Such a Pleasant Thing

By Kevin Harbison

Freezing rain flowing down one's back was never a pleasant thing. This fact didn't change when such rain was combined with stones of hail hitting exposed gashes in one's skin. The teenager Matvei was experiencing these facts for the first time...

He ran through the darkened alley. The rain and hail assaulted his back, unprotected with lack of a jacket... it had been stolen by them along with his wallet. The streets of Moscow this time of year were never nice, but Matvei had never experience such violence. The memories of his attack came flashing to the front of his eyes as a crack of thunder was released overhead.

Matvei panted as he ran, dodging his eyes all through the alleyway... he saw the skyline from in between the two buildings where he ran. Tall, monstrous silhouettes served the single purpose of blocking out some of the clouded sky illuminated by the dull and scattered moonlight.

Matvei heard their footsteps running for him. The gash in his thigh was slowing him down too much... no, he couldn't run anymore. He had to hide. His eyes scanned through the alleyway, crouching his head forward so that his neck wouldn't be so assaulted by the sky's onslaught. He saw it: refuge. A stairwell leading down to a basement... the entrance to the stairwell was blocked by a black dumpster. The boy quickly ran for it, dashing behind the dumpster and practically throwing himself down the flight of concrete steps.

A pool of freezing water and slush had formed at the bottom. Matvei knew that he would have a far better chance of evading his attackers if he was crouched as much as possible... he sat down in the water. An instant stabbing pain overcame his lower body... he stayed siting, though, crouching himself into a corner of the now waist-high pool.

He sat back, closing his eyes. The rain and hail hit him in his cut cheek directly, making the wounds sting beyond what they already had when the knife tore through with such violence. He could hear them coming closer, yelling out profanities... they wanted more than the money Matvei was carrying. The teenager kept still, though, praying to something for a salvation.

The hearers of the prayer, if any, were quite ineffectual. Matvei opened his eyes to see the gang descending down the steps... he closed his eyes when he felt himself being grabbed, when he felt the punches connect with his stomach and arms. He let out the customary screams for help before he was kicked in the groin, that starting his screams of just pain. Matvei heard the withdraw of that knife again and braced himself.

It cut into his side, the cold metal bringing a complete shock to him... not pain. Matvei didn't feel the pain, just the shock of the metal lodging itself in the body. Using it for a sheath. The boy's screams continued as the knife was pulled out and stabbed back in only an inch away... and pulled out, and stabbed in again. The sickening mulching sound from the twist of the blade could almost be heard above the strike of thunder again felt.


Matvei opened his eyes wide, screaming out still as he again looked to the skyline. All of those buildings were so tall, so far away... none of them had colour. Even if they were bright pink and deep blues, their colour would have been washed away by the rain which painted everything a shade of gray. The moon, though, suddenly wasn't so scattered and dimmed by the clouds... no, it was being enhanced. Spread out and multiplied, bringing light to everything.

Matvei opened his eyes wider. Suddenly the residual pain on his body from the punches and gashes were so severed... Matvei was rising above them, leashing them with some metaphysical restraint. He wasn't being lifted into the air by nothing. No, he was stepping on all of the gashes and punches and stabs... each one was a stepping block for him. With every passing second the world was becoming larger, every single angle of detail in his surroundings became so acute that he could touch them and feel them with sight alone. Every strike they gave him was something to be taken in. The key wasn't to try and fight the pain, Matvei knew now, it was to use it. Control it. He was flying, now, far above the men that were taking part in their violent delights...

Matvei stopped his screaming. The men took this as signal that he was near dead... the leader of the attack drew back his knife as far as he could manage before plunging it deep into the center of Matvei's torso. His organs would be torn, the blood would be pouring inside of him... he was as good as dead.

As the men left Matvei's eyes closed. He couldn't be bothered with sight anymore. Everything was overwhelming with delight... he swam in the pool of freezing water tainted with his own crimson, floating above the stairwell and above the skyline. All he had to do was step on the pain, rise above it. Still the clouds poured down onto Matvei's back, its hailstones burrowing into the torn flesh. He accepted it all. He smiled.

Freezing rain flowing down one's back was never such a pleasant thing.