from above. He truly believed that was what the melody was supposed to do to him—but only for a split second.
“Wait. That’s Mozart!”
She put the violin down and smiled, openly pleased with herself.
“‘Fool me once, shame on me . . .’ Oh come on, are you offended? Don’t be, I was just kidding.”
But he did feel hurt, and he went to his bedroom, never gathering enough courage to speak with her. He felt helpless and hollow. A runaway from a mental institution, an angel falling from heaven—everything was topsy-turvy, nothing could be trusted, and only one thing was clear: if this continued, he, Aspirin, was going to lose his mind.
He opened the window, letting in one of two instantly melted snowflakes. Outside Irina ran laps around the building following her own footsteps.
Lap after lap—this measured pace reminded Aspirin of Alyona’s zeal in music. Wet snow flew from under Irina’s wet sneakers.
Aspirin ran by her side: “I can’t handle more than a hundred laps. I maintain a sedentary lifestyle.”
Irina turned her head, meaning to say something but then probably decided to save her breath.
“Have you ever done track and field?”
“When I was a young girl . . .”
“I thought so. You still have the professional athlete’s approach to movement.”
The road turned a corner and went uphill. Aspirin’s breathing got heavier; they passed a parking lot, a bus stop, turned another corner, then went downhill. Aspirin sped up. Irina kept her pace. By the next turn Aspirin slowed down, got his breathing under control, and allowed Irina to catch up with him.
“I see you running every night.”
“Not every night,” she said evenly. “Sometimes I am on call.”
“My work gets busy too. But I wouldn’t pick up running in any case. Running is boring.”
She said nothing. They ran across the courtyard, took another turn, and the road went uphill again; wet snow fell, threatening to glue their eyes shut. Puddles sprayed from underneath their feet.
“I don’t even own sneakers,” Aspirin said, his shoes thudding in the snow.
They passed a parking lot, a bus stop, turned a corner, then ran downhill. Another lap around the courtyard. He could see Irina’s breath in the cold air.
The road went uphill. Aspirin fell a little behind, then leaped ahead to catch up with Irina. He stopped her, and she didn’t protest. He held her shoulders and turned her to face him.
Snowflakes sparkled on her face. Brightly lit distant windows reflected in her eyes.
He held her, so thin, so tense, belonging to no one. Their mouths met, and her lips felt chapped, like cracked desert soil, and he licked them like a dog licks his master’s wound.
Snow fell like down from a ripped pillow, refusing to melt.
He woke up in the darkness and knew Irina was awake.
It was morning. Water pipes grumbled, the elevator screeched. The front door slammed shut. Aspirin pulled his body back under the blanket like a snail back into its shell. He didn’t want morning. He wanted rest.
Irina remained still. In the darkness he found her shoulder, goose bumps all over her skin.
“Are you cold?”
“No. It’s time to get up.”
“No, it’s not,” Aspirin murmured.
Irina pulled away. In the darkness she climbed from underneath the blanket, slipped from the room, and he caught a glimpse of her silhouette against the door frame. The door closed.
He was irreversibly awake.
“Good morning,” a tall woman of about forty said. “I am your doctor.”
She had on a uniform with an emblem sewn on her chest. Aspirin would never have believed that average clinics supplied their staff with such outfits.
“And you must be Alyona Grimalsky?” the woman asked, baring her teeth in a professional smile. “Hello.”
Alyona was playing her scales, and the quick glance she threw at the woman over her bow did not bode well for the future. The woman wanted to come closer, but after taking a tiny step, changed her mind and sat down on a chair, pretending to listen to Alyona’s exercises. Aspirin winced: he would have preferred that the doctor reprimand the girl, saying that an adult is addressing you, and you . . . But the doctor listened and smiled, behaving exactly how—in Aspirin’s mind—specialists in pediatric intellectual disabilities were supposed to behave.
What if the girl moved from the scales to playing fear? Or (Aspirin’s hair stood on end) lust?
He began to panic, but at that moment Alyona finished the scale and brought down the bow with a flourish. She placed her violin in its case, sat down on the sofa, and pressed Mishutka,