Tag: short-story

the finest confectioner in all of kyiv

AFTER DISEMBARKING at the railroad station, our group was ushered through the city by heavily armed security. We were brought into a large room, almost the size of a gymnasium, not far from the presidential palace. It was underground and connected by a series of zigzagging tunnels with the metro. There was nothing else in the room and the walls were black. The floors had been painted black as well. Lighting was provided by a series of lanterns. They revealed to us a large frosted sheet cake.

On top of this sheet cake slept the president, dressed in the black combat outfit he most recently wore to the Pope’s funeral. He was set on his back, his legs pointing down, his arms at his sides, but his hands folded upon his chest. His eyes were closed. He had a tranquil, beatific look on his face. Everyone in the room was entirely still, and we were allowed to walk around the giant frosted cake on which slept, I hoped, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Or was he asleep? I watched his chest for any sign of a stir, any giveaway sign of life such as a sigh or the gentle rise and fall of respiration. Zelenskyy was stiller than still life, more wax than flesh and blood. One of his representatives whispered in my ear, “This cake was made by the finest confectioner in all of Kyiv.” “The president?” I nodded at its curious centerpiece. “Is he among the living or the dead? He looks like Lenin. It’s a bakery crossed with a mausoleum.” “Just take a closer look,” one of the Ukrainian minders said. “All will be revealed to you in time.”

We circled the cake once again and I could see that a vast chocolate death’s head had been imprinted at one end. The death’s head, a combination of a skull with wings, well known to any son of New England as it can be seen in relief on gravestones in any number of ancient Puritan burial grounds. Some of the most venomous brigands of the Golden Age of Piracy flew this emblem as their flag. The death’s head could mean death itself or symbolize one’s defiance of death. “What is it then?” I asked the Ukrainians. “What is the fate of President Zelenskyy?”

One of the Ukrainians, a lovely woman who happened to be the deputy minister for eurointegration at the Ministry of Digital Transformation, stepped forward and said, “But President Zelenskyy is not dead, sir. He is just meditating on the future of Ukraine.” “Why is he lying on a cake?” I asked. “He says that cakes help him meditate,” she said. All eyes were on Zelenskyy as he meditated on the cake. Then, as if he could hear us talking, his eyes opened. “Принеси мені ложку!” Zelenskyy said in Ukrainian. Prynesy meni lozhku! “Bring me a spoon!”

a bus full of books

I HAD TO GO TO PORTUGAL to pick up some books. The address was somewhere between Porto and Povoa de Varzim. It was a seaside street, ruled by proud white castles of houses. Matteo, of all people, answered the door and we shook hands. Then someone else, another Milanese writer, told me I should relocate to Portugal and that the beach here was “just full of people like us,” in other words other Italians. But I had to drive back to Estonia, I told them. Business demanded it.

On the other side of the street there was a canal, and some local yogis were filling it up with birthday cake. Channels of cake, cream, different kinds of colorful toppings, so that it almost resembled a floating chocolate garden. They were hanging decorations above the canal, too, in preparation for a major street festival. But I was expected back in Tallinn within days with a shipment of books, and so set out shortly after toward Madrid. When I got to Barcelona, I parked my car and went for a walk. On one back street, I passed an aerobics class in session. I could see Linnéa inside stretching. “You can stay and watch me,” she mouthed to me through the glass. “I don’t mind at all.” As she stretched, I caught sight of her undergarments. There was just something about the pattern of the lace on her skin, the way her golden braids dangled down her back. I decided to curl up right there, outside the window glass, and sit beside her as she stretched.

Later, a door opened and I watched Linnéa and the others file out of the class. A Catalan nurse had come to administer fresh COVID-19 booster shots. I remained at a distance, though I could see the tiny glass vials of the Pfizer vaccine piling up. I didn’t want anyone to know of my secret affection for Linnéa. An old colleague happened to turn up and we started to talk about people we had known from our days in New York. Good old Jankauskas! I told him about the bus full of books and the long ride in from Portugal. Jankauskas asked me the books and I told him all about them. You should have seen his eyes as I relayed their plot twists and turns, their heroes and villains. Jankauskas said it sounded like a lot of good reads.