Dominanta

Never before had I flown to Asia alone. By then, I already had many European cities behind me. But India belonged somewhere beyond the boundaries of what felt reasonable. The part of the map where people like me simply didn’t go — least of all on their own.

The sun won.

On the second day, it began…

A sudden, overwhelming hunger hit me. I slammed on the brakes of my scooter. To my right was an Indian café. Lights glowed warmly. A live band was playing. The place was full of people.

I made up my mind. Here. I’ll eat here. I was tired of looking for somewhere that matched my expectations. It seemed such a place simply didn’t exist here. I glanced at the parking area, made a sharp turn, and pulled into an empty space.

— Do you need help?

Please, not this, I thought, turning around. A tall, bald young man was standing beside my scooter.

— I’m fine, thank you.

I tossed the words over my shoulder as I climbed off the rented machine that had been carrying me around for the past few days. But the young man had no intention of stepping back. Instead, he took hold of the rear of the scooter with both hands and, ignoring my protests, shifted it with one firm movement until the back wheel was perfectly aligned with the row of motorcycles.

— Thank you.

I said it almost absent-mindedly, without breaking my stride. I walked past him and headed inside. A typical Indian café. Checked tablecloths that looked almost dirty. A young woman singing on a makeshift stage. I took an empty table and opened the menu.

Arcan Bar, I read. The name of the place.

The hunger was almost feral. I hadn’t eaten all day and had spent hours on the road. I needed food — urgently. First, though, I had to find something edible among hundreds of things I couldn’t even identify.

Suddenly, I felt someone watching me. The same tall, bald young man was standing beside my table again.

— Are you waiting for someone? No? Then would you mind if I kept you company?

He asked politely, gesturing towards the empty chair across from me. But beneath that politeness there was a trace of irony. And something else — something elusive, with the sweetness of honey.

— Not yet.

I answered with that same hint of sweetness and watched his reaction.

He was already pulling out the chair when the meaning of my answer reached him. He paused for a brief moment.

— Ha-ha-ha.

My seafood sizzler arrived. I ate, and slowly I felt my goodwill towards the world returning. Meanwhile, people kept stopping by our table to greet my neighbour. He clearly had no shortage of company. So why had he chosen to sit at mine?

He took out a green packet, along with a few other things, and began rolling what looked like a cigarette. Seeing me watching with open curiosity, he explained:

— It’s tobacco.

He pointed to the green packet.

— And this is rolling tobacco. I hope you don’t mind?

I nodded. He flicked his lighter and lit the cigarette.

— I’m almost out.

He nodded towards the packet again. There was unmistakable concern in his voice.

— It’s hard to find here. And none of my friends from Russia are flying to Goa anytime soon.

Without a word, I picked up my phone and messaged a friend in Moscow. She replied almost immediately. Her boyfriend was flying to Goa in a couple of days. I sent her the name of the tobacco.

— I can’t promise anything. But there’s a good chance you’ll have a couple of packs of your Golden Virginia in a few days.

He stopped smoking mid-draw and looked at me intently. I hid a smile and quietly watched his reaction.

— If you ever feel like having coffee, let me know. I know a place that makes a good one.

Without ceremony, we slipped into calling each other you in the familiar form.

— It’s quieter there. We’ll actually be able to talk.

And yes, I wanted a good cup of coffee more than anything.

A few more turns. Crowds of tourists just like me. This village was called Arambol, farther north than the place where my tour operator had booked my stay.

And there we were, the two of us, sitting at a large round red table. The conversation continued.

— Yesterday was your birthday? — he asked again. — Do you happen to know what time you were born?

Something changed in him. He became noticeably more alert, studying me with renewed attention. He took out his phone and started entering something into it, while I, with the carefree openness of a traveller, kept sharing little details about myself.

— You’re a mathematician?

He repeated the word and fell silent. That piece of information clearly wasn’t what he’d been hoping to hear.

— Now I’m not even sure whether I should tell you what I do…

I looked away from the chaos of the Indian street and turned back to the bald man dressed in black. Strange. Very few men shave their heads completely when they don’t have to. He had gone still. Everything about him suggested he was genuinely uneasy.

— What is it? Don’t worry. I’m open to new things.

I meant it.

He seemed to relax. Then, with unexpected caution, he said:

— I’m a Jyotish astrologer.

Is that some kind of astrophysicist? I wondered, remembering a rather unusual date with a PhD from Silicon Valley. He was watching my reaction closely. I simply shrugged.

— I have no idea what that is.

He looked at me. Then back at his phone. Suddenly, he straightened in his chair. His eyes widened.

— Wow…

A week later, I caught myself thinking that I was beginning to like India. Somehow, the dust had disappeared. My eyes no longer noticed the dirt. The roughness of the place had quietly become something complete, something natural in its simplicity. What had once seemed like pure disorder was beginning to reveal its own hidden logic — as though life here followed laws that existed all along, and I simply hadn’t learned to see them yet.

I remembered the things I’d once said about this country without ever having set foot in it. Perhaps fools are forgiven their mistakes when they recognise them with an open heart. As for the snob… a large cockroach may run through his house once or twice. And if understanding still refuses to arrive, the procession of unexpected visitors will simply continue.

It was a gift. India itself — and everything that had been waiting there for me.

After returning to Moscow, I could feel that something irreversible had happened. But I gave myself time to look around.

Had everything that happened to me in Goa been a dream? No. It was my life in Moscow that now felt like one. Dull. Cold. A box tied with a red ribbon sat on the bedside table.

A payoff.

I finished the book I had bought at the airport before my flight. It was full of wise words about loving yourself, loving God, loving other people, and the art of holding all of those things together.

I took out the candle I had brought back from India, poured into an unusual clay vessel. Its flame was large and full of life. I switched off the lights in the apartment and, for the first time in my life, sat down to meditate. When I opened my eyes, the very first thing I did was reach for a notebook and a black gel pen.

Everything had already been decided.

Was I afraid? Refusing to give that thought any room in my mind, I crushed the feeling beneath the imagined heel of a sharp, mirror-polished stiletto.

That evening, I began a conversation with the man who was beside me at the time. Or perhaps we were only pretending that he was. He heard my decision — I was leaving him.

And he smiled sooner than he should have.

The next day, I walked into the apartment. And there he was, leaning over the bed. My notebook was in his hands. The very one marked with black ink. The one no one was ever meant to see. Hmm… I watched the scene in silence. Then, all at once, he looked up at me and almost shouted:

— You’re going to India?!

Nothing remained of yesterday’s cheerfulness. His face had fallen. He seemed to have withered somehow, his whole posture collapsing inward. Strange, I thought. Does that really change anything? But his reaction spoke for itself.

— Yes, — I answered calmly.

I wanted neither victory nor war.

I The Magician

What lay ahead was something no school lesson in survival could ever have prepared us for. I smiled to myself as memories of those years returned.

A global pandemic. A “hazy honeymoon” in Moscow. An escape to St Petersburg. A return to the capital. The summit of the Black Pyramid at sunrise on the first of January. Remote work that kept me from losing my mind along with the rest of the world. Lockdown in South America. And a quiet mountain village above Yalta. Waking up every day to the sight of Ai-Petri.

I took a deep breath, winced, and thought of my relationship with the Jewish man. As it turned out, there was much more to him than I had once imagined. Never toy with instinct.

How did I find out? I had a dream. The kind of dream after which reality becomes the illusion. For several days, you look at familiar things as though you’re seeing them for the very first time.

Then come the direct questions. And then the illusion shatters, while reality turns into the nightmare.

I blinked, pulling myself away from the memories. And smiled a curious smile — one that held more understanding than anything else. I was sitting on a rooftop in one of the most fascinating cities on Earth.

Istanbul.

The sound of the evening adhan echoed from one mosque to another. The voices rebounded from walls of stone and brick. Invisible currents rose into the air. People sank to their knees. Foreheads touched the earth. The city resonated like a musical box from an Eastern fairy tale.

I’d been lucky with my Airbnb. Within a few hours, I had gone from being a guest to being a friend. They showed me the Istanbul tourists never see. I found myself at an auction where a sketch by Aivazovsky was about to be sold. I spent the night inside a historic building in the heart of the city. I danced beneath a soaring vaulted dome with friends I’d only just met.

And now, before me, stretched the magnificent panorama of an ancient city in its most beautiful light — the golden hour.

Or Constantinople?

My hair danced in the wind. My eyes were fixed on the distance. Slightly narrowed. I love studying details from far away.

Wind or… changes?

A strange inner stillness had been surrounding me since the day before. It felt familiar, though I hadn’t yet understood why. My gaze drifted between the horizon and somewhere deep within myself.

The pain of what I had realised was so overwhelming that the day before I had walked across half of Istanbul without lifting my eyes once. Trying to remember what I had passed along the way was pointless. I hadn’t seen a thing.

When I had finally reached the end of my strength, a taxi appeared somewhere in the streets of the old city. Then the front door closed behind me. I shut myself in my room, and for the first time in my life, I screamed without a sound, without a single sob. I remember my cheeks were wet. I don’t remember the tears.

The walls were closing in. The ceiling had disappeared. My fingers were trembling. I rolled from my back onto my stomach. Bit into the blanket. Smothered every sound in the pillow.

Pain. A whisper. A soundless: I was wrong.

Who was I saying it to? Who was listening?

And yet, someone was unmistakably there.

I could feel it.

The golden disc of the sun gently touched the skyline. The wooden door to the rooftop creaked open, and two heads appeared above the stairs. My host and his friend joined me. Both were about my age.

They had noticed the change in me. I’d grown quiet. Thoughtful. They behaved like true gentlemen, never asking the questions that didn’t need asking. And wherever I went, I could feel their quiet support.

— Oksana, thank you. Because of you, we remembered this rooftop again.

One of them handed me a mug of hot tea. They had come up at exactly the right moment. The most beautiful part of the evening was about to begin.

I smiled. How could anyone forget a treasure like this?

The pain hadn’t gone anywhere. There was simply tea beside me now, kind people, and the enchanting music of Istanbul.

0 The Fool

A few more flights. A few more cities. And at last, I found myself in India. What unfolded there became such a defining chapter of my life that it grew into a book of its own — perhaps even more than one.

At that time, there was a master beside me. A man whose role was to teach me. Or rather, to help me remember what I was meant to remember.

Candlelight. Half-darkness. A fine mist hanging in the room. For days, for hours, I trained myself to master the sensations. Then he began showing me practices that are difficult to write about. The moment you do, the story either turns into a mystical thriller or a dark fairy tale. Tantra without the marketing. India beyond the tourist trail. Dangerous.

Will you step inside?

I did. Not only did I step inside — I plunged in headfirst and surrendered to it completely. India gave me far more than I had ever asked for. And even that more cannot compare with what I was initiated into.

The Key of All Doors.

But as so often happens, everything has its other side. Each of us has a shadow. And the deeper a person is, the more fascinating — and more dangerous — that darkness becomes. One day, in the middle of a conversation, the master suddenly said:

— You’re sub.

Excuse me?

How else could someone with a BDSM past have reacted? And how else could I have understood his words when all I knew came from a few films and whatever images I’d happened to see online?

No one knew.

At first, I didn’t even understand what I’d heard. Then I did. And my face changed instantly. I stood up. Without a word. My body was already moving towards the door. It was as though an invisible boundary had appeared around me. And he could not cross that line.

No one could.

My mind was trying to catch up with what had just happened. How could someone invade another person’s space with such complete disregard? How could anyone say something like that? I felt offended. And I was angry.

How dare he…

I wanted to leave. I felt insulted and, for some reason, frightened at the same time. He stood up as well.

And then, quite calmly, he said:

— Feels like I have to apologise.

I didn’t answer. And I left. At the time, all I wanted was to prove that he was wrong. I was convinced he was talking complete nonsense.

Years later, that conversation began to look different.

The façade of spiritual practice?

Simple physiology?

Or something elusive, somewhere in between.

Find that middle…

Part II

Prologue

Night. Red light. A vast, unfurnished room. A silk shawl, deep purple, softly brushes against my skin. My naked body spins slowly around its own axis. Music fills my headphones.

Loneliness?

Ha… ha… ha…

Closed eyes — as soon as you stop trying to look, you begin to see.

I allowed myself to dance. A dizzying, elemental dance that could never be performed for anyone else. The kind that becomes possible only after the last observer disappears.

I treasure these moments…

No one is watching.

But that’s never true.

Someone is always watching…

And now, there was no witness left in the room except the flames of the candles and the sound of my own breathing.

I spun faster and faster. As though I were remembering something long forgotten. No. Not remembering. Returning to it without questions, without thoughts, without desire.

The body remembers what the mind buried long ago under layers of good decisions, common sense, and discipline. It remembers first. It remembers without words. And sometimes a single movement is enough to shatter years of carefully guarded silence.

One turn. Then another. The silk glided over my shoulders.

For a moment, it felt as though the years had vanished. As though there had never been any distance between the woman I was now and the one I had once been. She had never gone anywhere.

She had simply been waiting.

How long had it been since I had fired without a weapon.

Mistaking courtesy for surrender is an expensive mistake.

The music kept playing. The candles burned with quiet delight, and the red light rested on my skin like something almost alive. I ran my fingers across my phone, about to turn the volume down, when I felt that familiar shift again — as though an invisible layer of reality had silently turned.

Someone’s hand was already resting on the next page.

Just then, a message appeared.

— When are you flying to Goa?

You never get used to something like that, even when it is your own life.

— On the full moon.

Before I returned to the dance, I caught his reply.

— A wise choice.

IV The Emperor

For the first time in all the years I had known India, I finally began to understand the energy of that place.

Not to go where you shouldn’t — even if you’re invited, even if they insist. Not to look where your eyes have no business wandering — even if curiosity pulls you in. Not to linger where you are meant to keep walking — even if you share a past with what lies behind you.

I was working on my second book and getting ready to leave before the monsoon season. Everything had been settled well in advance. The tickets. The timing. The plans. Then, without warning, the itinerary we had agreed on months earlier began to fall apart before my eyes.

First came the outbreak of war in the Middle East. Then several days of suspended decisions. And suddenly, everything was there, distilled into just a few lines.