Kolia by Perrine Leblanc Read Free Book Online Page B

performance for a kid from Kamchatka,” the man in the singlet said to the tall girl beside Pavel. “Mitya likes him a lot,” replied the girl, shrugging. Their conversation was drowned out by the noise of chairs and tables being moved and stacked.
    Pavel stood up and headed directly backstage. He passed Mitya in the corridor, who gave him a discreet salute.
    The narrow dressing room was already awash in the smell of alcohol. When Kolia spotted Pavel, he immediately excused himself from the celebration and walked up to him, placing his hand on Pavel’s shoulder. He hadn’t worn a speck of makeup for the performance.
    â€œI gave it my best shot,” Kolia said, offering Pavel a drink.
    â€œI always give it my best shot. You’ll see.”
    Kolia liked that about Pavel. His concise remarks were unambiguous and to the point. He invited him to join the others in a celebratory toast.
    Kolia’s new friendship with a bona fide star of the circus made quite an impression on his fellow actors. Pavel was suddenly bombarded with questions and invitations to dinner — he was even asked if he would be the surprise present at Vyacheslav and Oksana’s wedding. He politely declined, using the pretext of a previous engagement to save himself from the pointless expenditure of energy such outings entailed. Spending time in the company of ordinary people exhausted him.
    Word of Kolia’s association with Pavel spread back to the mole at the hostel. The following evening, Alexei invited Kolia to join him in the reading room to sample some red wine from Spain. Other than partaking of the occasional toast, Kolia drank very little, and if he did drink, he would always cut himself off before reaching the limit imposed by the pain in his stomach. He detested losing control of his body and, even more so, his mouth — talking too much and saying nothing intelligible. But that night, both fatigued and still pleased with his performance the previous evening, he allowed himself to get drunk. Just this once. But Alexei was unable to pry anything out of Kolia that the others hadn’t already mentioned regarding his association with Pavel. Even when drunk, Kolia could hold his tongue. Alexei changed the subject.
    But something Kolia said in a moment of relaxed candour, somewhere between the wine and the vodka when time seemed to stand still, stayed with him. “You know, Alexei, it feels like I’ve just turned the page on the last chapter of a very long book.”

IN THE RING
    KOLIA ARRANGED TO RETURN TO the tavern the following Monday. Pavel had promised him a ticket for the circus. He kept his word. Kolia’s features, while not particularly attractive, still fascinated Pavel. They seemed to be constantly in flux beneath the surface of his skin. His handshake was firm, his palms rough and callused. Kolia had mentioned his work in the sewers as an explanation for his blackened fingernails. People said that he was born in Kamchatka, that he could read French. A strange character.
    Kolia found his seat in the crowd. He was sandwiched between the pillars of a family — on either side of him, a man and a woman were each propping up a child. The children bore a definite resemblance to each other. The mother was cursing the woman who had sold them the tickets and “cut the family in two.” Kolia offered her his seat; the lights dimmed and changed hue. The crowd fell silent, and, for a moment, the world shifted.
    After the troupe had made its entrance into the ring, Beria, the tightrope walker, commenced his act. The wire cable suspended high above the crowd had a soul. At its centre was a solid core of hemp. Beria advanced slowly, without any special manoeuvres, balancing with a pole that was much longer than he was tall, until he reached the other end of the cable. Then, proceeding in the opposite direction, he stopped to pay his respects to the guy line that was stabilizing the cable, and