St Petersburg Syndrome
The Annual Fiction Special for Soaring Twenties Social Club
The Annual Fiction Special for Soaring Twenties Social Club.
By the time I crossed Sebastian bridge St Petersburg was wrapped in a sickly yellow twilight. I wanted to stand on the south side, just for a moment, so I could stand as close as possible to the place they told me it had all ended.
My eyes became little cameras that observed every grain and texture in the landscape. It was St Petersburg. A magnificent destroyed place. The perfect place for death to prepare its nest.
Yes, there were still things of beauty here, but I needed to breathe in the city and its past. Years of paranoia will do that to you. Even if you realize a closure can never fully occur, you still look for it, and hope that something will click and beautifully erase all your troubles. People are like that. We want to make sense of things, we like to put things into order.
In an absent minded trance I began walking away from Sebastian bridge. It was as if something pulled me further away, south. I knew I should turn around but instead I walked on. The moisture in the air stuck onto my face and left a cool film on my nose. It itched and I had to keep wiping it away with my scarf. I squinted into the darkness. It could have been a candle flicker that caught my attention. Like some insect drawn to light I strayed toward it.
When I was little and had to walk through pitch dark forests I would sing to myself. I would usually pick a cheerful tune and then add my own lyrics to it. Then I would skip along the road and sing fabricated happy songs while deep inside I knew I was fooling myself. But I usually managed to generate a burst of happiness that lasted a few seconds at a time. A bit like the Little Match Girl.
My night vision kicked in and I walked faster. I took slow and deep breaths through my nose as I moved forward. The lack of people made me feel watched. I realized I was humming and quickly stopped. I saw the light flicker again. It was a candle light in a window about two blocks away. I turned around and looked north. North was calling me back but sometimes I don't listen all that well.
The sulfuric light peered through the somewhat crooked arrangement of dark houses. A nervous sensation shook me into action and all I could think of was to find shelter. It was risky. I was south of the river, and tourists should never go south of the river. I headed toward the candle lit window.
A bell sounded as soon as I entered the small hotel. The reception desk was unmanned. A white taper candle stuck in an empty label-less vodka bottle was placed on a tiny window sill facing north. The lobby was small and only accommodated a pair of well-worn leather chairs and a tea table. Everything looked dated but somehow well kept. I walked up to the front desk and waited.
"Reservation only," said the man who quietly appeared from the back room. He did not look at me.
"I apologize," I began before my own sound was muted by mucus. My voice was hoarse after breathing in all that fog. And, I hadn't talked to anyone in well over two days.
The man looked impatiently somewhere around the area of my chest and navel and said:
"Who sent you? We're full. Now if you'd please..." and began showing me out.
"Please sir. Could you tell me how to get back to the north side?"
I was trying to buy a little time. He thought for a while, then cast a glance toward the window and the candle lit vodka bottle. He sighed loudly and heaved out a:
"Damned moths!" Then he finally gave me a glance, this time his eyes made it as far up as my mouth.
"I'm really sorry for imposing. I truly am. But could you please make an exception and let me rent one of your rooms tonight?"
I really had no idea why I said that. And why did I keep apologizing? I definitely didn't want to stay here.
"I said we're full," he repeated but stood there and inspected me as if expecting to find something.
"Are you sure? It seems kind of quiet here," I said. I felt how unwanted I was, but what do you do when all you see is one candle light?
"It's always quiet here. Now, tell me, who sent you?" His outright stare was no different from the prying looks I got from the locals each day, but he was searching me with his eyes. I did not know what it meant. Who sent me here? Was that a code for something? Perhaps I had ended up in some drug infested headquarters?
As calmly as I could I said:
"No one did, I'm lost. I saw the candle in your window, and that is how I ended up here. Can you help me?"
He thought for a moment and responded:
"No. I can't."
Looking out I saw that it was sleeting. I wondered if Evan had walked in this part of town and if he also had hated the sleet.
The man walked back behind the desk, stopped, and tilted his head slightly as if thinking about something especially demanding.
"I'd be happy to pay extra to get a room," I tried. Was I crazy? I wasn't even in charge of what came out of my mouth. I really needed to get out now, and I needed to head back to the hotel before it got too late. He looked up and amidst that staring I could detect something I hadn't registered in him earlier, an intelligent mind at work. I had to get a hold of myself and quick. As he walked out of the room he said:
"But I know someone who can help. Sit. I'll call him."
I sat down in the leather chair and sighed.
The next time I heard his voice it was much later because the taper candle in the window had burned out and another one was lit on the front desk.
"He's here," said the man without betraying any emotion. I jerked up in my chair. I must have nodded off. Then he walked toward the back room and motioned me to follow. I was tired and unfocused. I held my leather messenger bag tightly and pressed it toward my damp jacket as I followed into the backroom.
A long table occupied most of the rectangular room. We entered at the short end of it and in the candle light I detected a man sitting at the far end of the long table. Fear crept up from my knees and lodged into my thighs. My jeans were still wet and felt like aluminum foil.
"Here. And you can have 124," said the innkeeper to the other man, "Let me know if you need anything – else."
"Thanks, Kaidanov," said the man.
My stomach instantly began churning. The man rose from his seat and walked over to me. He was tall and wore a full but short beard. I couldn't really see his eyes but there was something gray that glimmered there for a moment.
"Madam, you are under arrest for trespassing the safety zone of the Russian Federation. Turn around." I understood the words first when I felt the cold metal of handcuffs being clasped around my wrists. I was like a mute child. All the words and profanities I usually accessed with ease were now gone, completely out of reach. Perhaps it was Russia. You know, being in another country. Perhaps it numbed my instincts. All I could find the wit to say was:
"What happened to international law?" That resulted in a quick and painful snap of my wrists and we were on our way out of the room.
Unintelligible thoughts rushed through my head. Most of them told me I would be raped, tortured or even worse. The man pushing me up the stairs had to be an agent with the Federal Security Service. I knew this could happen. I had been warned this could happen for Christ's sake. I just never really thought it could happen to me. No, that wasn’t true. I knew it could happen. Just not to me.
I had always, and I mean always, been perfectly careful. This trip was, of course, the most exposed I had ever allowed myself to be. This was it then, and now look how amateurish I was. This was how it felt like to be led to my own death. He pushed me into room 124.
It was a large hotel room. A fire was roaring but I was too shocked to care. He led me toward the fireplace. My hat was wet from the thick fog and my hair kept getting in my face. The handcuffs alternately burned and chilled my wrists. He threw a backpack on the floor and stood near the fire.
"I want to see some I.D.," I finally managed to press out without crying, and since it brought me a sense of courage I added: "Who the hell are you?"
"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked me while leaning himself slowly down onto a couch.
In a frustrated attempt to shake some locks of hair away from my face my hat fell off and landed right at his feet. Between my streaky long bangs I saw him try to light a cigarette. He looked up at me, and it took him several clicks on the lighter before he got a flame. With a surprised look he surveyed my face and again asked:
"What the hell are you doing here?"
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My sci-fi anthologies: Errante and No End Code
