blinking simultaneously at sweat, grins tighter and tighter until their jaws bulged, their thighs shook, the floor around them shook, the shaking floor emptier and emptier, and then just them, the thunderous clapping, the frenzied music, the brothers holding on.
Yarik sat by himself behind the dark windows in the backseat of the sedan. In his lap, one hand lay palm up, holding the mint the driver had made him take, the red and white cellophaned swirl shaking like a pinwheel on the edge of starting to turn. His other hand held tight to the rim of his hard hat, upturned on the seat beside him and shaking, too. He was still wearing his work gloves. When the foreman had called him over, told him to brush off his coveralled ass, shoved him towards the car—some new model of some non-Russian make, all gleaming black and glinting chrome—he had been too surprised to do anything but walk. When the driver had stepped out of the car to open the rear door, Yarik had waited for whoever was inside to climb out. But the backseat was empty. Gospodin . . . the driver said. Yarik couldn’t recall another time in his life when he’d been called “sir.” Ducking in, he had clanked his hard hat on the car’s roof, and by the time he’d yanked the hat off and shoved it down on the seat beside him, the driver was sitting in front, turned to face him, a smirk barely hidden in his eyes. The man held out a small silver box. For the ride, he said and flipped open the top. Inside: a dozen candies in shiny foils—rubies, sapphires, small squares of gold. The pinwheel mint was the only one with a wrapper clear enough to see through. Too late, he realized his fingers were still bulky with gloves. The driver, smirk slipping over his entire face, fished the mint out for him, held it until Yarik turned up his palm.
Now, on the car radio, the long knells of the Kremlin’s bell tower rang out. Three o’clock, Moscow time. His son would be with the neighbor they paid for after-kindergarten care, his baby crawling the rugs of the old woman’s apartment. His wife would be at work. His brother would be asleep. By now, Yarik would have been pushing through the toughest time of the day, out with his crew at the Oranzheria’s far edge, trying not to count the hours till the transport bus would carry him back along this road. The car sped on, passing heavy trucks and little Ladas that drove onto the shoulder to let them have their way. In every field he passed, the monstrous sprinklers slowly rolled, their long metal backs arched from one high wheel to the next, linked together for kilometers, darkening the earth with their artificial rain. Above, collection gutters ran like veins through the clear skin of the glass, tubes dropping to storage tanks, workers lining the irrigation ditches, manning the distribution valves, directing the flow of the canals. All paused when they saw the car. He saw the faces of the workers follow him and knew that he had felt that look before, felt it coming from his own face; he had simply never known till now what it felt like directed towards him.
It felt like he was someone else. As if, for a moment behind that tinted glass, he had become the man his mother had hoped her boy would grow to be. When he’d been born—he knew because she told him—she had brought him to her breast before Dima had followed into the world. Sometimes he wondered if his brother had come first would she have chosen Dima instead? Set Dima aside for success? Checked his schoolwork first? Insisted he learn to drink black tea while still too small for such bitterness, showed him how to suck it through a sugar cube, told her six-year-old son it would help him stay awake to study? Would she have brought Dima instead of Yarik to social evenings at the army base? Introduced Dima to the men who could pull strings, who she flirted with, cajoled, tried to ensure they’d tug just a little in just the right place for him?
By the time Yarik had turned
Yarik sat by himself behind the dark windows in the backseat of the sedan. In his lap, one hand lay palm up, holding the mint the driver had made him take, the red and white cellophaned swirl shaking like a pinwheel on the edge of starting to turn. His other hand held tight to the rim of his hard hat, upturned on the seat beside him and shaking, too. He was still wearing his work gloves. When the foreman had called him over, told him to brush off his coveralled ass, shoved him towards the car—some new model of some non-Russian make, all gleaming black and glinting chrome—he had been too surprised to do anything but walk. When the driver had stepped out of the car to open the rear door, Yarik had waited for whoever was inside to climb out. But the backseat was empty. Gospodin . . . the driver said. Yarik couldn’t recall another time in his life when he’d been called “sir.” Ducking in, he had clanked his hard hat on the car’s roof, and by the time he’d yanked the hat off and shoved it down on the seat beside him, the driver was sitting in front, turned to face him, a smirk barely hidden in his eyes. The man held out a small silver box. For the ride, he said and flipped open the top. Inside: a dozen candies in shiny foils—rubies, sapphires, small squares of gold. The pinwheel mint was the only one with a wrapper clear enough to see through. Too late, he realized his fingers were still bulky with gloves. The driver, smirk slipping over his entire face, fished the mint out for him, held it until Yarik turned up his palm.
Now, on the car radio, the long knells of the Kremlin’s bell tower rang out. Three o’clock, Moscow time. His son would be with the neighbor they paid for after-kindergarten care, his baby crawling the rugs of the old woman’s apartment. His wife would be at work. His brother would be asleep. By now, Yarik would have been pushing through the toughest time of the day, out with his crew at the Oranzheria’s far edge, trying not to count the hours till the transport bus would carry him back along this road. The car sped on, passing heavy trucks and little Ladas that drove onto the shoulder to let them have their way. In every field he passed, the monstrous sprinklers slowly rolled, their long metal backs arched from one high wheel to the next, linked together for kilometers, darkening the earth with their artificial rain. Above, collection gutters ran like veins through the clear skin of the glass, tubes dropping to storage tanks, workers lining the irrigation ditches, manning the distribution valves, directing the flow of the canals. All paused when they saw the car. He saw the faces of the workers follow him and knew that he had felt that look before, felt it coming from his own face; he had simply never known till now what it felt like directed towards him.
It felt like he was someone else. As if, for a moment behind that tinted glass, he had become the man his mother had hoped her boy would grow to be. When he’d been born—he knew because she told him—she had brought him to her breast before Dima had followed into the world. Sometimes he wondered if his brother had come first would she have chosen Dima instead? Set Dima aside for success? Checked his schoolwork first? Insisted he learn to drink black tea while still too small for such bitterness, showed him how to suck it through a sugar cube, told her six-year-old son it would help him stay awake to study? Would she have brought Dima instead of Yarik to social evenings at the army base? Introduced Dima to the men who could pull strings, who she flirted with, cajoled, tried to ensure they’d tug just a little in just the right place for him?
By the time Yarik had turned
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