UnAlaska

9. Unalaska

Evening, August 26th, outskirts of Dutch Harbor Alaska

Rusty reclined in his favorite chair. Rain pattered on the roof of his modest manufactured home in Dutch Harbor. He looked outside and saw the rain streaking down his window, while the heater purred comfortably. Jets screamed across his old tube TV, from his well worn VHS of Top Gun. Rusty smiled under his rust-red mustache. The best movie in the world, he thought, takes me back to the Gulf War. He took the last long pull from his ice cold can of beer, shook it, and found it empty.

Rusty paused the movie and levered his fifty year old body out of his chair with a grunt. He smoothed his receding hair down, scratched his thick, powerful torso through his white t-shirt, and padded down the hall to his fridge in socks.

Four blocks away, Bogdan and Aleksandr parked their weathered white sprinter van and opened their doors into the evening rain. Bogdan, the older of the two, shrugged his six foot tall, stocky frame into a long rubber raincoat. He flipped the hood forward, covering his close cropped brown hair and framing his stubble-covered lantern jaw and harsh, deep-set eyes. Aleksandr circled around to the front of the van. His short, wiry frame flashed in front of the headlights.

"Ready?" Said Bogdan.

"Sure. Seems simple enough."

Bodgan punched him in the arm. Aleksandr tipped sideways and caught himself with a scuffle of shoes on gravel. "Sasha. You're putting on a brave face. Do this enough, and it becomes nothing."

Aleksandr sighed. "I guess. It's new for me."

Bogdan grunted. They started a slow walk at the margin of the road. Gravel crunched under their heavy boots.

"I've never torn up a passport and flushed it down a toilet before."

"Get used to it. I've had a lot of names."

"I guess. I was Konstantin Abdulov for JFK to Seattle. Then Fyodor Popov to Anchorage. Konstantin isn't a bad name. I kind of liked it." Aleksandr smiled and swung a canvas tool bag as he walked.

Bogdan said nothing. The road had no street lights. They passed a few manufactured homes, set down gravel driveways at odd angles to the road.

"Why are we walking anyway?"

Bogdan sighed heavily. "You'll learn. These Americans all have guns. A stranger pulls up to the house making a racket, and they have time to get ready. Knocking is less suspicious for the neighbors than kicking a door down anyway."

"Oh."

They kept walking. The lawns were damp and green, behind chain link fences. Aleksandr's eyes tracked a heap of cars, piled under a blue tarp. The tarp's edges rippled in the wind.

Aleksandr spoke again. "I think I'm starting to miss Little Odessa. We've only been here a week."

"I miss Varenichnaya. The pelmeni and borscht. Phew." Bogdan shook his head ruefully.

"You're going to make me hungry. I don't think they have kasha and onions here. Or herring. Did you see the shithole airport? There was only one terminal. This town is a backwater."

Bogdan shrugged. "I guess. You can still enjoy the simple things. Did you know we're further West than Hawaii?"

"​​Сука, really?"

He nodded. Rain sluiced off his hood. "We're practically in Siberia. This used to be Russian once. You see the church? Oldest one in Alaska. Russian."

Aleksandr scoffed. "You're not even religious."