The Russian Dreambook of Color and Flight by Gina Ochsner Page A

made fish more noble than man, put them above the petty designs of people like him, standing on frozen ice or on muddy banks, their long shadows looming over them.

    They were so splendid, these fish in their shiny coat of armour, impervious to the injustices of the day. And when he thought of them like this, he was almost glad when the wily eel or tricky pike sloughed a hook, freed itself, and swam away triumphant. Almost. Because he needed the food, after all. That was the real reason he and other veterans like him were all standing or crouching over the ice, freezing their hands and feet off. Because fish meant food or fish meant money. A deficit item like fresh fish could bring as much as fifty roubles if the right person arranged it with the right people. Sure Yuri knew about a practice in the West called catch and release. And in his heart he agreed with it completely. But these days his stomach held fewer philosophical inclinations. Besides, people in the West could afford to be more enlightened and environmentally responsible. They ate better over there and had the fat asses to prove it. Which is not to say he didn't believe in being sporting about the whole matter. He used baited hooks. Once he'd tried spinners. Today he was using his mother's ornamental spoon. Never—not even once—had he pulled any of Vitek's low tricks like rubbing slime on his arm and luring the pike or carp to swallow the arm up to the elbow, while punching them between the eyes as hard as he could with his free hand. Even so, Yuri felt a little anxious, couldn't help
counting the veterans up and down the ice and wondering if any of them might be police. Nobody had a licence to fish here. Every one of the dark shapes over the ice was in actual fact a poacher. But as long as poachers shared their catch with the right people, life moved along like this river, without a snag, and everybody was happy. Everybody except the fish, that is.

    Yuri set the auger, and started drilling.
    'You! Prick on a stick! Hey!'
    Yuri sat on his heels and squinted. He could not see who was yelling, but assumed they were yelling at him. Yuri pointed to the helmet, waved good-naturedly, and maintained air silence. Then he went back to drilling his hole. After all, as a veteran he had a right to fish here, at Mircha's spot.
    'Bugger off, bottom feeder!' Crazy Volodya hollered at him from down river.
    The rule of the river dictated that younger vets paid a fishing fee to the oldest and craziest vet. This morning, the oldest and—by far—the craziest vet on the river was Volodya, who lost his legs in the big war. Even without his legs, Volodya could beat Yuri to a pulp any day of his choosing. And Volodya would be well within his rights to do so: Yuri was only twenty-one, had fought in an unpopular war, had come home broken. Not like the old timers, not like Crazy Volodya who had in his day brought down German Junders, had the medals and decorations to prove it. Now Crazy Volodya sat in his wheelchair attended by two muscle-bound vets and fished anywhere he wanted. If you wanted to trade fishing spots with
someone or move up or down river or dump bleach into the water or fish with Chinese firecrackers, then you had to work it out with Crazy Volodya. This always involved a complicated negotiation of favours and bribes or, at the very least, a simple beating. That was the hierarchy. And everywhere he went, no matter what he did, Yuri was at the bottom of the ladder.

    Yuri packed up his gear and moved to a much less prestigious spot on the ice, close to the bank where plastic bottles and other bits of trash lay frozen in the ice. He leaned on the auger. The bit bucked just as it punched through to water.
    'Yu—ri!' A voice, harsh as a crow's, sliced through the morning calm. It was Zoya, there on the bank wearing her most fashionable winter boots. She put her hands on her hips, shifted her weight from one foot to the other and back again. He read in