"Jesus! How can you be so stupid?" Nellie flung up her hands. "When did you even have time to start liking him? It wasn't even a date. How much time did you spend together?"
Arina pondered.
"Probably an hour. Maybe two. I don't remember," her voice cracked again as though she suffered from a sore throat or bronchitis.
"See? You don't even remember!" Nellie nodded. "That shows that nothing terrible has happened."
"But I remember him," Arina croaked, looking depressed. Nellie stood there, deep in thought. She saw that when Arina came home yesterday, she wasn't quite herself. She didn't talk to Nellie and didn't even look at her. She came home, went straight to the bathroom and started crying, or at least that is what it seemed like. Then, Arina went to bed, but at night, she started crying again — quietly like a lost kitten. Nellie tried to question her but she only said that nothing was wrong and that there was nothing to worry about. But when morning came and Nellie found the sink full of dirty dishes, she became really worried.
"Has someone hurt you? Have you been robbed? Are you sick? Has someone died? Have you found an abandoned puppy?" Nellie asked a million questions, worried about her girlfriend. Arina shook her head, turned away to face the wall, and pulled the blanket over her head. In the end, when it turned out that Arina's tears, the sleepless night and dirty dishes were all because of some photographer, Nellie burst out laughing.
"My God, this is ridiculous! All this because of a man?"
"No!" Arina almost yelled at her. "You don't understand!"
"Of course. How could I? What happened? Was it love at first sight? Wow! Finally! We were beginning to think that you were a robot or an alien, and that you simply don't have a heart. So, was it a handsome prince in a white Mercedes? Now tell me that he's special, there's no one else like him, and that your heart is broken."
"Nothing's broken," Arina muttered wearily. The sleepless night was finally catching up with her; her head was spinning and her brain was so foggy and scattered that she couldn't even finish a sentence.
"You bet it isn't!" Nellie exclaimed. "Because it takes more than a couple of hours to have your heart broken. It's all hormones. You have never experienced anything like this before, right? That's why you feel this way. The truth is that you'll have hundreds of men like him. Forget about him."
"I already have! I am . . ." Arina nodded eagerly. She had been dreaming about his face all night, his beautiful face. Was it really a dream or was she hallucinating? His crazy eyes; she was looking into them, and it felt as if she were jumping off a cliff with a parachute. The thought of him took her breath away. If she surrendered to delusion, she could even recall that subtle, pleasant smell, his smell.
"Good girl. Come here and I'll make you some tea or something." Nellie got two cups out of the sink, filled them to the brim and started washing them, splashing water around. Arina jumped up and pushed her aside.
"Let me." Nellie didn't stop her. This was even better since Arina was usually responsible for the cleaning, doing the dishes, and other house chores. Nellie was responsible for paying the electricity and water bills although they were relatively small.
"So," Nellie clapped her hands together, "if you have already forgotten about him, why are you still crying? Tell the old snail what the problem is. It didn't work out between you and this . . . Oh well, to hell with him!"
"I don't understand why he decided to run after me in the first place," Arina finally found the courage to open up. She needed someone to talk to, and Nellie, all other things aside, knew a lot about men. Like it or not, there was no denying that she had that about her. She knew how to draw a man to her with a single gesture, one glance, one grin, and how to make him dance to her tune, and even how to make him pay for a night with her. Arina was shocked by such a pragmatic approach and yet . . . She couldn't imagine that anybody in their right mind would want to pay to spend the night with her, the pale and awkward shadow that she was.
"You look like Snow White!"
Arina flinched, thinking of the timbre of his voice. She would never hear from him again.
"Why did he run after you? Well, that's easy given what you just told me," Nellie said confidently, adjusting her white bra because its strap had slid out from under her shirt. "Anyone can offend an artist. You offended him and he wanted to explain what was what. He didn't know you were such an animal lover."
"You're an animal lover," Arina snickered.
"Me? Are you crazy? Do I look like I care about giraffes? Although . . . can you make a fur coat out of them?"
"Get lost," Arina was offended but not for long. At this point, she didn't really care about the giraffe either and besides, she knew Nellie was joking.
"I'd love to. Especially if I had good company," Nellie winked at her.
"Why did he invite me to the coffee shop?" Arina asked, barely audibly. Nellie thoughtfully examined Arina from head to toe as if wondering what exactly could make a person, no, a man in his right mind go to a coffee shop with this little prickly "hedgehog" in sneakers, with a ponytail.
"Perhaps he was hungry?" she suggested finally. Arina blushed and began scrubbing the dishes even harder.
"He was probably just being polite because he saw the piece of bread I was eating." Arina's voice gave away her frustration against her will. It was typical. She could never hide anything no matter how hard she tried.
"Bread? What bread?" Her girlfriend was taken aback. Arina sighed woefully and nodded towards the leftovers lying on the table. Nellie gawked at Arina, unable to believe the picture that had just formed in her head. Then she put her hands on her hips.
"This is just impossible! He took you to the coffee shop to FEED you!!! What a disaster! How shameful! How do you think that makes me feel? You're eating plain bread in the middle of the city! Am I starving you to death?"
"I just haven't had breakfast," Arina mumbled.
"And why not? Did somebody tell you not to have breakfast? Or maybe we don't have any food in the house?" Nellie was outraged. Arina was silent, looking at the floor. She didn't want to explain that she hadn't had breakfast because Nellie's Sergei was walking around their apartment wearing nothing but his briefs.
"Okay," Nellie exhaled. "It's not like you want to have a family with him, right? Who cares what he thinks about you?"
"He said that I looked like Snow White," Arina blurted out.
"I said forget it, and you're still whining. Who cares what this stupid photographer said?! Snow White?" Nellie looked at Arina thoughtfully. In her pyjamas, eyes swollen from crying, chapped lips and the birthmarks on her left cheek, she looked more like a little witch, although Nellie couldn't help but admit that there was some something wildly graceful about Arina. Maybe if she were better dressed. . . But that was not Nellie's problem.
"Do you think I look like Snow White?"
"Did you know that she lived with seven dwarfs?" Nellie gave her a crooked smile. "But if you really want to know what I think . . . I think that you, my friend, have reached the age when you'll be seeing your potential "future husband" in every jerk you see on the street. And the faster you forget this particular jerk the sooner someone else will appear, maybe even someone who's better for you."
"I don't need anyone," Arina said, shaking her head. Nellie didn't believe her and explained that right now she might think that the photographer was The One but tomorrow she would think that the professor reading the course on the anatomy of domestic animals would be The One. The day after tomorrow it would be a fifth-year student. Then, it would be . . .
"I get it, I get it," Arina said, putting up her hands, but Nellie made her promise that she would use contraception, be smart, and would not attach too much importance to love nonetheless.
"Unless you're getting married," she clarified, just in case.
"I don't want to get married," Arina muttered which outraged Nellie to the depths of her soul.
"Getting married is our only chance. Or are you going to graduate and go back to our podunk hole? Jesus Christ! Don't you understand that there is nothing for you there? The local men are either drinking or have already drunk themselves to death. And they breed pigs! You won't survive there."
Arina had finished doing the dishes and began to wipe them dry. She felt better already. Nellie was right. She should stop being silly, thinking about some elusive photographer and the sound of his voice. Step by step, slowly, she thought only about what really mattered. She needed to clean the apartment before one of Nellie's "friends" showed up to "take care" of her. If anything, Sergei was the best of her lovers. He was older. He always took off his shoes and left them in the hallway and he never brought a case or two of beer with him for "the guys." Andrei, on the other hand, another one of Nellie's lovers, would always appear at the weekend and never took off his shoes. He would often cut strong-smelling sausage on their kitchen table, making a mess and leaving a horrible smell and scratches on the countertop. Andrei had a lot of friends, and they hung out at Nellie's when Arina worked her night shift. When she came back home, she sometimes saw them sleeping on her kitchen sofa.
Cleaning up after them was painful, disgusting, but absolutely necessary.
At lunchtime, Nellie decided to clarify the issue that had been bothering her despite the fact that she didn't give a damn about it. When Arina finally appeared to be feeling better, Nellie decided to find out what Arina's stance on "paid love" was.
"You know," Nellie started in a roundabout way. "I feel bad about what happened yesterday. Why did you run off? See what happened? You met this photographer. Whatever got into you?"
"I . . . I needed some air," Arina mumbled, perplexed because she wasn't ready for the conversation. She had already hoped that they would forget about it but Nellie was worried that Arina might have told someone that her lover was paying for her love, or that she was thinking about doing so.
"Nellie, it's none of my business," Arina assured her, not making eye contact.
"You're just saying that!" Nelly blew up. "But you still think that I'm a prostitute."
"I don't think that," Arina said, outraged. "Please stop putting words into my mouth. Your relationships with men, no matter how many of them, are your personal business."
"THERE YOU GO!" Nellie raised her index finger. "You're saying one thing but thinking something completely different, and I know what."
"What is it? I told you that I didn't..."
"No, no, no!" Nellie narrowed her eyes. "You think that you would never take money for sex, right? You think it's AWFUL, don't you?"
Arina paused because she didn't know what to say. She couldn't lie, and her thoughts were written all over her face.
"Who cares what I think?" Arina muttered in confusion. "I'm not judging you!"
Nellie didn't believe her. She began angrily wiping the crumbs from her robe. Then, she straightened up and started yelling, filled with indignation.
"I don't need his money! Although, you know, it doesn't hurt either!"
"I get it," Arina nodded.
"And now you're going to tell my parents, right? Bear in mind that if you do, I'll tell yours that you have a lover too!" Nellie turned her back to Arina, opened the fridge, and started slowly, thoughtfully exploring its contents.
It was a low blow.
"But . . . that's not true!" Arina stared at her. "Besides, I told you that it isn't any of my business. I won't say anything to anyone."
"Are you sure?" Nellie took two cherry yogurts out of the fridge.
"I'm positive!" Arina nodded. "Why would I do that?"
"Do you want a yogurt?" Nellie asked her in a much calmer voice. In the end, she just wanted to scare Arina a little so that she knew that keeping her mouth shut was in her best interests.
"No, thanks," Arina pouted.
"Come on! You need to eat. Let me pour it for you." Nellie reached for her cup but Arina shook her head vigorously. The cup dropped to the floor and broke.
"You're such a butterfingers!" Nellie yelled. "I said I would pour it for you. Why did you twitch? Alright, I've got to go. Andrei is waiting for me outside. I'll be late!"
Nellie left the room, muttering something indignantly under her breath. Arina was left alone, picking up the pieces of the broken cup. It was her favorite one, with kittens on it. Arina grabbed a dustpan and brush and began to clean up. Then suddenly she became angry, threw the brush on the floor and stared out of the window. Why was everything always so hard?!
In the end, she cleaned up the kitchen, went to the store nearby, and then opened her chemistry textbook. The chemistry professor was young and "alright" but he could never spark a thousandth of the fire that sparked inside Arina's body whenever she thought about Maxim Korshun.
"I somehow don't want to let you go!"
Arina almost hated him. That savior of the starving! And now she couldn't stop thinking about him.