“White elephant? That’s what we call Lev when he’s not around,” Volk laughs when I tell him about my gift exchange idea.
I suppress a giggle, digging my mittens into the pockets of my shiny black parka. “Leave my mishka alone. Save the ribbing for a prank present, if you must.”
Volk shakes his head, the fur of his hood fluttering with the faint flurry. “You join our crew through Lev and now there’s gonna be sharing circles and kumbaya carols. Got us all spun around. Next, you’ll crochet cozies for our pill bottles and bedazzle the gats.”
“Ahh, you play too much. You guys lack a feminine touch.” I raise a brow like he’s got a dry spell worse than the west coast. “Besides, you bastards are the reason Lev can’t take me to see Moscow. Think I want to spend Xmas with you bozos?” I poke his forearm that’s still meaty under three layers. It’s easier to poke the wolf when I can’t see his tattoo growling at me. I’m reminded of a phrase Lev taught me: To live with wolves, you must howl like them.
Volk rolls his jaundiced eyes. “It’s not our fault he got sloppy and has to stay to make amends. If anything, it’s the distraction of a malen’kaya named Masha,” he fires back—but I won’t take the blame.
I shake my head, saying he better play the game or I’m not playing his: the goods won’t get delivered to his spot on Ninth.
“Now who’s the Grinch?” he teases, lighting up a long Red, beaded vision never leaving mine.
“Oh, boo hoo. No white by the fire for three shysty corner clerks. They’ll suffice.”
“Masha,” he says more sternly, his torpedoed smoke making me tear. “Don’t make—”
“I’m goin’, I’m goin’. And you will be at the Christmas party, front and center like a fruitcake,” I retort, boots already slushing through exhaust-shaded snow-piles.
***
“Hello,” Lev greets, it sounding like ’allo. “Where you heading, solnyshko?” he asks, amused by my fast tracks in the sidewalk. “You will make dry ice, moving like nitro-boost.”
I sigh and flip through the cash stash in my pocket. “Just hit Vincent’s, DiStefano’s and Mr. Gao’s. Going to Northside next.”
“Busy bee.” He smiles proud, hands in his suit pants like it isn’t below freezing. “Volk tells me you, too, are convincing like an ox.”
“Stubborn, you mean. Wait, so he agrees, we’ll have a get-together after all?”
He gives a brisk nod, adjusting his cap. “So long as we keep up this streak. No dawdling.”
I bounce up and kiss his bald head. “For real? So we won’t be bored off our asses at home?” I’m already mentally rearranging my agenda to squeeze in more trades. Frostbite be damned.
He laughs and reaches up to cup my winter-red cheek. “Da, malen’kaya. No pouting in the apartment this Khristovo. Santa will bring all his little helpers to the block and dance for you,” he kids, knowing I puppet him and the boys too much with feminine wiles and whines.
I imagine all the d-boys in black Christmas hats, puffing “candy-caine” sticks and swigging bowed bottles of Green Mark vodka. Our little melting pot block of degenerates, from the first to fourth wave of dream-chasers. We’ll crowd around our coatrack of pretty spent bottles like an abstract Christmas tree, celebrate to blackout, because I’ve been a good foot soldier this year. “Bet!”
***
Between warehouses on the eastside, a dozen of our gang/allies gather around fire drums. They make dick joke after suggestive jig about dancing sugarplums and roasted nuts.
Volk just sticks to the sidelines, packing heat like a buzzkill sentinel.
Screw that. Busted my ass like a DoorDash grunt on the docks with a pneumonia-worthy windchill. After endless deliveries every day—gun and gak—I’m cutting loose. The piggies in my boots are numb enough, might as well shake ’em and the rest of my body.
The crew fountain-spits vodka to make the flames flicker higher, cheering. They peacock about cars they stole and cathouse tricks they pulled this week. It’s nothing new.
I can one-up them like baby brothers, spitting, “Yeah, yeah, Krokodil, but who flipped your brick on new turf, who swapped the plates and kept your first wife out of the pen?”
Volk sways his head like we all belong back in juvie, too Americanized.
But the boys toast to me. Lev twirls me under multicolor lights to holiday trap sampling Nutcracker and “Carol of the Bells.” We stand in small groups, hot-potatoing gag gifts like bad luck cuffs and mistletoe, making jokes about next year’s plug busts and pregnancy scares. Guys trade homemade or engraved bullets and girls’ numbers from gent clubs.
Lev slips from my waist, saying he’ll swing me another kissel shot. It’s not long before I see him chatting up Volk though. Expressions stormy to sober.
Whatever. Another mission? I’ll handle it with my six on the 26th. He still bitching out Lev over a half-ass hit by the bay? Just wait to see the next’s expertise.
When the beat lands on me, Volk places a Magic 8 Ball in my palms. He says I can leave it up to fate whenever he gives an answer I don’t like. “Oh, yeah?” I purr, giving the glossy toy a hard shake. “Does Volk like me after all?”
Better not tell you now, it reads. I give it another go. Reply hazy, try again later.
“Sounds fair. A halftime occasion. Maybe this thing can see the future.” I slip him the billfold I made off with on the last charge. “Merry Christmas. Keep the change.”
His eyes widen a smidge. An ID with an address he needs to even the score. How’s that for letting Lev off the hook? He leaves loose threads; I mend them and pluck a “button” off the next big guy to take down. Which side is distracted and sloppy now?
His respectful gaze is gift enough, if fleeting. “You’ve come a long way, Masha. I—”
Lev squeezes in, showing me the brass knuckles he won. He laughs at how little they are, “Like for a lady.” He tries to fit them on me but we decide they make a better paperweight. Something to steady the uneven table at home.
My eyes flick up to Volk and he nods me off, saying, “Enjoy your party.”
I smirk and do by challenging Lev and the boys to Last Man Standing, gambling, crazy dances and parkour dares through a haze of smoke and winter breath.
Before the sun rises with too much bile, Lev walks me home. Says I have one more wish for Santa’s list before the clock runs out.
“I want a good year. Will we have it?” I ask the 8 ball, sloshing it good.
When the glittery water settles, the purple triangle shows, It is decidedly so.
“I think it’s on to something,” Lev says, thumb-caressing my lower back as his other hand clasps the plastic. He turns it on its side, pointing out a slit at top.
“Like a piggy bank,” I muse.
“Signs point to yes,” he jokes, sliding out some folded papers.
I squint. Blue but not like Benjamins.
He accordions out two plane tickets to Moscow.
My jaw drops. We’re free from the game this New Year—at least for a couple weeks.
Volk isn’t such a big, bad wolf after all. More like an unconventional motivator. It is certain,like the 8 ball says.
With a knowing twinkle, Lev asks, “Ready, Masha?”
“Vsegda!” I cheer, hugging him tight like I will Volk when we get back. “Always.”
Bio:
Paige Johnson is EIC of Outcast Press and author of the illustrated poetry books Percocet Summer and Citrus Springs. She has appeared in Urban Pigs Press media a number of times, like the Hunger anthology, two poems for the Journeys issue, as well as the short stories White Lies and Afterglow. Additionally, she has had stories published in Punk Noir Magazine, Horror Sleaze Trash, Starlite Pulp #5, Troublemaker Firestarter, amid others. Socials: X, IG, FB @OutcastPress1 and TikTok @OutcastPress
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