Riding Icarus by Lily Hyde Page A

supposed to be bad luck.
    “I haven’t had a chance to say happy birthday to you yet,” said Aunt Anya. “Did you get lots of nice presents?”
    “Yes, I did,” Masha lied. Aunt Anya’s soft voice and pretty, sad smile made her very easy to talk to, and for a moment Masha wanted to tell her how disappointed she’d been that her mother hadn’t sent anything for her birthday. But after all, she’d got a present from Anya instead. “Thank you very much for the book of animals,” she said.
    “Did you like it?”
    “A lot. I brought it with me, to show you which are my favourites.”
    Masha took out the book, and they looked at it together on the kitchen table. Aunt Anya liked the penguins. “Let’s go to the zoo sometime and see if they have any there,” she suggested.
    “All right,” Masha agreed. “But I like the Siberian tigers best. I bet there aren’t any of those in the zoo. They only live in the Far East, and Kamchatka. They’re
huge
.”
    She turned to the page, and there was the tiger, burning orange and black against the brilliant forest green.
    “I’m not sure there really are tigers in Kamchatka,” Anya said. But she added hastily, “They are fantastic! Scary.”
    “Everything’s bigger in Kamchatka,” Masha said. “My papa grew up there, and he told me about it. I want to go there one day.” She suddenly started feeling peculiar and sad, the old ache. Her papa had never come back from his last expedition to Kamchatka. She sometimes imagined him there, watching the tigers as he sailed on dandelion seeds as big as parachutes. At the same time, she thought he was probably dead. Only that was much harder to imagine than dandelion seeds as big as parachutes.
    Aunt Anya kissed her quickly. “What an adventurous girl you are. How are you going to get to Kamchatka? Perhaps you could ride across Siberia on an elk. Are there any elks in this book?”
    “What are you two looking at?” said a voice behind them.
    Without them hearing, Uncle Igor had come into the room. He looked over their shoulders at the tiger.
    “Ugh! What a disgusting animal,” he said with a violent shudder. “I hope to God I never meet one of those. Put that picture away,” he went on irritably. “Even if such revolting creatures have to exist, I don’t see why I should have to look at them in my own kitchen.”
    Masha closed the book and put it back in her bag. Into her mind, unbidden, popped a sudden, incredible picture of a Siberian tiger in Uncle Igor’s kitchen. Its enormous fat tail sweeping the cups and plates onto the floor, its vast mouth opening in a roar.
    “Well, Masha, how are you?” asked Uncle Igor.
    “Fine, thank you,” she answered awkwardly.
    “And how’s the grandmother? Comfortable in the hospital, I’m sure. You know she’s better off there; she’s far too old to be living alone with a little girl. Perhaps you should come here and live with us, hey?” He bestowed on her his wolfish smile. “How would you like that, while we wait for your mama to come home?”
    Masha found herself looking at Aunt Anya’s face, sad and yearning under the careful make-up. It made her feel confused. “I like living with Granny,” she said quickly. “She’s coming out of hospital soon.”
    “We’ll see,” said Uncle Igor ominously. He tapped his fingers on his waistcoat, a big, dark, shiny man, like his Mercedes, and then sat down at the table and pulled a packet of cigars from his pocket. He took one out and held it under his nose, sniffing it ostentatiously.
    “Mmm, delicious. What a smell.” He held it out to Masha. “How about a smoke? Here, take it. Put hairs on your chest. Go on.”
    Masha felt angry and silly, all at once. What was she supposed to do with a cigar? She reached out hesitantly and Uncle Igor roared with laughter.
    “You bad girl,” he said, slapping her fingers so they stung. “Smoking already. You see, that old woman isn’t bringing you up properly. I really think you