Zhenya had fallen in love with her friend’s husband back when they were at university. She and Asya rented an apartment together, and while Zhenya often had guys staying over for the night, Asya was the proper one: she crammed lecture notes, went jogging in the park in the evenings, and wrote poetry. One day, Zhenya came back from visiting her parents earlier than expected and found a sleepy-looking guy in a wrinkled T-shirt standing in the kitchen. She could hardly believe her eyes.
“What wind blew you in here?” she asked, feeling her heart drop so fast that it was already too late to save it. Sometimes a man fits perfectly into an image you once created in your mind, and it suddenly feels as though you have loved him forever.
“A northern one!” Slava laughed. “You must be Zhenya?”
Zhenya had no idea what he saw in kind but boring Asya. No, she loved her friend and appreciated many of her qualities, but no matter how hard she tried, she could not understand what such a handsome man had found in the plain little mouse that was Asya.
Slava really was handsome: a Nordic-looking blond with a perfect smile and a mischievous dimple in his cheek. Once, Zhenya even cropped Asya out of a photograph and put herself in her place. She and Slava looked much better together, like yin and yang. Zhenya herself was a brunette, dark-skinned and graceful, and she had never suffered from a lack of admirers.
In their fourth year, Asya and Slava got married. Despite all her fantasies, Zhenya never did anything to steal her friend’s boyfriend. She tried to be at home less often when he was there, never flirted with him, and never tried to get him alone. But she continued to love Slava even after she herself got married and later divorced, left alone with her four-year-old son.
She divorced because her husband had started visiting his ex-wife again. Physically, he strongly resembled Slava, and perhaps that was the only reason Zhenya had fallen for him. But in character, her husband was completely different. Slava seemed like a one-woman man, while Zhenya had become this man’s third wife, and he had a child with each of the previous two.
Zhenya refused to tolerate cheating and decided she could manage raising her son alone. Besides, her mother helped her a great deal: she took her grandson for weekends and was always ready to babysit if Zhenya had to stay late at work or wanted to go to the cinema with Asya.
Asya and Slava had no children.
Once, Zhenya carefully asked her friend about it, and Asya admitted:
“It just doesn’t happen. Slava is the one with the problem, not me. Male infertility.”
Zhenya felt a tiny flash of spiteful satisfaction. At least in one respect, perfect Slava was not perfect.
Zhenya never married a second time. She simply did not meet anyone worthy. Suddenly it turned out that all decent men were already securely married—just like Slava.
Her son grew older, her mother became ill, and Zhenya had to work more and more. When you work that much, there is no time to run around on dates.
That year she was turning thirty-five, and one day she suddenly noticed in the mirror that the contour of her face had begun to soften, wrinkles had appeared on her forehead, and she had gained ten extra kilograms. Extra because until she turned thirty, the scales had always shown sixty-two kilograms, and Zhenya had become accustomed both to that number and to the clothing size that went with it.
So she decided to start running, just as Asya had done back in their university days.
At first, jogging was difficult. Zhenya kept finding reasons to skip a run: the heat, the rain, exhaustion after work, or the fact that the only clean T-shirt that matched her bright pink sports pants was dirty.
But gradually, she got used to it.
The number on the scales moved slightly and then froze at sixty-seven, but Zhenya stopped caring. She had fallen in love with movement. She began to feel that her body was strong and still capable of plenty. And clothing sizes could always be changed, after all.
She ran into Slava by chance.
They lived only two blocks apart, but over all those years they had crossed paths accidentally only once or twice. And now there he was, running toward her, wearing a headband over hair that had just begun to turn gray and a fashionable tracksuit.
“Zhenya? I didn’t know you ran,” he said with a smile.
Zhenya immediately looked around, thinking she would see her friend nearby.
“Looking for Asya?” Slava asked. “She hasn’t run in a long time.”
Recently, Zhenya and Asya had drifted apart.
Nothing in particular had happened. Their lives had simply become too different.
Asya had built a successful career as a lawyer, while Zhenya had gone into real estate. Both of them worked a great deal and rarely found time to meet.
Besides, Zhenya had a son, and whether she liked it or not, her life revolved around school, sports practice, and children’s activities.
Asya had acquired four Sphynx cats and bred kittens that won prizes at exhibitions. Zhenya understood that the cats were a substitute for children and did not judge her friend for it, but Asya’s apartment now had a strong cat smell, and Zhenya did not particularly like it.
“I see,” Zhenya replied awkwardly, not knowing what to do next.
She hoped Slava would continue along another route, but instead, he turned around and began jogging beside her.
They did not talk. They simply ran together.
When they parted, he asked:
“Do you run every day?”
“Every day.”
“What time tomorrow?”
“Nine.”
He nodded, and Zhenya did not know what to think.
Was it appropriate to jog together with her friend’s husband? Should she tell Asya about it?
Unable to decide anything, Zhenya thought she would simply let things happen as they happened. After all, they were not doing anything wrong.
Their runs together became a revelation for her.
Yes, Zhenya had always liked Slava, but in truth, she had never really known him.
Now, when he walked her home after their runs, they talked about everything under the sun, and Zhenya discovered that Slava was completely different from the man she had imagined all those years.
And Zhenya herself began to reveal a side of her personality she had never known before.
Zhenya herself told Asya about their runs.
“Well, yes, you’ve gained weight lately,” Asya said. “Who would have thought, huh? Remember how you were a slim gazelle when we were young, while I was the plump little bun? And now it’s the other way around.”
Asya seemed to laugh without malice, but it still hurt.
Asya had changed in general. She had become pretentious and spoke either about her professional achievements or about her cats. Whenever Zhenya invited her to the cinema or to listen to live music at a restaurant in the evening, Asya waved the suggestion away.
“You’re just like Slava! At our age, there’s no need to pretend to be intellectuals anymore. Come to my place instead. We’ll have a drink and gossip about everyone.”
Zhenya did not want to be in the same apartment with both the cats and Slava, so she gradually began avoiding those gatherings.
It was difficult to say who made the first move.
It happened in August, when Zhenya’s son was staying with his aunt in the countryside and Asya had left town to attend a relative’s funeral.
Instead of jogging, Zhenya and Slava went to a bar.
From there, they went back to Zhenya’s apartment.
Was she ashamed?
Of course she was.
But there was also something vengefully pleasurable and strangely exciting about it. Zhenya had never done anything like that before, and to her surprise, she discovered that secret meetings could be almost more thrilling than Slava himself.
Slava often complained about Asya.
She was a bad housekeeper, she did not support him, she was constantly fussing over her cats…
Zhenya listened silently and remembered every word.
She cooked elaborate salads and thin Italian pizzas for Slava. She did deep cleaning in her apartment almost twice a week. She tried to remember when Slava had difficult meetings or important appointments with clients and always asked how everything had gone.
She tried to become perfect for him, secretly dreaming that one day he would come to her and stay forever.
She did not use contraception.
She remembered what Asya had told her about her husband’s infertility.
But fearing that the subject might be painful for Slava, she never let him know that she knew his secret. The first time, she told him she was taking birth-control pills.
She was not taking any pills.
When autumn came and she realized her period was three weeks late, she blamed it on stress and a long-lasting cold.
Ironically, Asya was the first person to suspect the pregnancy.
Zhenya finally went to visit her, although she felt ashamed to look her friend in the eyes. The strong smell of the cats immediately sent Zhenya running to the bathroom, where she spent most of the visit.
“Did you get food poisoning?” Asya asked. “Or maybe you’re pregnant?”
Zhenya was horrified and decided that it simply could not be true.
But that same evening she took several pregnancy tests.
Every one of them was positive.
“It’s a miracle!” she decided. “A sign that we are meant to be together.”
She spent a long time thinking about how to tell Slava the news and watched countless touching videos about pregnancy announcements. But in the end, she decided simply to tell him the truth as it was.
Zhenya was nervous. She imagined how happy he would be.
But things went very differently.
Slava’s face was like stone.
“Are you serious?” he asked. “You told me you were taking pills.”
A sticky wave of nausea rose in Zhenya’s throat.
“I must have missed one,” she squeaked.
She expected him to tell some touching story about how he had believed himself infertile for years. Then she would reply that when two people were truly meant for each other, miracles could happen.
But Slava paced tensely around the room, wringing his hands.
“You’ll get rid of it,” he finally said.
Zhenya froze.
“No!” she blurted out. “If this is because of Asya…”
“Asya has done it several times, and nothing happened to her.”
Something did not add up.
Zhenya even felt dizzy.
“What are you talking about?”
Slava punched the wall.
“I will never have children. And this is not up for discussion. My father… he has schizophrenia. My brother does too. I never told you because… well, I just didn’t. It can be inherited. Do you understand? I will never allow that to happen.”
Perhaps he had his reasons for speaking so harshly.
In another situation, Zhenya might even have understood him.
But now she pulled herself together and said:
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?” he shouted.
“I said no. I’m going to have this baby.”
She had never seen Slava so angry.
For a moment, she even thought he might hit her.
But Slava only struck the wall again and left.
He simply walked out without another word and disappeared from her life.
And because Zhenya was barely speaking to Asya anymore, she did not see Slava for a long time.
Asya found out about the pregnancy by accident when she ran into Zhenya on the street.
Of course, Zhenya should have told her earlier, but she had not been able to find the courage. She was afraid Asya would figure everything out.
“Well, that’s news!” her friend exclaimed. “And I was wondering where you disappeared to! I thought you might be pregnant back then, remember? Well, congratulations! Who’s the lucky father?”
“Oh… just someone from work,” Zhenya lied.
Strangely enough, Asya believed her.
Or pretended to.
“My condolences,” Asya said. “At our age…”
Zhenya did not know whether Asya truly thought that way or whether she was simply disguising the pain of her own childlessness.
She felt sorry for her friend, but what had made Asya go along with Slava’s wishes?
Was it really love?
Whatever love Zhenya had felt for Slava had disappeared completely on the day he had spoken those harsh words.
The baby girl was born healthy.
Zhenya knew that the illness would not necessarily show itself immediately. It was something like a ticking clock, measuring time without anyone knowing whether the bomb would ever actually explode.
But she decided to take the risk, and she never regretted her decision for even a second.
Two years later, she ran into Slava by chance while jogging.
He turned around and ran in the opposite direction.