It's a long way home.

Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

Geography. Alyaksandr hated geography. It was without a doubt the most boring subject he had at school. He remembered the trip they once had made to Kyiv (Kiev), in order to examine the Dniepr river, and to determine the pollution caused by the Chernobyl accident back in the 80s. That was the only thing he liked about geography. Considering that they made a day trip to Chernobyl, the trip was actually great.

As Alyaksandr was deep in his thoughts about how much he disliked geography, the bell rang, signalling the end of the school day. He was the first one to pack away his things, and run out of the door, escaping from the subject he disliked so much.

On the corridor he met Ksenia, who was just making her way outside the school building.

"Ksenia!" he called after her.

Ksenia turned around to see who called for her, when she met with Alyaksandr's eyes. She smiled upon seeing him and walked towards him.

"Hey!" she dragged out the "y", as she hugged him. "How was geography?" she went on to ask him.

"Terrible. Like always."

Ksenia chuckled in response to her friend's negative answer. She then continued her way outside, with Alyaksandr by her side.

"Where are the others?" he asked her.

"They're going for food together before we go to Buddha Bar." Ksenia explained.

"Why aren't you joining?" Alyaksandr asked her.

"I was actually going to go home to change." she answered. "Do you want to come with?" she offered him.

"Yeah, I guess I should change too. This is not exactly the right outfit for going out, especially not for Buddha Bar.

Ksenia laughed at Alyaksandr's remark. She knew how neat he was. He would never be under nor overdressed. She would say he was almost meticulous when it came to representation, but then she thought about all those little things that failed him to reach full meticulousness. Those were the things she liked about him. He was purely human, as good as it gets, but still human. In her eyes that was something very valuable.

Alyaksandr turned to her when he noticed she was looking at him, once again, a little longer than actually necessary.

"Что?" he asked her somewhat surprised.

"Nothing". Ksenia said, shaking her head.

Once again, Alyaksandr decided to drop the topic. He continued walking next to her, before the reached they bus stop.

"Let's see..." Alyaksandr said, as he read off the board at the bus stop. "34 more minutes, there has been an accident on Butyrskaya Ulitsa. Great." Alyaksandr stated frustratedly.

"Whatever, let's just take the metro. It's already four-thirty. If we take the metro now we'll be back here on time at seven." Ksenia told him.

"Okay, let's go for it. You know what that means though, right?" he asked her.

Ksenia just smiled at him knowingly, as they both started running to the metro, trying to get the next train. It was a custom by now. If the bus wasn't there, they would take the train, which usually came three minutes after their bus, so each time they had to run to catch it.

As Ksenia and Alyaksandr ran, people stared at them, both of them laughing and not caring. As they ran down the stairs to the metro station, Ksenia turned to Alyaksandr.

"I can hear it!" Ksenia told him.

As they reached downstairs, they saw the train arriving. Being out of breath, they both stopped in front of the train's doors that were now opening. As they entered, Alyaksandr found them both a place to sit. They both took a minute to take a deep breath and calm down from running. Once they both came down, Alyaksandr looked at Ksenia, who was looking out of the window of the train, head leaning back against the seat and the right side of her face against the window. She looked beautiful. Her ushanka, this time open, covered her head, her long, brown hair falling perfectly. Her blue eyes were looking out of the window, as her hand was in front of her mouth, holding her necklace, the pendant itself between her front teeth. She was deep in thought, as she looked over the horizon of Moscow. The snow was reflected in her ice blue eyes, as was the skyline of Moscow. It was a long journey from the city center to Khimki, approximately 45 minutes.