Krasnosamarskoe, or How I Learned to Accept the Dark Truth of My Heritage

I had a dog once.

I had him when he was just a very small creature, not much different from myself at the time.

___

16:00. 

It was nearing the end of a rendition of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade conducted by Valery Gergiev of the Vienna Philharmonic. I sat there, quietly absorbed in my own thoughts amongst the other researchers in the cargo bay benches. After flying for about six or seven hours from Pulkovo Airport in Saint Petersburg, the Mi-26’s rotor blades hovered above a convenient spot just a few meters away from the research site tents before setting itself down gently on the grand sprawling landscape like a peaceful dragonfly on a drop of morning dew, the majestic river Volga right in front of them, and the mountainous Urals just lurking behind from hundreds of miles away.

7:00. 

I awoke from a massive hangover.

Without any more semblance of thought, I began to pack for the trip to the dig site – string, brushes, lawn clippers, magnifying glass, one change of Hanes underwear, two UNIQLO shirts, a pair of work Levi’s, an outdoor parka, and my Nikon D3100 with lenses (all other equipment was already taken care of so I’m packing light this time).

I rinsed off the remains of yesterday under a faucet, and put on a decent pair of pants, an old Kmart round neck, and a comfortable winter jacket (never mind breakfast, I’m not even that hungry yet).

My wife left me a note on the bedside lamp table. I thought it was strange at first, seeing as she wasn’t really the type of person who would leave notes scattered around (and it looked hurriedly written and messy, her usual chicken scratch-like handwriting).

Don’t forget. 

That was all she wrote in that scrap of paper. I haven’t got a clue what it meant at all.

Don’t forget what? What does this woman want me to do?

I snuck a glance at the wall clock and my hair immediately stood on end. 

Shit, it’s almost eight and the taxi was still nowhere in sight. 

And so, I’ve thought nothing of that cryptic line until I’ve figured out a way to get to the airport without losing my already fading sanity – I don’t have time to be Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot right now.

___

It was the middle of winter. My father and I were out in the steppes hunting for game when we finally spotted this beast – it was a lone wolf with a cloudy gray hide that looked and felt larger than life. It howled and barked furiously, suddenly feeling threatened by our presence in its territory.

We felt the animalistic tension linger like icy daggers in the air.

We saw it – it saw us. 

Don’t move, my father said. Get behind me.

The creature moved closer and closer; it bared its dirty yellow white fangs at us while my heart was gripped with fear – he brandished the spear as I further retreated into the safety of his shadow.

___

9:15.

“Fuck! Why are we up this high?”, one of the older researchers cursed in Russian from the opposite side of the Mi-26.

“First time flying in a helicopter?”

“Yes…”, he shouted from across the galley row, “… I don’t like heights.”

“I take it that you prefer office work in Moscow?”

He nodded anxiously. “Yes, I do. That is easier way – no leave chair, just sit in front of computer, do work – all done. No worry.”

The engine noises slowly started intruding the airwaves. “Don’t you find it boring?”

“What!? Sorry?”

“I SAID, DON’T YOU FIND IT BORING!?”

“NOT REALLY, NO – IT’S GOOD WORK. I GET PAID – ALL GOOD.”

“YOU’RE MISSING OUT, THEN. I’D PICK AN RICKETY OLD AIRLIFT LIKE THIS OVER SOME DINGY CUBICLE ANY DAY…”

By that point, the engine noises subsided a bit. The senior researcher continued to shudder in his seat, and I had a pair of headphones stuck to my temples – The Ride of the Valkyries, Wagner’s finest.

Damn, just like Apocalypse Now.

It feels so good to be alive!

___

Run!

Without warning, the wolf charged ahead.

I ran as fast as my little legs could carry me until I reached the village up ahead.

Help, I told them with all urgency. My father… wolf… danger!

…

Moments passed, and the hunting party emerged with their weapons and their hounds – I followed along just to be safe.

…

When all the men arrived, my old man stood there, blood on his face and kyrtill – and in the corner, there lay the dead wolf, the sharpened spear sticking out of its wide gaping mouth.

…

Good son, he said to me, panting and heaving from exhaustion. 

You brought reinforcements.

___

12:00.

The Iridium buzzed and rang in my right pocket – it was my wife that called.

“You got the note I left behind?”

No hello, as usual.

“Yes, I got it. What do you mean, though?”

“You already know,” she just said plainly, matter-of-factly.

No, I don’t.

“Look, if it’s about what I did last night, I’m sorry. I really am. Okay?”

“No, I’m not buying it.”

“Come on. I really don’t know what it is with that note of yours.”

A beat.

“Look…”, she said after keeping momentarily silent, “… just… oh, forget it.”

“Hold on. Wait-”

The call ended unceremoniously.

Don’t forget.

“Attention, passengers,” the pilot announced on the intercom in a thick Russian accent, “we will be arriving at the Volga site in approximately four hours from now. The time now is 12:07.”

Don’t forget.

“Sit back. Fasten your seatbelts. Have a nice day!”

Don’t forget.

Radio silence – some had their blankets out and got themselves warm; some were fidgeting and moving about randomly; some had their phones out (updating statuses on social media, maybe, I don’t know) – I had a book with me, Underworld by Don DeLillo. 

Don’t forget.

Shit. Plutonium waste. The Cold War. Baseball. Giants versus Dodgers. J. Edgar Hoover (and whatever the hell he was doing with Frank Sinatra and a couple of jazz icons in the Polo Grounds Stadium). The Bobby Thomson homer. A long-lost love rekindled for a fleeting moment in the wide American desert – I made it around a quarter of the way into the book just a few days prior. It looks great so far – David Foster Wallace never disappointed in his magnanimous praise for that particular maximalist novel.

Don’t forget.

It’s such a shame, really – he’s not around anymore, DFW. 

One day, his wife found him hanging from the rafters of their home. 

The end. 

That was it – that was how his tale ended.

The tragic story of an English language prodigy, graduated summa in Amherst, made it big in the literary scene not long after, and it all vanished without a trace years later. 

He had enough.

He’d been drowning in anti-depressants for decades, he felt the world closing in on him, and he set out to do the only thing he thought reasonable in that window of opportunity.

Suicide. 

That’s what too much success would do to the unstable mind.

He will be missed.

…

Don’t forget.

___

One of the hounds started following a scent along the bushy undergrowth of the steppes – he had his nose buried in the mossy, swampy dirt, scoping the rest of the area out for any more signs of life much like Hel on the prowl for lost souls.

Are you okay? I asked my father. You took quite the beating out there.

Don’t worry about it, he assured me. 

This isn’t the first time I’ve killed a wolf.

…

About a few moments passed and the hound began barking huskily in the distance, signaling my father and the rest of the hunting party to follow the trail that it had taken in its pursuit of the mysterious scent.

A medium-sized hole on a small slope by the side of the ground – that was where the hound stopped short. 

Judging from the size of it, it must have been a den of some sort.

A den fit for a killer.

There might still be wolves around this part, I shuddered when I heard it from one of the older men, his raspy voice ringing as clear as day in my ears. They might show up any minute and tear our whole party to shreds like the wild and feral animals that they are.

___

14:00

I remembered the events that had transpired last night.

It was late – around 8:50 or so in the evening. 

I stood by the door of our apartment flat, hopelessly drunk from all the Chianti I had when I was out with my other colleagues, half-hesitating to enter. She wanted to talk. I knew it, but look at me? I was in no state to have a decent conversation.

She wanted to talk about something important.

She wanted to talk about our marriage.

Fuck this – go ahead and open the door. No, wait – look at yourself all shitfaced.

Fuck this – go open the fucking door. No, you don’t – you’re a fucking mess as it is.

Fuck. 

I turned the handle, opened the door – and there she was.

…

“Where the hell have you been!?”

“… Oh, I don’t know…”, I answered groggily, half-laughing, half-unable to process what she meant exactly by this simple statement, “… here, there… everywhere…”

Don’t forget. Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

“This… this… this is why-”

“Why what, huh?”

“This is why I wanted to talk to you! And look, look at yourself…”, she grabbed a mirror on the table and held it up against me, “… you’re a big, fucking mess!”

I brushed the mirror aside – it clattered to the linoleum floor and broke into a few shards, a few shards that would have broken into a million other fragments – force overdone.

“Oh, so I’m not allowed to live my life the way I want to!?”

Don’t forget. Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

“You’re so fucking selfish, you know that!?”

“I work too hard…”, I said in a slurred speech, “… I need this-”

My face felt hot the instant I let the words go – the hateful contact of her hand on my flesh sent me reeling back in pain.

Her eyes blazed with an anger I haven’t seen from her in forever.

“You work…”, she continued amidst her silent fury, “… you go out; you work, you go out, you work again, even harder this time, and then you go and have another round; and then you go home, wondering why I don’t really care about shit, wondering why I don’t give a damn about your life anymore; and then you work, and then go out…

“… Like nothing ever happened.

…

“It used to be us against the world, you and I…

“… But ever since we moved here, I don’t see much of you anymore – you abandoned me…”

Her eyes were turning a pale shade of pink and red.

Her voice was broken.

She felt all choked up – her soul was weeping, but she had to hold it all in.

Don’t forget. Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

I just stood there, a blank expression on my face.

It was true.

It was all too true.

…

“Just go… run off to god knows where…

“… You’re nothing to me now.”

I didn’t know what else to do, so I just got out the door and left her there.

Alone in her own misery.

I stood by our door for a few more seconds, Number 403 – she finally broke down in tears when she thought that I finally left.

Finally left for good.

Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

The night was cold, and winter began to set in.

Chianti was still coursing through my veins – I felt warm, but undignified.

Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

She broke down in tears.

I moved further away from the apartment block, my mind in a hazy daze.

Wrapped up in darkness – she broke down in tears.

Don’t forget. Don’t forget. 

I keep escaping the night, but I’ve got nowhere else to go.

The further I got, the emptier I felt inside.

She broke down in tears.

Don’t forget. Don’t forget.

…

I gave up about two hours in and walked all the way back to the flat. 

The key was turned, the door was opened, the door was shut.

The broken mirror was still there – my wife wasn’t.

She broke down in tears.

…

I collapsed on the sofa – CNN was on.

Something about the Boston Marathon Bombing – three dead, more than 260 injured – all in a fraction of a second. Oh god, the tragedy...

“Tovarish, you okay?”

Reality set in – the nervous old researcher called out from the other side of the cargo bay. Looks like he’s gotten used to heights no time quick.

“You’ve been staring into dead space for ages. Everything okay?”

I sighed. “All good here. Don’t worry about me.”

And then I sunk my head down low – do not disturb.

…

She broke down in tears.

Don’t forget.

___

I entered the hole.

They had no other choice – I was the only one who could fit in it.

It’s going to be alright son, my father assured me. We’ll be here, don’t worry.

And so, I went, down the hole – off to certain doom.

The moment I entered that crawlspace, it felt even colder for some reason.

Like Hel hanging around, breathing down my neck.

Waiting for the worse to come.

Odin, help me.

Not long after, I heard a faint whimper – a faint whimper that I could’ve sworn was in there somewhere…

I gulped, and I inched closer and closer to the source, a small hunting knife in hand, shaking to the core, unable to utter a single sound while simultaneously plucking up the courage to move inches at a time.

The whimpers were getting closer now.

It might be a bluff, I thought. Too obvious.

Alright now, show yourself, you foul beast! Show yourself now, or I’ll…!

What?

When it finally showed itself, it wasn’t what I thought it was.

I expected something bigger, another beast of the steppes perhaps – or something else entirely that I didn’t know about that was out to kill me.

Instead, it was something else.

It was a little wolf pup.

A little, defenseless wolf pup – not much different from myself.

___

15:18

I stopped listening to my thoughts and let the music run through my restless mind.

The brasses, woodwinds, and strings open us up to the grand symphony; the violin carries with it a mysterious energy that drives the melody home. 

Scheherazade by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

The wind-swept Arabian desert in full view, the palace of Baghdad just up ahead – she was there, the namesake gem of this vast arid wasteland, with colorful cloths and silks and satins, lavish yet equally as modest – Sinbad is on his way, don’t fret.

He’s still at sea.

One Thousand and One Arabian Nights.

The king (Shahryar, he was called) found out about his queen’s extramarital affair, and then had her and the lover beheaded for adultery.

“All women are vile snakes,” he resolved, proceeded to wed each and every last bride in the kingdom, and then had them all killed come sunrise – what a way to end a relationship. 

Hell, he’s even worse than Henry VIII (I mean, at least he had the earthly decency to divorce Catherine of Aragon before it was too late).

That was, until the grand vizier’s daughter was the only unwed woman left in all of Baghdad.

Shahrazad. Scheherazade.

Potato. Potato.

Every day (for 1001 nights, obviously), for just a few moments short of dawn, she wakes up to tell Shahryar a story – she starts off slow, he gets invested in her tale, and then she ends it abruptly just when the plot would begin to thicken.

Big 180 from the in medias res, if you ask me.

Long story short, all that suspense was killing him, his curiosity thrived, he reevaluated his goddamned excuse for a love life, removed the murderous decree, and they both lived.

Happily.

Ever.

After.

And scene. Applause rings out from the crowd.

But life doesn’t work that way – never does.

Just yesterday, my wife walked out on me just after I’ve knowingly walked out on her.

Shahryar, that daft bastard, somehow had the fortuitous chance to change, he took it, and Scheherazade couldn’t have been happier.

Get the picture?

Don’t forget…

___

I returned home not long after, and I carried the pup in my hands.

He was the only one left in that hole, that poor creature.

It must have been his mother that was killed.

She must have been out hunting too when she crossed paths with me and my old man – the rest of her young might have died recently, and the hole near the side of the slope must have been a temporary den.

Nature is a vicious circle that never ends.