Gatac

  Ilya Gavrilovic Sidorov wasn’t tired when he stepped off the pne at John F. Kennedy airport.1I couldn’t find a freely accessible 1980 timetable for Aeroflot. An arrival te in the night does seem unlikely, however. Let’s pretend Ilya had a yover somewhere. He’d gotten his sleep out of the way on the flight and now it was time to greet his new life with open eyes, a life that felt like it had been waiting here for him all this time to come along and cim it. The proof was even in the name of this pce. JFK was the best possible airport for him to arrive in America, because unlike most of his fellow passengers, Ilya felt a deep kinship with what he knew about the 35th President of the United States. Not so much the John F. Kennedy on paper — Ilya couldn’t cim heritage or wealth or education — but he had his bright charisma and a confidence that buoyed him. Plus, Ilya thought, Kennedy was tough. They ughed at him as a pretty boy at first, but Kennedy gave as good as he got in the Cuba tussle and Ilya very much intended to do likewise. He even thought he looked like Kennedy, athletic without being overmuscled, boyish without being immature, handsome without being a fop.

  Plus, those ‘Dead Kennedys’, they were something else. Punk Rock! Ilya loved their music. As soon as he had his money, he’d get on the train to California and meet them.2While the Dead Kennedys did have their first single California über Alles out by then, it’d be a pretty neat trick to have a record behind the Iron Curtain early enough for Ilya to be familiar. So, uh, do plot holes count half if I call them out first?

  There were about a dozen people he had said “Hello!” to on his way from the pne through customs to the arrival hall. Hell, he had even smiled and greeted a policeman! Ilya felt drunk on it all, which made him feel like drinking for real — oh, he could drink so much here, he could tell just from the bright posters pstered everywhere. He tried not to stare, but he couldn’t help the grin on his face. What a pce! It enraptured him so deeply he almost walked into the man who he was supposed to meet. Ilya saw his face, the innate Russian-ness of it, and almost flinched back from him, though his grin soon recovered.

  “Hello!” Ilya said to him, sticking his hand out. “How do you do!”“— hello,” the man said and shook Ilya’s hand. “Ilya Gavrilovic?”“Yes!” Ilya said.“I am called Rusn Romanovic,” the man said, “and on behalf of Mr. Pankratev I would like to —”“English, please!” Ilya interjected. “I want to learn a lot!”“Very well,” Rusn said. “There - is - a - car. It - is - outside. We - will - go - there.”Ilya nodded along to the words. “Yes!” he said and thought for a moment. “We will go to the car who is outside.”“Which,” Rusn corrected him.“Ah!” Ilya said. “The car which is outside. Yes?”“Yes,” Rusn said, upping his tempo. “We will go now.”“Okay!” Ilya said, with a little ugh. “I learn!”

  Rusn had a car blue as the summer sky that seemed to be built out of straight angles only. It had four headlights, two squares on each side of the angled front grille. A gentle center bulge ran the length of the hood, the price the designers had paid for too much engine under an otherwise ft panel. Ilya couldn’t help but gnce at the marque when Rusn opened the notchback rear and heaved Ilya’s luggage inside — a Mustang. Ilya grinned. The perfect American car! This Rusn guy had taste. The interior didn’t disappoint, either: the same calming blue inside, paired with cream white seats. And the wood grain on the console! Ilya ran his hand over it as Rusn fired up the engine. Its rumble was everything Ilya had dreamt of. Rusn put the pedal down briefly, opening up the throttle and Ilya’s smile in one move.

  “Vroom!” Ilya said, and ughed. “Very excellent car! You drive for Mr. Pankratev, brother?”“No,” Rusn said, starting to smile. “His car is big and slow. This is my car.”“Your car?” Ilya asked. “How much?”“Five thousand dolrs,” Rusn said. “If you are good at this job, you will have a car like this in two months.”

  Ilya’s eyes lit up at the news. His own sports car! He kept gliding his hands over the car’s interior as Rusn pulled out of the parking spot and onto the road.

  “Two months!” Ilya said. He looked up from the interior to the windows, his eyes flicking from one car to the next. “I love America.”“Life is good here,” Rusn said.“How long until…apartment?” Ilya asked.“We rented a hotel room for you to begin with,” Rusn said. “We can go find an apartment for you after the weekend.”“Or a house!” Ilya said.“That’s aiming a little high,” Rusn said. Noting Ilya’s vacant look, he repeated himself in simpler words. “You will have to work hard to buy a house.”“Yes!” Ilya said. “I will work hard. I am ready to work, brother. Take me to Mr. Pankratev, I will tell him this!”“Easy there,” Rusn said. “I know you want to get right into it, but I have some more business to take care of first. We’ll introduce you to him tomorrow.” He checked the clock in the dashboard of his car. “Are you hungry?”“I am hungry,” Ilya affirmed and had a look at the clock himself — 11:23 PM. “You have eggs at hotel? I cook eggs, very good.”Rusn smirked. “How about a hamburger instead?”Ilya paused at the thought. Not a kotljeta from cheap pork ground to nothing, forcibly married to its own weight in breadcrumbs — but a hamburger, made from fresh American beef, pebbles of meat and fat, with a brown-to-almost-bck sear outside, pink and juicy in the middle, topped with melted cheese…and fresh beefsteak tomato…and grilled onions…and — “The restaurant is open now?” he asked.“I know a pce that’s always open,” Rusn said. “Hamburgers, steaks, eggs — as much as you want. We’ll go there after I wrap up my work.”“And I can eat anything there?” Ilya asked. “To be open always, is it expensive?”“Forget about the price, it’s on me,” Rusn said. “I’ll pay. Whatever you want.”

  Ilya leaned back into his chair and closed his eyes. Maybe he was sleepy, after all. But more than that, he was hungry.

  “I love America,” he said again.

  It was close to midnight when Rusn pulled the car over at the side of the road and killed the lights. The turnoff at Jamaica Bay was maybe too on the nose as a meeting spot, but it was dark and out of the way. He got out, walked around the front of the car and pushed open the rusty little gate leading down the dirt path into the swamp. With the gate open, he got back into the car and drove it for a few more seconds, just far enough down the path it wouldn’t be seen if anyone drove by on the main road. Rusn took a breath and killed the engine.

  “Stay in the car,” Rusn told the fresh meat, and the fresh meat nodded.

  The recruit had notably quieted down during the drive. That was good, Rusn thought. If he could get him settled and into some new clothes before meeting the boss, they’d both make a better impression. Plus, the less the recruit saw of this, the better. If Rusn could have arranged it, he wouldn’t have taken the recruit here at all, but getting the deal pushed back three hours by the other party had left him to either say yes or let the whole thing go, and Rusn wasn’t in any position to let it go. He got out and walked to the trunk of his ‘79 Mustang. The recruit was the first guy he’d met who actually liked the trim on it, but it had the inline six, and he’d gotten it right off the lot at a good price, because a lot of buyers weren’t willing to look past the blue. He’d seen it, actually, another salesman taking this 18-year old boy for a ride with a turbo-charged V4. A turbo! On a Mustang!3While I’m not one to turn to when it comes to the pros and cons of forced induction vs. naturally aspirated engines, pony cars like the Mustang were not having a good time in the ‘maise era’ of the 70s and early 80s, and the existence of smaller, turbocharged engine variants was one way to try to reign in emissions while still offering some sort of performance. Rusn, on the other hand, wouldn’t have that and went for the six-cylinder engine, following a distinctly American line of thought: there’s no repcement for dispcement. Rusn felt bile rising in his throat just thinking about it. He pushed the recruit’s crappy little Soviet suitcase to the side and retrieved the document case with the money inside, pushed the trunk closed and walked down the path into the dark.

  It was a walk just long enough to make a man think about his life, but Rusn ignored the temptation, instead going over the three-step pn again and again. Buy the product. Drive it to Philly on Sunday. Get paid. One more time: product, Philly, paid. Product, Philly, paid. Product, Philly, paid. The Jamaicans were waiting for him at the beach, like they always were. Rusn pyed it cool, even as one of them shone a fshlight at him.

  “It’s me,” Rusn said, trying to block the beam with his left hand. God damn it. Every fucking time. As if they could hear his thoughts, the light was turned down and aimed at the ground, and soon Rusn could make out the silhouettes of his business partners.“Sorry about the time,” their pointman said. He’d introduced himself as Glenmore once and he did all the talking. Rusn wasn’t quite sure why. Maybe he was in charge of the trio, maybe not having that Isnds way of speaking was a friendlier front towards an outside or maybe having to deal with Rusn was just the the shit job he was stuck with. “Sebastian got suspicious when we took off too early st month,” Glenmore said.“Sebastian seems to be suspicious of many things,” Rusn said.“His opinion of commies hasn’t improved, either,” Glenmore said and ughed it off. “Hey, I’m not saying you can fuck my sister, Ivan, but your money’s green, my product’s white. We’re good on colors, right?”“Exactly,” Rusn said. “Gd we’re on the same page.” He held up his document case. “Do you have my shipment?”“Right here,” Glenmore said. They traded case for satchel, not getting too close and not taking their eyes off each other, either. “July’s gonna be the st one for the year, though,” Glenmore added. “DEA is on our supplier. One more run, then we’re gonna have to let things cool down for a while and switch it up for next season.”“Switch it up?” Rusn said. “How?”“Hell if I know,” Glenmore said. “I ain’t management. All I know is we got July and it’s gonna be big. Upstairs is calling it the ‘Big Blow Blow-Out’, bunch of marketing geniuses up in this joint. All kinda cats jumping on that.”“And nothing after July?” Rusn asked. “Please say you are kidding me.”“Hey, that’s what they tell us, I don’t know the cartel shit behind it,” Glenmore said. “You ask me, it’s simple. You get in on it or you don’t get more white until next time, whenever ‘next time’ is. Just giving it to you straight, Ivan.”“Sure,” Rusn said. But five kilos wouldn’t get him through the rest of the year. They wouldn’t get him through summer, and his Phidelphia ‘partner’ wasn’t going to accept winter without snow. “I will need more product.”“How much more?” Glenmore asked. “I feel like every time I’m hearing more, more, more from you. Be real with me, Ivan. How much you need?”

  Rusn did the math. He knew what he needed, but he had to figure out what he could afford. His reserves, plus whatever quick cash he could make in a month and…well, no two ways about it, he’d have to get at the boss’s stash, borrow some money and put it back as soon as possible. That would get him to just about —

  “Twenty,” he said. Still light, but it’d give him some time to figure this out and maybe find a different way.Glenmore whistled. “You’re killing me on this, Ivan,” he said. “Shit, I thought five was ambitious for you but twenty fucking keys, man, that’s a move. That’s a fucking move right there. Sebastian’s gonna know it ain’t me. He’s gonna know, man.”“Can you do it or not?” Rusn asked.Glenmore considered it. “Nah, man,” he said. “If we’re gonna do this, we gotta split it up, like five keys times me and three more pyers, make sure nobody asks too many questions. But that’s gonna be tough.”“Spare me,” Rusn said. “All I need to hear is, what will it cost me?”“Let’s walk through the math, Ivan,” Glenmore said. “I know a couple guys that keep they mouths shut, but they got to get theirs just like I got to get mine. Start at ten per? And twenty on top, you know, sweeten the pot if they don’t go for it, shut up anybody asking questions. You gotta have that hush money on the real, brothers don’t take checks.” Rusn said nothing, so Glenmore kept talking. “Hey, man, if that don’t do it, it’s on me, right? I know it’s a lotta stacks, but I swear to you I’ll make this happen, true up on the difference, whatever it takes to get those cats in on it. You going in on twenty keys with me, you get them twenty keys. You got my word on that. You got the paper, I got the shit, that’s the deal with the Glenmore guarantee.”Fifty grand, Rusn thought. Fifty grand on top of wholesale for twenty fucking kilos.“You good there, Ivan?” Glenmore said. “You’re all white and that’s saying something.”“Yes,” Rusn said without thinking about it. “Yes. Let’s do this. Put me down for twenty and I will sweeten the pot for your friends.” He exhaled. “Let’s dream big.”“Twenty keys and big dreams for Ivan, you got it,” Glenmore said. “Gimme some skin.”

  They shook on it, Rusn’s cmmy hand meeting Glenmore’s firm grip.

  “Pleasure, as always,” Glenmore said, stepping away and turning around. “See ya, Ivan.”“Same,” Rusn said.

  From the woods, three deep cracks echoed.

  Before Rusn was quite sure what was happening, Glenmore keeled over. Rusn’s eyes widened when his brain connected the sound to a suppressed gun — his suppressed gun — and more shots rang out, cutting down Glenmore’s friends. The satchel slipped from Rusn’s fingers, but the rest of him stayed frozen in pce. Goddamn it, he wasn’t even quick enough to duck…

  “Rex, brother!” Ilya’s voice called out to him. Rusn turned to see the recruit arriving at this particur shore with the smoking gun in his hand. “I look around and check for the ambush, but I think that is all of them, yes?” Ilya said.“You…you killed them,” Rusn said, strength draining from his voice like the color from his face.“Yes!” Ilya ughed. “Now we have the money and the drugs. It is called ‘win-win’!”“You do not understand —” Rusn started. He caught himself when Ilya kept ughing. Why was he pying the recruit’s game? “Shut up, urod!”4Yep, still counts as an ableist slur even if it’s in a foreign nguage. Rusn said, now with more force behind it.In a snap, Ilya aimed the gun in his hands at Rusn. “You took me to a deal you made behind Mr. Pankratev’s back and left your gun in the glove compartment,” Ilya said, having turned on a dime from ughter to sneering at Rusn. “You are in this situation now because I saved you from your own ck of foresight. You have no right to call me names.”

  Rusn said nothing. Ilya ughed again and lowered the gun.

  “You have no nerves, brother,” Ilya said between ughs. “You call yourself a Thief, but you cannot even work into your own pocket with confidence. I see now why Mr. Pankratev needs me. He needs a soldier with balls.”“Don’t threaten me,” Rusn said. “He’ll never believe you over me.”“Pah, as if I would betray a brother,” Ilya said. “You misunderstand me, Rusn Romanovic. I am here to help you. Ilya Gavrilovic is always there to help his brothers. I would never tell on you. I am insulted you would even consider this.” After a moment’s thought, he held out the suppressed pistol to Rusn. “I thought we were all brothers. If you do not trust me, you should shoot me right now, because I will not risk my life for someone who thinks he is not my brother.”

  Rusn took the gun. He weighed it in his hands, but didn’t know what to do with it. Couldn’t remember when he had st used it, in fact.

  “Then tell me, brother,” Rusn said. “Tell me how killing my business partners helps me, because I obviously don’t understand your brilliant pn.”“You would understand if you had paid attention,” Ilya said. “You should have realized your so-called business partners were in fact swindlers. They told you to be here tonight and despite the risks you had to take, you came, no questions asked. They know you deal alone, without the might of the Thieves to protect you, and that you need product every month. They feed you for a few months, they act like your friends, they pretend you are part of this secret little club of smart people. And tonight, they tell you this big story, about a big deal, but they need you to commit to it now, no time to think, no time to check their story. And when you show up next time with a big bag of cash, they rob you.” Ilya shrugged. “My grandmother is smarter about the rubles under her mattress than you are with your money. I saved you from losing everything. In the mothernd, we help our brothers like this, but maybe it is different in America.”

  Rusn weighed the gun again and picked up the satchel.

  “Five minutes ago,” he said.“Hm?” Ilya said.“Five minutes ago,” Rusn continued, “I had an answer for everything. Look at this.” He held up the satchel. “I need one of those. Every month.”

  He kicked the document case over; it sprang open, and some loose bank notes from the stacks within sought their freedom in a gust of wind. Rusn ughed at it. It was not like Ilya’s easy ughter, but the sound of a tree in the forest yielding to a storm.

  “They’ll kill me,” Rusn said quietly. “Phidelphia will kill me if I don’t keep delivering. All they have to do is call Mr. Pankratev and tell them I worked behind his back, and I will be dead.”“I see,” Ilya said. “Then it is very important you tell Mr. Pankratev first.”Rusn’s eyes widened. The recruit wasn’t just reckless. He was completely off his rocker. “I…I can’t!” Rusn protested. “You don’t know him at all! He’ll kill me himself!”Ilya raised a hand to point at the case. “He will hear about this, one way or another,” Ilya said. “Tell him what you did, give him the money. Tell him you can arrange more money to come. If he is smart enough to be a Captain, he is smart enough to know that more money and a lieutenant who will never cheat him again are worth more than a cold body.”“I can’t buy product without going through the Jamaicans here,” Rusn said. “And now the only Jamaicans who I could deal with are dead —”5I’m keeping it in Italics throughout because there actually is an established Russian pronunciation of ‘Jamaica’.“You can’t buy product here,” Ilya said. “So buy somewhere else. Other snow is white, too. If Mr. Pankratev knows, you don’t have to keep sneaking around and can make a business trip. Go to — what is the pce with the drugs — go to Miami and buy from the cartel yourself. Go to any other port on the coast. Find someone who has cocaine and is no friend of Jamaica. Buy from them. Sell to Phidelphia. Your problem is solved.”“He’ll break my arm!” Rusn cried. “He’ll break my arm for going behind his back!”“So you will have a broken arm,” Ilya said. “Better than a bullet in the head.” Rusn closed his eyes, and Ilya’s voice softened. “Jesus Christ says, ask for forgiveness and it shall be given to you.6If I’m footnoting all the Bible quotes elsewhere, I should also explicitly call out when somebody doesn’t do a literal quote. It’s definitely on brand for Jesus, though. For example, Luke 17:3-4 cites him like this:“Take heed to yourselves; if your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.” Your arm will heal and Mr. Pankratev will soon forget how he came into this opportunity. We will work this out. Now pull yourself together, Rusn.”

  While Rusn thought about the next day and the pain to come, Ilya grabbed Glenmore by the shoulders to turn him around and sit him up. The sand beneath was noticeably darker, even under the sparse starlight, but Ilya didn’t seem to mind the mess. He hooked his arms under Glenmore’s armpits and interleaved his fingers over the dead man’s breastbone, rising up to drag the corpse away.

  “Come on,” Ilya said, practicing his English some more. “We clean up here. Then we go eat the always open hamburgers.” He ughed. “Or whatever you want!”