Along with his pains and a dull ache coming from his lower back, he felt a gnawing hunger that reminded him that he had not eaten much at all since the turkey sandwiches at the restaurant just off the highway back in another life. The little bit of fish he’d swallowed right before the riot hadn’t amounted to much, and he felt the growl in his gut and the faintly pleasant tightness that reminded him of day three of a fast. Does the condemned man get a last meal around here? He suddenly remembered that food may not be the best topic of conversation with prisoners who have been starved for a week.
After an hour or so sitting quietly in the dark the light flipped on and he saw a face look in at him through the tiny window. With his one good eye and the crisscross of chicken wire he didn’t recognize the face at all. Clay sat up on the bunk and pushed his way along it to the far wall, not knowing if this was to be another interrogation or if they were actually coming to kill him.
The lock turned and the door swung open and a face looked in at him and smiled. It was the face of a boy who looked to be about sixteen or seventeen, and then the rest of the boy came through the portal carrying a faded green plastic meal tray. The young man approached slowly, with some hint of fear on his face, and he tried to smile bravely as he handed the tray to Clay.
Clay looked down and he was startled at what he saw. For a starving people they surely ate well around here. His tray was loaded with four or five thick slices of some kind of rye bread slathered with butter. There were two hard-boiled eggs, peeled; a bowl of some kind of hot cereal grains (also slathered with butter); some sliced apples; a hunk of whitish cheese; and a mug of hot, black coffee.
“Wow,” Clay said, looking over the veritable feast. “Good thing I still have my teeth.”
The young boy nodded, smiled politely again, and then turned to leave.
“Wait… you,” Clay sputtered, not knowing what to call the youth, “what’s your name?”
“I don’t speak the English,” the boy said, shyly and with a very heavy Russian accent.
“Someone forgot to tell your mouth,” Clay responded.
“Vasily,” the boy replied, again with a very thick accent, looking over his shoulder as if he were doing something very wrong. He stepped back out into the hall, and then quickly returned back to the cell with a case of water in plastic bottles, still in the plastic wrap. The writing on the water bottles was, he assumed, in Russian.
Clay grabbed one of the bottles of water and twisted off the cap and took a long swig of water. “Where’d you get the food, Vasily? I thought you guys were all starving to death.” Indeed, Vasily did look slightly thin, though not in any way approximating starvation or even some kind of malnutrition. His eyes were clear and bright, and his hair had been cut recently and he looked strong in a sinewy kind of way.
Vasily did not reply, but something in his eyes tried to communicate with Clay and he wrapped his hands nervously in his faded orange prison shirt not knowing if he wanted to flee or stay and talk.
“Are they going to kill me today, Vasily?” Clay asked, taking a bite from the toast, his good eye rolling back in pleasure at the taste of the salty, melted butter and beautifully toasted rye bread. When he looked back to Vasily, he smiled at the boy again, just waiting for a reply.
Vasily did not reply, he just nodded his head and walked back out of the cell. The lock ticked closed but this time the light was left on.
The next two meals that day were the only other interruptions to Clay’s somewhat welcomed solitude. Lunch was as bountiful as breakfast had been, though Clay could not be sure exactly what each of the dishes were or what they contained. There was a cold, sour soup that Vasily called “Okroshka” which had some green leafy vegetable, large pieces of potato, and chunks of fish. It was delicious. There was actually a small dab of some white caviar with small crackers which he did not enjoy, but then there was a heavy pancake topped liberally with butter and sour cream which was perfect. There was more coffee to drink, along with a shot of vodka. The only things he left on his tray after lunch was the caviar and the vodka. He laughed to himself as he looked at the un-tasted vodka. Last time I had vodka, I got thrown in jail!
Supper was a bowl of what looked like beet soup with ample pieces of meat (he could not tell if it was beef or venison or some other meat) and heavy dollops of sour cream on top. This was served with thick chunks of black barley bread with butter and a couple of sliced cucumbers.
“Maybe they’re getting me ready for my execution,” he told Vasily, “fattening me up so they can eat me.” The boy, who either did not understand or did not appreciate gallows humor, simply paused at the door as if to say something, but decided better of it and then disappeared again.
He was left alone without visitors for a few hours after his supper, and then, about the time that he figured it might be starting to get dark outside, he heard a knock at the door and recognized the tall figure of Vladimir peering in. Why knock?
Mikail led the procession into the cell and Vladimir and Sergei came in behind him. Both leaned up against the walls with arms crossed affecting a youthful position of arrogance and unearned power, like thugs who had just taken over the playground. It had become evident to Clay that Mikail was the man in charge and it didn’t seem that he minded letting Clay know that either.
“Good evening, Clay,” Mikail said with a cold smile of mock friendliness.
“Hello,” Clay responded unemotionally. It was apparent to him that the façade of good cop had been dropped. Mikail had apparently decided to now deal with him as who he really was, whatever that could be. With the better lighting and some minimal use of his right eye, Clay now noticed that Mikail was probably in his early 20’s, older than Clay had originally thought, though youthful enough to pass for an older teenager. Sergei and Vladimir did not look to have reached their 20th year yet and were maybe in their late teens.
“I hope you have enjoyed the food. Things improved for us radically once we’d taken the town,” Mikail said, with just a hint of pride.
“So there is a Russian town around here?” Clay asked.
The three young men started to laugh, Mikail laughing the hardest, and it took a moment for him to return to his more serious demeanor.
“Yes, Clay, there is a Russian town around here. Right here in America. Warwick, as we informed you earlier. And like a wick draws up oil, so Warwick has drawn you into itself. It is our town, and now we run it.”
“Congratulations. Ok, so what does that have to do with me? Why am I still here? Why are you still acting like I should know something I don’t? Why was I beaten? What comes next?”
“Easy, Clay” Mikail said, “You are still here because we have not yet decided what to do with you. You are a hostage. The rest can wait for now.”
“Do I get a phone call?” Clay asked sarcastically.
“Maybe you could if the phones were working, or if anyone else in the tri-state area had electricity. But…” Mikail paused, taking a deep breath. As he did so, Clay could sense the bravado drain out of him, replaced by a level of stress and weight that the young man was not entirely used to. The crown weighs heavy on the head of a king.