Page 8 of Mysterious Teacher : Arrival
“Where you boys from?” The older man stepped down from the porch and approached his car. Only when he came around the front bumper did he see his dead dog on the ground. “Coach! You killed Coach! Why the...”
Igor took two big steps toward the old man and slammed his fist as hard as he could into the older man’s face, sending him falling back. He landed hard and lost hold of his shotgun.
“You boys should...”the old man said as he tried to get up.
Boris quickly grabbed the shotgun, pointed it at the old man’s head and fired. “Never try to tell a a Bolshevik what he should or shouldn’t do.”
“Damn it, Boris,” Igor said. “Now you’ve gone and alerted the nearby neighbors. Hurry. We’ll go inside and I’ll try to grab some food. You try to find the car keys so that we can leave this place before the neighbors arrive.”
Igor rushed into the empty house and headed straight for the kitchen. He opened one cupboard door after another, finding dishes, glasses, coffee cups and more dishes. “Damn American. Where do you put your food?”
Then he turned to the refrigerator, something that few households had in Russia. He opened the door. Beer was the first thing he saw. He turned to spit on the floor. “American beer,” he growled with disdain. But he reached in for a platter of sliced roast beef.
“Found the car keys,” Boris called from the front hall.
Igor mumbled an unintelligible reply as he went to a narrow door and found the pantry. “This is where it all is,” he said as he walked in and found shelves laden with jars of pickled vegetables and fruit preserves. He grabbed as many as he could and headed out to the car to join Boris who was already seated behind the wheel.
“No sign of any nosey neighbors,” Boris said as he backed the vehicle out of the drive.
“Where’d the old man and dead dog go?”Igor said, noticing their absence.
“I tossed them down the cellar to avoid attention.”
“Good move.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“Hang on!”Igor called out as Boris began to back up. “I’ll be right back.”
“Where are you going? We have to get out of here.”
Igor rushed into the house, opened a kitchen drawer, then another, and found what he was looking for. He grabbed them and hurried out to the car.
“What was that all about?”
Igor held up the scissors he’d grabbed. “Before we see anyone else, we need to change our haircut.”
He made quick work of the blonde hair at the top of his head until he was nearly bald.
“Quick,” he said, handing the scissors to Boris. “You do the same.”
Boris took the scissors. “Okay,” he said, then quickly snipped his light brown hair off until he was nearly bald.
“Good. Now no one will notice us.”
As they took to the road, Igor opened one of the jars and handed it to Boris who shoved the jar between his legs. “Looks like cauliflower and carrots.”
“What? No sauerkraut?”he said with a chuckle. “And what do you have?”
Igor held up a jar. “Green string beans and some unidentifiable yellow thing.” He set the plate of sliced roast beef on the seat between them, then opened his jar and ate with his fingers.
Slurping and licking their fingers, they ate as they travelled down the winding country road. The houses were farther and farther apart.
“What about one of these houses?”Boris said. “They’re out here in the middle of nowhere.”
“No,” Igor said, not yet feeling safe.
“What’s in the other jars?”Boris said as he tossed his empty jar out the window.
