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a child. I don't know what to do. I don't know who the father
.
"
IS.
"How do you mean-you don't know who the father is?"
"I'm twenty-four," Klavdia replied. "In the spring I de–
cided to become a woman and now I am one."
Akim was at a loss for further questions.
"I was absorbed not by love, but by myself and my own
feelings." Klavdia continued. "I picked different men in order
to get to know everything. I didn't want to get pregnant. Sex is
a joy in itself and I didn't think of a child. But I am pregnant
and I've decided not to have an abortion."
"And you don't know who the man is?"
"I'm not certain who it is. But that isn't important. I'm a
mother now. I'll manage somehow and the state will help me.
And as for morality, I just don't know what it is. It doesn't make
sense to me any more. Or rather, I've got my own morality. I
can only answer for myself and through myself. What's immoral
about giving yourself to a man? I know exactly what I want and
I don't have to answer to anybody.
Do
I know the man, you ask.
I don't want to involve him. A husband's all right when you
really need him and when he's not tied in any way. I don't want
a fellow who just walks round the house in his slippers and gives
me kids. People will help me out-I believe in people. People
like you when you've got a sense of your own dignity and when
you don't want to impose on them in any way. And the state will
help me too. I went with the men I liked simply because I
wanted to. I'll soon have a son or a daughter. At the moment I
don't give myself to anybody, because I don't need it. Yesterday
I got drunk for the last time. I'm just telling you what I think
as
it comes into my head. I hate myself for getting drunk yester–
day, but I may need a father for the child. You ran away from
your father and I never had one, or rather I heard nothing but
bad of him, and this made me very mad when I was a child and
I was angry with my mother. Yet all the same I've decided not
to have an abortion. My womb is full of the child. It's an even
