Julie Himes - Mikhail and Margarita

“You didn’t bring her to the lecture.”

“She’s generally not interested.”

Ilya’s face was hidden in shadow. “She’s comfortable with you?” The question didn’t concern itself with Margarita so much as it did with Bulgakov, as though his integrity of character made this conclusion questionable. Ilya wanted to know if he was taking care of her. Was he mindful of her welfare? Was being with Bulgakov a good thing for her?

“I’m not keeping her hostage, if that’s what you mean.”

Ilya didn’t react to his indignation. He looked up at the window again as though even the briefest view of her could confirm or refute such a statement.

Ilya had wanted to see her. That had been the reason for the suggested ride. Of course he could have come alone. Sat in front of their building for hours. Perhaps he’d done this already. Perhaps every night. Only tonight, for some reason, he’d wanted Bulgakov to know.

That he desired Margarita?—he probably cared little if Bulgakov knew. Rather, that regardless of how he might feel about it, they were not so dissimilar.

Bulgakov got out of the car and crossed the street. At the building’s door he thought to turn back. To tell him that in fact, yes, she loved him.

He pulled open the door instead and went upstairs. He needed to know if she did.

She was removing the curtains from the windows. Panels of material lay on the floor in untidy piles and the night sky, grey-orange from the city’s light, now hung on their walls like uncertain art. She was on a chair beside the third and final window; she unpinned the fabric from the cord which served as a curtain rod.

“I’m surprised you’re home so early,” said Bulgakov. He shut the door behind him.

Margarita pushed a stray lock of hair from her eyes; it immediately fell back. “The film broke,” she said.

“I’m sorry.”

She put the pins in her mouth as she worked her way across the window.

“Can’t they normally fix that?” he said. “I mean, restart the rest of the film?”

She took the pins from her mouth. “I meant the projector broke. The bulb.” The curtain fell to the floor. She put the pins on the sill then started on the last panel.

“They didn’t have another?”

“I guess not.”

“So the film is O.K.”

“I guess so.” She sounded tired.

He really wanted to stop. “Do you need some help?” he asked.

The curtain dropped next to the other one. He offered his hand as she climbed down from the chair.

She asked nothing of his evening, of the lecture, its attendees; of those he might have conversed with, flirted with, longed for, as though she was indifferent—and, he thought, stubbornly indifferent, sticking to this stance as if she would teach him indifference—and in this she seemed even more guilty of some concealment. He was closer than he’d ever been to achieving his dream—the play catapulting upward to some new and better orbit, yet at the same time and seemingly in some strange and cruel reciprocation, it felt as though she was quickly falling away and there was nothing he could do to stop her.

“What’s your plan with this?” he asked, gently touching a crumpled pile with his shoe. He wanted her to answer a different question. He wanted to know what her plan was for him.

“Laundry.” She sat on the bed and began to unclasp her stockings from their garters.

The windows seemed to harbor a curious gaze into their lives. “And until then?” he asked

“Until what?”

He changed the subject. “I’m sorry the film didn’t work out,” he said.

“You said that already.” One stocking snaked translucent and docile from her hand. She laid it over the chair in front of her.

“You used to like to wear my trousers when you worked,” he said.

“Are you complaining about me?”

“No—I’m just noticing.” He sat on the bed beside her. “I like looking at your legs too.” He wanted to stroke his finger along the curve of her knee, to where it disappeared under her skirt. She stared at her leg as well, as though expecting this too. She seemed ambivalent about it and when he didn’t she went to work on the other stocking.

It was then that he decided to lie.

“I saw Stanislawski tonight.” His mind raced ahead. “I wasn’t going to say anything—I didn’t want you to worry. Perhaps it’s nothing.” He glanced away. “He seems concerned.”

She slowed her movements. “What is it?”

“The censors want another viewing.” He wondered how to modulate the tone of his words. Fearful? Resigned? He maintained a flatness instead; she seemed not to notice.

“It’s already passed. Why another?”

“I don’t know. He didn’t know. Of course he can’t refuse them.” He wondered how she might discover his lie. On the rare chance the director attended a Party event, she was never there.

“This is just muscle-flexing,” she said. “Some bureaucrat trying to show how important he is.” She patted his leg and went back to her stocking.

“There’s something else,” he said. He thought quickly. “There’ve been other visitors from Lubyanka.”

Her seriousness returned. “Ilya Ivanovich?”

“No, not him,” he said.

“He’s been there before. Remember?”

He’d forgotten. They’d seen each other there—or she’d seen him.

“It wasn’t him,” he repeated. “Someone else. I don’t know who.”

“Maybe it’s nothing,” she offered. “Maybe they are no one.”

He was conscious of his own breathing. “Stanislawski doesn’t think so. He’s started rehearsing Hamlet. He’s talking of it as a replacement.”

“Oh, my dear,” she said. Her stockings were forgotten. She touched his hand.

He thought, first, not of the pleasure of her touch. He thought of his betrayal of Stanislawski, who’d stopped all rehearsals weeks before; who’d embraced him warmly. Here he’d delivered an image of the director’s cowardice, of his expediency. He’d besmirched his name in the necessity of a lie. To seduce a woman.

“Perhaps I’m overthinking this,” he said. If he sounded miserable, he thought, this was an honest thing.

She kissed him. He was conscious of the texture of her lips in a way he hadn’t noticed before. As though this was their first kiss—or, he thought then, their very last.

She eased back on the bed, urging him back with her. For a time they simply lay next to each other, still clothed. She kissed him purposefully, as though she could expunge his sad and fearful thoughts. When she went to unbutton his shirt, he started a little.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“Whatever for?”

What was he sorry for? Her head was bent slightly against the pillow as she worked. He was sorry that somehow she needed to feel pity in order to find love for him.

“I’m sorry you have to worry,” he said.

She brought her face close to his, her expression resolute, and for a moment he was uncertain of what she intended. Her lips touched his and she filled his mouth with her tongue, as though to fill it with something other than words. It seemed, then, gloriously full. He began to pull her clothes from her. Flesh-to-flesh—he couldn’t be close enough. Somewhere below, he heard what sounded like the distant tattling of fireworks; the fabric of clothes ripping. It grew louder.

Later, they lay together, her cheek against his shoulder. He touched the smoothness of her stomach; he spread his hand, his fingers wide, over it.

He could push away these last few weeks. There had been the pressures of the play. The worry of secrets kept; barriers between them. He could imagine these things gone, the whole of Moscow laid flat for their pleasure. There would remain only the two of them.

Would she want that? She seemed so still. Perhaps there was less love on her part and more pity; itself not an antidote, but a poison to love.

“Maybe you’re right,” he said. “About the play. Stanislawski is overreacting.”

“I’m certain I’m right.” She patted his chest, then sat up, her legs over the edge of the bed. She seemed suddenly tired. She scratched a patch of skin just above her elbow. He bent forward and kissed it. When he was done, she rubbed it absently, as though wondering how exactly he thought that would be helpful.

“We can hope that the actors won’t confuse the Danish for the French.”

“Hmm?” she said.

“Those rehearsing Hamlet.”

“Yes. Of course. They won’t.” She didn’t react to his humor. They were words to quiet him. She stared at one of the bare windows. It reflected the interior of the room. As though a chorus hovered invisible on the other side, some congregation to whom she must answer.

“Are you missing the curtains?” he asked.

“No.”

The skin of his chest where her hand had been felt strangely alive, strangely empty.

“It’s funny—when you think I’m not doing well, you seem to find it easier to love me,” he said.

She turned—her expression was inscrutable. “What do you mean by that?”

“Maybe I’m wondering if you just feel sorry for me.”

“You’re picking a fight again,” she said, as though making a casual observation.

He stroked the back of her arm, then he kissed it. She let him.

She got up and crossed the room, naked as she was, and turned off the light. The window became immediately translucent, revealing the exterior night. Any watchers, be they angels or demons, vanished in that moment. She came back to the bed in shadows.

He wondered if Ilya had been outside, witness to it all.

He decided, in the morning, he would ask her to marry him.

She feigned a headache at work and was told to go home for the rest of the day. At Lubyanka she gave her name to the clerk at its entrance. She admitted she didn’t have an appointment and was directed to a row of chairs. Once there, she decided it was ridiculous that she’d come, though where she would go now in the middle of the day in the middle of the work week she couldn’t imagine as though the world outside was transformed during those hours and she in its midst would be lost. Ilya appeared from a side corridor and she stood; he took her by the arm and walked with her out the door. They crossed the street and continued down the sidewalk.

“Next time,” he began. It seemed he would say something else, but he finished differently. “There are better ways to meet.”

A block beyond Lubyanka he slowed his pace; the grip on her arm relaxed as well. He glanced at her. She expected him to make a comment about her appearance but he said nothing. He directed her to an outdoor café, to a small table set back from the street; it was late morning and there were no other diners. The waiter came up; he wiped his hands on the towel around his waist and looked ill-prepared for customers. Ilya ordered for both of them: two café au laits and for her a large serving of their okroshka.

“I’m not hungry,” she said.

Ilya nodded to the waiter and he withdrew.

He offered her a cigarette; she declined and he lit one for himself. She watched the pedestrians pass on the sidewalk nearby. She looked back and found he was watching her.

“You must stop that,” she said quietly. He looked away.

Sitting together as they were she was reminded of their last meeting in the park. She glanced at his hand where it rested on the table.

The waiter appeared with their coffee. He apologized for the delay; the okroshka was not yet ready. He told them it would be provided shortly, then retreated.

“This is a surprise,” said Ilya, as if explaining his behavior. She didn’t say anything.

“You are a surprise,” he said.

“Not really.”

She’d rehearsed what she would say to him.

A breeze lifted for a moment, it was cool on her skin. Morning’s condensation beaded on the table; she drew her cup toward her, holding it for warmth. The drops coalesced around its base into a crescent-shaped puddle.

“Did Bulgakov tell you I gave him a ride home last night?” he said.

She retraced their conversation. Why wouldn’t he have mentioned it? For a moment she felt confused, uncertain why she was there.

“You must stop harassing him,” she said suddenly.

“I paid for the cab.”

“I saw you at the theater,” she said. “Talking with Stanislawski.”