Сергей Огольцов - The Rascally Romance (in a single helluva-long letter about a flicking-short life)

I walked patiently because Dad had warned me even before sending after the warms there was a walk of eight kilometers, to which I hastily answered then that it was okay with me, yes, I could do that. So I just walked on, though my fishing pole and the tin can with baiting grew very heavy.

Finally, we went out to a forest lake and the fishermen told it was the Sominsky which I couldn’t recognize though it was the lake where I once learned to swim. We walked along a grassy promontory by whose end there was a real raft. One of the fishermen remained on the shore, and we 3 boarded the raft that was made of logs from deciduous trees with smooth green bark, maybe, Aspen.

Dad and the other fisherman pushed the raft off, stepped onto it and kept jabbing slowly the lake bottom with long poles until we got some thirty meters away from the shore. There we stopped and began fishing.

The raft logs were not close to each other and thru the gaps between them, there were seen the openwork traverse logs drowned in the pitch-black depth, so we had to move carefully.

Our 3 fishing poles overhung 3 different sides of the raft. Fish struck pretty often though the catch was not as big as promised by the vigorous resistance to the pulled line, besides, you had to be very careful taking it off the hook because around their muzzles as well as on back fins there stuck out very prickly spikes.

Dad said it was the ruff, and the fisherman added that the ruff was the most delicious fish. Later, when we got ashore and cooked the soup in a pot hung over the fire I, of course, ate all of it but couldn’t decide how delicious it was because the steaming soup was way too hot.

After the meal, the fishermen advised there was no hope of good catch anymore because at that time of day fish went sleeping. So, they stretched under the trees and slept too, the fishermen and my Dad. When everyone woke up, we slowly started back home.

Returning, we didn’t take the shortcut footpath thru the forest, choosing to walk over the low hills and dales because the paper permitted to stay away till 6 in the evening.

From the top of one of the hills, we saw a small lake in the distance, it was perfectly round, rimmed by the growth of reeds. When we reached it, Dad wanted to take a swim at any rate, although the fishermen tried to talk him out of the idea. One of them told it was too often that in that round lake, called Witch’s Eye, someone got drowned caught by its duckweed.

But Dad doffed his clothes, all the same, grabbed hold of the stern of a skiff by the shore and, kicking up foamy splashes, moved off to the reeds by the opposite shore. Halfway thru, he remembered the watch on his wrist, took it off and hung on a nail in the stern. When he came back in the same manner, the duckweed clung all over his shoulders in long thickly spliced garlands.

He was ashore already and putting on his clothes when we saw a woman in a long skirt of villager womenfolks, who ran across the slanted field with indistinct yells. She ran up to us but didn’t say anything new and only repeated what we had heard from the fellow-fisherman.

Near Checkpoint, we were caught in a spell of bad weather and the rain thoroughly drenched us before we got home, but no one fell ill after…

~ ~ ~

With bicycles, I palled up since early childhood. I can’t even remotely remember my first tricycle, but some photos confirm: here it is with the pedals on the front wheel and me, astride, a three-year-old fat little man in a closely fitting skull cap.

However, the next one I recollect pretty well—a red three-wheeler with the chain drive—because I often had to argue with my sister-’n’-brother whose turn it was to take a ride. Later, Dad reassembled it into a two-wheeler but, after my fifth grade, the bicycle became too small for me and was hand-me-downed to the younger for good.

And then Dad got somewhere a real bike for me. Yes, it was a second-hand machine but not a bike for ladies or some kind of “Eaglet” for grown-up kids.

One evening after his work, Dad even tried to teach me riding it in the Courtyard, but without his supporting hand behind the saddle, I would fall on one side if not on the other. Dad got weary of my clumsiness, he said, “Learn it yourself!” and went home.

In a couple of days, I could already ride the bike. However, I didn’t get the nerve to throw my leg over the saddle and perch up properly, instead, I passed my leg thru the frame and rode standing on the pedals, which caused the bike to run askew.

But then I got ashamed seeing a boy who, though younger than me, was not afraid to race along with his bike, step onto a pedal and flung the other leg over the saddle to the second pedal. His body length did not allow to use the saddle without losing touch with the pedals so turning them he rubbed his crotch against the frame which also served him for sitting upon with his left or right thigh, alternatively. On such a brave shortie’s background, riding the bike “under the frame” was quite a shame…

And at last, after so many tries and falls ending both with and without bruises or scratches, I did it! Wow! How swiftly carried me the bike above the ground, no one would ever catch up be they even running! And—most important—riding a bicycle was such an easy thing!

I rode it non-stop driving along the concrete walks in the Courtyard, orbiting its two wooden gazebos until, a bit warily, I steered out to the road of concrete slabs surrounding the two Gorka blocks…

Later, already as an expert rider, I started mastering the bikerobatics— “no-hand riding”, when you take your hands off the steer and pilot the bicycle by feeding your body weight to the side of your intended turn. And the bike understood and complied!.

Another achievement of that summer became keeping the eyes open when under the water.

The dam where I once slipped off the slab was restored to bring about a wide bathing pool which attracted numerous beach-goers.

Among us, boys, the favorite game in the water was “spotting” where the “it” should catch up with and touch anyone of the fleeing players. Your speed when walking thru the water is slower than that of fleeing swimmers so you have also to swim which reduces your visibility. Besides, a player can take a dive and sharply turn down there, so it’s hard to guess where he’d re-emerge for a breather. Ever before, when plunging in the water, I firmly closed my eyes but that way you cannot catch a glimpse of flicking white heels that kick full ahead underwater.

True enough, in the ever-present yellowish twilight beneath the surface, you can’t see very far, yet sounds there turn more crisp and clear if you are sitting and knock, say, two gravels against each other, possibly because the water cuts off all unrelated noises. However, you cannot sit underwater for a long time— the air in your lungs pulls you up to the surface and there’s no other way to resist the upping but use your hands for counter-rawing which makes you drop the gravels…

~ ~ ~

Our parents’ leaves did not coincide that summer so they went for their vacations in turn. First, Dad visited his native village of Kanino in the Ryazan Region. He took me with him there, but strictly warned beforehand that on the way I should not ever tell anyone that we lived at the Atomic Object.

At the station of Bologoye, we had a long wait for the train to Moscow. Leaving me seated on our suitcase in the station waiting room, Dad went to punch the tickets. On a nearby bench, a girl was sitting with an open book in her lap. I got up and neared the girl to look in the book over her shoulder. It was The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne.

I read a couple of paragraphs of the familiar lines I liked so much. She kept reading and didn’t pay any attention to me standing behind the bench back. I wanted to speak up to her, but I did not know what to say. That that was a good book? That I had also read it?