OKSANA. What? I have to sit here with you all night? Get your fucking hands off me.

ANDREW. I felt myself gong red. Got even angrier. What’s up with her? Is she crazy or what?

OKSANA. Then he starts yelling. It’s my fault I’m stuck out here. If I didn’t want to go I should just have refused to come. I just wanted him to shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.

ANDREW. I was trying to explain that it’s her that’s in the wrong. That actually she’s only got herself to blame for ending up out here. She’s a free agent and she made a choice to come here. If not consciously then unconsciously. But she wouldn’t listen.

OKSANA. I crossed over to the other side, stuck my thumb out again, straight away stopped a BMW heading the other direction.

ANDREW. She got in the car like she wasn’t hanging around. I ran to it and got in the other side. The driver was a guy in a white shirt. He told me to watch out for his suit. It was on a hanger next my head. I hadn’t noticed.

OKSANA. The car smelled good, and I was really conscious I hadn’t showered in two days. In the dorm there’s one shower for a hundred and twenty rooms, so the queue takes forever, and you can only really use them at night. And people just fuck in them all the time anyway. Although me and Seka never did…

ANDREW. He was obviously some kind of businessman. He said «I’m headed to Arkhangelsk, so I’ll drop you in Shichenga, as long as you tell the cops there’s been an accident back there. I’ve got business to take care of. I can’t go to the cops, there’ll be all these procedures and it’ll be a pain in the ass.

OKSANA. He said a Zaporozhets had gone up the embankment and hit a tree. Two old men. One survived.

ANDREW. Looks like that old man was destined to die today. But not Oksanka. So I wondered – why’s she here? I used to not give a shit about that stuff. Main thing was being remembered after I’m gone. Maybe I’m smarter now. Maybe I want respect while I’m still alive. Money too, although that’s just paper. I’m not a greedy person – not business-greedy – not my thing. Like this guy, he didn’t just give us a ride, he wants us to go to the cops in return. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours, and I’ll make people believe that’s the way it’s working cos that’s how I’ll sell stuff. And then the ads start appearing everywhere. When there didn’t exist before. Before you worked for the people around you. Now it’s for the house, the car, the cash. Travel. I used to see myself walking, camping, seeing the world that way. Now I want a beach resort in the Maldives. This guy’s probably been in the sea a hundred times. I’ve been once. In Riga. In the winter.

OKSANA. And that time my period was late. Please don’t let me be pregnant. They say if you have one abortion you’ll never have kids. He still wouldn’t marry me, even if I was pregnant. Literature class, in the fifth grade, room fourteen on the second floor. My legs felt sticky. And I saw blood on my legs, and my dress, and the chair. The teacher took me to the toilet, gave me a pad, sent me home. And none of the class made fun of me as like they were scared, because this was a new thing. I was the first. Nobody knew what this thing was.

ANDREW. We got out of the car and he drove off. Not a word. Not even a goodbye. Even the car was quiet, like it was sneaking away.

OKSANA. Didn’t tell us anything about the life of a businessman. Didn’t want to talk to mere mortals, apparently. I was ashamed of how I looked. Like I’d slept in a dumpster. Some kind of beggar princess.