The Exchange Student

The Ice Floe

It was spring. My friend Ruslan and I were walking along the Angara River. White snow had just begun to melt. A meter away from the coast there were some “islands” of ice and a “brilliant” idea appeared in our minds. We made a bet that the person, who jumped on an ice floe and returned back to “the land” without falling in the cold water, would get 5 rubles.

A minute later, Ruslan found a suitable ice floe, and said, “Now, I’m going to jump on it!”

He jumped and landed the floe, he stood a minute on it with a smile on his face. Then jumped back to the beach and asked me to give him five rubles. I gave him the money and began to search for my floe, on which I could jump without the risk of being in the water.

I found such one pretty soon it was a meter away from the beach. I ran, jumped and landed on the ice, which immediately broke off! I grabbed the other side of the floe with my hands, but my legs were already in the cold water. I made a big effort to pull the legs out. Then I stood up on the ice and looked at myself. The half of my body was covered in ice.

Ruslan was standing on the shore and tried not to laugh.

Suddenly, I noticed that the ice started going with the flow of the river!

I got panicked and began to shout, “Ruslan, help me! Tell me where to jump!”

Running along the shore, Ruslan started checking where I could jump without any risk of getting into the water. The ice was soft in all the places that were convenient for me to jump. A gap of several meters appeared between me and Ruslan!

At that point we both realized that I would never jump that far to the shore and it was not funny at all. I started to draw pictures in my head, imagining the ice floe starting to melt, the distance to the shore getting longer and longer and me getting frozen in the water.

Luckily, some people were working in the construction area not far away from where we were. Ruslan realized that I was about to have a long trip on that piece of ice and ran to ask the builders for help. After a few minutes I saw him running back with people and holding a long stick in his hands. He shouted, “Nikita! Catch it man!”

I managed to grab the stick only at the third attempt and they started to pull me. When I finally got to the shore, I did not know how to thank my friend and the builders. I remember how my feet got cold and pants got covered in ice.

We came home; I immediately ran to the radiator to get warm. My mom asked me, “Where did you get your pants soaked?”

Unfortunately, I lied to her and said that I had fallen in a puddle. I didn’t want her to know what had just happened to me.

A Moment of Life

It was getting late when that happened. I was on my way home with my friend Kolya, and we noticed two people screaming at each other: A guy barely standing on his feet and a woman, who was holding him. Suddenly after drunk one had noticed me and my friend he quickly pulled out a gun and aimed it at us saying, “What are you looking at?

I’m going to shoot you now!”

We literally got scared to death! We couldn’t move at all. My heart started beating rapidly. There were 2 outcomes: either getting shot by that man or staying alive just because of a lucky occurrence. I didn’t know what would happen with me in those seconds, which seemed to me like hours. I could imagine the man pulling the trigger and everything instantly becoming dark.