(no subject)

[capable_of]

His steps were light as Lex wandered down the path in the direction of Anatoly's hut for their first Russian lesson. His mood was high for two reasons: his actual true joy of learning something new and spending time with someone that he considered a friend. Clark had been his first real friend, so the idea was still new to him. At home he couldn't trust just anyone and here was proving to be almost as difficult. But Lex didn't feel like that around Anatoly. He felt more like Lex then Lex Luthor then he had since arriving on the island and it hadn't taken nearly killing himself by driving recklessly off a bridge to do it.

In his hand, he clutched a small bottle of rum. He'd heard rumors of Han Solo giving away semi decent rum. When he'd noticed that today was the day of the Russian Revolution, he felt the need to bring something to celebrate so he'd tracked down the famous smuggler, hiding his inner geeky fanboy rather well if he thought so himself, and managed to procure some of said alcohol.

Finally arriving at the hut, Lex knocked on the wood by the door. "Hello?" He called politely in Russian, not sure yet if he should just walk in or not. He figured it was better to be polite.

Comments

[capable-of.livejournal.com]

Lex gave him a sharp look from the corner of his eyes, a disbelieving smile. "I can see it now. The generations of Island children will learn about the Russian chess playing hermit who talks to invisible opponents." He teased lightly before shaking his head. "Or at least that's the fate I hope to save you from."

Then he nodded. "Looks like a perfect spot." There was even a nicely sized piece of wood sitting under it that would serve as a table. He walked over a settled himself gracefully on the ground beside it, removing two cups from his pockets that he'd brought to accompany the bottle of rum.

[chesspolitik]

"Now, I have never talked to invisible opponents," Anatoly protested as he sat down at the indicated spot. "Only the chess pieces, if I am feeling bored. And I never expect them to answer back."

[capable-of.livejournal.com]

Lex only raised his eyebrows, rather pointedly. "I think I'm glad you don't have your own chess board. On this Island, they just might one day." He teased before nodding to the books. "Where shall we begin?"

[chesspolitik]

"I haven't quite decided that," Anatoly answered, choosing to ignore the possibility of more island weirdness for the moment. "I know you said you knew some Russian, but how much?"

[capable-of.livejournal.com]

"Very basic. Greetings, numbers, places, basic information gathering. It was memorization so I don't really know the alphabet beyond recognizing a few letters here and there." Lex offered as he sat back against the tree. "I know next to nothing about the grammar either." While normally he'd be more reluctant to admit his short comings, this was for a good cause.

[chesspolitik]

"That's a good start. I can work with that." He smiled at Lex then glanced down at the books, flipping through them to find a good starting place. "I thought perhaps we could do some more basics today, at least. The alphabet is a bit daunting, I'll admit."

He'd tried to teach Florence, but that had turned out to be a disaster. This would be different, he was sure, but all the same, he wasn't going to start with Cyrillic.

[capable-of.livejournal.com]

"Basics it is." Lex replied with a nod, unable to help himself from leaning over to look at the book Toly was flipping through.

This would be different. Because Lex took things like this with obsessive seriousness and had no intention of letting himself or his teacher fail. And if anything, at least he was spending time with one of the few people on the island he trusted. That was almost enough in of itself.

[chesspolitik]

Anatoly tilted the book so Lex could see it more easily. As far as text books went, it was a bit outdated and highly simplified, but useful enough for their purposes.

"So, my friend. Where shall we start?"