Squiggly lines
Inspired by the article "Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky" on Wikipedia
Life in the north was a serenade heard only by those keen enough to perceive the intangible. Despite this, the intangible seemed to pull on brows and extend frowns much like squiggly lines drawn upon sheets of paper by the hand of an infant. All the men, all the women, of the court had that look. I always wondered. Wondered and wondered — did they see it on each other? We children were oblivious and as the men discussed politics, economics, warfare — concepts too far removed from the lives of minors — we hurdled with the womenfolk. It was apparent to me, even then, that understanding flowed downstream: first from God, then to men, through the women and finally to us children. That same understanding cast the most abysmal of scowls on the scarred faces of men and a little less each level down the hierarchy one went.
This is not to say that us at the bottom quite understood. Terms like socialism, orthodoxy, imperialism flew past us like paper planes with only the chosen few capable of grasping them mid-flight. As for the rest of us, as for the typical child, subtle cues were of greater importance than terminology. And thus, we understood — understood the squiggly lines on hardened faces.
The following would be descriptive of all that we saw; a ball, a soirée, dedicated to the victorious general. Courtesans in diamond encrusted jewellery, dukes, counts, clad in military uniforms. Tchaikovsky creating ambience as the men, being men, led the women to the floor where they would suggest, imply, intimate a desire for the intimate. As time passed the men would wander off into the tobacco lounge and the women, with no one around to esteem the effort made for the evening, would gather like a flock of lapwings here, there or, most commonly, in the parlor. The married held positions of esteem but those married with children were the matriarchs upon whom the lesser women depended on for their every word. Debutantes stood silently, poised, elegant with a little something out of line, as the matriarchs spoke with a feigned understanding of what was happening in the tobacco lounge. “My beloved recently came back from the east. He says the enemy has adapted an expansionist philosophy challenging our rights to those lands,” one woman would say. The others would nod that practiced nod that meant nothing more than “I have nothing to add”. And surely, would a debutante, despite years of schooling and knowledge in the classics, possess the conviction to eclipse a matriarch?
Some of us children, trying ever so diligently to unravel the mysterious world of adults, would sit quietly listening to magical words that would vex women and young girls alike. And of the spells, none was greater, it seemed, than the incantation Yefimovich.
The name Yefimovich carried with it a weight that, at the time, was truly supernatural. Womenfolk, gathered in the parlor, would whisper the spell from one ear to another. A slight excitement was expressed in some and an appalling terror in others. Did the men do the same? They must have. How else would the women know of the happenings of the world? Of the monsters that existed beyond our curated gardens? Thus it came to be that God brought down knowledge from heaven, to the men, through the women and finally to the children — Yefimovich, Yefomovich. We would return to school and the short, the ugly, the repulsive would be christened Yefimovich. Yefimovich.
I should add that none of us ever knew what a Yefimovich was. Only in school houses and dormitories did one of us become that monster that haunted conversations between mother and father, priest and parishioner. It was innocence. Innocence that drove children to crave the existence of a monster in their lives. Innocence that sought the creation of that monster. The grownups had one and so would we.
Come afternoon, the governess would set us free. Under the guise of playfulness, we would walk and walk until she was out of sight and settle in the dark woods. Between jagged trees and shallow streams, one of us would scream “Yefimovich!” and the hunt would begin. Kill the demon before the demon claimed you. “Yefimovich’s sharp nose can sniff out the fear in your soul. Do not fear. Punch, kick and bite. Don’t let long-fingered, sharp-nosed Yefimovich win.”
We would return to the school house. Bloody knuckles, torn shirts and psychotic smiles. Oh, the squiggly lines said it all. Little boys that felt, for the first time, they were men — men from a holy war. Yefimovich would be left out in the woods until one of us — one inspired by some obscure religious teachings from a strange part of the fatherland — would go out and drag him back to the dormitories. It didn’t matter. Yefimovich would be brought to justice yet again.
How old was I? 15, maybe 16. It has been quite too long but the memory does linger. Memories of squiggly lines cast on apprehensive faces. Father, mother, monk and nun all looked this way and that as though something unfathomable had come to light. Anyone from across the fatherland would tell you the same thing. How could we forget? How could we forget the day when every man, woman and child discovered that Yefimovich had a face; that Yefimovich was as real as the blood spattered on the snow.
We were out of school. No longer had to stalk, hunt, and kill Yefimovich as he walked our school halls. The season was left to loftier ideals. The birth of Our Lord was upon us and the family kept with the spirit. Father would command that no one mention that name. No one did — at least, not in his presence. Friends of the family would join us for dinner and some even spent nights. After the grown ups went to bed, the children formed packs like wild dogs. The girls in one room, the boys in another. Neither pack spoke higher than a murmur. Neither group spoke of anything other than Yefimovich and all the “what ifs” that came with childish imagination inspired by dying candlelight. “What if he followed us from school?” one would say. “What if he’s in the girl’s room?” another would ask. “Do you think we should go and protect them?” the leader would suggest.
With toy swords and wooden rifles in arms, we tiptoed to the girl’s room. One of us would place his head against the door. We never did learn if he heard a thing but the squiggly lines conveyed enough. He stepped back, and with one foot, broke through the door to the girl’s room. “YEFIMOVICH!” We all screamed in unison.
There was no monster in the girl’s room. Not the kind of monster that we expected to find. But it seems to me, all these years later, that we did create what we found in that room. Yefimovich — his skin taut over his bones, flesh bore blank for our naive eyes. One girl on a bed with crimson painted by her sides and the rest in a corner with their eyes to the demonic form. Squiggly lines drawn to worship the legionnaire of hell, Yefimovich. Yefimovich.