The Guard by Peter Terrin

me alive, I’ve got rations in the back. Do you hear me?” He waves both hands. “Can you understand me?”
    “Who did you have those adventures with?”
    “My friend here, made in Korea. Have I come at the wrong time?”
    “You mean the van?” Harry asks.
    The driver looks over his shoulder silently. I aim at the spot where his eyebrows meet.
    “Answer!”
    “Of course I mean the van.”
    Harry signals for me to join him at the rear of the van. As usual we take cover close to the ground. While the driver gets ready to open the doors, I see out of the corner of my eye that the barrel of Harry’s pistol is shaking like a leaf. Get it over with, runs through my head. I’m exhausted, empty. I’m a shell. The idea of not shooting, of giving my assailant time to take aim so that one bullet will suffice, is almost overpowering. An irresistible prospect.
    The doors swing open on oiled hinges, the driver clicks them into position—left, right—then takes a step back.
    I’m alive.
    And hungry again, more than ever.
    57
    From where I’m standing the load compartment looks empty. I study Harry’s expression. He stands up and visually inspects the load.
    “Everything in order, boss?” the driver asks.
    As Harry nods, I stand up too. Before the youth bends into the back of the van, I catch a glimpse of the load. Not hard plastic trays in a range of colors, just one cardboard box accompanied by bottled water, stowed in a corner. The driver has to crawl into the load compartment to reach the ration.
    The box is a good bit smaller than the previous one and exudes the smell of stale lavender. It once contained fabric softener, eight two-liter bottles.
    Harry is almost beside himself with impatience but his hands stay glued to the Flock 28 while the driver, with growing reluctance, kneels to pull the bottled water back out of the depths. “Hurry up,” Harry snaps, coupling his order with a poke with his foot just when the youth is at his most defenseless. “Take it easy,” he says, remarkably unmoved. “I’m almost done.”
    Afterward, leaning on his door, his right leg already in the cab, he looks us both in the eye by way of farewell. To me he seems much more mature all of a sudden. While dropping onto his seat, before slamming the door shut, we clearly hear him say the words, “Be glad I still bring you anything.”
    58
    We’re sitting next to the cardboard box, in front of Mrs. Privalova’s open garage, at a reassuring distance from the entrance gate, and neither of us is inclined to stand up and put an end to this party. For one and a half hours we’ve been sitting here as if in the company of an old mutual friend, who is telling us about long journeys, summoning up images of small harbors enclosed by steep mountainsides, sunbaked fishermen on strangely shaped boats who toss the morning’s glittering catch onto the dock while the cool breeze rattles the rigging. There is a blissful peace on our faces. We have earned this, even though we wisely stopped after a quarter of an hour’s gorging. Our initial regret about the lack of anything sweet, which evaporated at the sight of the tins Harry arranged around the box, now starts to nag again. Sugar would be a welcome change after the rich taste of fish in oil, but of course we don’t complain. I saw my ownoverwhelming desire reflected in Harry’s eyes as he tore open the first tin and shook the chunk of fish out onto his hand as if it was coming out of a baking tray and the sensuous golden-yellow oil ran down between his fingers. Fortunately our stomachs have shrunk and the deranged flurry passed quickly, before we did even more damage to our limited month’s supply. We know what we have to do; we just don’t feel like it. Everything has to go straight into the storeroom, under lock and key, we have to put an urgent end to our debauchery or face another period of devastating hunger. Harry leans back on his elbows, a pose people adopt on the beach, gazing out