All That Is Solid Melts into Air (4 page)

“I owe you some thanks, Dr. Brovkin.”

Zhykhov cuts in. “Vladimir Andreyevich Vygovskiy has recently been appointed the chief advisor to the Ministry of Fuel and Energy.”

“Then we’ve both come a long way from Kursk.”

Vygovskiy takes a long pull from his cigar, holding the smoke, which gives him a moment to consider his answer.

“Yes and no, comrade. There I was in charge of a nuclear power plant. I had real things to look after: equipment, operational procedures. I had a building to run. That time, when I was sick, my wife was getting calls every hour, asking advice, wondering when I’d be returning. Now, I think I could go missing for months without anyone really noticing. The department would just carry on without me. Someone else would be happy to offer the advice I give. I’m sure, Comrade Brovkin, you’ve never experienced such feelings. Every day you have people’s lives in your hands. You’ve never come home in the evening wondering,
What’s the point?
”

“We all do what we can do, comrade. It’s good to meet you again in full health. I don’t remember the circumstances of your case, but it can be an awkward procedure. I’m pleased to know you are well.”

Grigory wants to move on to a spot of his own, to close his eyes, let the steam filter in, but he can see Vygovskiy is interested, lining up another question. It would be disadvantageous to provoke Zhykhov’s displeasure, so he stays.

“You feel a sense of ownership to your cases?”

“I feel a responsibility. If an operation goes wrong, who else is there to blame?”

“Many people blame fate.”

“Yes, they do.”

A pause. Vygovskiy is a man who knows how to read a pause.

“But you’re not many people.”

Vygovskiy turns to his associate. “You have an excellent surgeon here. My wife had nothing but praise for him, even though he was about twelve at the time. And my wife is not an easy woman to please. Apparently he talked everything through with her so calmly. I remember when I was back home in bed, she said a tornado could have blown through the building and the young surgeon wouldn’t have flinched, he’d still have sat there, answering her questions.”

Zhykhov laughs, slapping Grigory on the shoulders, his prize pig.

“I choose well, Vladimir. I keep telling you we have the best medical staff in the city. Imagine what results we could achieve if we had some proper funding.”

Grigory remembers the man’s wife. There was a thing she did with her mouth, a certain turned-up disdain that showed on her lips and, even if this were not the case, people could tell by the quality of her clothes that she was married to someone with influence.

He had lied about not remembering the circumstances. It was a crucial moment in his career. He could recall it all in great detail.

BY THE TIME
Vygovskiy checked into the hospital, his appendix had swollen up like a balloon. No one would take on the procedure. The man was a high-ranking member of the regional section of the Party. It was well known that he had connections to the highest levels in Moscow. Any mistakes could have serious consequences for the surgeon or his family. Even the administrative staff were reluctant to handle his records. Everyone knew that perforation of the organ was very likely, and that peritonitis, which is often fatal, could set in. So the responsibility was passed down the line, surgeon to surgeon, until the file landed in Grigory’s hands.

A few hours later, Maria approached him outside the break room, placed her mop against the wall, and walked out through a delivery door. He knew her signals well enough by now to understand he should follow, even though he had a patient waiting, even though he’d get a dressing-down from one of his superiors for being late. They sat in the car park, behind a beige Moskvich with a drooping headlight. She wore a padded overcoat with her thick plastic apron showing through underneath, her hair in a net, some loose strands clinging to her face. She smelled strongly of bleach.

“I’m hearing things,” she said.

“About me?”

“Of course.”

“What things?”

“Don’t ask me ‘What things?’ You know what things.”

“So then. You want to talk about it.”

“Yes. I want to talk about it.”

“I can’t discuss it. I have to respect the patient’s privacy.”

“Don’t. I’m not just some stranger. I’m thinking about your safety. Don’t. They say he’s powerful. They say his wife is feeling guilty that it took them so long to get help, she wants to blame someone.”

“They say a lot.”

“Yes, they do. I hear things and I’ve been here long enough to tell the difference between gossip and something real. When people talk about you now they shake their heads. They’re pitying you. They think you’re being offered up as a sacrifice.”

Grigory didn’t say anything. They sat in silence for a few moments.

“Are you?”

“Yes. Probably. In their eyes at least.”

And they were quiet again.

When they fought she hunched in on herself, took time to choose her words, to calm her temper. It was something he admired at the beginning, that ability to be both articulate and angry at the same time. Later he came to hate it. She always had an answer, even when she was wrong; even at the end, when her actions were unforgivable.

“Why you? Why should you take this on and not someone else?”

“Why not me? If we delay it much longer the man might die. Someone needs to make a decision.”

“There are others with more skill.”

“I don’t believe that.”

She looked at him, laughed at his arrogance.

“There are people more experienced than me, yes, but not more skilled.”

“You haven’t even finished your training.” She said this in exasperation, breath filling her voice.

“It’s a routine operation, I’ve observed it dozens of times.”

“Oh. Well, if you’ve
observed
it. Well, in that case, you’re the perfect surgeon for the job. ‘I’ve
observed it,
’ he says.”

He put a hand on her arm.

“Do you trust me?”

“Yes. But I don’t want you to take this risk. I don’t want to imagine what might happen.”

“I’m a doctor. I can’t walk away from this because I’m afraid. I’m a surgeon and he needs surgery and no one else will do it.”

“It doesn’t have to be you.”

“It doesn’t have to be, but it is. Do you trust me?”

“Yes.”

“So . . .”

He clapped his hands against his thighs. There was no more to be said. He didn’t want to rationalize it, to turn a medical decision into something that should be weighed against political risk.

“When will it happen?”

“In the morning.”

“You’ll find me afterwards.”

“Yes. Of course.”

“You’ll be careful.”

“Yes.”

He kissed her, a consoling kiss, a faint taste of chemicals on her lips, and then walked back to the building alone. More scared than he’d ever been.

SWEAT RUNS DOWN
Grigory’s eyes and he wipes it away and sees the steam room has filled. Two men sit across from him exchanging stories. One is mapping out the terrain of their conversation by tracing his finger through the air.

He hears Zhykhov’s exaggerated laugh again and turns and watches Vygovskiy. After the operation, responsibility was thrust his way. He was allowed to scrub in on the most difficult cases. His learning accelerated and promotion came quickly. How easily, he thinks, our lives hinge on single incidents.

Grigory stands and offers his hand. “Good to meet you again. This time in better circumstances.”

Vygovskiy stands to shake it. “I had hoped you’d stay. I’m interested to hear about you.”

“Unfortunately, comrade, I can’t this evening. I really must get back to the hospital.”

Grigory nods his good-bye to Zhykhov and leaves.

In his office Grigory can’t concentrate. He realizes that a full hour has passed, staring at the same page, the words divorced from him, seeming to float above his consciousness. Studying has been a part of his routine for so long that he can pore over dense texts for hours without losing momentum. Usually he opens a page, scans it for the relevant facts, a sentence buried in a dense paragraph, makes some brief notes, and moves on.

Not tonight, though.

He raises his head and considers the room.

He takes pleasure in his office, especially at this time of day, when it’s cocooned in the soft amber light of his reading lamp, textbooks and journals arranged chronologically on dark wooden shelves that take up an entire wall, the most recent publications nearest his chair, so he can check a case study without standing. A couch and coffee table in the corner, which he never uses. His certificates framed and evenly spaced on the opposing wall, standing proudly over three well-ordered filing cabinets. Beside the door, across from his desk, are the only personal items in the room: three photographs of beech trees, the same image taken at different points of the year, their colours in stark contrast. Photographs he had taken as a teenager, when photography was an obsession for him. A passion he keeps promising himself that he’ll return to someday, if he ever finds the time.

Grigory swivels round in his chair and looks out the window. It’s not yet fully dark, and he walks over to take in the view, placing a hand on the thick blue curtains. The window overlooks a park. On the grass below two lovers roll over each other. Not a sexual tryst, rather a childlike tumble, their laughter carrying upwards.

THE NIGHT AFTER
the operation he and Maria experienced a similar joy, an unburdening taking place through each other’s touch. He had found her that morning and delivered the good news, how it had been a success, the man would recover, but they were in public, the conversation taking place near the nurses’ station in the orthopedic wards. He could only relay a short message, their eyes speaking for each of them, relief expanding their pupils. When his long shift finished he met her in a railed garden near her apartment. She waited for him on a bench. No other life nearby. He stood and looked, an outsider to the scene, an onlooker, drinking in the sight of her, as she stamped her feet on the ground to stave off the cold and anticipation. When he approached he took her hands and tipped backwards into the snow, his momentum lifting her from the bench, pulling her on top of him. His hands propping up her shoulders, her chest, feeling the volume, the density of her. Her breath streaming into his collar, radiating down into his chest, regions of their clothes being peeled away. All of it slow and deliberate. Blending their skin. Both of them reaching for the place of most heat, her fluid running like warm oil, gathering in the cleft of his hand. Until finally she enveloped him, condensation hovering over them. And they collapsed into each other, a dark form on a pristine canvas, pulsing together, their individual elements becoming erased.

And afterwards he wrapped his fingers around the parts of her within his reach and named the bones that formed her. Manubrium. Ulna. Radius. Scapula. And she listened to the inflections of his voice, felt the vibrations of his words in her ear. Their breathing slowing, calming.

A SIREN WAILS
in the distance. Grigory watches the lovers stand and leave, brushing grass off each other’s backs, still laughing. He opens the window and puts his head outside, the evening air refreshing him. He shouldn’t still be here. He knows he won’t get any more work done this evening. An impulse comes over him to go see a play at the Kirov, but it’s too late now. He wants some company. He could call on Vasily, have a drink at his kitchen table, but the man has a family, there’d be kids to be bathed. Besides, Vasily’s wife would probably remember it was Grigory’s birthday. How pathetic he would look, calling round because he had nowhere else to spend the evening.

No. He’ll go home, go to bed early, something he hasn’t done in an age.

In the corridor visitors are leaving the wards, coats slung over their arms. They have concerned conversations: couples, siblings, parents. Telling each other their impressions of how their loved ones are progressing, saying all the things they can’t say in front of the sick. We put on our most positive front in the face of weakness. He sees this continually. Around each corner people are leaning their backs to the wall, crying silently, a hand to their faces, their companions standing beside them, a reassuring touch on their shoulder or arm. Inside the wards the patients are silent. In time they’ll pick up a conversation again, introduce their visitors in retrospect, summarizing them in brief biographies: their son’s career; the intolerant men their daughter always chooses; the older brother who still treats them as though they were a teenager; the grandchildren they’re still waiting on. He passes through Intensive Care, stopping at the nurses’ station to inquire about the progress of his patients for the day, something he does every evening. All are stable and have reacted well, so far, to surgery. He decides to round off his day by checking in on this morning’s endoscopy, making his way to the ENT ward. The nurse reminds him of the patient’s name, Maya Petrovna, and points him towards her bed.

She’s sitting up, knitting, her needles clicking time.

“A scarf?” he asks.

“It was supposed to be a sweater. But they all end up as scarves eventually.”

“You’re not following a pattern?”

“I’m just following the needles.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Relieved.”

She stops her knitting and leans over conspiratorially.

“I had a thought, before the anaesthetic. I knew it was a routine procedure but I began to fear the worst.”

“Don’t worry, you’re not the first.”

“No, that’s not it. I wasn’t worried about it all ending. I was worried about the funeral. I couldn’t bear the conversations. ‘Death by Chicken Bone’—what a fate. Everyone doing their best not to laugh. I thought, if I have to die early I want it to be from a condition with a complicated name.”

Grigory smiles. “I’m not sure you get to choose.”

He puts a hand on her shoulder. “Good night. I’m glad to see everything’s okay.”