The night air cooled me down. I could not explain even to myself why I ventured out. It made way more sense to report the incident to the police and let them handle it. But whenever this thought crossed my mind, my gut told me I had to go. I didn’t know whether the rational or irrational part of me would have won out if I had not declared my intention to Egor. I now felt that I had to stick to my resolution, however crazy it might seem. And I owed Oxana at least that. I knew it was idiotic to go back to the place of the robbery and expect Oxana to be sitting and waiting for me. Of course she was at home. Probably, fuming to her husband about our bad luck.
Then I heard a shriek. It startled me. I broke into a cold sweat; my heart leapt into my throat.
“It’s an owl hooting,” Egor explained nonchalantly. “They come from the nearby forest to hunt. For rats or small birds.”
“Whatever,” I mumbled.
But I could not return to normal. That screech had stirred up the emotions I had felt when robbed. The fear gripping me blocked out every other feeling. My heart was pounding in my chest. My hands got clammy.
I turned to the yard where it all happened and froze immediately. In the blackness of the night, my gaze immediately fell onto something luminous. It must have been Oxana’s flower hairpin. I touched Egor to draw his attention, pointing to the object. We moved closer.
She was lying on her back, arms outstretched.
“Oxana,” I shouted, my voice sounding low and strange.
Egor lifted her hand and felt her pulse.
“Is she…” My voice faded away, and I did not finish the sentence.
He was silent for what seemed like an eternity and then said in a low serious voice: “I’m afraid not. I can’t detect a pulse. I’ll call the ambulance and police.”
I suddenly felt freezing cold. I started shivering violently. “No, no, no, please, it can’t be true, it just can’t be true. Oxana, Oxana, please, open your eyes, make some movement, you are hurt, but you are alive,” I was pleading desperately inside. “You can’t be…”. I swallowed hard and could not bring myself to even think of the horrible, blood-curdling word.
I do not know how much time elapsed, but the police were the first to arrive.
“So, we have a corpse here,” one of them said matter-of-factly after a brief examination. “Tolik, seal off the area. Sanyok, start taking pictures,” he continued, addressing his co-workers.
I felt numb and strangely out of place. The three police officers were very efficient and… very detached. Were they real? Was I real?
Then the commanding officer turned and eyed me and Egor.
“I have a few questions for you,” he said. “Tell me in detail what happened.”
And so I recounted my story again.
(…to be continued…)
Transadaptation Volume 6 – Meaning? – Uncertainty, Instability and Extremes Transadapted
January: A Regular Train Trip – Mateusz Tymoszewski (Poland)
February: Growing Up – Adriana Uribe (Columbia)
March: Mess – Veronika Groke (Austria)
April: The Roads We Take – Svetlana Molchanova (Russia)
May: Need – Nadia Silva Castro (Brazil)
June: “Next Sunshine” – Jonay Quintero Hernandez (Spain)
July: Intentions – Narantsogt Baatarkhuu (Mongolia)
August: Planet Kyiv – Anastasiia Leonova (Ukraine)
September: Feeling like a Fool – Ulrike Bergmeister (Germany)
October: Stories of Outcast Souls – Armine Asryan (Armenia)
November: Ronaldinha – Alejandra Baccino (Uruguay)
December: Aimlessly – Krisztina Janosi (Hungary)
Background – Context
Transadaptation Volume 5: Of Flowing Vicissitudes – Life Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2024)
Transadaptation Volume 4: Material Dissent – Adulthood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2023)
Transadaptation Volume 3: Evanescent – Young Adulthood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2022)
Transadaptation Volume 2: Conceived – Childhood Transadapted, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2021)
Transadaptation Volume 1: In the Middle – Prelude to a Contemporary Transadaptation, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2020)
Peripatetic Alterity: A Philosophical Treatise on the Spectrum of Being – Romantics and Pragmatists by Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
La Syncrétion of Polarization and Extremes Transposée, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2019)
The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2018)
L’anthologie of Global Instability Transpuesta, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2017)
From Wahnsinnig to the Loony Bin: German and Russian Stories Transposed to Modern-day America, (eds.) Angelika Friedrich, Yuri Smirnov and Henry Whittlesey (2013)
Emblems and stories on the international community
Perception by country – Transposing emblems, articles, short stories and reports from around the world
Credits
Top row (left to right): 1. Saratov, Russia – Listening to music – NataVilman (Shutterstock); 2. Saratov, Russia – Cityscape – Lapandr (Shutterstock); 3. Saratov, Russia – Privokzalny market – Trolleway (Shutterstock)
Middle row (left to right): 1. Saratov, Russia – The Work City – Sarlynx (Shutterstock); 2. Saratov, Russia – Out with the family – Irina Wolfe (Shutterstock)
Bottom row (left to right): 1. Saratov, Russia – The way home – Trolleway (Shutterstock); 2. Saratov, Russia – Residential blocks – Irina Wolfe (Shutterstock); 3. Saratov, Russia – In the snow – Irina Wolfe (Shutterstock)
Source: The Codex of Uncertainty Transposed