Her husband sat in an armchair, pretending to read that very newspaper.She was speaking loudly, drying her hair with a blow-dryer. She was wearing a light robe.
Well, I had access to the shared living space without needing permission. He clearly didn’t like that – kept glancing at me sideways, as if he couldn’t move anything but his eyes. How did I end up there at that moment?
“A new cartoon’s about to start, and I’ve got the blow-dryer plugged in.” “Oh, Franco, you probably want to turn on the TV?” Adelina laughed suddenly, nodding in my direction. Which is more than I can say for myself. That seemed to calm him down.
I came back a few days before the university classes began. During the Christmas holidays, my father suggested I stay home – apparently, my mother had influenced him. I replied that I’d think about it. That I’d think about it very seriously.
“Interesting thought.”My neighbors were in a bad mood. Turned out, I’d missed something important. When I saw Adelina, I decided to kiss her like a friend, but she pushed me away. “We don’t kiss when we meet or say goodbye,” she reminded me, most likely referring to Russians. “How do you express friendliness?” “Well, it’s good enough if we don’t call each other names… Just kidding. We don’t open up to just anyone. We’re very selective, that’s why we seem serious.” “One affectionate look must mean a lot, then.”
“Sorry, it’s been a rough week for us.”For some reason, I immediately thought that her husband, a native Italian, looked very much like a Russian. Suddenly—though not immediately, but still, suddenly—she began to cry, shouting that she really wanted to go home, even just for a little while, to see those who didn’t think her choice was beneath her, to hear her native language, to walk around her hometown… But only a couple of minutes passed before she calmed down. When she wiped away her tears, one could believe she had never cried in her life.
I found out that the attacks continued, that her husband was threatened with losing his job. That Adelina, unable to take it anymore, came to his school during a meeting and declared out loud that they could all come to that cabaret club in the evening and see for themselves what kind of stripper she supposedly was—so next time they would think twice before accusing someone.