Faust

Suo periculo fecit

               Couple of notches before the clock strikes 8, I follow the unwanted and the wanton off the Central Park station. Thoughts lingering in mind as if thorns twining into a knot for a son of bitch to kick and dribble in my skull. It's not the sense of loss or wavering, not even anger, more of an agonizing deja vu. The feeling of obliviousness. And it doubles down when I'm roaming Nochnaya.

Pacing through lights and neons of royal blue, hunching across empty alleyways, striding by colorful suckers. Cutting south through the tail of Lesnaya, is a run through a marquee of canvas framing things you fail to reach or let go before death grips you by the silent exit at Kirov.

                Kirov St. never ceases to amaze me with how fast it could turn the carnival up north into a remark of ignorance of what lies behind. The better part of Noch residential still lurks the desolation and the failure destined from its motherland. What's the point of neon strips without an audience?

Few limos coming down from Lesnaya in supercilious miles. From the rebounds of music blaring inside and the laughter, but mostly the fact they're driving south, indicate they could not afford a room in a hotel. I stroll through the now empty crossroad and hug the wall of Central Park for two blocks before running through the empty traffic again, half of the lights on the street are off as if in agreement making the sound of my own steps against asphalt louder with......
Wait.
A tinge of pressure at the back of my head accompanied by the realization my footsteps wouldn't ring a bloody after-sound of crushed debris. My mind was in clarity.

               Why don't you cunts tail me to bed and bring your girl along too?

               I slowed my pace as if by a whim through the proximity of a closed beauty shop, its bay window and offed light serves as a mirror but I caught nothing in its reflection, not even my own shadow. Swallowing a curse and letting it out in my head, I can feel a lump pushing itself up my throat, boiling my blood.
              When will you learn?
You are in noch.
               I keep the pace until the first alleyway as I dive into it like a photophobia animal. Along the dim lights and bleak street, there's a pair of offed headlights just out of the corner with the driver seat occupied. Now, that's much more doable than a personnel on foot.

              I navigate the maze among blocks of humming residents and closing shops, drawing a moonlit path as it shimmers above the roof outlines. The long way home felt second nature to me. I recognize all the little details behind tubes and aluminum back doors, always shut dumpsters. I found myself pacing faster through the turns and corners until I reached the one across the southern entrance to the park leading back to the Kirov main road, I can see the grocery stores blinds from here.

The only problem is, four men in baggy tracksuits and fitting hoodies are leaning against the crude brick wall. Two of them fidgeting subtly, the tallest fella in a black cotton shirt being a nuisance murmuring gibberishes that I'm too far to catch. And the fourth one's leaning closest to the corner, he's got steady eyes on the street and the rest of his face hidden in this angle, palm massaging behind his neck, four pieces of silver on his bracelet clings by his motion.

               That's some luck straight from the other end of Satan himself. The moment such thoughts were composed in mind, the tall bloke in black cotton shirt bumps his friend's arm with elbow, strung eyes locked onto me. The guy next to him tilts his head over my end. His mouth opens an inch wider than needed for a human being to talk and suddenly my poor memory connects. Those three closer to me are the ones from this morning.

The gazes quickly spread like a flu from one to another, elbows to shoulders then mouth to ears, glee and a wriggle for relief appear in them.