They Let Us Go at Nine

reading time: 3 min.
They Let Us Go

June 26, 1993
Saturday
9:00 PM

They let us go at nine in the evening. I had come back to a state that allowed me to move under my own power. Borscht churned in my stomach, the borscht they had fed us at the «Terem». My alcohol-killed neocortex came back to life, the hum in my head giving way to questions: «where is the exit? which way? what is this? a door… the exit... the street… a streetlamp…».

I stepped out of the restaurant, caught my breath, leaning against the doorframe.

Zhorik tumbled out after me with a vastness of plans: The night is full of fire. We’ll drink hard, we’ll burn it down like nobody’s business, we’ll light fires over the city like big boys! We’ve earned it! Agreements have been reached with debauched Komsomol girls, we’re off to a den of culture. There we consume alcohol and, on an accelerated program, perform the marriage ritual, as the classic poet bequeathed! In a circle of nervous girls, in the sharp company of ladies, we shall turn the comedy of life into a dream-farce.

Zhorka finished off his decadent speech with a flourish. Stretched an arm out and, chopping the air in measured strokes, declaimed:

Whirlwind, strike the Lyre,
Lyre, howl like a wolf,
Chaos ever wider, wider,
Lord! Grant them rest.

Finished declaiming, Zhorik ran his eyes over my unsteady figure and grew disappointed:

 

— Eh, student. You’re completely limp. Fine, let’s go home. Sleep it off, we’ll see in the morning. We’ll talk the Komsomol girls into a rain check.

My mind brightened. Sleep!!!

I think I fell asleep before we got home. Passed out in the back seat of the taxi. Don’t remember the details. What lingered in my mind was the nauseating smell of exhaust and Zhorik’s question from the front seat:

— Student, can you drive?

Don’t remember my answer. Probably reported that my dad had a Moskvich, and the interior didn’t stink. That I could drive. Never got a license. No time for it… And no real need…

Notes

The Neocortex

The neocortex is an evolutionarily young part of the mammalian brain's cortex, most developed in humans. It consists of six layers of neurons and handles higher functions: perception, speech, abstract thought, and planning. In humans, it makes up 76% of brain volume. Under alcohol intoxication, its functions are temporarily suppressed, disrupting thought and self-control.
Igor Severyanin: Overture

This text is a fragment of Igor Severyanin's poem "Pineapples in Champagne," written in 1915. The work captures an atmosphere of unrestrained merriment and extravagant decadence, reflecting the aesthetics of Russia's Silver Age. Its lines pulse with the dynamism of the modern world, a passion for life, and a hunger for vivid sensation.
Konstantin Vaginov: "Whirlwind, Strike the Lyre"

Konstantin Vaginov was a Silver Age poet and prose writer, known for modernist novels and poems about Petersburg. In 1921 he joined the "Guild of Poets," and later took part in an OBERIU evening. His work, steeped in motifs of chaos and decay, only became widely known after his death. Interest in Vaginov revived in the 1990s thanks to reissues of his work.

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