The Kukotsky Enigma: A Novel

2

THE NEXT SUNDAY ZHENYA WAS NOT ABLE TO COME: THAT evening, her husband had taken her to the maternity hospital. During the same Sunday after-dinner hours when Zhenya normally would be combing and drying Elena’s gray and no longer wavy hair, her cervix dilated and the fetus began to be pushed out: the baby’s head crowned. They—Zhenya and the baby—still constituted a single whole. The rise and fall of their muscle spasms were coordinated, but the moment was already approaching when the baby would begin to undertake its first independent movements . . .

When she could no longer stand the pain, Zhenya screamed, and the pain receded, then rolled in again. “If Granddad were alive, he would probably do something so that it wasn’t so painful . . .” she thought in those moments when she was capable of thought. This was heavy collaborative work—for her, the child, and the midwife, whose face she completely forgot. What did remain in her memory, however, was her commanding and tender voice: “breathe deeper . . . put your hands on your chest . . . count to ten . . . don’t tense up . . . now shout . . . shout . . . good . . .”

It was the most imperfect of all natural mechanisms of giving birth—human childbirth. No other animal suffered as much. The pain, the duration, and sometimes the danger for the health of the mother were signs of human beings’ special status in this world. The two-legged, straight-backed, forward-looking, freehanded, and sole creature in the world conscious of the connection between conception and childbirth, between corporeal love and that other variety, known only to human beings. The price of walking straight up, some thought. Recompense for original sin, claimed others.

The child had already bent its head so that the posterior fontanel faced forward, turned it slightly, and, straightening its head, entered the pubic arch. The pain was so unbearable that Zhenya’s world went black.

The midwife slapped her, saying, “Hey, Mommy! Everything’s fine . . . Just a little bit longer,” while commenting to someone on the side, “Left occiput anterior position.”

Tears and sweat streamed over Zhenya’s face. The head tore through. He was already turning his shoulder, and the midwife, grabbing the wet, elongated head with both hands, coaxed the front shoulder forward . . .