Igor Savelyev: Off the Beaten Tracks: Stories by Russian Hitchhikers

“Oh, lilac!” said Nastya. She could see in the dark, like a cat.

This was followed by the rustling of branches. Obviously Vadim had taken her words like a call to action. You need to watch what you say to inebriated young men.

“Oh, how romantic!” Nastya’s voice was full of sarcasm. “A boy and a girl, a moonlit night… He trespasses on the grass to bring her a stolen bouquet…”

“Oh yeah, a moonlit night! Not a single bloody light-bulb… I nearly broke my leg just then. Here!”

“Well, thank you, kind sir… Charmed, I’m sure!” Nastya burst out laughing.

They continued walking. They weren’t sure which direction they were supposed to be going. In the middle of the courtyard they stumbled into a pile of tar, which was probably intended for roof repairs. At least there was something even blacker than the night!

“Hey, have you ever found a ‘lucky’ lilac blossom? You know, one with five petals?”

“Yeah, loads! Not in the middle of the night, though.”

Vadim grinned.

“I’ve never even found one, can you believe that? It used to really upset me when I was little. It was a constant source of entertainment — whenever anyone brought a big bunch in from the garden the others would look through it until they found one, then they would make a wish and eat it. And they kept finding them. They were always chewing, like cows. I never found a single one! My mum used to feel sorry for me, so she would collect ‘lucky’ flowers for me to eat… But it wasn’t the same.”

“Ah, poor little Vadim.”

“I’ve never seen a lucky omen. One night I was standing out on the balcony, just thinking about stuff, and suddenly out of the corner of my eye I saw a star fall from the sky! I started frantically trying to think of a wish to make… But then the star landed on the grass and disintegrated in a scatter of sparks. It was a cigarette butt! Someone had thrown it from one of the floors above.”

“You, young man, are quite the Lord Byron! However, I feel I should remind you that we haven’t come out for a stroll in the moonlight… We’re supposed to be finding a kiosk, to buy more booze.”

They both laughed. Vadim knew exactly how to react. He should just make light of it all, feign indifference to her barbed comments — that was a weapon against which there was no defence.

“I’ve seen loads of shooting stars since, though. Real ones. Out on the road.”

He really has. Russia’s not like Belgium, where they have floodlights on the motorways so it’s brighter at night than it is during the day. Over here, the highway can be a pretty bleak place at night, without another living soul for miles around. At least, no lights to indicate their existence. It’s just you and the stars — an infinite celestial backdrop, untouched by artificial illumination. This is eternity, in all its immutable desolation. If you tip your head back and look up at the sky when you’re out on the road on a clear night you sometimes feel as though you’re suffocating, choking on the stars. I say no more.

Night is completely different in the city, and not just because of the megawatts of electricity obscuring the sky. At night, when it’s fast asleep, the city is an extraordinary sight, almost absurd. It offers quite different images of eternity, desolation and solitude. After seeing the city alive during the day, swarming with a million inhabitants, it’s strange to see it so dead at night — a nocturnal wilderness of deserted avenues and empty courtyards, all bathed in the eerie glow of security lights and street lamps, each more unnatural and lifeless than the last.

Do you want to know why it’s absurd? Have you ever walked through a deserted city courtyard at 3.00 a.m.? It makes you want to run. Not because you’re worried about being attacked, though… When everything around you is so dead, even the sight of your own shadow and the sound of your own footsteps are enough to drive you mad. It’s even worse knowing that there are people nearby. There must be… Somewhere… But all the windows are dark. So you start to run, scurrying about frantically like a tiny insect. Is it paranoia? Maybe. But still…

“It’s my own stupid fault. I overslept and didn’t get out onto the road until lunchtime. I only made it as far as E-burg on the first day, so today — or was it yesterday? Whatever — I didn’t want to waste any time!” Nastya laughed. “I went straight through Chelyabinsk and made it to Ufa.”

“Cool. I hope we have a day like that tomorrow!”

“I want to get to Nizhny Novgorod tomorrow. That’s probably about as far as I can hope for… And I can always sleep in the woods if I have to. The wildlife’s pretty harmless round there.”

“You’d probably scare it all off anyway!”

Laughing, they stepped into the circle of light cast by a street lamp. Somehow they hadn’t noticed the gang who were now swaggering towards them.

There are certain situations you can read immediately. Humans do have a kind of ‘sixth sense’, a way of silently detecting a subtle change in atmosphere. This sixth sense is what tells you it’s no coincidence that these thugs decided to get up from their bench and stretch their legs just as you approached… In any case, our young couple realised it straight away.

They stumbled and hesitated, but they weren’t about to run away. Maybe it would all blow over. Maybe their ‘sixth sense’ was mistaken. Maybe…

“Stay on my left,” hissed Vadim, through his teeth.

Nastya didn’t move.

The gang of thugs moved into the light and stopped, evidently challenging them to follow suit. They certainly looked the part. One of them was even wearing a flat cap, the trademark of Russian street thugs. I’m sure you don’t need me to describe their shaven heads and fat, thuggish necks.

“Whoa mate, what’s the hurry? Where’re you from?”

“St Petersburg.”

The thugs had a problem processing this piece of information. They’d been expecting him to name one of the other districts in Ufa.

“What are you doing here?”

“Visiting a friend.”

“What’s his name?”

“You don’t know him.”

The thugs thought about this.

“Is she with you?”

“Yes.”

Now they would ask about his hair. Vadim knew this scenario off by heart. God, he was so sick of it… Did none of them have a brain? Or was it the herd mentality? Either way, the first thing any street gang would ask about was the long hair. Or the earring, if you happened to be wearing one.

“What’s with the long hair, mate? Are you some kind of hippy?”

With that, the ringleader put his hand up and touched Vadim’s hair. He even rubbed it between his fingers, as though he were selecting vegetables at the market! That was the final straw.

Now, Vadim was no superhero. He would not have been capable of the kind of intrepid exploits they showed in old Soviet films, like spitting in a Nazi face. His response was more of a spontaneous reflex. Vadim was very protective of his hair and didn’t allow anyone to touch it (except girls), so without even thinking about it he knocked the youth’s hand away. This was the trigger they’d been waiting for.

“You f-f-f…”

(I’m not using ellipses to replace a swear word here, by the way. Those street thugs actually talk like that. It’s a kind of reductive language, if you like. They use it in those ‘prison slang’ songs too.)

The exclamation was accompanied by a swift and effective punch in the face.

Sparks flew and the world began to spin. Vadim’s brain arrived at the logical conclusion that he was lying on the ground, although he couldn’t work out how he’d got there. He could just hear a ringing sound, and there was a high-speed train rushing straight towards him… He later realised that he’d just been looking up at the street lamp as Nastya tried to shake him back to life.