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

I’ve been with a couple of women — girls, technically, I suppose — but it didn’t mean anything. It was just sex. When we were students it was something you went along with, something you did because everyone else was doing it. Someone’s nicely furnished apartment, expensive vodka poured into a set of matching shot glasses… all very contrived. There might not have been enough snacks to chase the vodka with, but there were always plenty of candles casting shadows that flickered on the walls and made me feel uncomfortable.

When everyone started to pair off and head towards the beds and sofas, not having sex would have been like an insult to the others. I remember one time… It would have been rude to move away afterwards, so I had to go to sleep with my arm around her and my face pressed against her back. It was July and the nights were unbearably hot and humid, and I spent the whole night covered in sweat.

No fun at all, but it was a long time ago. And more than two thousand kilometres away.

Nastya’s walking along beside me in the semi-darkness. The street lamp we’re walking past isn’t working, so I can see her features clearly outlined in silhouette, like a classical sculpture. Her slightly aquiline nose… Her forehead… Her cropped hair…

She lights a cigarette. I admire her profile with the tiny glowing ember.

“D’you want one?”

I don’t really smoke but I have the odd cigarette now and then, if I’m drinking. Or if I’m in a really bad mood. Right now I feel capable of rising up above the tarmac and soaring through the sky. At least I’m experienced enough to take a drag without properly inhaling, so that I don’t start coughing.

We walk and smoke in silence. The city is completely silent. I’m starting to feel a bit rough from the beer, but it’s no big deal — I’m just a bit dehydrated. My mouth feels sticky and I can taste my own teeth. The cigarette is adding an aftertaste of prunes… Sorry! That’s more than you need to know about the state of my oral cavity.

I kiss her again. She presses herself into me. She runs the fingers of her free hand through my hair, and it feels amazing.

“So what’s the distance between St Petersburg and Tyumen, exactly?”

Of course the atlas is in my rucksack, and my rucksack is back at Squire’s squat; I roll my eyes, trying to work it out. I call to mind an image of the Russian Federation.

“About three thousand kilometres. Maybe a bit less.”

“That’s a long way,” she sighs.

“Tell me about it!”

“And think of all the people in between — millions of them! It’s amazing when you think about it, we might never have met.”

Instead of answering I just hold her more tightly.

“You know,” says Nastya, suddenly pulling away from me. “One of my friends married a German guy two years ago. Seriously! She moved to Germany. I can’t remember which city. She writes to me quite often. She misses it here… The German guy came to Tyumen specially to meet her!”

“Bit weird, was he?”

“Why do you say that?” Nastya is offended. “There was nothing wrong with him. He was about eight years older than her, but basically just a normal bloke. He was a bit bald, though… Actually, I’ve noticed on TV too, German men always lose their hair early. Why is that? Is it because of the radiation, or something?”

“Maybe it’s their hormones.”

“German hormones? Don’t make me laugh! Anyway, when this guy showed up he was beside himself with excitement. ‘Siberia! Siberia!’ he kept saying. I’m surprised he didn’t bring a fur coat with him! It was summer, and due to the hole in the ozone layer over Siberia it was about thirty-five degrees. Probably not quite what he was expecting…”

I suddenly become aware that I’m smiling indulgently and quickly straighten my face before Nastya notices. Tyumen was pretty remote, and it must have been the first foreigner they’d ever seen. An understandable reaction!

The ice cream that I’m holding to my face has almost melted and is sloshing around inside its wrapper. Tracing an arc, it falls to the tarmac and lands wetly, like a frog. It occurs to me belatedly (as usual) to offer it to Nastya.

“Don’t worry about it. I don’t eat sweet stuff.”

Just like me. We’re very similar. I keep thinking that. Both inside and out. You can’t really see it right now in the pale light of the street lamps, but the right-hand side of her face is tanned from standing on the side of the road. The unmistakable hallmark of a hitchhiker.

Nastya lights another cigarette. She smokes too much.

A car drives past us on the avenue. It might be the first one we’ve seen the whole time we’ve been walking. The wide avenue is generously illuminated by the street lamps and completely empty. It would be a good place to come rollerblading in the middle of the night, or early in the morning. This vast expanse of smooth tarmac, completely deserted, the wind whistling in your ears and not a care in the world.

“Wait… Let’s just stand here for a bit.”

“Why?”

“Just because.”

I stopped obediently, although at first I didn’t understand why. Then I realised. It was so that this magical night would last as long as possible.

We put our arms around one another and kissed. Nastya buried herself into my embrace, her whole body shivering, and I warmed her up. With her face muffled in my arms, she still managed to cover me with frenzied kisses — my neck, my chest (through my T-shirt), my shoulders. When her lips touched my arm above the elbow, I remembered the conversation over the table at Squire’s place (just a few hours ago, but it seemed like a hundred years!) and tensed my bicep slightly. She kissed it.

“I thought I wasn’t your type! I don’t have ‘wings’…”

She burst out laughing and bit my arm.

“That’s not true. I was just being stupid. You do have wings… The best kind.”

The city sky above us was as full of stars as a city sky can be. My head was full of song lyrics, all jumbled and chaotic… I was happy. I’d found my happiness here, in this strange and distant city. So my journey hadn’t been in vain, after all. After all that travelling, I’d finally found it.

Just before sunrise everything in the city faded to grey and seemed to swell up and fill with shadows. Even Squire’s apartment was full of transparent silhouettes and unreliable outlines. Everything seemed exactly as they’d left it a few hours ago. They tiptoed straight into the kitchen, so as not to wake the others.

Nastya poured herself a glass of cool water from the kettle. She was dying of thirst. It was the dregs from the very bottom, and lime-scale deposits swirled thickly in the glass. She would have been able to see them if it hadn’t been so dark.

Vadim went over to the window.

The street lamps were waning against the sky, which had started to grow pale. There were no lights on in any of the windows. It was just after 5.00 a.m.: the deadest hour. When it grew a little lighter, the birds would all start singing simultaneously and then it would seem strange that anyone could sleep through such a racket. But this moment was yet to come. For now, silence reigned and the only movement was the swaying of the trees in the grey half-light before dawn.

“It’s so strange…” began Vadim, clearly unable to get over the way fate had brought them together. “Meeting you here, in this random city… In the Urals, in Asia…”

“Actually, we’re not in Asia,” laughed Nastya. “Ufa’s still in Europe, but tomorrow — today, I mean! — on the way to Chelyabinsk, about two hundred and fifty kilometres from here, you’ll pass a funny monument. It’s like a massive slab of stone, saying Europe on one side and Asia on the other. It’s so weird! Wait till you see it. It’s really off the beaten track. The Ural Mountains… The road twists and turns like a snake — it’s all rocks and ravines, and you won’t come across another living soul. The enormous electricity pylons are the only sign of civilisation. And then all of a sudden, out of the blue, you’re at the border between two continents! It’s like something out of a sci-fi film.”