Trafika Europe 13 - Russian Ballet

AVENGERS (short story) By Katia Kapovich Translated from the Russian by Alexander Cigale “Thou shalt repay every wrong with kindness?” If you ask me about it, my answer is: “Who the heck are you? Mother Theresa?” We’ve been sitting on the porch the whole morning – me, Luca, Malcolm, Diana, and Mirsky, going over in our heads how we can knock off our friend Galileo’s father. “We”: that’s the six “Inseparables,” which includes Galileo, the only difference being that he’s not with us today. This is how it all began: somebody calling himself Galileo’s father appeared out of the blue and won custody over Galileo in court, so that both he and his brother were taken away from their mother and must now live with this father, whom none of us had ever laid eyes on before. “And who despises him!” says Luca. We’ve been sitting here on Luca’s porch, waiting for his mom (whose name is Romana) to bring chocolate milk out for us. She promised it already an hour ago. “You know what else he came up with?” Luca continues. “He took away Galileo’s cell phone and computer and is going to send him to a different school! And he won’t even let him see us. So what did you come up with, Malcolm?”

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