“For an officer, you are remarkably out of touch with reality.” Her hands, buried inside thick fur, reached for his.
“We’re right here, right now! That’s reality!” He tried to pull her against him, but Galina was inhibited by the presence of the workers. She ran toward the gangway that led to the airplane’s passenger door. The pilot appeared at the top of the ladder to oversee the de-icing procedure. Galina clambered up beside the pilot, pointed at the equipment that was being loaded inside the plane, and gave him instructions. Leonid was freezing; the feeling of having no feeling in his face struck him as a metaphor for this brainless trip. All around him, the work teams were exchanging rapid handshakes in order to escape the cold as quickly as possible. The hoses were removed from the aircraft, the ambulance’s rear doors were shut; Galina sprang from the gangway and went running up to Leonid.
“You’re on active duty in the army! You can fly with me!” When he hesitated, she poked him. “What are you waiting for?”
“How did you do this?” he muttered, bewildered, as he returned the pilot’s salute.
“I said you have relatives in Artyk!”
“Is that the name of the backwater we’re going to? Artyk?”
Leonid saw the pilot disappear into the cockpit and followed Galina to the gangway. As he climbed up, he thought about all the service regulations he was in the act of disobeying. He couldn’t immediately get his bearings in the dimly lit cabin; Galina pressed him into a seat. She pulled the hatch shut with one hand, gave the pilot a signal, sat down, and buckled herself in. The roar of the propellers grew louder, and then the aircraft started to move and rolled out to the runway. A few minutes later, the turboprop machine rose from the ground and climbed up toward the crystalline sky. Leonid watched the airport and the city disappear below him. He remained motionless for several minutes in his pod-shaped seat until he grasped his new situation. They followed the winding course of the river for a while and then turned toward the southeast. Except for the pilot, Galina, and Leonid, the eight-seater aircraft was empty.
“How long is the flight?” Leonid asked, calling to Galina from across the center aisle.
“Three or four hours. It depends on the wind.” Galina unfastened her seat belt. “This box can’t go faster than one hundred eighty-five miles an hour. You’re on leave—relax and enjoy it.” With that, she stretched out her legs on the seat beside her and folded her arms. “I spent half the night operating on people. Now I’ve got to sleep.”
Leonid thought about home. Up until now, everything involving Galina had been spontaneous or even accidental: an officer in a strange land, a meeting with an unusual woman, a passionate night—sometimes such things happen. But from now on, he was cheating on Anna intentionally, with premeditation. This airplane was taking Galina and him to some remote spot, and even the pilot seemed like an accomplice. While Leonid watched the flatlands disengage from the mountains, he pulled off his wedding ring and casually stuck it in a pocket, as though hiding it from himself.
All at once, he choked a little and swallowed hard. Where was this sudden anxiety coming from?
“We’re flying at twelve thousand feet. The cabin isn’t pressurized.” Galina sat up against the wall of the plane and looked at him.
A mountain peak appeared and disappeared beside the aircraft. “There are some thirteen-thousand-foot-high summits in this area,” Galina said. “But the pilot’s familiar with them.” Abruptly, she got up from her seat and took the one next to him. “Isn’t that wonderful?” She leaned against him, and they looked out. The rugged mountain crests stretched out to the horizon. “This is my homeland.”
“Does anyone live here voluntarily?” Leonid’s breath was coming in loud gasps.
“If you need oxygen, say so right away. A collapse is hard to treat when you’re up in the air.”
The conversation turned to normal topics. Galina confessed that the readjustment from Sakhalin to Yakutsk had lasted longer than she’d expected; he talked about his everyday army routine. He was mad to kiss her, but he hesitated on the incomprehensible grounds that he wanted her to make the first move. Eventually, the turning shadows signaled that they were changing direction.
“We’re descending.”
The pilot appeared in the frame of the cockpit door and explained that the weather at their destination was unfortunately not as good as in Yakutsk.