Henpecked. Dating story no. 28

Sometimes, matching people with their ideal partners, you catch yourself wondering what exactly is so ideal about it. There are features of such relationships you would not wish on your worst enemy. And yet the two people involved are happy and keep playing their game with relish, because it answers everything they are asking for. Couples like this are far less rare than they seem; more than that, they walk into our favourite films almost as archetypes and give them a flavour of their own. You meet them in your own stairwell, among your friends, on the underground or in a shopping centre. They are unusual, at times comical, but more reliable and more stable than many a glossy, glamorous pair.

We are used to laughing at henpecked husbands, and men are often terrified of becoming one. On the other hand, a counsellor I know calls himself henpecked with some pride and is convinced that the secret of family happiness is for both partners to do a little more than is asked of them. For many people, my colleague included, this is a conscious decision, rewarded with calm and harmony at home. And for certain personality types it is close to their most natural state, one in which both are happy, whatever society may think of it.

That is roughly how I was talking myself round as I prepared for my interview with Nadya. Nadya — Nadezhda Petrovna, to be exact — ran a nursery school and was a legend in certain circles. Strong-willed, forceful and strict, often uncompromising, demanding and rather radical, and at the same time ready to give away her last pair of trousers for the good of the toddlers in her care. She was feared in several higher offices, her teachers trembled under her gaze, most of the parents worshipped her. She was a short, slender, outwardly even fragile brunette with short hair and a sharp, appraising look. She said little about her previous relationships and did not particularly need new ones, but growing old alone was definitely not part of her plan, so, having thoroughly researched the marriage-agency market and weighed up all the pros and cons, she settled on us.

Seva, her match by personality type, was kindness and Christian forbearance incarnate. Officially his job title was sous-chef at one of the cosier restaurants on the edge of town. In practice he did everything nobody else had hands for, from dicing vegetables to planning the menu and laying it out in Photoshop. Very gentle and yielding, afraid of disturbing anyone or getting in anyone's way, always smiling, naive, with the faithful, sorrowful eyes of a St Bernard. So caring that even arranging the interview took longer than usual, because what if it were inconvenient for me, what if I had no time — any hour and any conditions would suit him. He was ready to accept absolutely any woman; he simply wanted very much to look after someone, to cook for someone and to have a home, to run after little children and to "give someone a massage while we watch some film or other". In short, the living dream of any woman — and utterly certain that no woman would even look at him, because he was not good enough.

Seva was ready for anything; Nadya needed time to agree to someone so "neither fish nor fowl". She put it more gently, of course: she needed a proper man, not one who would lie about on the sofa. Knowing Seva's personality type, I assured her with a clear conscience that in his case the sofa would come to know the brush and the vacuum cleaner and, possibly, the crumbs of a pie that Nadya herself would eat — but simply sitting on it was something Seva was quite incapable of.

They spoke on the phone and, after long attempts to let each other choose the venue, Nadya quite by chance arranged to meet him at the very restaurant where he worked. Seva was mortified, started apologising, stumbling and mumbling something, out of which Nadya understood only that any restaurant would do except that one.

— "But the food there is the best!" Nadya objected, cutting the flow of apologies short.

— "Thank you," Seva said, modestly lowering his eyes, "we do our best..."

— "Oh!" Nadya belatedly remembered where Seva worked and hastily suggested another place. Seva let out a sigh of enormous relief.

They met in the centre, in a coffee house that served a Melange just like in Vienna. Nadya walked in exactly at the appointed time. Seva only just made it, because fate seemed to have turned against him: the neighbours' poodle, a dog named Rockefeller, left a mess on Seva's doormat, the bus pulled away from under his nose and the case for his phone tore — luckily he noticed quite quickly and managed to "retrace his steps" almost all the way back to the stop and pick up the phone, which a local tramp already had his eye on. In the coffee house a waitress nearly ran into him. Seva caught the empty latte glass with a practised movement and smiled at the startled girl almost apologetically, after which he worked out with remarkable accuracy which of all the women there was Nadya. They greeted each other very stiffly, ordered a Melange only because the place was famous for it, and a strudel each. And then Seva could bear it no longer.

— "Who cooks a strudel like that!" exploded Seva, outwardly unruffled until then despite all his misfortunes. "As if nobody could tell almonds from walnuts! And you cut the apples smaller so they bake through more softly!"

Nadya froze with her spoon in mid-air, trying hard to work out whether her strudel had almonds in it or walnuts. By then Seva had already had time to panic that such a beautiful woman would simply walk out on him after his fussing, and was frantically working out how to save the situation. He had already "ruined" more than one date with misplaced apologies, so this time he took the strategic decision to act differently.

— "Nadya, do you know how they used to test the dough for a strudel?"

— "How?"

— "With newspapers. You had to be able to read a newspaper through the dough..."

Nadezhda Petrovna gasped. Seva took it as a good sign, and suddenly something carried him away. Words, tall tales, jokes and compliments poured out of him in a stream, wrapped Nadezhda Petrovna in sweet treacle, confused her and closed around her like the coils of a boa constrictor. Before long she no longer took in the separate words, but he was clearly saying something nice. Nadezhda smiled just in case, twisted a strand of hair and tried to flirt. Trying to stop the flow looked hopeless from the start, so she relaxed and let it carry her away. Sometimes it is precisely the absence of resistance that guarantees a pleasant evening.

Encouraged by such a successful start, Seva plucked up courage and suggested a second date. Nadezhda had not yet come back to her senses and unexpectedly agreed even to be collected from work. Seva was delighted to learn that she worked at a nursery school: it meant she was the kindest person imaginable, and altogether... The second flood of compliments was shorter than the first, but no less warm and cosy.

The relationship developed like a fairy tale. Seva came to the nursery, played with the children, worked miracles of care and attentiveness, brought pies and cakes of his own baking, held doors open for Nadenka and gave up his seat to her, helped her into her coat and even took on small repairs. Nadya watched in astonishment at how gallantly he dealt with it all before she could so much as reach out to do something herself. And Seva did it so unobtrusively, in passing, that Nadya never even had time to protest that he was leaving her nothing to do. Now she thought, sometimes with laughter and sometimes with genuine annoyance, of how, while all the other women were letting a man do a man's work, she had stubbornly done everything in the world herself.

Seva, for his part, made it plain in everything he did how afraid he was of losing Nadenka, of Nadenka suddenly deciding she had no use for him at all. He tried to guess her every wish, stressed at every turn that she was always right, dropped everything to come to her at any hour, cooked, washed up, took out the rubbish... and at the slightest excuse would start sighing sadly that he was not quick enough, not decisive enough, not forceful or sharp enough, and so on. And Nadezhda Petrovna, for all her outward fragility and elegance, would immediately throw herself onto the barricades for her dear Seva. He was so tender, after all; he would never manage without her.

It all felt logical and self-evident. He looked after her, and she looked after him. Sometimes that care was rather too much; the impression was that Seva smothered her with it, while he himself kept looking as helpless as a newly hatched chick. But Nadezhda Petrovna was no stranger to command — two or three sharp remarks and she brought Seva back to his senses and into shape in a moment.

It all felt logical and self-evident. He looked after her, and she looked after him. Sometimes that care was rather too much; the impression was that Seva smothered her with it, while he himself kept looking as helpless as a newly hatched chick. But Nadezhda Petrovna was no stranger to command — two or three sharp remarks and she brought Seva back to his senses and into shape in a moment.

Seva might never have realised that such an arrangement was something to complain about, but his behaviour at work caused a stir. The cooks and the waiters noticed at once that sociable, almost never-say-no Seva was disappearing somewhere, was terrified of being late and phoned someone at a set hour every day. The seasoned, experienced men worked out immediately what was going on and did not even mind explaining it to Seva. You are done for, mate. You have got yourself a woman, and now your life will never be your own again.

— "But I love my Nadenka..." Seva ventured timidly.

— "Yes, yes, that is how it looks at the start," his colleagues confirmed, "and then there is no room left for you on the bathroom shelf because of all her creams and oils, the fridge is packed with vegetables, soya yoghurts and other contraptions so there is nowhere to chill a beer, and you are expected to do the laundry, the washing-up and the bins... Bang, and you are not a man any more!"

Seva did not argue. He dimly understood that he was a long way from the real man his colleagues were talking about — and that he did not need to be one. He was no macho who could bang his fist on the table, send someone packing or demand to be waited on. In truth, even now he was wary of objecting, so he simply sat there smiling guiltily: yes, that is the useless sort I am...

— "And it only gets worse!" His reaction was read as agreement and as permission to go on. "First they only ask you to say who you have been with, then you also have to be home by ten in the evening, and then they stop letting you see your mates at all, because supposedly you come back from them drunk!"

Seva looked in fright at his beer bottle, nearly drained, then at the clock, and hurriedly jumped up out of his armchair.

— "Lads, it has been great, but my Nadenka is waiting for me!"

Laughter followed him out, along with calls to stay and shouts that he was a "sucker", a "fool" and "henpecked". He heard it more than once afterwards, from friends and from strangers alike. Yes, Nadya really could be stern at times, she earned more and she had less time for the house. When they dared to have a child together, it was Seva who danced around the baby with a bottle, warmed his tummy when he had wind and later ran about with him in the yard.

Sometimes he did not like it, he suffered, he was afraid of Nadya and frightened himself with horrors of his own making. At such moments what he wanted most was to get on a direct flight to Paris somewhere and burn his passport on arrival so that he could not be sent back. Or at least to feel free, drinking cheap beer out of a can in a park with old friends.

It never went further than thoughts, though: happiness does not come "just like that", without work. And children, a family — that is happiness. And however hard he had to work for them, Seva was ready. Ready to work, to sacrifice and to suffer, as long as the family was all right. And it was precisely in that work and that suffering that he was, strangely enough, absolutely happy, quite unable to imagine himself without them. Well, suppose he did fly off to his Paris — and then what? Who needs him there? Who would he look after there? And, to be entirely honest, where would he be without his Nadenka, with her confidence, her decisiveness and her perfectly clear knowledge of what has to be done? Good heavens, unthinkable!