Russian Debutante's Handbook by Gary Shteyngart Read Free Book Online Page A

Vladimir’s mother. “It’s been how long? Almost a year?”
    “How impolite,” said Dr. Girshkin. “What are we . . . savages, that you’re ashamed of us?”
    “She’s in summer school,” Vladimir said. He uncovered the dessert plate full of imported Russian candies from his childhood, the chocolaty Clumsy Bear and the caramel-fudgy Little Cow. “All day long, taking classes,” he mumbled. “She’ll finish medical school in record time.”
    “She really is inspiring,” Mother said. “Women seem more adjusted in this country anyway.”
    “Well, to women,” said Vladimir’s father, raising his cup. “And to the mysterious Challah who keeps our son’s heart!” They toasted. It was time to set the hamburger meat aflame.
    AFTER IT WAS over, Mother lay in her mass-produced four-poster bed, nursing a bottle of rum, while Vladimir paced around her enormous berth lecturing on the topic of the day: Sensitivity to African-Americans. One black marketing director was about to be sacked, and Mother wanted to sack him “in the new, sensitive fashion.”
    In the course of an hour, Vladimir pitted everything he learned during his stint at the progressive Midwestern college against Mother’s peerless Russian racism. “So what are you telling me?” Mother said when the lesson was over. “I should bring up the middle passage?”
    Vladimir tried again to paint the big picture, but Mother was drunk. He told her as much. “So I’m drunk,” said Mother. “You want a drink? Here—wait, no, you might have gotten herpes off that girl. There’s a glass on the dresser.”
    Vladimir accepted a glassful of rum. Mother grabbed a post and hoisted herself up until she was on her knees. “Jesus, our Lord,” she said, “please shepherd helpless Vladimir away from his tragic lifestyle, from the legacy his father bequeathed him, from the pauper’s flat which he calls home, and from this criminal Groundhog . . .” She put her hands together but started to tip over.
    Vladimir caught her by one shoulder. “That’s a pretty prayer, Mother,” he said. “But we’re, you know . . .” He lowered his voice out of habit: “Jewish. ”
    Mother looked at his face carefully, as if she had forgotten something and it had gone into hiding beneath one of Vladimir’s thick brows. “Yes, I know that,” she said, “but it’s all right to pray to Jesus. Your grandfather was a gentile, you know, and his father was a deacon. And I still pray to the Jewish God, the main God, although, I have to say, he hasn’t been helping much lately.
    “I mean, what do you think?” she said.
    “I don’t know,” said Vladimir. “I guess it’s all right. Do you feel good when you pray like that? To Jesus and to . . . Isn’t there something else? The Holy Something?”
    “I’m not sure,” said Mother. “I can look it up. I got a little brochure on the subway.”
    “Well, anyway,” Vladimir said, “you can pray to everyone you want, just don’t tell Father. With Grandma losing her mind, he’s been more into the Jewish God than ever.”
    “That’s what I’ve been doing!” Mother said. She grabbed Vladimir and held him against her tiny frame. “We’re so much alike underneath all your stubbornness!” she said.
    Vladimir gently detached himself from his mother and reached for the rum, which he drank from the bottle, herpes be damned. “You look good now,” Mother said. “Like a real man. All you have to do is trim that homo ponytail.” A teardrop formed in the corner of her left eye. Then one in the right. They overfilled and commenced to flow. “I’m not crying hysterically,” Mother assured him.
    Vladimir looked over his mother’s peroxide-blond curls (no longer was she the Mongolka of Leningrad days). He surveyed the running mascara and soaked blush. “You look good, too,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.
    “Thank you,” she sobbed.
    He took out a tissue from his pants pocket and handed it to her.