James Baldwin: Burn Artist

Two nights before Vyacheslav Nazrenko burned to death, Vassily and I were at the movies. It was a week after the premier of Aliens , and we were watching it together for the third time.

“Ohh… ohhh… here it comes.” Vassily, mumbling around a mouthful of popcorn, pointed at the screen with the straw of his soda. “The screaming cock of doom, Alexi. Right out of her fucking chest.”

I didn’t reply, eating popcorn one kernel at a time. I flicked one into my mouth and caught it with a crunch.

“This is why you never let anything over five inches near your mouth, man. Bananas, squids, nothing. Before you know it, BAM, something’s rammed its dick right down your throat and is pumping you full of alien spooge.”

“Shhhhh.” Someone behind us hissed.

“Vassily.” I stared fixedly at the screen, keeping my voice down. “They’re eggs.”

“Yeah, eggs . Which is basically just spooge in a shell.” He made a face. “Worst M&Ms flavor ever.”

“SHHH.” The hissing behind us was louder, this time. A man’s voice. It was lost in the sudden shriek of the chestburster exploding, the cocooned woman screeching, the Marines on screen yelling, and the whoosh of a flamethrower.

“YEAH! Barbecue that sucker!” Vassily called out in Ukrainian, bouncing in his seat.

The man behind us reached forward to shove at Vassily’s head. He flinched away as I dropped my popcorn and snatched the stranger’s wrist, catching it before he made contact. I cranked it back, and he yelped.

“You. Don’t touch my friend,” I rumbled.

“Then tell him to shut the fuck up!” The stranger – a red-faced, stocky Brooklynite of indeterminate European ancestry – tried to pull his wrist back. He had a can of beer in his other hand. “Leggo my arm!”

“You know, it’s really rude to touch people’s heads in some cultures.” Vassily turned in his seat, blinking with wide, innocent eyes. “So how about you go fuck yourself in the ass with that can and let me enjoy my goddamn movie?”

The guy turned a nasty shade of purple. All at the same time, he threw his beer into my face, I lunged forward and punched him, and Vassily reflexively dumped popcorn over the both of us.

The screaming and screeching on the screen drowned out the sounds of our fistfight as the guy pulled me over the seat and into the next row. He’d made a mistake in dragging me to him. I’m nearly always shorter than every other man in the room, but I’m also often the strongest. And Sokolsky men know how to brawl.

It was 1986 in Brooklyn, and summoning an usher was the last thing on anyone’s mind as I took the guy down to the floor. Confined between the rows of red padded seats, there wasn’t much room to wrestle on the sticky carpet. I got on top of him and beat him until he stopped trying to knock my teeth out and began to fight for escape instead. The people who’d noticed the fiasco in the aisles around us cheered us on.

The man crawled out from under me and under the legs of our fellow moviegoers, stumbling up at the end of the row as I did my best to stalk toward him. Difficult, when you have to turn and sidle like a crab past the knees of laughing, bewildered, and irritated people. Eying me like a wild deer, our assailant turned tail and ran.

I gave up and rejoined Vassily, glaring at him in the gloom as I took my seat and used paper towel to wipe beer out of my hair. In the spirit of brotherhood, he offered me his soda. I accepted a mouthful, sweet as it was.

We lasted another fifteen minutes before the staff came in. Vassily nudged me, and then motioned to the door at the corner of the theater. “Hey, check it out. Time to make our daring escape.”

Ugly and a few of the cinema staff were congregating at one of the exit doors. They were waiting, which meant they were probably hanging on the police. I nodded, and together we picked our way stealthily down the aisle in the opposite direction, headed up the back of the theater, and vanished into the tacky Art Deco hallway outside.

“Well, that was a fuck up.” Vassily rolled his eyes. “You head to the car. I’m going to the box office.”

“What?” I brushed down my wet dress shirt, which smelled strongly of alcohol. “Why?”

“Because I’m getting our money back, is why.” He slapped me on the shoulder, and gently steered me toward the front door of the cinema. As we were going out, the police were coming in. They passed us in the foyer with a brief glance at my disheveled hair.

“Hey, Sir,” Vassily called out to them, lifting his voice above the small milling crowd. “Excuse me. Are you looking for the drunk guy?”

“Yeah. What’s it to you?” The cop called back.

Vassily pointed back down the hall. “They’re that way. The ushers are holding him by the door downstairs.”

“No worries.” The other cop held up a hand to him, and they passed us on by.

“Are you out of your mind?” I hissed.

“Crazy as a snake on a hot road,” Vassily replied cheerfully.

“You’re on remand!”

“This whole case is stupid white collar shit. You know as well as I do that Marco will get me off. Go on, man. I’ll meet you at the car.”

There was more than one reason Vassily insisted I leave, and more than one reason why I was happy to do so. I wasn’t great around cops. It was like they could smell the violence on me… the lingering ghosts of illegal magic, old blood, cold metal, and bleach.

Due to the nature of my profession, I always kept a towel and spare clothes in the car, including a nicely pressed white shirt and black leather gloves. I also had a bottle of Dramamine in the glove box, which I was grateful for after the sensory assault of the cinema on my synesthesia. Aliens was worth every minute, but it was still hard going when every high-pitched sound burned like acid on my tongue.

After fifteen minutes or so, Vassily strolled out of the building and popped the passenger side door, dropping into his seat. He had a shit-eating grin and a deep dancing light in his dark blue eyes.

“VIP passes for our next film, my fine, prickly friend.” He winked and clicked his tongue. “They had the guy in handcuffs. He was ranting about some ‘Russkie dwarf that don’t speak American’ trying to punch his lights out, but he was pretty drunk.”

“My goodness,” I said, tugging my clean gloves up along my wrists. “What is this city coming to, Vasya?”

“Some people are just nuts, right?” Vassily stretched like a cat in his seat, and yawned. “Well, let’s get back home. I have to work out what the fuck I’m getting our mighty Avtoritet [1] Authority. The ‘ground commander’ or 4-star general of any given Organizatsiya. They effectively rule, but generally answer to a Pakhun or a board. for his birthday party. I’m looking forward to it, don’t get me wrong, but everyone is going to get him a Rolex and I just… I mean, how many Rolexes does a man really need?”

“We have the money if we get something together,” I said. “We could get him a car, maybe a Hot Rod or a Corvette. Some kind of 1950s showpiece.”

“And show up Lev or Vanya in front of the boss? Are you kidding?” Vassily rubbed his thumb across his lips. “Nah, nothing quite that extravagant or obvious. Let me think about it some more. Besides, I want to go home and jerk off to the image of Ripley with a flamethrower while it’s still fresh in my mind.”