Letters from Yelena by Guy Mankowski Read Free Book Online

was inevitable that soon I would be pushed off the edge. But I wanted to choose the moment when that happened,
and only once I had worked out how best to fall.
    I remember it was a cool and bright day, if not quite the English summer’s day I had mentally rhapsodised over when living in the east. One night after rehearsal, I checked that I knew how
to get to your house. It was harder to pinpoint than I’d thought it would be, but in the end I found it, towards the edge of the city, at the beginning of the suburbs. It was on the corner of
a field that students often cut through on their way to the university, partially obscured by a row of willow trees. Only by taking the more elaborate route home did I see from the other side that
it was in fact a deceptively large townhouse, with none of its windows currently illuminated. I wondered if you were perhaps writing in the dilapidated chalet that I had noticed in the corner of
the garden, just visible from the field. I didn’t stick around to find out. I was concerned you would notice me and reasonably enquire what I was doing there, a few days early. What is
curious is that in the days leading up to our date, in my mind I had already walked through your house, and when I did finally come to enter it, it was exactly how I had thought it would be.
    That night I managed to escape from rehearsal a little earlier than usual. Knowing that I was coming to your house, I felt as if I was carrying a heavy jewel that I had stolen from the other
girls. The silence of my flat seemed to push me out into the city as I stood, the desk lamp illuminating the contours of my stripped body, in front of my full-length mirror. Anxiety had begun to
grip me. I loathed the slightly comic curve of my torso, the long, helpless circles my arms tended to swing in and the wide gap between my eyes. But then I remembered my sister’s advice, on
the days we’d toyed with makeup as little girls: ‘You don’t need to do this, Yelena. Wear as little as you can, so people can see how pretty you are.’ As I prepared for our
date, her words returned to me. I left my face almost devoid of makeup, expect for a touch of red on my lips. I chose a simple, white summer dress and brown sandals. I was late already, but in no
mood to hurry the experience.
    Having walked through the soft summer’s evening, I heard commotion the moment I pushed the doorbell. I haven’t been on that many dates, Noah, unlike you. The building throb of
uncertainty, that rising thirst for details, the peculiarly feminine reluctance to yield without sufficient cause. These are emotions that you will be unaware of. And again the voice of my sister,
in later years, returned to me. ‘You are the woman – the pressure is on him to earn you.’ That was what she had said. At the time I had dismissed her words as archaic and sexist,
but as I heard movement behind the door, they acted as a sudden balm to me.
    You were wearing a crisp white shirt, the sleeves rolled up as if you had been mixing ingredients with your hands. You greeted me with a half-smile before looking nervously at the floor. As you
ushered me inside I took in the Rothko prints, the statuettes, the stacks of fanned books. The large portrait of a semi-nude ballerina over the fireplace – should I have taken that as a
warning? Music was playing in the distance, but I couldn’t quite make it out. Steam moved in bulbous curls from the kitchen. I could hear a kettle singing. As we moved towards the cooking I
saw the back door wide open, and through it the faded façade of your chalet.
    As the risotto cooked you suggested we open a bottle of wine out on the patio, where you could still keep an eye on the steaming pots. As you made adjustments in the kitchen I picked around the
charming relics in your garden – the small, algae lined fountain, the somehow brooding chalet. I moved over to its windows and peered inside. It was dusty, but draped over a wicker chair I