out. Then he put his pants back on his wet body. He wanted to move close to her, kiss her, and spit to the side in disdain like they do in the movies, but instead he picked up his bag of shrimp and started walking away.
Up above, in the shrubbery, was a stone gazebo. It seemed that nobody was there. Serge turned around. For a long time they stared unblinkingly into each other’s eyes. Then he took her by her hand and pulled her along a steep trail. But climbing up like that wasn't comfortable for either of them, so they switched places, and Serge helped Janna up, supporting her by her hand and reveling in this presumptuousness. Soon they reached the stone terrace. The gazebo was constructed in the standard post-war style. Round columns supported the massive roof. The only thing lacking was an alabaster statue of some horn player or a girl with a bowl. Instead, there was a different, live girl. She sat in the depths of the gazebo, on a pile of straw from God knows where, and next to her sat a guy who looked like a gnome in the grass. Serge went up to the edge of the gazebo and stared down into the dark expanse, where below, almost invisibly, hissed the sea. A distant ship flickered its lights, pointing out where the water ended and where the sky began.
Janna approached Serge, resting her elbows on the fence, which was thick as a boa. In the dark, her shape seemed timid and even tender, although, he certainly hadn't noticed any tenderness coming from her the whole day. She abashedly looked at the ends of her fingers. She clenched them together as if she were asking for forgiveness for their unwarranted interruption of the sentimental couple below. Serge sensed a timid request to leave. But he knew he wouldn't leave. Now, he felt a power over those bodies hiding in the shadows. He felt a power over Janna, remembering how they reached the gazebo, how he touched her firm legs with his head, and how carefully and quickly she planted her feet on the sharp stones of the trail. She hadn't left or deserted him. Recalling this, he experienced a new sense of security. How the hell could they have known that this place was occupied? After all, there was no sign.
The straw rustled. Serge turned around, pulled a cigarette from his pocket, and asked for a light. Darkness responded—no matches.
“Well, I guess I’ll have to use my own then,” Serge replied like a high school sophomore. He took out his box of matches and struck one, lighting up the gazebo. On the straw sat two offspring of humanity: a man of about forty, with a large belly and the pitiful countenance of one of Chekhov’s officials, and a woman of about the same age. She quickly shuffled her skirt up to her knees, moving farther off into the shadows. The match’s flame exposed those guilty eyes, and it seemed the couple would get down on their knees and pray: “We are sinners, father. Sinners. May our souls repose …” Janna sputtered with laughter. Serge made a supercilious grimace and lit his cigarette. He wanted to shout, “Get out of here you shameless! …” But turning to Janna, he took hold of her elbow, gently pulled her close to him, saying: “Let’s leave them.” They took a few steps before noticing two silhouettes slithering through the shadows, abandoning the solemn spot of straw.
“Well isn’t that nice of them,” Serge said, sitting down on the warm straw, leaning up against a column. Janna mirrored his actions.
“Give me a cigarette!” The word “please” was clearly not part of Janna’s vocabulary.
Serge handed her the pack. While Janna tapped her cigarette, Serge watched the match burn his fingers; finally Janna lit it up:
“Well that was amusing, wasn’t it?”
“Yep. We’ve been amusing others all day. Now it’s their turn to amuse us.”
“So you were watching how others were staring at us, getting a kick out of our antics? I was hoping that you were only staring at my legs!”
“I won’t hide the fact that I was