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By Root 201 0

of our pursuer. The plastic shattered against his knuckles. One of Moscow’s finest melted on to the road. More police rushed the street. A water cannon washed an old lady and her shopping on to the pavement. Police rampaged down the avenue. Vegetables rolled from her split bag, mashed under jackboots. I was done for, Billy K or Barry Fulton, the truncheon wouldn’t know. Then a lady called out from an open door to one of the mansions. A wide-hipped woman with an apron and headscarf, the cleaner. My friend dragged me up the steps and into the house where he kissed her on both cheeks. I did the same, grappled to her bleach-smelling bosom before she shooed us along the hallway to the back entrance. We shot down an alleyway on to a busy street. Now, I’m not sure if my friend hailed or hijacked the taxi, but suddenly we’re beyond the avenues, skidding through narrow lanes, the coatless man twisting around to speak to me in Russian. I guess he told the story of the KO’ed policeman as he punched his open palm and bellowed another laugh. He turned to me and slapped his chest. ‘Viktor,’ he proclaimed. ‘Barry,’ I said. He studied me more closely and asked, ‘Billy?’ I said, ‘Barry’ again. He repeated my name, the one I was born with, smiled and shook my hand. We drove past warehouses, between smoking chimneystacks. The taxi driver waved away the money Viktor offered and dropped us at the rear of a factory. I was cold now, the heat of running evaporated. Viktor still had his sleeves rolled up. I didn’t care where we were going as long as it was inside. I needed a drink. I could taste tear gas in the back of my throat. Viktor hammered on a windowless door that was opened, and I’m not bullshitting, by a man with a black patch over his left eye. Viktor said, ‘Barry’ and the patch said, ‘Barry’ and we all descended the crooked staircase into a raucous drinking den where men sat around packing crates and downed glasses of vodka that made them spit and growl after each swallow.

GJ – Where were you?

BK – No idea. All I knew was that I was alive. Somebody. Barry. They called me Barry. Viktor navigated us between groups of men to the bar, ducking under exposed pipes, a ragged flag of the hammer and sickle. I say bar, but it was a high wall with shelves and shelves of the same bottles of vodka. Nothing else but a few dusty cans of tonic water. The barman slid Viktor a bottle and two stout glasses. We walked through the drinkers. Viktor clutched men by the shoulders and spun them around. They shook my hand and said, ‘Barry, Velcome Barry.’ The first glass thrust into my hand was brimming with vodka. I downed it in one. The scorch of tear gas erased from my throat. I was melting from the inside out. I heard music, an accordion pumping up the room, and Viktor the bear, backslapping his buddies and laughing, his atomic bellow. Glasses were filled, held, and tipped. I reached into the pockets of the coat and fished out the snakeskin wallet of Ricky Wise. I set free the roubles, dollars and pounds, showering bills on to the bar like confetti. The barman held up the empty wallet and stood on a stool to announce the generosity of my manager. Roars rattled the shelves of glasses and bottles. Viktor danced, gravity his friend again, a twinkle-toed big man light on his feet. He swept his hand across the seated men, ordered a dance floor and the clearing of furniture. Packing crates and chairs flew into the fireplace, the roof beams shook with stomping feet of men dancing, singing and drinking. Time didn’t exist here. No clocks on the wall. No sun, moon or stars. I looked at the long bar and thought of a submarine stranded on the bottom of the ocean, these abandoned men the doomed crew, making merry before the last of the air.

GJ – How the hell did they find you? None of this ever made the press, did it?

BK – Wise. He was scared of what would happen if the police got hold of me first. Two were killed in the riot. Maybe I was to blame?

GJ – For singing?

BK – Singing? Not singing? Before the goons hired by Wise tracked me down,