Trafika Europe 13 - Russian Ballet

Two Stories

though she out-and-out kidnapped Gena from the university and took him off to – Crimea, to see his mother and make her acquaintance in the guise of his bride. And, if all the things I just told you contain even a smidgen of truth, then it is apropos of that very servitude – when each of us, whomever so wishes, takes up into his own hands a branch and carries it off to wherever so he wishes…. There was no word of Gena for a year. Only the usual rumors reached us, about Gena having fallen off somewhere, or him having drank something incomestible…. After a year, I made it down to Crimea for a week-long vacation. In the airport, I was met by some of Gena’s friends from among the gourmands. “Where’s Gena?” “He went to buy some flowers.” “What flowers? What for?” “He said that one must greet arriving flyers with flowers….” We arrived at an old house on the edge of a wild stretch of beach. Girlfriends and wives unfamiliar to me were setting the dinner table – sheep cheese, tomatoes, boiled meat, and decanters and glass jars filled with homemade wine. Still no sign of Schneiderman. Perhaps he drowned somewhere with the flowers. The surf was pounding with great resolve,

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