Fall of a Cosmonaut

“You’re in luck,” she said. “I get off in half an hour. You have a car?”

“I do,” said Ivan.

“Then maybe we can go somewhere and talk,” she said. “Two beers.”

She turned and walked back toward the bar.

“I can’t believe it,” said Ivan.

“It is probably that touch of French blood in you left over from Napoleon’s short-lived vacation in Rostov,” said Misha.

“I don’t care,” said Ivan with a grin.

“She is not young,” said Misha. “Perhaps forty-five.”

“Age means nothing,” said Ivan. “She is my kind of woman and I am very, very much in need.”

“I understand,” said Misha, looking toward the bar where two men in their twenties were looking at the two cosmonauts. One of the men caught Misha’s eye and the two men exchanged a look that Misha well understood.

“Shall I ask her if she has a friend?” asked Ivan.

“No, thank you,” said Misha with a smile. “I will see what I can do on my own. You go off with Miss Hoffer. I’ll make my way back to the house. If worse comes to worse, I’ll get a cab.”

They listened to music and drank two beers each.

Misha and the young man at the bar glanced at each other from time to time, and eventually Helga Hoffer, minus pencil and pad, made her way to the booth and wedged in next to Ivan, who enjoyed the touch of her hip against his.

“I think I’ll leave you two,” said Misha, standing and placing a ten-dollar bill on the table.

“We’re gonna leave too, aren’t we?” Helga asked, looking at Ivan. Their faces were no more than six inches apart.

“We are certainly leaving,” Ivan said, letting his nose touch hers, feeling her breath against his mouth.

Misha waited till Ivan and the woman had left and then he sat back down and waited. It was probably no different here than it had been in Moscow, but it had been a long time. Misha was definitely nervous, but he did his best not to show it. He had purposely nursed his second beer and now reached for it. Both of the young men approached the table and the one whose eyes had met Misha’s asked, “May we join you?”

Misha showed his best smile to the young men and said yes.

It was more than twenty minutes later and Ivan was still no more than fifty yards from the bar. He was now parked at the dark, far end of the gravel-covered parking lot. The nearest car was about twenty-five feet away. He would have preferred to be someplace more private, possibly even their house, but Helga had reached down the front of his pants and between his legs before he could ask her where she suggested they go.

The experience had been wonderful. She had proved to be experienced and he had been quite durable and willing. Now he was spent from her hands, her mouth, and, finally, from her surprisingly firm body in the back seat.

She sat up and began to dress. She turned her head toward the entrance to the club as he sat up.

“You wish to continue elsewhere?” he said, quite naked except for his shoes.

“Not tonight, honey,” Helga said, leaning over to give him a moist, open-mouth kiss that tasted of her, of him, and of something quite sweet.

“Then I can see you? …” he began.

The door on his side suddenly opened. Helga, not yet fully dressed, opened her door and hurried out, saying, “Sorry, honey. I had fun.”

The two men pulled the naked Ivan from the car. One of them kicked the door closed.

“Bi’str iy, ‘quick,’” said one man to the other in Russian as they pulled Ivan toward the nearby trees, shredding his bottom on the gravel.

Ivan struggled, but the men were strong and his leverage poor.

A few seconds later Ivan lay in pain, naked, on his back, and the two men over him, behind a wall of bushes and trees.

“What is this?” Ivan demanded.

“You’ve talked,” one dark figure over him said.

“Talked? About what? To who?” Ivan demanded, wishing he had something to cover himself.

“You know,” said the second man.

“I … you mean? No, I have not.”

“But what is there to stop you?” asked the first man.

“I wouldn’t,” said Ivan.

“Why are we talking?” asked the second man. “Let’s do it and get out.”

“You are going to kill me?” asked Ivan.

The first man reached under his jacket for something. Ivan knew what it was.

“No … I …” he said, trying to back away, holding his hand up.

What happened next was a blur of imagination and confusion.

The man with the gun grunted and staggered forward. The other man turned toward the first and Ivan could see something heavy, a rock, crash into his face. The second man fell next to Ivan, soundlessly bleeding, his nose broken. Ivan tried to sit up.

The first man tried to level his gun but someone stepped forward and seemed to punch him in the stomach. The first man let out an “Ohh” that faded like the air from a flat tire.

“Are you badly injured?” Misha asked, helping Ivan to his feet.

“Badly? … No, I don’t think so. They tried to kill me. They are Russians,” said Ivan, bewildered.

“We heard,” said Misha.

Ivan looked at the two men who were with Misha. They seemed familiar. Yes, they had been in the bar.

“How did you know? How did you find me?” asked Ivan, now on his feet.

One of the two young men took off his jacket and handed it to Ivan, who tied it around his waist.

“My friends told me that this was a place where people come to get together. We saw them dragging you from the car.”

“You make friends quickly,” said Ivan.

One of the two young men said, “Maybe another time.”

The evening had already been a nightmare by the time Sasha and his mother had arrived at the movie theater.

They had gone out for dinner. Lydia had insisted. This was a special occasion. She would pay. They had eaten at the Yerevan, with Lydia, who had picked out the restaurant, grumbling rather loudly that she was not terribly fond of Armenian food.

“Then,” Sasha had said, loud enough for his mother and the people at the tables on both sides of them to hear, “why are we here?”

“Because you love Armenian food,” she said.

Sasha did not love Armenian food. He liked it reasonably well, but it was certainly not a culinary love. The bozbash-‘lamb and potato soup’-which seemed just fine to Sasha, was “too full of spices” for Lydia, who drank it all anyway. The chebureki-‘deep-fried meat pies’-which Sasha found delicious, were, according to Lydia, “filled with things that would block your heart and kill you.” She ate her entire plateful and drank a large glass of Armenian brandy.

The waiter had refused to acknowledge Sasha’s shrug and search for sympathy in a conspiratorial glance.

“What are you smiling about?” Lydia had said over brandy.

“Nothing. I don’t know.”

“You look content,” she said suspiciously. “You’ve found some woman.”

“No,” he said, loud enough for her to hear. “But I was asked to be a movie star today.”

Lydia shook her head. She did not understand her son’s jokes.

“You should look terrible,” she said. “Your wife and children are gone. You should go get them. You could be in Kiev by train in half a day. I would pay. I want my grandchildren back.”