Adventures in the Great Perhaps: May 2014

I promised I'd put my short story up once I'd submitted it, so here you are:

Hunting Season
“Just jump you great tit!” Luka called up in a whisper.
Alek frowned down at Luka and held a finger to his own lips. “Shut it you. There is an art to this.” Luka sighed with impatience as Alek slipped back into the second floor bathroom of their friend’s house to apply ‘finishing touches’, whatever they might be. Luka leaned against the neighbour’s wall, taking care to stay out of the view of the living room window, lighting a cigarette and watching the sky change as the white clouds that drifted above the skyline merged and reformed into a mass. Their brief reprisal from the heavy snow of a Russian new year would be over very soon.
“How the hell does it take a person that long to get ready?” Eva giggled quietly next to him, breaking Luka out of his reverie.
“We could ask the same about you, darling.” Irina muttered playfully, earning an offended scoff from her girlfriend and a shove for her trouble.
Luka rolled his eyes. “Careful, he’ll hear you and we’ll never hear the end of it.” He muttered, gesturing up at the window in which Alek’s head had just reappeared. Luka watched as Alek scaled the tree next to the window, dropping to the ground in front of him irritatingly unruffled.
Casting a glance down each direction of the alley, Alek grabbed Luka’s hand and planted a brief, fierce kiss on his lips. When Alek released him Luka looked around worriedly and pulled away from him, linking arms with Irina and striding down the alley in the direction of their apartment block. Alek sighed and loped after them, squeezing himself between Luka and Eva and linking arms with them both. Luka wriggled with discomfort but Alek caught his arm and pulled him to a halt. “What, so now I can’t kiss you?”
“Not in public, I don’t want to risk getting caught.” Luka said as the two girls walked on ahead to give them some space.
Frowning, Alek almost growled with frustration. “There weren’t any children around, so I don’t see why I can’t kiss the man I love.” He paused, shaking his head to cast out the negativity. “Am I not hot enough now for you or something? I mean, how high can your standards be?”
Luka attempted to repress a grin. “Careful with that ego or your head will get trapped even further up your ass.” He snickered. Alek gave an outraged gasp, playfully pushing Luka and sending him tumbling into the small fountain in the courtyard of their apartment block.
“Well, great. Now I’m angry.” Luka said, wiping his hair from his eyes and holding up a now very soggy cigarette. “You killed it!” He laughed, attempting to push himself back up. Alek feigned helping but pushed Luka into the water again, dancing off out of his reach. “I’ll get you for that!” Luka yelled, lurching out of the fountain and chasing after his lover. They ran in dizzying circles around the fountain, darting side to side, before Alek caught up with Luka and pinned him down, kissing him into submission.
“Hey lovebirds, stop trying to get us arrested!” Eva called over, waiting for them in the apartment building's door. For once they had reason to be grateful that their persistently useless doorman was fast asleep. Making apologetic faces at Eva, the pair stumbled up from the ground and followed the girls inside. “Your apartment or ours?” she asked, reaching for Irina’s hand in the safe cage of the lift.
Alek raised his eyebrows at Luka, who gave a shrug and pressed the button for their floor. “We have better wine.” Alek explained to the girls with a wink, avoiding Eva’s riled shove.
Barely an hour later, when they had all settled into the living room of Alek and Luka’s apartment, a tipsy Eva admitted that their wine was indeed much better. Alek sat with Eva on the floor, marvelling at her low alcohol tolerance, while Luka and Irina watched from the bookshelf by the window. They had been chuckling together as Luka tried to dry himself off, but Irina had begun to frown, and they now stood in silence. After a few moments, when Alek and Eva had noticed the quiet seriousness in the corner, silence fell across the room. Irina declared that she and Eva had something important to announce: “We’re leaving.” She said.
Luka automatically reached a hand down to Alek in shock. “Here? St Petersburg? What do you mean?” he asked.
Irina shook her head apologetically. “The country.”
“What?” Alek and Luka gasped, staring at their two friends. “Why?” Alek asked.
Irina moved to sit down next to Eva, holding her hand tightly. “When we went to the film festival, someone from those hate gangs was handing out gift bags with rope and soap inside, pretending they were gifts from the organisers. We realised what it was and refused to take them, but it was still horrible. The festival was cancelled half way through because of a bomb threat, and when we got home we found Mariya crying with her babysitter. She’d been sent a video online of a priest saying that gay people are spiritually and mentally unsound. When we watched it after putting the children to bed, Eva said-”
“I said maybe he is right.” Eva interrupted, sobered, with her lips pressed in a tight line. Alek and Luka murmured with sympathy, too shocked to respond. Irina ran her hand through Eva’s curly brown hair, gently pulling her head down to rest on her shoulder.
“So we’re leaving before they brainwash our family. We have the girls to think about – we can’t just stay and wait for them to be taken away from us when the new legislation goes through.” Irina said, gritting her teeth against the pain and fear visible in her eyes. Luka reached out a hand to her and she smiled gratefully, taking it in her own. “We want you to come with us.” She said, and Eva raised her head to nod in agreement. “We know that you will need to talk about it, but we have the tickets ready to book. Our friend Katia and her husband have been helping us organise it all but we can’t leave without asking you to come with us.”
Luka almost agreed there and then, but looked across at Alek first. Seeing his uncertainty Luka excused them both, pulling the door shut as they stepped inside the kitchen and hid their discussion in the noise of clearing away the dirty crockery. They emerged after what seemed like much longer than a few minutes, and the girls took their leave before the babysitter started charging overtime.
A few hours after the girls had left Alek and Luka lay on the sofa, limbs gracefully overlapping, as Luka traced the pattern of Alek’s veins lightly with his fingertip. Behind him, Alek used his free arm to text Eva. ‘When are our flights?’
*
“What on earth is she doing?” Luka asked bemusedly as he watched the window of the apartment opposite a month later, with his usual four o’clock coffee in hand. The woman had stopped in the window, barely moving for at least a minute, when moments ago she had been her usual bustling self.
“Maybe she’s watching us.” Alek muttered from the floor, leaning into Luka’s hand as it moved from the tangles of his dark hair to trace the sharp line of his cheekbone. “Maybe she isn’t the only one.” He added quietly after a pause, scratching the wooden floorboard with his fingernail. Luka turned and dropped his back to the wall beside the window, allowing his body to slide down next to Alek’s.
“Please don’t talk like that; you make us sound like someone’s prey.” Luka sighed, resting his head in the nook between Alek’s neck and shoulder and placing his mug on the coffee table. After a long pause, Alek reached for the newspaper that had arrived from America that day, and which he had promptly stowed under the sofa when Luka came home.
“My sister sent me the American paper she likes today.” He said quietly, holding it towards him. Luka smiled in response but quickly pulled the paper from Alek’s hands when he saw the headline. Alek watched Luka’s smile drop as he read about the gangs tricking people like them into meeting and then forcing them to suffer abuse on camera. “One of them was Dimitri.” Alek added.
Luka froze in shock and Alek pulled him closer, wrapping his arm around his shoulders and removing the newspaper so that Luka didn’t have to see it. He held Luka until the shaking subsided, and he knew the initial shock had passed. “We’re lucky Eva and Irina are taking us to England with them.” Luka said weakly. There was a pause.
“One last date night here tomorrow, and then we’re gone.” Alek agreed.
“Date night?” Luka asked, startled.
“It’s the Winter Olympics opening ceremony tomorrow, the perfect day to protest. We have to!” Alek finished, slightly less gently than he had intended and Luka stared at him in horror.
“No, this is why it is too dangerous!” Luka exclaimed. “The security is going to be ten times higher than usual, and you’ve already almost been caught and arrested twice when there were only two of you being peaceful on the streets.” He stood up and paced away from the window. “Besides, a protest isn’t the kind of date night I signed up for – what ever happened to dinner at a nice restaurant?”
“Surely you can’t just expect me to go to dinner and pretend everything is okay instead of fighting for the very right to be with you in public anyway?” Alek snapped, rising so quickly that Luka almost flinched, but instead backed away to rest his hand on the ancient burgundy leather sofa for support.
A thick silence hung in the room for a moment as they stared each other down, Alek shaking with hot-headed anger while Luka took deep breaths to calm himself. Luka walked to the window, resting his hands on the small wooden ledge and staring out into the darkening street. He shivered with a no longer irrational fear and sighed sadly. “The danger is the whole reason we agreed to go, Alek. If being able to be with me matters so much that you want to risk being arrested then why won’t you just be with me? Ignore the law and come and have dinner with me, like a couple should. Why can’t we let that be protest enough?” Luka said.
“Because I am sick and tired of living in fear that these people could be two steps behind me. Or us.” Alek brandished the newspaper between them, stabbing the headline with his finger and throwing the newspaper to the ground. He said the last words with bitter disgust, bile rising in his throat at the thought. “I’m done with feeling hunted in my own home. The law is so vague that they can target us for anything, and they aren’t just going to stop when we leave. The least I can do is stand next to my friends in one last protest before we abandon them all and skip off into another country’s sunset.” Alek said with disgust, storming over to the window beside Luka.
“Leaving has to be enough. I don’t want to live my life without you, but I will try if you force me to. There’s no – there’s no future for us here anyway.” Luka stammered breathlessly, a pain in his throat as he clenched against sobs. He had gone too far, and he watched Alek take a step back away from him in shock. Luka whirled around and fled to their bedroom, tripping on the bed covers that had fallen to the floor and letting his body collapse to the ground as the fear took over. Alek backed away from the window, his mouth agape as a dry sickness crept up his throat. Struggling to breathe, he turned and stormed out into the night.
Luka stayed where he was, trapped by fear and frustration. His own silence was so loud that he didn’t notice Alek approach an hour later until he had wrapped his arms around Luka and held him tightly. “I’m so sorry, Luka.” Alek whispered, rocking his lover gently in his arms and allowing the snowflakes in his hair to melt down his hot skin. “I’m just scared for our friends.” He lifted his hand and ran his fingers through the soft blonde locks of Luka’s hair, feeling the tension in Luka’s body dissipate slowly. Luka shrugged Alek’s arms away and pulled himself onto the bed, curling up with his hands under the duck-egg-blue pillow.
“Did you ever think that, just maybe, I’m scared for us?” Luka replied. Alek lay down next to him, moving closer so he could listen. “Sure, you could go to the protest and come back in time for dinner. But what happens if you get arrested? Then you don’t just miss dinner but you won’t be allowed to leave the country for however long. Or what if someone from those gangs sees you and follows you here? There’s just too much at risk this time.” Luka pleaded earnestly, placing a hand on Alek’s cheek and searching his eyes for emotion. For a moment they just lay there in peace, Luka watching the emotions change in Alek’s eyes the way that the colours of the sky change from glittering yellows to gold-orange at sunset. Alek looked back at him and sighed, shuffling himself closer to Luka and planting a kiss on his dry lips.
“You’re right, I shouldn’t and won’t go. We’re done being hunted.” Alek said finally, and Luka sighed with relief and thanked him, pressing their foreheads together. Exhausted, the pair curved their bodies around each other and fell asleep as they were, Alek’s hair still dripping with the coldness of the outside world.
*
The next morning, before they left for work as usual, Alek zipped his fingers into Luka’s. “I’ll be there.” Alek had promised, before locking their lips together as if throwing away a key.
That evening, Luka leant against the wall in the cool February air, watching the smoke from his cigarette curl up into the mist and drift above the heads of the people passing by. He flicked the lighter and watched the flame burn the way that Alek’s amber eyes did. It spluttered and went out.
Alek rarely missed anything, but today he was late. Luka allowed himself to be distracted by the cold air on his cheeks, the tacky theatre signs, and the young couple laughing too loudly as they stumbled past, already drunk. Alek would be there soon.
Luka waited to call until Alek was half an hour late and the waiter was threatening to give up the table to the procession of couples forming a queue in the light snowfall. He stopped trying after twenty two missed calls. After being barged into again Luka folded himself into a safe corner by the restaurant doors and told the waiter to let the table go. He muttered Alek’s name into the air, twisting his red cashmere scarf and toying with a burnt-out cigarette. Alek wasn’t coming.
When he had been standing in the cold for at least an hour longer than he should reasonably have waited, and saw the fireworks popping from people’s gardens to mark the start of the opening ceremony, Luka gave up. For once, he was too angry to feel the unfriendly gaze of the city stalk him as he walked home. He was ready to shout at Alek when he opened the front door, but when he walked in he found the living room disappointingly empty. There was no sign that Alek had been home at all that day; the apartment as empty as it had been when he left it almost nine hours ago. The breakfast plates still sat stacked in the sink, littered with pancake crumbs, and Alek had forgotten to put the frying pan in soak again. Frowning, Luka pulled off his boots and returned to the front room, placing them on the shoe rack and picking up the television remote on the way to the window.
He flicked through the channels until he hit one that was covering the news rather than the opening ceremony, and a familiar mop of dark red hair forced him to freeze in shock, his thumb hovering millimetres above the button on the remote. Luka watched as the news reporter confirmed that a group of men had been arrested in St Petersburg for holding up a banner in a peaceful protest. Behind her, Luka could see Alek being bundled into a police van with the other protestors, his expression unreadable.
Luka buckled at the knees as if shot, sinking to the floor like a wounded animal and retching at the emptiness in his chest.
Alek stood at the barred window of a detention cell some distance away, staring out into the darkness with regret. He crumbled a piece of stale bread past the bars and watched it fall like the memories of happy mornings with pancake crumbs dropping onto plates, disappearing out of reach. He gazed into the city as if expecting to see Luka at their window again, but instead saw only fireworks, sparks hanging momentarily in the sky before falling like a net onto the city, slowly closing in.

Adventures in the Great Perhaps

Monday, 26 May 2014

News:

Friday, 23 May 2014

Hunting Season

Wednesday, 14 May 2014

Actual goodbyes