsure why he was still talking.

“He wrote it, and he directed it, and then nine days after the premiere, he died!”

“Oh, well, that’s good.”

“What? What’s good about that?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Tell me!”

Volodya’s mysterious behavior was irritating Yurka.

He started circling Volodya, begging him, “Tell me! Come on, tell me!” But Volodya just smiled awkwardly and shook his head no.

Yurka was frustrated.

“I’m not leaving until you tell me!”

Volodya looked at the boathouse visible on the opposite shore and gave in.

“I read his diary.

It was translated into English, but it was complete.”

“His actual diary? The thing he wrote with his own hand? Not his autobiography but his actual diary diary?” asked Yurka, stunned.

“You got it,” replied Volodya, with a sly smile.

His entire face had Finally I know even just a teeny bit more about music than you do! written all over it.

He clearly enjoyed making this big of an impression on Yurka.

“I didn’t know there was anything like that ...

but ...

So what’s it say? And why isn’t it in Russian? Is it really not in Russian?”

“It is, but the versions published in the USSR have been edited.

They’ve had bits taken out.”

“What do you mean, ‘taken out’? Why? That makes no sense: Why should Americans get to know more than Russians? He’s our composer!”

“But there’s stuff there, in those diaries, that’s ...

gratuitous.”

“What?” Yurka’s eyes lit up.

He grabbed Volodya by the arm and shook him.

“What is it? Tell me! What is it? Did it say what he was like? How he composed?”

“He was quite capricious.

He suffered from bouts of rage.

He drank.

He drank a lot.

He played cards.

He had a mania for it, for cards ...”

Yurka’s face fell.

“Well, then, it’s a good thing that that’s not in the Russian diaries.

Let the Americans go on digging up all kinds of dirt about great Russians.

We don’t need that! Why would we need to know anything bad about Tchaikovsky? Why remember that? And anyway ...

But wait: Why are you bringing this up?”

“You asked.

I answered.

And I’m talking about all this not to sully his name but just to prove he was a normal person.

Do you know anything about Tchaikovsky’s personal life? That he was married but that he separated from his wife after a few days? You could even say he was never married at all.”

“Married or not, what difference does it make? I have no interest in that.

I’d rather you tell me how he composed!”

Volodya shot Yurka a look, then nodded.

“Of course you’re not interested in that.

Rightly so.

How he composed? On a schedule, every day.

If he didn’t write anything that day, he’d be upset, but he still composed every day.

He listened to other people’s compositions.

Good ones, to take as examples.

Popular ones, so he’d be in the know.

Bad ones, so he could learn from other people’s mistakes and avoid making them himself.”

“Was he often dissatisfied with what he’d written?”

“Very often.”

“And did he hear the music? I mean, while he was composing, did the music play in his head? Or before he wrote it down? I mean ...”

“I understand.

It did.

But again, not always.”

As they conversed about Tchaikovsky, they walked down to the river and crossed the shallows.

They were so engaged that when they heard the bugle, they both flinched in unison from surprise.

Only then did they come to their senses and hurry off to where the troops assembled.

They ran into Masha, who was sitting out of breath on a bench by the athletic fields.

They were so engrossed in conversation that they didn’t reply to her muted “Hi.”

Once he rejoined his troop, Yurka got into formation like the rest of them.

But unlike the rest of them, he didn’t listen to Ira Petrovna.

He was thinking about how Volodya was right: even a great composer was, first and foremost, a human being.

The same kind of human being as Yurka.

And if a musical career was in store for someone Tchaikovsky’s age, who chose music instead of a boring civil service desk job when he was already twenty-five years old—which, Yurka felt, was basically just plain “old”—then maybe all wasn’t yet lost for Yurka, either? This thought, as unlikely as it was, cheered him.

Somewhere deep inside him, desire sparked to life: the desire to sit down at the piano and play something lively and happy.

Maybe Pachelbel’s Canon?

After snack, Yurka was so loaded down with civic duty work that he was in danger of not finishing it until late at night.

He tried asking Ira Petrovna’s permission to get out of it, explaining that the script had to be finished today.

But Ira was adamant.

“Come on, Ira Petrovna, let me out of it,” he whined.

“I really need to finish writing the script.

Why don’t you have me sit down and rewrite it right here next to you so you can see I’m not just trying to get out of work, I’m doing something!”

But his begging and persuasion had no effect on the troop leader: “Not a chance, Yura.

These beds aren’t going to make themselves.

And don’t get all mopey; together you and I will be done in no time.”