My car stopped working at Elk Knob State Park just as the sun was setting and just as the Russians were finishing their hike so I asked if it was possible if I could get a jump.
The man said “Yes. Of course.” and that’s when I think I first realized they weren’t necessarily from the North Carolina High Country and then he addressed his wife in Russian so I said “I hear an accent. Where are you from?”
“Russia,” the man replied proudly. “But I’ve been here 20 years.”
My car still wouldn’t start so I asked if I could get a ride just to the corner.
“Yes of course,” he said.
The woman said something in Russian and the man translated: “She said she doesn’t think it’s your battery.”
“So what part of Russia?”
“Siberia.”
I said something about how I just started reading The Gulag Archipelago.
“Oh yes. Solzhenitsyn,” the man said.
It turns out he was a Russian and a sociology professor.
I said “I’m sure the winters here are mild compared to there.”
They spoke again in Russian to each other and the woman laughed. It turns out she had only just moved to Boone a year ago so the Siberian winters were still fresh in her memory.
“But,” the man said, “I’ve grown accustomed to these winters.”
At the Corner Market I thanked them for their help.
“Of course,” the man said again.
I gathered all my belongings, I thought, but later realized that somewhere between Elk Knob my favorite pen had gone missing. Lately I’ve started imagining that it fell out in their car and that the Russians have my pen.