Free The Moscoviad by Yuri Andrukhovych

fucking wander off to the right. And
there, in the wonderful little old streets, in this eclectic preserve of the
rotting Moscow art nouveau, somewhere next to the Georgian and Lithuanian
embassies stands a fantastic house with trees growing out of it. And nobody
lives there. Except Galya.
    But the
“Children’s World,” von F. You are not even one step closer to it!
    Chill, guys! I’ll
stay at Galya’s for an hour, have breakfast, perhaps phone Kyrylo once and make
plans with him for a precise meeting time. Then crossing the Vorovsky and
Herzen Streets, passing by the church where Pushkin was careless enough to get
married, I’d get out on the Boulevard Ring. And there it’s elementary. There I
have an entire tree of options. An entire forest of options. A labyrinth of
options. What have we just passed, by the way? The Sushchovsky Rampart? No, the
Sushchovsky was earlier. Aha, Vadkovsky Lane, which I first though was
Pubicovsky Lane . . .
    So, on the
Boulevard Ring you can catch any trolley bus for two stops or simply walk to
the Pushkinskaya metro station on Pushkin Square. And then just one stop to the
Kuznetsky Bridge station. And that’s it. And I get out next to the “Children’s
World,” but from the other side, not from the Dzerzhinsky monument, but from
the Fuckinsky one.
    Although now I am
still going past the Butyrki prison. I recall from a poem by Andrukhovych,
“Here the bus takes me daily right by the jail. They teach me to love this
country.” Nice lines, damn it.
    But there exists
an even better option. At Pushkin Square there is no need to go down below to
the metro. One can simply wait for the same bus number 18 that is carrying me
now, and trot along to the earlier mentioned monument to I won’t say whom.
    Well-well, von
F., may God help you not to get sidetracked from this path. For somehow all
this expedition looks rather doubtful. You now resemble one of Rimbaud’s poems.
But you are not the drunken boat. A boat is too pretty for you. A drunken
bulldozer, that’s who you are.
    And there is no
need to breathe so passionately into the back of the neck of the girl in front
of you. She may somehow resemble a prostitute, but she’s still a schoolgirl,
she’s even wearing the white uniform apron. And don’t even think about stalking
her in the subway. Don’t you want to see Galya? Hey, von F., stop it, what’s
with you, where the hell are you going?!
    It’s too bad that
the girl ran away. It seemed to me her lips were covered with cherry jam. I
only wanted to lick that jam off, nothing more. There are times in one’s life
when one wants something sweet. A piece of candy, for example.
    But I got off
right in time. Mendeleyevskaya metro station. Named after Blok’s father-in-law. 10 Would they name a metro station after my father-in-law? I doubt it. And I no
longer have a father-in-law, actually. Although, it seems, I used to play chess
with him.
    Galya grabs the
receiver at once, before the end of the first beep.
    “You . . .”
    “Me.”
    “How are things?”
    “You’re back?”
    “Yes.”
    “I’ll drop by.”
    “By my place?”
with as much indifference in the voice as possible.
    “I want to see
you!” as much impatience and passion as possible.
    “Then stop by . .
.”
    “But it looks
like you don’t really want me to? . . .”
    “Oh come on, stop
by,” with a sigh and noticeably less indifference in the voice.
    “No, really, if
it’s unpleasant for you, I won’t . . .”
    “Stop by, I’ll be
waiting!” the indifference in the voice is no more. But so is the conversation.
    Short beeps. The
local pay phones know the ways of sophisticated taunting. And no more coins.
And this at the moment when your heart is bleeding.
    So Kyrylo will
have to wait for your phone call a little longer. Besides, there’s still plenty
of time. It’s only three.
    Now, Your Royal
Mercy, the All-Knowing Olelko the Second, something from the history of my
loves. This has nothing at all to