The Autobiography of Mercutio Polinski

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
OF

MERCUTIO POLINSKI

by

Genadiya Kortova

To the writer, with love.

I.

Who Am I? Who Is Mum? Who
Are Rosa and Her Father?

Once upon a time in an old-fashioned
little house, so lovely with its fairy coziness, there lived a
great writer. In fact, he was the greatest writer of all time. Yes,
he was—at least for me, because I had never seen any other writers,
and him I knew well. As I said, he was the greatest writer of all
time. He was handsome, slender, and tall, with little silver in his
hair. I wanted to be like him so much: a handsome, slender, tall,
and thoughtful writer. But most of all, I dreamed of giving joy to
the world, just like he did. That’s what I had realized one spring
morning, when I had just woken up. I was still very young and
small, but so happy and excited that I knew immediately who I
was.

“
I am Joy!” I cried in my
mother Margueritte’s ear, while she was trying to make me burp
after breakfast. I scared her so much that she dropped me. I
stretched my arms out in the air as I did so, landing on my back in
my little bed. Just like everyone else, I had my own little bed.
Then I started hiccupping. My mum started fussing around, as she
thought I might have hurt myself. She began examining me carefully,
but I just told her that she was beautiful. Then she knew I wasn’t
like the other guys, because she used to say that as far as looks
were concerned, she was anything but beautiful.

“
I have big sharp teeth;
my ears are wide, and some pieces of them are missing; and my nose
is long, too long for the tiny, skinny face I’ve got.” She
criticized herself while she was looking lovingly at me.

But what she didn’t notice, what even
the others couldn’t notice, were her beautiful blue eyes. She
passed them on to me, thank God, and I am so proud of them. I
noticed and cherished them—her loving blue eyes.

So, to be conscious of yourself and to
know who you are from early childhood is quite a good thing. Then
it becomes quite a bit easier to do what makes you be yourself.
That is why I was so happy when I found out who I was. But
still…when I looked at the writer in our house, I couldn’t help
daydreaming, wanting to be a little more like him. To give joy, not
only to be one. And how did I know that he made people happy? To
know that, it was enough for me to see the happy face of his
daughter, Rosa, every time he read one of his books to her.
Rosa…

Oh, what an enchanting
name for such an enchanting child,
I often
thought while I was watching them both.

Every evening I sneaked secretly
between the books on the shelves in her room and listened, holding
my breath, to the countless stories. Paul, that was the writer‘s
name, used to read to her before she went to sleep. There I stood,
hidden behind the numerous books on the broad shelf, silently
listening to their voices. Under the spell of the night’s silence,
veiled in a cloud of fairy dust, these two people were for me more
beautiful than the rainbow itself.

When the sun set and night came, Paul
would sit in his woven straw chair near Rosa’s bed. He would open
the book to the pages he’d last read, while swaying back and forth.
Gently, with lots of care in order not to wake up all the sleeping
angels in the room, he started reading to the most wonderful angel
of all—his daughter, that beautiful morning dew. Her soft chestnut
hair was spread across the folds of her pillow, and her drowsy head
dropped quietly to one side as she listened with dreaminess in her
eyes. When her eyes were almost closed, the writer stood up and
left the room, making no noise at all. To my great regret, she fell
asleep just at the moment when the story became particularly
interesting and exciting for me. It was that one moment in the
story when all the muscles of my body were stretched tight from the
strain like a bow about to release an arrow, or when the fur on my
back bristled as if from cold. I didn’t have the will or strength
to stop listening to him. Just then, the writer closed the book
with a weary face. And I, engaged with the story and filled with
amazement, went home disappointed and stayed awake ’til morning.
Because I knew he was going to read to her again, I impatiently
waited for the evening to come once more. Then I sat behind one of
the large volumes of someone like Shakespeare or Flaubert, whom I
also knew thanks to the writer. I became all ears when he opened
the book, and listened to the end of that most extraordinary story.
Those were the moments when I became the happiest person…I mean
mouse…I mean dreaming creature, in the world. That is because I was
taught never to judge others on their appearance. And while
listening to the stories of the writer, I felt I was something more
than a mouse; I was a dreaming creature.

II
.

Why Mum Punished Me, and How
I Stopped Being Invisible…

Let me tell you how I met Rosa and her
father Paul.

Having spent so many long days behind
the books on their bookshelves, I wanted to see them in reality so
much. Yes, in reality; everything you can’t touch seems so unreal
that you can easily mistake it for a fantasy. I didn’t want them to
be a mere fantasy. I dreamed that I would see them and they would
see me, as I said, in reality; that they would pet me; and that
together with the writer, I would muse over the profound and
insightful ideas of one of his interesting books. And since I
really wanted and dreamed of that so much, shortly it
happened.

One day (in fact it was evening), when
my mother couldn’t find me in my room, she got really worried about
me. And since she was one of those worrying mothers who would
always cry when their children don’t come back from the playground
on time, she started calling for me.

“
Mercutio! Mercutio!” she
cried breathlessly.

She had named me Mercutio because she
liked Shakespeare very much, although she wouldn’t admit it openly;
Mercutio was one of her favorite characters. She also said his name
sounded proud and strong. She wanted me to be proud and strong,
just as my name suggested. That is why she had called me
Mercutio.

So she had been calling my name again
and again, until she got really tired. Exhausted, she left our
house and went into the writer’s house. It took her some effort,
but she climbed onto the bookshelf for a better look over the vast
space spreading out in front of her. Just then, the writer was
putting one very heavy book on the shelf where she was standing.
Mum wasn’t quick to see the book, and as she was trying to hide
from it in one of the corners of the shelf, the book somehow
trapped her tail. Mum’s frightened scream startled Paul, and he
dropped the book on the floor. Brave as she was, especially when
someone arrogantly teased her tail, my mother Margueritte jumped in
front of him and scolded him, dressed in her everyday wear—a pink
sleeping gown and nightcap. Paul was really astonished by that
speaking mouse, but I think he was mostly impressed by her wearing
an old-fashioned sleeping gown and unfashionable pink nightcap. But
mice are known to be old-fashioned, after all. Although I dare say,
I am not old-fashioned at all. I wear a white linen shirt and long
cotton trousers in a chestnut color. Sometimes mother would make me
wear a white-spotted blue bow tie, which I didn’t like much. But I
wore it, just because I respected my mum.

So that writer of mine, instead of
getting angry with my mother for telling him off, laughed happily
and stroked her reassuringly on the nose. He had never seen a
speaking mouse before, and was really interested. But she stamped
her feet, as she told me later, and hid behind the books of Victor
Hugo, who was kind enough to provide her with the sanctuary of his
book covers. All that time, I was fast asleep. When I woke up, my
mother had already found me, and she was carrying me by the scruff
of my neck through Rosa’s room. I rubbed my eyes with my paws and
grouchily looked around. When I saw him, the writer was looking at
me with a smile. He was not an illusion any more, and I was not
invisible; we could now both see each other. I smiled at him
amiably, as I would smile at an old friend. Then my mum pushed me
through the door of our home and hid me.

After that unfortunate
occasion, I was grounded for quite a while for staying away from
home for such a long time. Mum refused to let me among people
again. She told me that they were really tactless creatures, who
would impertinently push one’s nose. Boy, how I wished the writer
would stroke me, on
my
little white nose.

I learned from mother that he often put
some little slices of cheese in the corners of the house as a gift
for us. She used to bring them to me for breakfast, and still she
wouldn’t miss a chance to point out how little she liked him,
despite his delicious food.

“
He is so big-headed!” she
said. “All day long, he does nothing but work with his books. He
could have tidied that big house a bit,” the house was really
small, for humans, “or dusted the floor. I sneeze so much when I go
shopping that I come home breathless.” My mother was a strict
mouse, and keeping the house tidy was a really important thing for
her. I, on the other hand, wasn’t interested in that kind of stuff
at all. I saw the gentleness of the writer’s character and his
daughter’s, and that was enough for me to love them.

III
.

On the Habits of Sorrow,
Paul’s Fairy Tale, and How I Got to Know Him and His
Daughter.