Real and Phantom Pains: An Anthology of New Russian Drama. John Freedman
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BLIZZARD: The whole hall was bloody.
MANIAC: Did she find somebody else?
BLIZZARD: You know how girls do it.
ORANGINA: How?
BLIZZARD: To get rid of one guy they find a third they go live with and then they dump him. They just keep crab-legging it from guy to guy until they find what they want.
MANIAC: I asked a friend today if you can just walk up to a woman you like and put your head on her shoulder. He said you can.
BLIZZARD: Basically, that’s what everybody does.
(MANIAC goes to SNOWFLAKE and puts his head on her shoulder. SNOWFLAKE smiles and washes a tablet of some kind down with a drink of water.)
SNOWFLAKE: I finally decided today. I’m not going to love anybody anymore.
ORANGINA: Why’s that?
SNOWFLAKE: I can’t love anybody if they don’t love me.
MANIAC: I can’t either.
SNOWFLAKE: I’m only going to love when somebody loves me.
LENOCHKA: I feel this hatred welling up in me. Instantly. I don’t know what it is.
SNOWFLAKE: I know exactly what you mean. And I’m perfectly aware of it as it happens.
MANIAC: It’s the ego.
SNOWFLAKE: But that’s what my love is like.
LENOCHKA: If I see somebody’s getting frustrated with me, that’s it. It’s all over. The love boat has landed. On the rocks.
SNOWFLAKE: I know it sounds awful, like somebody handing down an irreversible verdict. It’s not very Russian and it’s not very feminine – but these mood swings have just become a part of my life.
(They work silently. Someone sighs, someone eats something, someone drinks something, someone goes out, another comes in, someone forgot something and came back in before going back out.)
SNOWFLAKE: I was walking down the street today and on the corner when I turned in from the left side, right there on that spot, I promised myself – this is it. I’m crossing out love and I’m never going to love alone again.
LENOCHKA: Yeah, let’s put an end to solitaire love.
ORANGINA: What’s he say about it?
SNOWFLAKE: He says, “Your skin drives me wild! Show me another man who can love you more than I do!”
LENA: How’s that for an equation?
MANIAC: Yeah, but he doesn’t know you’re toying with him –
SNOWFLAKE: Is that what I’m doing?
MANIAC: Well, yeah –
ORANGINA: I need him, I need him not; I love him, I love him not
BLIZZARD: Good in the evening, bad in the morning
ORANGINA: Or the other way around
SNOWFLAKE: You know what he says to me? A thousand years ago people like me were burned at the stake
SNOWSTORM: Snowflake, that’s a compliment
SNOWFLAKE: It is?
BLIZZARD: A hundred years ago you would have been stoned
ORANGINA: Poor women
SNOWFLAKE: I don’t care what you say; I think women are an incredibly deprived lot
BLIZZARD: I mean, women have fear instilled in them from childhood
SNOWFLAKE: I mean, it’s men that are afraid of women
ORANGINA: I mean, everybody’s afraid of everybody
MANIAC: I mean, everybody’s just afraid of fear
LENOCHKA: I’m afraid of darkness, maniacs, the cold, germs, snakes, spiders, heights, fast cars, policemen, guards, face-control, rude people, dogs, men and random sex
(ORANGINA looks out the window, beyond which another window is visible, as well as the window of a café, a really pleasant place where it smells of coffee and a waitress’s hands are cleaning off a table and emptying ashtrays. A handsome young man named VOLODYA is drinking espresso and talking about something as he cracks and eats pistachios. The waitress, BUSHY-TAIL, looks like Twiggy. She has huge eyes, a smart little blue dress, long legs, a white apron and a chic, tidy hair-do. She is always smiling, humbly and modestly.)
VOLODYA: I think about women a lot. I think about them constantly. In fact, I don’t think about women in the plural, but about one woman, one single woman. Of all the women I’ve ever met, I know not one who could ever become my other half.
BUSHY-TAIL: Why not?
VOLODYA: Ah, for one reason or another. When people come together – it’s a whole science.
BUSHY-TAIL: What about when they break up?
VOLODYA: No one person is ever to blame for breaking up. It’s nobody’s fault. It’s just two puzzle pieces that don’t fit.
(VOLODYA sips his coffee. BUSHY-TAIL leaves. VOLODYA is silent. Looks at her. Waits for her to come back. Looks out the window. Sees ORANGINA looking out her window but he doesn’t know her name. BUSHY-TAIL returns, replaces his ashtray. )
I’ve always been attracted to unhinged women, I guess you could say. I mean, the kind of girls who know how to stick up for themselves, the kind that can really stick it to you. But I’ve always wanted someone defenseless and fragile so that she’d be the kind I’d be able to protect and take care of.
BUSHY-TAIL: Can you do that?
VOLODYA: You know, I never leave anyone in the lurch. Anybody’s secrets are safe with me. If you ever end up on an uninhabited island with me – you won’t go hungry.
(The office. People are coming and going. The group of six is constantly surrounded by a crowd of faceless people. Five of them are working. SNOWSTORM is always up and dancing. Somebody sighs. LENOCHKA puts make-up on her eyes. Somebody’s looking at the clock; somebody’s washing their hands. SNOWFLAKE sprays on some perfume. Somebody’s cleaning their desk, somebody’s putting something on, somebody’s taking something off, somebody’s getting ready to go somewhere.)
LENOCHKA: I think women are made purely for decoration
ORANGINA (Taking SNOWSTORM’s photo): Those are just childish illusions
LENOCHKA: Why did people invent Faberge eggs or Feng Shui?
SNOWFLAKE: I would really like to settle down. Become soft, calm and caring. But I’m so sensitive. I like it when people care for me
MANIAC: People ask God for love even though they haven’t the vaguest notion what it is. What a nightmare.
LENOCHKA: I’m afraid of falling in love
BLIZZARD: Why?
LENOCHKA: I can’t. I’m married
ORANGINA: I fall in love once a year
SNOWFLAKE: I never do
BLIZZARD: Being in love should be more controllable the older you get. But –
ORANGINA: Whenever I fall in love I am all nerves
MANIAC: Love is a damned psychosis. Last fall I liked this one girl so much my knees went weak. I prayed to God, “Lord, bring her back to me. Bring her back.” And what do you think happened? What came of all that? Six months of nagging ailments.
LENOCHKA (Reading from a book): An obsessive thought of a yellow-black aura evoked by the constant reconsideration of a certain individual of the opposite sex
SNOWFLAKE: All you have to do is redirect