Gen nodded towards the bathroom door. “I was on my way.”
Fyodorov looked over his shoulder and then held out his hand as if to lead Gen in. “Of course. Of course that is nothing. That long I can wait. However long. You take your time. I will be outside the door. I will make sure that I am first in line for our translator when he is finished.” Sweat was creeping down the sides of Fyodorov’s shirt, leaving a new dark stain inside a history of much paler stains. Gen wondered if that was what he meant by being unable to wait much longer.
“One minute,” he said quietly, and then let himself inside without knocking.
“I wish I knew what you were saying.” Carmen laughed. She tried to mimic the words, spoke a Russian nonsense which sounded something close to, “I never cracker table.”
Gen put a finger to his lips. The room was small and very dark, black marble walls, black marble floors. One of the lights had burned out next to the mirror. Gen would have to remember to ask Ruben about a new bulb.
She sat up on the sink. “It sounded very important. It was Ledbed, the Russian?” She was whispering.
Gen told her it was Fyodorov.
“Oh, the big one. How do you know Russian, too? How do you know so many languages?”
“It’s my job.”
“No, no. It’s because you understand something and I want to know it, too.”
“I only have a minute,” he whispered. He was so close to her hair, which was darker, deeper even than the marble. “I have to translate for him. He’s waiting right outside the door.”
“We can talk tonight.”
Gen shook his head. “I want to talk about what you said. What do you mean, this is where we live now?”
Carmen sighed. “You know I can’t say. But ask yourself, would it be so awful if we all stayed here in this beautiful house?” This room was a third of the size of the china closet. Her knees touched his legs. If he took even a half step back he would be on the commode. She wished she could take his hand. Why would he want to leave her, leave this place?
“This has to end sooner or later,” he said. “These sorts of things never just go on indefinitely, somebody stops them.”
“Only if people do terrible things. We haven’t hurt anyone. No one is unhappy here.”
“Everyone is unhappy here.” But even as he was saying it Gen was not entirely sure it was true. Carmen’s face turned down and she studied her hands in her lap.
“Go on and translate,” she said.
“If there’s something you should tell me.”
Carmen’s eyes were watery and she blinked them hard. How ridiculous it would be for her to cry. Would it be such a terrible thing to stay? Be together long enough to speak perfect Spanish, to read it and write, to learn English and then maybe some Japanese? But that was her own selfishness. She knew that. Gen was right to want to get away from her. She offered nothing. She only took his time. “I don’t know a thing.”
Fyodorov knocked on the door. His mounting nervousness would not allow him to do otherwise. “Trans-laaa-tor?” He sang the word.
“A minute,” Gen called through the door.
Time was up and now Carmen had lost a couple of tears. There needed to be whole days together. There needed to be weeks and months of uninterrupted time to say all the things that needed to be said. “Maybe you’re right,” he told her finally. The way she was sitting on the black marble sink in front of the mirror, he could see both her face and her narrow back at the same time. He could see in the large oval mirror with the frame of gilded gold leaves, his own face over her shoulder, looking at her. He could see in his face a love that was so obviously displayed that she must already know everything there was to know about it. He was so close to her then that they owned every molecule of air in the tiny room and the air grew heavy with their desire and worked to move them together. It was with the smallest step forward that his face was in her hair and then her arms were around his back and they were holding each other. It seemed so simple to get to this place, such a magnificent relief, that he couldn’t imagine why he had not been holding her every minute since they first met.
“Translator?” Fyodorov said, his voice a little worried this time.
Carmen leaned forward and kissed him. There was no time for kissing but she wanted him to know that in the future there would be. A kiss in so much loneliness was like a hand pulling you up out of the water, scooping you up from a place of drowning and into the reckless abundance of air. A kiss, another kiss. “Go,” she whispered.
And Gen, who wanted no more in the world than this girl and the walls of this bathroom, kissed her again. He was breathless and dizzy and had to lean a moment against her shoulder before he could step away. Carmen got off the sink and stood behind the door, opened the door, and sent him back out into the world.
“Are you unwell?” Fyodorov asked, more in irritation than concern. Now the back of his shirt was clinging damply to his shoulders. Didn’t the translator know this would not be easy for him? All of the time he had spent, first considering whether or not he should speak and then deciding to speak, then after that decision was made there was the decision as to what should be said. In his heart the feelings were clear, but to translate such feelings into words was another matter entirely. Ledbed and Berezovsky were sympathetic, but then they were Russians. They understood the pain of Fyodorov’s love. Frankly, they experienced similar pains themselves. It was not impossible that they would eventually find their own nerve and approach the translator to approach the soprano. The more Fyodorov spoke of his heart’s desire, the more they were sure it was a malady with which they had all been infected.
“I apologize for the delay,” Gen said. The room before him melted and waved like a horizon line in the desert. He leaned back against the closed bathroom door. She was in there, not two and a half centimeters of wood away from him.
“You look unwell,” the Russian said, and now he was concerned. He had a fondness for the translator. “Your voice sounds weak.”
“I’m sure I’ll be fine.”
“You are pale, I think. Your eyes are very damp. Perhaps if you are truly ill the Generals will let you go. Since the accompanist, they claim to be very sympathetic in matters of health.”
Gen blinked in an attempt to still the swaying furniture, but the bright stripes of an ottoman continued to pulse in the rhythm of his blood. He stood up straight and shook his head. “Look at me,” he said uncertainly, “fine now. I have no intention of leaving.” He looked at the sun pouring in through the tall windows, the shadows of the leaves falling across the carpet. Finally, standing here with the Russian, Gen could understand what Carmen was saying. Look at this room! The draperies and chandeliers, the soft, deep cushions of the sofas, the colors, gold and green and blue, every shade a jewel. Who would not want to be in this room?
Fyodorov smiled and slapped the translator on the back. “What a man you are! You are all for the people. Ah, how greatly I admire you.”
“All for the people,” Gen repeated. The Slavic language was pear brandy on his tongue.
“Then we will go to speak to Roxane Coss! There is no time for me to wash again. If I was to stop I would lose my nerve forever.”