XIV
“Bukharin, we need you.” Kolya looked up from his walk at his friend
who had gone through nearly everything with him, while sharing the same name as
he. He marveled at how the wet spring
weather seemed to do nothing at all to his friend’s well slicked black
hair. His overly large spectacles reminded
Kolya of the bug eyes he used to look at with a magnifying glass as a young
boy.
Kolya smiled and shook his head. “You flatter me, Osinskii. You have never needed me. You have always been one of our brightest
intellectuals. You, Smirnov, Stukov, you
would’ve changed the face of Russia without me.” Osinskii let out a sickly laugh as if his
lungs could just manage to push it out before devolving into a cough.
“Now it is my turn to be flattered, but
you and I both know that no one would have taken us seriously had we not all
been together. We need each other. We need you as much as you need us.” Kolya turned off the street down a concrete
staircase leading down to the river’s edge looking towards what Osinskii
thought looked like a rather bleak and wet Kremlin. He watched as Kolya stooped down near the
river’s edge and placed his hand in the river.
A second later, he pulled it out holding what looked like a small
beetle. Osinskii took a step back,
surprised at his friend’s spontaneous find.
“Do you know what this is Osinskii?”
“Well it looks like a beetle.” Kolya laughed at his friend’s face as he put
it back in the water.
“Haha, it’s a crawling water beetle,
otherwise known as a Haliplidae. Come
here comrade.” His friend stooped down
hesitantly next to him.
“Now I want you to reach down in the water,
touching the concrete right here, and I want you to tell me what your hand
touches.” Osinskii was reminded of their
college days, when Bukharin would point out seemingly every insect known to
man. He didn’t like the creeping
crawlers that much, but he knew his friend would not let him leave without
doing it. So he reached down slowly,
feeling the oily touch of the underwater cement, the seaweed stuck to it, and
then he found it. Bukharin could tell by
his face he had found something.
“What’d you find?”
“Well, it seems like there’s a large crack
in the cement.”
“Large enough for a creature to hide in?”
“Well I suppose so.”
“Beetles are interesting creatures. They manage to survive in some of the harshest
conditions on earth and some of the friendliest. Sometimes they hide unsuspectingly underneath
the leaves of a tree, and sometimes they hide in cracks of cement like this
one.” Osinskii was beginning to wonder
where he was going with this.
“You’re saying we…hide, we hide from the
new economic policies because we lost the fight on the war.” Kolya stood up and sighed before helping his
friend up.
“I’m not saying we hide completely, but we
should be like the beetle.”
“Be like the beetle? Are you hearing yourself Bukharin?” Kolya laughed waving off his friend.
“Yes, I know it sounds stupid, but the
water beetle doesn’t just hide because he is afraid. He hides because he tires of fighting the
current. He hides because…because the
crack is his home.” Osinskii stared
dumbfounded at Kolya. “You know I agree
with you on the economic policies, but I also agree with Lenin. Yes, I know his policies are moderate at
best; the creation of an 8 hour week, and abolishment of property, only to
reprivatize industry doesn’t seem to be the revolution we envisioned. But it doesn’t mean it’s not the revolution
we envisioned either. My name will be
with yours on all publications, but I am confused comrade. The current is strong, and for a time I must
stay in the crack.” Osinskii peered at
the wall on the far side of the river.
“If that’s how you feel…but don’t wait
there too long, comrade. You know we
came to power because everyone else was still ‘figuring things out’.” Kolya nodded sadly as they looked at the red
walls across the river, neither daring to speak what was on their mind. But deep down they knew the deplorable truth. Their paths were parting, and without each
other, neither would succeed.
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