“A tragic person of the female persuasion. Isn’t that obvious?”

“Chatterbox,” smiled Iskra. “It’s impossible to talk to you seriously.”

Zinochka knew how to divert suspicion from herself, though “to know” is a verb poorly applicable to her. “To feel” generally fit her better. Zina could feel when and how she could alleviate her friend’s stern suspicion, and acted, though according to her intuition, yet almost always unerringly.

“Can you imagine? Sasha, with his talent, will not graduate! Do you comprehend what a loss this is for all us, maybe even for the whole country! He could have become an aircraft designer. Have you seen the models he’s made?”

“Why doesn’t he want to go to a specialized aviation school?”

“Because he has ears!” Iskra snapped. “He chilled his ears when he was a kid and now the medical board won’t pass him.”

“You just know everything, don’t you,” said Zinochka, not without malice. “About the models, about his ears.”

“No, not everything.” Iskra was above such barbs. “I don’t know what we can do for Sasha. Maybe we should go to the komsomol district committee?“

“God, why the district committee?” sighed Zinochka. “Iskra, did you grow out of your bra over the summer?”

“What bra?”

“Your bra. Please don’t attempt to incinerate me with your eyes. I just want to know whether all girls grow sideways or if it’s just me who’s a freak of nature.”

Iskra wanted to get angry, but it was difficult to be angry at the placid Zinochka. And the question she asked, that only she could have possibly asked, was a question for Iskra too, since, for all her air of command, she too was sixteen. But this she could not admit even to her closest friend: this was a weakness.

“That’s no way to talk, Zinaida,” Iskra said very seriously. “No way at all for a komsomolka to talk.”

“I’m only a komsomolka for now. Someday I want to be a woman.”

“How dare you!” her friend exclaimed wrathfully. “No, did you hear that, her dream is to be a woman. Not a pilot, not a parachuter, not even a Stakhanovite, but a woman. A toy in the hands of a man!”

“A beloved toy,” smiled Zinochka. “I won’t settle for being just a toy.”

“Stop talking nonsense!” Iskra shouted. “It’s disgusting to listen to, it’s repulsive. It’s all bourgeois vulgarity, if you really want to know.”

“Well, sooner or later, we’ll have to learn all about it,” Zinochka said reasonably. “But calm down. Let’s talk about Sasha instead.”

Iskra could talk about Sasha for hours, and no one, not the most egregious gossips, could imagine that “Iskra plus Sasha equals love”. Not just because Iskra rejected love itself as an untimely occurrence, but because Sasha himself was a product of Iskra’s single-minded activity, living proof of her personal strength, perseverance, and will.

Just a year ago, Sashka Stameskin’s name would come up at every teachers’ meeting, had a place in every report, and had a permanent place on the black board set up in the school vestibule. Sashka stole coal from the school boiler room, dunked girls’ braids in inkpots, and did not get better grades than ‘very poor’ out of principle. He had almost been expelled twice, but his mother would come to school, sob and make promises, and Sashka would get a reprieve “until the next complaint”. The next complaint about the incorrigible Stameskin would come right after his mother’s visit, the whole cycle would begin again, and by the November holidays, events had reached their apogee. The whole school was churning and boiling, and Sashka was counting the days until his long-awaited freedom.

Which was when Sashka’s tranquil horizon was troubled by Iskra’s appearance. She did not appear suddenly or out of thin air, but quite thoughtfully and deliberately, for thoughtfulness and deliberation were the manifestations of strength as the antithesis of human weakness. By November break, Iskra had applied to the komsomol, memorized the charter and everything else she was supposed to memorize, but this was passive, cramming anyone could do. Iskra did not want to be “anyone”. She was special, and with the help of her mother’s exhortations and her mother’s example, she took purposeful steps towards her goal. Her goal was to be an active, restless, socially-minded person - the kind of person she had from childhood thought of with the proud word “commissar”. It wasn’t an office, it was a calling, a duty, the guiding star of her fate. And, at her first komsomol meeting, taking the first step towards her star, Iskra voluntarily shouldered the most difficult and thankless burden she could think of.

“Do not expel Sasha Stameskin,” she said, as clearly and resonantly as ever, at her first komsomol meeting. “Before my comrades of the Lenin Komsomol, I solemnly promise that Stameskin will become a good student, a good citizen, and even a komsomol member.”

Iskra got an enthusiastic round of applause, was held up as an example, and she could only regret that her mother was not there. If she had been there, if she had heard the words used to speak about her daughter, then maybe - who knows! - maybe she really would stop unbuckling her wide uniform belt with that familiar convulsive movement and shouting, shortly and furiously, the words shooting out like gunfire:

“Lie down! Skirt on your head! Now!”

The last time it had happened was two years ago, at the very beginning of seventh grade. That time, Iskra had the shakes for such a painfully long time that her mother made her drink water, held the water glass for her, and even asked her forgiveness.

“You’re crazy!” Zinochka yelled after the meeting. “You’re going to reeducate him? He’ll beat you up! Or… you know what he might do? The thing that was done to that girl, in the park, that was in the newspapers.”

Iskra smiled proudly, listening condescendingly to Zinochka’s threats. She knew perfectly well what she was doing: she was testing herself. This was the first timid trial of her personal “komsolom” qualities.

The next day, Stameskin did not show up at school, and Iskra went to his place after class. Zinochka courageously volunteered to accompany her, but Iskra nipped this attempt in the bud:

“I promised the komsomol meeting I would handle Stameskin myself. By myself, do you understand?”

She walked along the long dark corridor permeated with the sharp smell of cat, and her heart sank in fear. But never for a moment did she permit herself the thought that she could turn around and leave, could say she did not find anyone at home. She did not know how to lie, even to herself.