It would be months before I befriended himâYuri Karamov. There were several reasons for this. Karamov was not only a Brommian, but a known troublemaker with a strong aversion to school authority.
He and his gang of dimwit farmers would insist on playing ball against the Arash of class 2E during the breaks, even though they were a much stronger team and had more players to spare, in case of injury. But what the Brommian lacked in skill, they made up for in abundant fervour and arrogance. They played rough and dirty. Things almost always got heated on the football pitch and would even escalate into a physical confrontation.
Yuri and a kid named Millin Ibranov were always in the middle of some sort of brawl. Mr Unjis, their homeroom teacher, had made them a target for his wrath. He swore time and time again that he would teach them a lesson. And he might have. Mr Unjis was not one to miss out on an opportunity to whoop the Brommian, but they were stubborn. They never learned. They always returned to the pitch eager for a rematch.
Yuri Karamov was one of the best players on the field, and you could always tell where on the pitch he was by the slew of vulgarity he shouted at the Arash. The thought of befriending someone who called a classmate a sheep fucker, a cow piss drinker, and a dunga (which even I knew meant something vulgar in Brommin) across a sixteen meter wide football pitchâto the point where his shouts could be heard from inside the schoolâwas unimaginable to my prudent self.
I witnessed these matches take place from my homeroom windows, situated on the east side of the building, overlooking the schoolyard, and beyond it; the small, patchy, football pitch.
I was no expert but even I could tell that what he did on the pitch was skilled. The way he dribbled past the players and took all the free kicks for his team, there was no other way of describing it. In those instances, he was cool. So unlike the boy who had only weeks prior been sitting drenched in the same car as me. His laughter echoed off the stone walls, and though he walked the hallways with the same bad posture, he seemed less pitiful than he'd been that stormy October morning.
I couldn't have explained to you what drew me to him. I just found him fascinating. Ever since that day, it seemed like I was always catching him around the corner. Always there, in my peripheral vision.
Buried in the folds of my subconscious was the awareness that I envied him. I didn't realise it then, but I do now. His easy-going manner, his abundant friends. The more I saw him play ball, the longer my eyes lingered on him, and my reservations grew.
I was nothing like him. For one, I almost never played outside. I had debilitating asthma and was known by everyone as the kid with the inhaler around his neck like a bell. This was the biggest, and perhaps the most cementing reason I couldn't befriend Karamov.
I had one friend, Adriana, but she didn't really count since she was my cousin. Plus, she wasn't a boy. Truth be told, I was afraid, afraid of being that kidâthe one with no friends. But Adriana was popular, and so I used her as a shield, hoping nobody would notice that without her, I was a ghost haunting the hallways during the breaks. Inanimately spying on my peers from the windows.
Unfortunately, she couldn't be there all the time. There were days she was absent. One such day, I was dragging my feet towards the entrance, feeling weighed down by an inescapable solitude. The realisation that I had no one, not a single friend to ride home with, made me stall when, by chance, I caught sight of the football pitch. My feet redirected their path from the entrance. The pitch was rarely ever empty, even after school, and this was my chance to step inside it for the first time. For some reason, Yuri Karamov came to mind, and I couldn't help the smile that spread on my lips.
A deflated, worn-looking football rested against one of the goal posts. Without putting much thought into what I was doing, I started kicking it about. I tried faking dribbles I had seen Yuri and the other guys do. I did it in slow-motion as to not get too winded, but I had no idea if what I was doing was correct. Yet, more I feigned, the more I found myself enjoying it.
I kicked the ball, aiming for the goal. There wasn't much force behind my kick and it stopped short of reaching the net. I got tired of playing half-heartedly. I gave it my all and ran as fast as I could, kicking the ball with all my might. It dented the net with force.
I was breathing audibly. The satisfaction of scoring my first ever goal became overshadowed by the constricting pressure in my chest. I coughed, thinking the pressure would lighten. It didn't. I grabbed for my inhaler around my neck only to find it missing. I looked down at my chest and confirmed with wild, searching eyes that there was nothing there. The nearest inhaler was in my bag.
Where was my bag?
I looked around, my breath becoming more and more shallow as panic fired off like fireworks in my stomach. I found my bag where I had dropped it by the fence around the pitch. I rummaged inside it with frantic fingers. Time and time again, in each compartment, my hands came upon all types of objects, but never my spare inhaler.
Had I left it in the classroom?
I couldn't stop coughing. Each pressure created by a cough alleviated the constriction in my airways, and for a second, bought me time to exhale, but it wasn't enough. My chest kept tightening. I tried to breathe evenly, but it felt like breathing through a compressed straw.
The world was spinning around me. Fear of death seeped into my bones, and I clawed at my throat, all the way down to my chest, trying in vain to lessen the itching. I must have looked around me, perhaps even attempted to shout. I'm sure I must have, but I don't remember it.
I don't remember the exact sequence of the following events. I have a vague recollection of looking up, of seeing the overcast sky drawing its clouds closer, and feeling the first droplets of rain on my face. Someone called my name. A loud crash, then footsteps.
I felt hands pulling at my windbreaker, then a thousand pinpricks on my face. A swirl of coloursâthe visual optics of a child rolling down a hill with a video camera. Something hard pushed on my lips and scraped my teeth.
Inhaling, that's what I remember the most clearly. The rewarding expansion starting at the base of my throat. It felt like breathing in sawdust. It hurt all the way to a point in my head. A sharp pain shot through my chest. It was the sort of pain that demanded immediate attention, and I was unable to do anything but gulp down air.
- Ru?
After a moment, as I was assembling my wits about me, I noticed the weight around my shoulders. A presence was holding me. I opened my eyes to the blaring sky, brighter than it had been seconds ago. Droplets of rain were falling and bouncing off his dark hair, forming a halo.
- Ru, are you alright? Yuri asked.
His hair I noticed, was like that of the feathers of a crow, neither black nor brown but all the shades in between.
I felt a deep-rooted embarrassment radiate from the very constitution of my being. Yet, all acts of freeing myself from his worried eyes felt futile. Had he always had such blue eyes?
I must have pushed myself away from his embrace because I remember asking, - Did you see? The question in retrospect felt like a shout, but I couldn't have had the energy required for it.
I was mortified of the answer, of its implications.
- What? See what? His accent was strong.
I felt rather than saw the blood rushing to my face, but by the look of his bemused expression, it felt like I was watching my body from outside of myself. How pathetic must I have looked?
- Oh, the ball? He asked. Realisation cleared his expression of worry.
- Yeah, I saw you getting winded too. Why did you do that?
I gripped the inhaler tighter in my hand. Its size, the way it didn't sit as familiarly in the palm of my hand, drew my gaze downwards.
It wasn't mine.
- Ho-How did you get this? I asked, my throat felt like sandpaper.
He looked down at my hand.
- My sister has asthma too, I keep it in my pocket.
- There's nothing to be embarrassed about.
The inhaler was much smaller than mine, but most noticeably, it had a pink body and lacked the ribbon with which I used to secure it around my neck.
- Thank you, I said. - I would have died.
His eyes widened as if he hadn't thought of that before. It was only then, in his surprised expression, that the severity of the situation registered in my mind as well.
I could have really died.
His eyes darted around, avoiding meeting my face. He got up before he extended me a hand, and helped me up from my seated position. He picked up my school bag but froze when he saw that most of its content was lying sprawled on the muddy grass.
My school books were getting soaked and dirtied in the mud. I went over and not very nicely yanked my bag from his grip. I crouched down and proceeded to haul everything inside the big compartment.
- You heading home? He asked.
I didn't like that he was following me. Did he plan on walking me home?
- Your papa coming to pick you up? He asked.
- No, I said. - He's my driver. My papa never picks me up.
I stopped to look at him. - Do you really say, Papa?
- Yes...is that not the right word? I mean Papa. He altered the pronunciation to Brommin, but it still didn't make sense. He was looking down at his shoes. It was obvious he only knew the word in Brommin and had directly translated it.
- I guess you could say Papa, but the right word is 'father', I corrected him.
He nodded but didn't look up. To spare him more embarrassment, I continued walking.
- No, today I'm heading home myself, I said when I heard his footsteps synchronise with mine.
- Wait, I have my bicycle. I'll let you ride on the handlebars.
- What? No.
- The seat then?
It was no use, he was already sprinting to where he had kicked his bike when he had seen me wheezing and coughing for air.
I felt strange knowing that moments ago I could have died. I still held the inhaler in my hand, afraid that if I let it go another asthma attack would knock me over. I hadn't planned to tell a soul about this near-death incident, least of all my parents. They wouldn't be too pleased that I had misplaced my inhaler.
- I live in Elhem, I said when he returned.
He smiled. - I know.
- Do you know who I am? I asked. A sliver of nervousness crawled up my spine.
- Yes, Ru Konstantin.
- Do you know my father?
His forehead creased.
- No.
I let out a small sigh of relief.
- But you live in the flatlands, how will you bike all the way to Elhem and then back?
His bicycle was old, it might have been green in a past life, but it had lost its gleam to decay, and was slowly being eaten away by rust at the handles. I doubted it could carry us both without falling in on itself.
Yuri looked at me as if I had grown an extra head.
- No, I live in Elhem too, he corrected.
- No, you don't, I said reflexively. Then when his face soured, I added, - Aren't you a farmer?
When I was six years old and had just started school, they had taught us the geography of Dronesk by having us fill in a miniature copy of the town map. Elhem was green and the flatlands was a yellow colour that symbolised the rapeseed crops. So in my mind, I had always grouped the Brommian at school with yellow, with the flatlands. It hadn't even occurred to me that they could live anywhere else.
Judging from the look on Yuri's face he must have thought that I was stupid. In many ways I was, stupid and oblivious to the things outside of my haven of Ljerumlup.
- I'm not a farmer. His knuckles turned white as he gripped the handlebars. I tried defusing his sudden anger by coming around to inspect his bicycle. The handlebars looked like they could hold a small child, but not me.
- So, how will I fit? I still thought he was delusional.
He kicked one foot over to the other side of the bike and got up on the saddle effortlessly.
- Get on and see.
There was no physical way I could just jump on the handlebars, seeing as they came up to my chest. I stared back at Yuri, dumbfounded by his suggestion.
- Climb up on the wheel, he urged.
- First, place your hands on that thing. I did as he said, grabbing the handlebars from the front.
- No, not like that...turn around. Yes, like that, he explained as I followed his instructions. I had my back facing the handlebars while I grabbed the steel rod with my arm extending out from my back. At last, I used the front wheel as leverage and heaved myself up.
The bicycle was thrown out of equilibrium as the center of gravity shifted to the front wheel, but Yuri righted it before I could fall off. With one swift movement, he kicked his foot off the ground, giving us momentum to pedal towards the school gates.