Page 76 of Pioneer Summer

The twenty-five-meter pool had been on the other side of the athletic fields. There were lots of swim races. Yura remembered the splashing, the shrill whistle blasts, and the troop leaders’ shouting as if it was yesterday. But now all that was left of the pool was a great big pit whose far edge was crumbling in. The little tiles had come off the walls and rainwater had collected at the bottom and gone all green and swampy. Only the starting blocks, with their barely legible lane numbers, could indicate to the random passerby that this had once been a pool.

But the weathered, broken statues of swimming Pioneers, covered in a layer of green, still stood on their pedestals. The woods behind them had grown considerably thinner. Yura heard the rumble of excavators and the whine of chain saws coming from out past the trees. He walked a little way into the trees and saw large clearings in the middle of what had once been a thick coniferous forest. The trees were coming down fast here, and out in the distance he could see a construction site. Past that bristled the triangular roofs of completed homes.

Yura sighed and returned to the statues of Pioneers. He walked up close to the pedestal and stood at the exact place where that evening, twenty years ago, he and Volodya had spent half the night kneeling face-to-face, holding hands, unable to let each other go. Yura chuckled, remembering how badly his legs and back had hurt afterward. But his smile evaporated immediately: this exact place was soon to be wiped from the face of the earth. Yura’s childhood, his happiest memories, were going to be destroyed irreplaceably, by progress as well as by time. Of course, nobody needed an abandoned Pioneer camp anymore. It was just taking up space. Yura imagined the “new” stepping on Camp Barn Swallow like a giant’s enormous foot, crushing it. Soon, nothing would be left. Nothing left of what had been so precious to him.

He stood by the base of the statue and looked down at the ground. This was where they had sat, where Volodya had held his hand, and embraced him tightly, and promised he’d never push him away again. Yura smiled to himself. His memories warmed him from the inside. How naïve he’d been then. Just a dumb kid who had no idea how serious the thing that washappening to them was. At the time, everything had been pure emotion for Yurka: the rapture of first love, the joy of it being requited, the sweetness of reciprocation ... Maybe it was good that Yurka had been such an absolute child. Because thanks to his innocent, childlike view of things, he hadn’t punished himself the way Volodya had. He hadn’t hated himself; he hadn’t hurt himself; and—this was the main thing—he hadn’t made the terrible mistake that Volodya would go on to make, in the very near future, just a few years after working at Camp Barn Swallow.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

LULLABY FOR A TROOP LEADER

The next morning Yurka was playing pioneerball with Troop Two on the beach. It was packed. The girls from Troop Two who were in the play were also here: Nastya, who was playing Portnova; Katya, who was Zina Luzgina; and Yulya, who was the village traitor. They greeted Yurka in unison. It made Yurka feel really good.

Troop One was ahead, but, as was the rule at camp, friendship came out the winner anyway.

Yurka grumbled to Ksyusha, the only Puke who was playing: “Next time we have to call our team ‘Friendship’ so we win for sure.”

“Perfect!” replied Ksyusha happily. She even smiled at him. Yurka was stupefied. Ksyusha?! Smiling athim?!

After the game was over, Yurka, who was dying from the heat, went over to the water to swim—or, rather, to help Vanya dunk Mikha. They’d promised to be ready as soon as the final score was announced, but they got held up back on the beach. Yurka got tired of waiting and got into the water on his own, but he’d only just started swimming around, relaxing and cooling off, when Olga Leonidovna and Volodya appeared on the beach.

The educational specialist was assiduously explaining something to the artistic director, who was himself assiduously looking around, searching for someone. Yurka guessed who that was. He stuck two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. Volodya saw him, squared his shoulders, waved, and smiled, glasses flashing. And then Yurka remembered what had happened yesterday. He hadn’t forgotten, of course, but now he remembered it even more clearly—so clearly that he felt Volodya’s breath, Volodya’s smell, on his lips. A warm feeling spread through his chest, and Yurka went still, a stupid expression on his face. He relaxed so much that he almost went underwater, but he came back to his senses and started moving his arms again.

Olga Leonidovna yanked Volodya’s sleeve—just like Yurka, Volodya had stopped, transfixed, to gaze at him—and dragged the troop leader over to the Troop Two boys, who were sitting in a circle on their towels. Then she dragged him over to a little group of boys from Yurka’s troop: Pasha, Mitka, and Vanya. After the boys nodded, scared, Olga Leonidovna grabbed Volodya’s arm and they went away.

The whole visit didn’t take very long. Yurka hadn’t even had time to get out of the water. He shouted to Mikha and Vanka, who raced over to him, kicking sand on whoever was sitting on the beach and splashing water on whoever was playing in the river.

“What did she want?” Yurka asked.

“She was asking us to be extras in the big crowd scene,” replied Vanka. “Well, not really asking. She told us we had to, and that was that.”

“Ooooh,” said Yurka.

“‘Ooooh,’” Mikha mimicked him mockingly. “Hey, Yurets, listen: that artistic director of yours, I heard he’s, like, harsh. He’s mean! But don’t tell him I said that, okay?”

“Volodya?” laughed Yurka, remembering the way that last night into the early morning the usually stern eyes under their glasses had come right up to his face, and then closed, and hadn’t opened again until the end of that long, warm kiss. Yurka burst into a sweat even though he was in cool water. “Oh ... uh ... if something goes wrong, Mikh, Olga Leonidovna’s the one who’ll tear your head off, not Volodya.”

“Oh no, we’re done for!”

“Come on, Mikh, it’s no big deal,” said Vanka. “Petlitsyn over there’s the one who got hit with a speaking part. All you and I have to do is stand there without saying anything and we’ll be fine.”

“No you won’t!” said Yurka indignantly. “You have to do what Volodya says, guys! Just you try goofing off ...”

“We won’t!” Mikha assured him.

“We get it!” confirmed Vanka. “So can we swim now, or what? We’re gonna freeze if we stand around any longer.”

“Race you!” shouted Yurka, and leaped forward.

When they got back to the beach, Yurka dried himself off slowly as he gazed at the opposite shore, hoping to see the willow, and mused, “So Petlitsyn wasgiven a speaking part, huh? Must be Yezavitov. That’s too bad. Volodya didn’t want that. Mitya’d be better, that voice of his is pretty darn big.”

“Where is Mitya, anyway?” asked Vanka, who had stretched out lazily on the hot sand.

The answer followed promptly.

“Greetings, Pioneers! You’re listening to the Pioneer radio newspaperPioneer Dawn,” said Mitka himself, his voice booming from the speaker. “Tomorrow is the long-awaited celebration for our beloved Barn Swallow Pioneer Camp! There will be two important events today in preparation for it. First is the dry run of the talent show, which begins after snack. Performers from Troop One must be at the main square at sixteen hundred hours. Performers from Troop Two—at sixteen thirty ...”

As Mitka dictated the rehearsal times for the rest of the troops, the girl tryhards from Troops One and Two copied them down intently. Olga Leonidovna had decided to have at least some kind of event to replace the play and ordered them to put together a little variety show, just an hour long, full of easy, simple songs so the performers wouldn’t need more than a day to get ready. Yurka wasn’t participating in it. All he knew was that the girls were going to do some kind of dance.

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