The Lovers. Юлия Добровольская

as much as he does?” asked Dina.

      “He loves the ladies, not the subject,” interrupted Vera.

      “Well, he’s not such a beast after all…” Valya interjected. “I remember how in the first lecture, he made it sound like I should just pack up and leave the university immediately, and then he ended up helping me on the exam.”

      “What about his humor?” Dina suddenly wanted to discuss Konstantin Konstantinovich, for some reason. “Everyone at university quotes his jokes!”

      “Oh yes!” Valya agreed. “Yet he never repeats himself… not like that man… who teaches scientific communism… when he makes a joke, you don’t know which way to look…”

      Vera rolled her eyes up dreamily. “Yes, Kokon is not a man you’d forget even after university. He’s a ray of light in a dark realm!” Then she remembered where she was, and picked up a book again. “All right, enough chit-chat, I’d like to pass the final exam on first try!”

      Dina stretched out on the bed and put her hands behind her head.

      “Go ahead, I’ll have a rest. Let me know if you’d like some tea.”

      She looked at the color portrait of Muslim Magomaev, whose songs she adored, especially the recording in Italian. She had cut out his picture from a magazine, maybe the Soviet Screen, and it hung opposite Dina on the side of the cupboard, together with a few other portraits, each one with their own story.

      There was Jean Marais, smiling from a glossy photographic print, which Dina had begged from her aunt, and who had received in turn from her friend. There was an autograph in the lower corner, done in blue ink. Although Aunt Ira tried to explain to Dina that the signature did not belong to Jean Marais himself, that her friend had added the autograph herself, Dina refused to believe it.

      Next to it hung the terrible quality picture of Anna Magnani from a film Dina had never seen, which had been copied from a tiny photograph and enlarged to the size of a magazine page. She had once read a small article about the Italian actress with the beautiful name that was so well-suited to her unusual appearance. The article was illustrated by a few black-and-white shots from the films that she starred in. The image that was hanging on her cupboard now – the actress’ face with contrast lighting – was the one that Dina had liked the most, and she had asked the laboratory technician from the school physics laboratory to copy and enlarge this portrait.

      Slightly to the left hung Dina Durbin. An attractive woman, but not in Dina’s taste. It was her mother’s idea: to name her daughter after a famous actress with a surname that was so similar to her own.

      “When you become famous,” her mom would say, “people will only remember Dina Durbin because her name is similar to yours!” And she would chuckle.

      There was the portrait of Dina’s favorite author. Dina had begged her mother for this portrait for a long time, done photographically on embossed paper that looked like fabric, with a loop attached to the thick cardboard backing – a serious, well-made portrait. It had cost two rubles and ten kopeks, serious money for their budget, especially since Dina’s mother did not consider a writer’s portrait to be an essential item, even if he was a favorite. Nevertheless, when Dina finished nine classes with almost perfect marks, with only one four, her mom remembered the strange request and decided to reward her daughter for her hard work. Besides, it was when her mother had been promoted at work, and she started to earn eighteen rubles and forty kopeks more every month. Dina’s mother was not in fact greedy, just very practical.

      And Muslim Magomaev… He does look a little like…

      Never mind! It’s not important right now! Dina wanted to remember how the exam for her toughest subject had gone. She mentally rewound the imaginary film, which had recorded the events, and started watching.

      Here she is walking to the teacher’s table, catching his eyes, which are staring at her legs, and stopping midway. Konstantin Konstantinovich Kolotozashvili, dressed in a loose red shirt, with a high collar and wide sleeves, gathered at the cuffs, which is open at the chest and tucked into tight black pants, rises from his chair and stands to his full considerable height. He extends his arms towards Dina and says in a rich baritone, “Congratulations on an excellent finish of the semester, Dina Aleksandrovna.”

      In the exact moment that Dina, trembling with happiness, realized that her teacher was actually Muslim Magomaev, somehow here, in the exam auditorium, her neighbor Vera stuck her head through the doorway, and unceremoniously interrupted this incredible moment of meeting her favorite singer:

      “Dina, why aren’t you getting changed? Some tea would be nice.”

      Dina clearly knew that Vera was not present at the exam…

      She opened her eyes.

      Muslim Magomaev was looking at Dina from the photographic print, with a red shirt open at the chest, extending his arms towards her, with his mouth wide open, as if he was saying “Congra-a-atulations.” Vera was sitting at the table, leaning back on the squeaking chair.

      “You’ve got nothing to do anyway,” she added. As if Dina needed to be persuaded or compelled!

      Dina stood up, fixed her clothing, and picking up the kettle that stood on the windowsill, stepped out of the room. She headed to the kitchen to boil the water on the gas stove, and so couldn’t hear the conversation of her two neighbors behind her.

      Vera: “She’s so lucky, getting out of this exam.”

      Valya: “Yes, and with perfect marks too.”

      Vera: “Well, she doesn’t get these fives easily.”

      Valya: “Yeah… only this one seems to have dropped down from the sky.”

      “Yup, you don’t say. And from Kokon, of all people!”

      “Maybe she has really caught his eye?”

      “Hmmm, maybe. She’s not gorgeous but she can present herself well.”

      “That’s true.”

      “She’ll be an idiot if she falls for him.”

      “Yeah… Like Rimma, and then she’ll need to get an abortion… Where is our Rimma, by the way?”

      “In the reading room, maybe.”

      “Ha! Rimma in the reading room! Don’t make me laugh!”

      “She needs to retake the exam with Barbara, and unless she studies her butt off in the reading room, she won’t pass.”

      “True.”

      Dina entered the room in that moment, together with the boiling kettle and Rimma, the fourth occupant of the room, whom Vera and Valya had just been gossiping about.

      Rimma

      Rimma, an eye-catching brunette with dark gray eyes and the graceful moves of a capricious cat, was a very attractive girl. Yes, it could be said that Rimma was the only exception to Dina’s theory that beautiful people were either not real or lived in faraway places. Like Anna Magnani.

      Rimma was good at utilizing the modest arsenal of makeup that the poor university students could afford: pearly eye shadow in either gray or light blue, often bought from gypsies, made from goodness knows what, and placed in a plastic black or white checkers piece, covered with a piece of cellophane, and dark pink lipstick, which she saved for special occasions. Her eyeliner was the same as most of the other girls: a black pencil from the Artwork pencil set. Rimma wore her hair in a ponytail, like Dina and most of the girls, but her hair was thicker and shinier than the others. Yes, Rimma could certainly be called a beautiful girl.

      She was also very good at drawing. She had a large set of pencils in a huge carton, which opened and could be set up in a special way, so that the pencils were displayed at a few different levels, and a box with pastels. Rimma used the pencils for the usual drawing album, and the pastels for large and small pieces of black paper, which were used to cover photoplates, and which, Rimma said, her father especially collected for her from his photograph friends. Rimma Yakovleva also sang beautifully