Илай Колесников - Earlyborn

The novel Earlyborn is translated from Russian into English by Lazutkina Aleksandra.

She was charming. As early in the winter morning things happen, and white ghosts of blizzard shine through the window, so did she appear all of a sudden every time, at the crack of dawn, and dazzled everyone with her beauty. She was thought to be named either Irochka or Mashenka, but never was it decided. A chief physician of the maternity hospital once said, coming by, “Wow, whom do we have here, at the crack of dawn, early in the morning??” And here our heroine got her name. She enjoyed sitting by the window, observing teeny-weeny people shuttle about at the footing of the Eiffel Tower. She loved to look after them, inventing diverse stories about who they were. For one:

Definitely, this small person in a short red fur coat with a bag over his shoulder is Ded Moroz 1 1 An old man who have magic powers. Russian Santa Clause. . Arguably, he came here, in France, from Italy, where he was said to be the most successful and highly paid Ded Moroz of the entire town. Arguably, wandering over there, somewhere under the lights of the Eiffel Tower, he made out its point and realizes his goal: to find a new dream. Arguably, that Italian dream was ruined, yet probably it came true—was reached. Arguably, there, in Italy, not only did our Ded Moroz just work but, perhaps, he saved up money for something. And he had become the best, as his job was exactly for his liking. Arguably, there, in Italy he was saving up money for his new yacht, craving to get it as soon as possible and sail away somewhere very far from here… Say, to Argentina. What for to act on a small scale? So, our Ded Moroz, we name him Luisian (for how can it happen that Ded Moroz has no name?), was saving up money to buy a yacht to head for Argentina. Why did he do so? Well, all that he wanted to become a cowherd of the famed Chianina cows and bulls, roaming around them and singing songs.

«Why is he in need of yacht, then?»

«Wait a min-ute!»

He needed a yacht in case some furious drunken bull… Whoops! indeed I meant “a drunken chief of bulls”… chased him, he would not lose his courage and shout, “Help me, kind people, lend a hand, give bread and salt or toss a coin!”—yet he would jump once, twice, shot out the tongue to one side, hop-hop, and sail homeward. But did our Italian Ded Moroz earn enough money to buy his long-awaited car (for we have started talking about him)? Yes, he did. Moreover, he had some coins in his pocket so that he could buy a bun and a cup of coffee from a salesman, when he was sitting in his brand-new yacht, and then, savour it, looking at all the hustle and bustle around him, and find that he had already obtained great success in life. Did he, Luisian, manage to get to Argentina, in that case? You have posed the right question, dear friends. He arrived in Argentina and did not blink. On the first day he argued with a chief, yet the consequence was not that in which the chef kicked him away from the island, conversely, he was chosen the new boss of cows and bulls; an old chef was sent back on his way, what is more, he was stupid to the extent that he did not have a boat with him. Wait! my kettle has boiled over!

That is that. Why, if everything was all right there, in Argentina, with bulls, did Luisian not look terribly content and happy here, in France? The case was next, dear friends, and I earnestly recommend you to listen to the case.

One day coming out of his ranch on a regular morning after a month had passed since he arrived on the island (he put cows out to pasture not at the continent itself, but at the nearby island, for he was paid more there with fewer cows), Luisian started marvelling at Argentina’s sunrise. It must be said that Luisian had rather good taste, and he even drew paintings in his childhood, wrote poems in his youth and during all the time before he became the best Italian Ded Moroz on call. The sunrise was this. If in summer you collected roughly ten thousand coins which are now in circulation in your country and at the full moon, midnight, got out of your house window on the rope or by a helicopter (it depends on the height of your house or a level of building you live on), and then bought a ticket to Moscow at the station, where (in Moscow) you moved some 186 miles straight away to my summer house, and after that (the final step) travelled across time to 4 August 2020, you would see exactly this dawn. However, what am I? I could say this more easily! It was that sunrise which was ten-eleven years of age! Again it isn’t that which I wanted to say… So, when Luisian saw quite a beautiful for his sense of humour and jacket sunrise, he said in Spanish, “Ah me!” It was that beginning of the story that was rather surprising, so that it could amaze even South American fur seals, although they cannot wonder. Anyway, that is all not awfully important! For us merely Luisian’s happiness from the real Argentinian dawn he saw is significant, and he was so happy that he desired to become a photographer.

Unexpected development, is it not? So be it, Luisian as any Best retired Ded Moroz on call, had a very strong love for unexpected turns of events. For this reason Luisian had quite an interesting and curious (everything is at your disposal, Luisian!) talk where the following was discussed: “Is it possible for an untrained person to fly to the Moon, but why necessarily to the moon if Costa Rica is a good place to start with?” This thought dawned on Luisian as a spring thunder blast. It was a deal. Luisian and a tipsy chef of Indian buffalos left their bulls to their fate that very minute and set out for an Argentinian market to buy a very old caravan. The one, you know, which can be usually seen in romantic films where you certainly need to shed a tear and a young couple is going to the South. Such motion pictures are often filmed in Brazil. Well, so is true for Argentina, thus friends managed to buy it for quite a sum of money. It was that very evening when the purchaser of Luisian’s yacht—by means of which Luisian had arrived here—was found, yet what on earth am I telling you? How, by your favour, would Luisian come back home? Basically, he left his idea to sell the boat, just like he left the purchaser who had quite a sum of money for Argentina in hands, and, moreover, Luisian got slightly angry, took his yacht, and sailed away. Huh! And why did they buy that caravan? Once Luisian made a circle and came back to the place where he wished the purchaser goodbye, but there was no one there. That was splendid. It turns out, Luisian went away to take a test shot with his camera (for his desire to be a photographer was not in vain, right? All the photographers without any exception are rather weird people. I tell you that for sure as I am a photographer myself :)), and he got a pretty nice picture. So he did his best, justly it is he who was the chief Ded Moroz, though retired. And what? Every person can retire. What’s resignation in general? That is merely the rank which was given to those who worked harder than their colleagues did; they grasped that a great move forward was needed. The more so since Luisian quit his job. Anyway, they went to Costa Rica. Yet we still do not know how and why Luisian got to France and where his beloved yacht was now. Never mind, I will answer all your questions. They would pull the yacht behind their caravan: they had found a platform with castors and put up scaffolding at which they placed the boat.

But now they for some reason were not driving. Why? They mended the caravan. Damn all impostors who sell goods and do not know a thing about prices of broken machines! If they fixed high prices, it would be clearly seen that the car is worn out and you should not buy it… But they are so silly and insecure and there is no drop of Jewish in them! They fix the low price and suppose, “Here is a dignified family of indigenous Argentines who decided to say goodbye to their loyal friend and give him a chance to work for the benefit of others.” Naturally! They gave machines a chance to work for others! It does not matter, as Luisian at long last knew that his father lived in France.

And here is the denouement, my dear friends, is it not? Nothing of the kind. Not yet, seemingly. But all right. So his father lived in France (after all, Luisian arrived to a decision to work as a Ded Moroz only on account of looking for his father when going to various houses. And then he could imagine a simpler and more achievable goal, the one which would not do harm neither him nor the deed—he sparkled with his eyes much). While the tipsy chief and he were repairing a dead carburetor, Luisian suddenly learned in an informal conversation where his father was. “Yet why did his father leave him?” you ask again. And that is a good question once more! You are like the tax inspectorate or… What am I, however? His father simply did not know that he had a son since his future bride did not reveal the details upon parting. But he, he was calmly sitting there, under his caravan somewhere in Argentina or already Brazil, and mending the carburetor when his passport, where the age of twenty-five is filled in fell out of his front shirt pocket. Why, then, the chef of drunken bulls was aware of his father? Happy coincidence? Is it a fairy tale? No, no! Simply, everything is simple. That boss of drunken bulls used to live in one provincial town in France with a mayor. That mayor was Luisian’s father. They arrived in Costa Rica with no trouble and bowed to each other. Luisian gifted his camera to the chief, and the chief gave him the keys to the caravan. The chef did not step back, for he loved to control the animals and settled down in Costa Rica where he became a manager of the crocodile farm. :) What a human! Dauntless! Luisian sailed back home selling the caravan to one local Costa Rican, which made him a bit rich to buy some fuel. And that was he now, in Paris, France, walking… He was wearing a heel-length fur coat, as he decided to call to mind the old days feeling sad because there was no money for a ticket, and his father was due to leave his provincial town to reign in some South French colony where it was hot, yet was no connection… Daybreak caught Earlyborn at the window of an ancient house, pondering about that tiny human at the footing of the Eiffel Tower.

She went to the kitchen and brewed a second portion of excellent Dominican coffee. A clock with croissants, which did fit the interior, where a true French lady dwelled, said just the beginning of five, well okay, six in the morning. Meanwhile Ded Morozs were long walking in the streets… Or had it only seemed to be so to our heroine? What was she thinking about when sitting by her window at that jolly time? What did gnaw away at her thoughts, at her, who looked as the one who had everything? What did the solitary woman at the zenith of her power need if a flat with a balcony in front of the Eiffel Tower was at her service? Not to mention that it was on the sixth floor… Out of the eight available. I guess that is a rhetorical question and I believe in absence of necessity for me to put in italics the world “solitary” in one of the sentences above. Or is it worth doing it? What for? She went to the kitchen and brewed a cup of excellent Dominican coffee… She sat at the bar counter, took a whole saucer of ripe wild strawberries and got down to business—started to mix coffee with berries. She turned Russian, she was (under no circumstances will you think of her age) twenty five years old. She was born in Irkutsk, in the family of one Soviet military man and, as it befits, she had lived in a military town for all her childhood.