The Sarabande of Sara’s Band

Chapter I-2

When I caught sight of Sara (and this happened during a group tour of travel agency managers and travel writers to Prague), I didn’t recognize her. It’s true, I haven’t at all managed to think anything about a slender woman with beautiful hair and a splendid bust, but here Sara Polonska recognized me. “Hi, Underbutt,” she greeted me. And she laughed her awful laugh. “I never thought I’d be meeting you at nearly all the geo-tour sites. You spoiled, delicate butt, you’ve somehow managed to sit down on several chairs! Hi, old man, how long since we’ve seen each other!?”

Just the word “Underbutt” helped me figure out who this stranger was. Because only one insidious being ever called me “Underbutt” – Sara Polonska, my former classmate. Fat, curly-haired Sara, who looked like a dirty, disheveled ewe. And she called me that because during our studies at the university I used to swim and often tucked a towel under my rear end during class. I was thin, and it was more comfortable for me that way: it’s painful to have bones leaning propped against the wood, if, of course they’re living bones. Sara, who sat next to me on the left across from the aisle, was the first to notice my habit. She took an interest, what I was stuffing in there? I don’t know why I told the truth back then. After that I became several nicknames richer: “spoiled butt, “Underbutt,” and “not-on-that-towel.”

I couldn’t stand Sara Polonska. Even in the pre-Underbutt period she used to annoy me. That happened to me from time to time. For example, I hated my mother’s curling iron. Two times I even tried to get rid of it. Even though I didn’t use it and should have been indifferent to it or at least more tolerant. But – no. I wanted it to disappear, my mood was ruined each time I saw it in the bathroom where it hung on a common wire hook. One time I said to the curling iron: “I’ll fix you, you devil’s plague.” I remember that till this day.

I didn’t use Sara Polonska either, but I wanted her to disappear. Those eternal wide velvet slacks of hers. Always brightly colored, from which her rump seemed even bigger. And those shaggy strands. Her wide face, and on it a small nose, as though she had stolen it from someone. Her eyelashes were so thick, as though someone had cut paper to make a beard for a paper man. Add to that she was extremely stacked. One time in the women’s bathroom she tried to put two glasses of water on her breasts and hold them up, but they spilled. Ha-ha-ha! In school I was also interested in knowing if you can hold up a cup on your erect member. But I didn’t actually try to check if that were possible, till now I don’t know if you can or can’t. Let someone else do that. If Polonska was a guy, maybe she would have checked it out then. It seemed, a grown-up woman, almost a qualified professional, but a dipshit is still a dipshit.

I personally was convinced that this was just an unsuccessful attempt, because Sara Polonska with her huge breasts could hold up two glasses of water on each one, and on her butt she’d be able to balance a two-liter jug. I still remember her black coat-mantle. We called it “the bat.” Under that coat you could easily hide about ten or so Chinese from the firm arm of the law. Add to that the fact that she laughed so harshly, that it seemed like she would squash you with that laugh, the way a boot crushes a worm in the rain. And at one party, celebrating the Day of the Department, I saw Sara Polonska puke out bits of pizza and salad at her feet, after which she calmly continued to dance in that puke. Just as I became conscious of what was flying out from under her energetic, powerful feet, I ran to the bathroom to do what she had done, without interrupting the dancing.

And I still remember that she was married, and her husband was a military guy. I recall one time he was waiting for her by the university – a harsh figure in a uniform next to a red-colored Moskvich car. Maybe, because of the color of his car and the uniform, we called him “Fireman.” In general I remembered quite a lot about that Sara Polonska.

From that Sara Polonska the Sara of today took just her bust (this time it didn’t frighten me with its expressiveness and size, and quite the opposite, drew my gaze) and her manner of laughing, but right now it seemed to me, as though with that harsh laugh, not a boot worm-crusher, but a friend with a gift in her arms was approaching me. In general I’ve never liked it when someone constantly and harshly laughs, and Sara Polonska was doing it just like that. She was laughing. For me a laugh meant clinical idiocy or derision, but not in any way a nice mood, success, and a friendly attitude. I presume that I lived for so long with Inna because she never laughed behind my back. But I’ll return to Sara Polonska – she had slimmed down ten kilograms. She said she didn’t want to talk about it. And laughed. She also didn’t like to talk about her former husband. She just made the observation that she would definitely introduce us. I can’t say I was particularly happy about that prospect. Her hair remained incredibly curly, but it wasn’t black, but chestnut-colored now. It glistened, it flowed in the sun and beguiled. She was wearing a simple white sundress and white leather shoes. For reasons unknown to me I fell madly in love with this Sara Polonska.

Sara was also surprised by our feelings. “Underbutt, how the heck could this have happened? Could you even have thought about something like this?” To that I answered, that if she continues to call me “Underbutt,” I’ll call her “Underboobs,” because she was barely visible from under her t**s. We laughed loudly, but a wonderful couple was established: Underboobs and Underbutt. The heroes of Czech cartoons: either mushrooms, or birds.

Our colleagues traipsed around Prague, and we with each other. “It seems to me when we were in school, you couldn’t stand the sight of me, isn’t that so?” She asked. That was a serious question. Sara posed it while she was lying down in bed, playing with her hair, pulling up and kissing her rounded knees toward her head – she loved to kiss her knees – and I looked in the hotel information directory for the number to call to order breakfast. I was naked and happy. I didn’t know what I was supposed to answer: the truth, a half-truth, or a half-lie. Or simply lie, to tell her that I found her attractive, but not enough for me to admit it. It was hard for me to tell a woman, with whom it was so good in bed, that I thought she was monstrous. “I was married then,” I heard my voice. Fine, like a mosquito’s stinger, that’s striving to find a hole in a mosquito net. I really was married then. Sara wanted to ask something else, but got distracted by a phone call – it was her mother. She didn’t return to that topic later.

About the fact that Sara Polonska will move in to my place, a real sailor told us, who was similar to a fake sailor. Similar to an out of work actor, who for some reason chose the image of a sailor for his life outside the theater. He was wearing a red sweater, an earring hanging from his right ear in the form of a tiny anchor on a golden rope. He was drinking beer. Strange, crumpled wrinkles plowed through his face, which was the color of oak bark. It seemed that each time he crumpled them differently. “I’m a sailor, lovey dovies,” he greeted us. “I’m a sailor, and I have to see foam.” “If you wish, you can treat him to beer. He’s a real sailor,” the bartender said. I also thought he didn’t notice anything other than that TV series about desperate housewives. We treated the real sailor to beer – at that time our hearts were filled with love for our fellow man. “If you order more for him – he’ll also tell your fortune,” the bartender informed us. The pair worked in concert. I admired the way the bartender shook out the money from us. We ordered the beer. The old guy slapped a little of the beer foam on our left palms, began to mutter something, and then said: “She’s going to move in with you. Soon. Now you have to lick off that foam – then the prophecy will come true.” I don’t know why we did that. At least I was quite squeamish, but we licked off the beer from each other’s palms. Who first started to do that: me or Sara? I don’t remember. Sometimes it seems I should remember that without fail.

I made acquaintance with Sara’s parents in a movie theater. We were watching Match Point, part of that was also about getting acquainted with the parents. I said to Sara that I had seen that flick and, in my view, it wasn’t the best movie for meeting parents after watching it. The main character was a mercenary killer son-in-law. Who, additionally, got away with the killing of a woman, with whom he had cheated on his wife. Do I need that? She laughed. She said that her father has a wonderful sense of humor. “He’ll like that, you’ll see!” I didn’t feel very confident. I thought for a long time before that meeting, which tactic to take – to be chatty or reserved? I didn’t have any experience in meeting the parents of a girlfriend. Because I met the parents of my former wife in childhood, they for me were just ordinary adults. When I told Sara about this, she just started to laugh: “Well then, just take them for ordinary adults, if that works.”

Sara’s father reminded me of the joyful characters of an Emir Kusturica movie. From time to time he would sing something (even while watching a movie. People would hiss at him, and he would politely apologize and start singing again), and his fingers either danced in the air or on some surface. A cigarette that he twirled between his pointing and middle fingers looked like the hypertrophically large p***s of Indian gods. I imagined the face of Sara’s father and face of my own father with two portraits with one and the same signature: “Father.” My father looked more convincingly like a father. Under the portrait of Sara’s father one would want to write: “vagabond,” “honored artist of Moldova, Viorel Nega,” or even “Bartok.” I would have believed it. On the backdrop of Sara’s lively father, Sara’s mother looked like a girl on a swing: they were swinging her so fast, that it was impossible to determine what she looked like. This was very strange, because Sara’s mother was a large woman. But I managed to perceive her only fragmentarily. A large, puffy mouth. The voice of an opera tenor. In profile her hairdo recalled a black moon. I noticed that her skirt was too short for such shapes and such an age. And her gaze – captivating. She loved dahlias and family holidays. In any case, it was easier for me with Sara’s parents than with my own. It seemed, as if they were completely satisfied with me. But, more certainly, they were completely satisfied with one another and with life.

When Sara asked when I would introduce her to my parents, I shriveled: “Listen, do you really feel like doing that?” I asked her then. She said that it’s the least interesting for her what they’re like, but if it’s a problem for me or for my parents, she’s not planning on being insistent. I thanked her. I can’t say that it was a problem, besides, in our family no one ever introduced anyone to anyone. I understand this can seem strange, but that’s the way it was. I didn’t know, for example, my father’s or mother’s friends. It’s possible my memory kept their names on long reins, but they were unfilled names. Like movies that didn’t interest you: you understand by their title you once saw them, but what they’re about or who’s playing in them – it’s impossible to remember. His parents, of course, were acquainted with Inna and her parents, and also with Tymofiy and his mother – the parent conferences at school helped that – they didn’t keep up relations either with Inna, or with Tim, and all the more with their parents.