January 15, 2022

You have to do a double-take when you see the thumbnail. He looks so much like Nick: the same pale, narrow face, the same dark hair, pulled back to reveal a large forehead. The person in the thumbnail is wearing glasses, unlike Nick, that slight difference highlighting the similarities. You read the title: "Riding the Metro in St. Petersburg." You haven't seen Nick since before the pandemic, but as far as you know he is still here, in the same city as you, and he has never been to Russia.

You click on the video.

"Hi, I'm Ilya, and I live in Russia. Today I'm going to show you what it's like to ride the metro in St. Petersburg."

He is standing front of a metro stop, a stylized "M" looming behind him. The camera frames his face at an upward angle, a close enough distance between two friends. His friendly demeanor and soft voice draws you further in on the thread of familiarity. He is at Lesnaya Station, the mouth of the metro opening to a deep metal throat.

You remember the story you'd been told about Soviet-era metro stations built deep to double as bomb shelters. As you recall this, Ilya responds as if he heard your thoughts. "Though many people think the metro stations were built so deep to be also bomb shelters, in St. Petersburg, this is just, let's say, a side effect. St. Petersburg is in fact on a marsh, and so closer to the surface the ground is too soft for good tunnels."

Interesting, you think—what else did you believe that was not entirely true?

He descends, down, down, down, into golden depths. You are with him in this moment, even though this video is from six months ago, when the sun shone more brightly in the sky. He is talking to you and you alone while also talking to thousands. You notice one of his front teeth is chipped, his smile sometimes forced and awkward.

While he says the metro has changed little since it was first built, to your surprise, the station is clean and bright. The train pulling in is painted a bold blue, and even the people are just like those you see where you live, some wearing masks, some not.

The video cuts to what looks like the inside of a palace: ornate lamps line the columns as well as Soviet-era reliefs cast in bronze. "As you can see," Ilya says in a voiceover, "St. Petersburg has some of the most beautiful metro stations in the world."

Once he ascends the escalator, he enters onto a long, wide street lined with buildings embossed with Neoclassical accents, a place that could be anywhere in Europe. The street is just a shade different from the city where you live, and you can see yourself there, walking beside him as he points out some cafes and historic buildings. You saw no one else today but for those through your screen, and when Ilya signs off, you almost say goodbye.

You don't subscribe yet. You're shy. But you watch another one of his videos, which starts right away.

January 28

You know why the video was recommended to you. You've been listening to Sovietwave playlists throughout the cold, gray winter, the sounds of a lost time and place encapsulating the sense of isolation. You stopped talking to people you couldn't see regularly anymore, which was most people, Nick included, the focus on a screen too draining beyond passivity. Videos are how you see people now.

Other Russians pop up in your recommended feed. You've seen some of their stuff, but you always come back to Ilya. He doesn't have the big, presentation-style voice that many of the others have. And he looks so much like your friend, they could be related—though Nick is from England, with not a drop of Slavic blood.

Ilya's next video is titled "Student Life in St. Petersburg." You are no longer a student, but you click anyway.

"Hi, I'm Ilya and I live in St. Petersburg, Russia. Today I'm going to answer some of your questions about being a student in St. Petersburg. As some of you may know, I first came here to study before moving to Asia for some time. A lot of you wanted to know what it's like to be a student here, and so I'll do my best to share my experience. I don't know much about visas or such kind of things, but I can tell you how it is like to be here."

He sits in what looks like a student bedroom: plain beige ceiling, wooden chair, a lamp lighting his face, blowing it out to a pale glow. He answers each question with a smile, and you sink into a sort of nostalgia, wishing you had thought to study abroad there.

You went to London, where you met Nick. There, you had a whole collection of friends who met at the same pubs and went to the same shows until the semester ended and the group dispersed. That was five years ago. A core had remained but had since steadily weakened, until it seemed that finally, the total dissolution of live meetings, or the possibility of such, broke down those essential bonds.

As Ilya speaks, you find yourself remembering your time in London. No strange language, but a place where you knew no one, each new face revealing promise and peril in their smiles, all their rooms with the same simple wooden desks and beds, suitcases never fully unpacked. Nick lived on the same floor and so was often the one to knock on your door when the group was going to hang out. You opened the door with a flutter of anxious hope.

You let the next video play, a tour of some student dorms. In a way, you already know these rooms: simple IKEA furniture, cramped spaces, white walls, small kitchen with no stove, only a microwave. The decor does not even differ at all—band and movie posters only having the aesthetic difference of Cyrillic. You consider sharing your own experience in the comments, but really, there is not much to tell.

He asks you to subscribe, and donate to his Patreon page if you can. But you don't have much money. Barely enough for essentials. One day you hope to travel again. Perhaps to St. Petersburg.

February 9

You watch Ilya's last video, about the Russian New Year. You start in a supermarket, just like any other you've ever been to, except for the Cyrillic letters everywhere. He is already beginning to feel like a good friend, and a warm and fuzzy feeling fills you.

Ilya is careful with his words. You like that about non-native English speakers. They take the time to think of the right word, rather than burst their thoughts through in an undammed stream of consciousness. You also choose your words carefully, for the greatest clarity and the least ambiguity. It's why you prefer text over voice, and you feel you would never be able to do livestreams like the way Ilya or other YouTubers do.

You know Russia has made the news recently, amassing troops near the Belarusian and Ukrainian borders, but you also doubt, if not the truth of it, then the framing. A life immersed in media has made you skeptical, and now, there are sources that reveal every single angle of a topic to you. You wonder if Ilya has said anything about it, but when you check his channel you see that his last posted video was January 18. This whole time you've been watching videos from last year. Your trust in him wavers a little—why has he said nothing about it? You realize that you don't really know that much about Ilya. You know where he lives, what he studied, who some of his friends are, and some of the things he likes. But there is more to a person. Much more.

The last time you saw Nick, you were huddled in the corner of a dark cavernous bar. He was on his third beer when he told you that he wasn't sure if he wanted to marry Zuzka, with the quivering clarity of sobriety. You asked him why not, and then he began to pour out his soul to you.

"I hate the language," he said after a deep gulp of his beer. "I just can't get my tongue over those fucking consonant clusters. And I mean, that's bad enough, since if I don't learn I'm basically stuck where I am, but it's also like... her family's here. When will I see mine? If we have kids, will they know my parents as well as hers?"

"Probably not," you say, the impulse to reach out for his hand restrained by clutching your glass.

"And what about me and my identity? I've been thinking, maybe it's important to me that I'm British, you know? And here... I'll lose that sense of self."

You kept listening, receiving his soul like lemonade in a pitcher, and poured back sweet words of comfort and encouragement.

When you parted at two in the morning, he hugged you, his beer breath sighing out, "Thanks for listening to me ramble. You're such a great friend."

Two weeks later, the virus arrived, and you could only peek at him through small LED windows, Nick all but vanished.

You think to write him, hey, I found your Russian doppelganger lol, he's on YouTube, and after composing the message in your head and leaving it for one day, you write it. You send it. It remains unread for days, and when you check again, the circle of his profile picture has appeared at the bottom, but no response.

February 24

Your phone alerts you that Russia has invaded Ukraine. You catch your skipped breath. The anxiety of uncertainty sets in: what will happen? How long will it last? Will NATO get involved? Russia has nukes, will the long-delayed sequel to World War II take place? You open the news to know more, going to the usual spaces where you lurk. Everybody's talking about it. It will lead to WWIII, some say; this is just a regional skirmish, say others. NATO will get involved. It definitely won't. You read and watch and listen to what everybody else is saying, with the basic fact of the invasion the only thought you can steady your head on. You don't think of Ilya, much less any other Russian YouTuber, at first.

You first think of the Ukrainian girl you met here, long before the pandemic, who had just started her master's studies. You wonder where she is now, and look her up. No evidence suggests she's moved, the profile picture of her together with her mom, the castle in the background. No updates since a photo of a Black Sea beach, taken last summer. You consider texting her, but think better of it. She's probably busy, and doesn't need to hear from you, an acquaintance she barely remembers.

You take a walk to pump the anxiety through you, in hopes of dissipating it. There is a portent of spring in the air, the sun warming your exposed skin. But the thoughts work their way in. Will the war come here? The Ukrainian border is less than 800 kilometers away, which feels so close now. Will you have to move back home? Go back to wandering? What did it matter, when your sense of place, of being here in particular, has dissolved? You have the feeling that this walk in the park may be one of the last, so you pay attention to the view from atop the hill, the way the sun shines on the rooftops, the flat layout of the city below like layers of a pop-up book.

You half-expect to get a text from your mother that day, but you get nothing. Even she no longer worries about you.

March

Soon you start seeing a new genre of YouTube videos hurled onto your homepage, titled "I left Russia." Roman. Natasha. Konstantin. You watch them all. But where is Ilya? You check his channel and you see that you missed a livestream he did of an anti-war protest. How brave! you think, to even be there at that time.

You watch the video. People are gathered, shouting "Нет войне!"—"No to war!" in the square. Others just walk by. Large trucks loom on the periphery as Ilya, still calm and cheery, describes what the people are protesting about and what the trucks are for: to take as many protesters away as possible. He becomes immersed in the crowd, and as police near, you start feeling anxious for him. You heard that Russian police can be brutal. At one point, he says they are told to stay still, and the police disappear behind a gate. You assure yourself by thinking that because he uploaded this video, he did not get detained.

A cut away from the protests, and he's now in a park, with leafless trees swaying above him. He talks to some Russians, using the accepted term "special military operation." Just like anywhere else, some support it, some don't, and all seem to be careful with their words. They speak slowly, they trail off as they are searching for the correct word to say. They could be anyone in the West—only the language is different.

You go to the drugstore the next day and buy toiletries for Ukrainian women and children. Entire shelves of toothpaste are empty. You can only buy one small bag of goods, but it's something. Once you drop it off, your conscience is momentarily clear. You will have had a positive impact on someone, at least, someone who will never know you, but had clean teeth because of you.

March 31

Anxiety still permeates the air like a high-pressure weather system. Nobody cares about the virus anymore. You meet your former colleague and friend Haley in a cafe you both used to frequent, before all the shutdowns began. Several empty tables remain on this cloudy afternoon.

Haley does more of the talking, as she has more news: a move, the adoption of a cat, frustrations with dating. So this is why she contacted you: she no longer has a partner to lean on about her problems. You keep her talking by asking about her last breakup, as gently as you can. You are a teapot, ready to receive the boiling water.

As the steam of your teas dissipate, you venture to ask about Nick. "Have you heard from him at all?"

Haley shoots you a searching look, but you maintain a neutral face. "You haven't heard? He moved back home to Brighton. His dad got sick and passed away like a month ago."

The news hits you like a punch in the chest. "He moved back? Since when?"

"Sometime last year. End of summer, I think."

"What about Zuzka? Weren't they engaged?"

"Broke it off," Haley says. "They had their wedding scheduled for like May 2020, so obviously that got canceled, and I think the postponement gave them second thoughts. I don't think Nick's moving back, honestly."

You slump in your seat in shock. He had poured his soul to you, and you received it. Yet you got no news, not even a goodbye?

Haley seems to pick up on your body language, and says, "He's been going through a lot lately. If you try getting in touch with him, I'm sure he'll respond when he's ready."

But the fact of your prolonged ignorance still stings, so you sit up and say, leaning over the dregs of your cooling tea, "How do you know all this, then?" You try to keep your tone calm and curious, but there's still a sharp hint of envy in it.

"I still hang out with Zuzka, and he's been keeping in touch with her, even since the breakup. It's hard to give up on an ex, you know?"

You know.

"Anyway," Haley says, stirring the teaspoon in her near-empty cup. "What's been going on with you? It's been a minute!"

You try to run through the past six months in your head—so many thoughts, so much time alone. What could you say? "Nothing much," you answer before too much time passes. "Been watching a lot of YouTube."

"Anything of note?" she asks, though you sense her attention slipping.

Your mind is still on Nick, so you think of Ilya. You mull mentioning the doppelganger to her, but decide against it, not wanting to find out how she would react. "Not really," you say. "It's a way to pass the time these days."

On the tram home, you reopen your chat history with Nick and consider the blank bubble. How to share your sympathies and disclose that you heard the sad news. You tap out a message, then delete a few words, revise the message, then revise the message again, and then your stop is announced and you rush off, shutting down the screen.

April 10

Ilya has been uploading videos regularly. He showed you around a Russian supermarket to compare the prices after sanctions. He gave you a tour of a nearly-empty mall. He has tried the new Russian McDonald's hamburger (rebranded "Tasty, period."). He has done a few videos about how the Russian media, now banned in the West and West-aligned countries, is reporting on the invasion. This is still normal life. People go shopping, eat fast food, complain about how everything is so much more expensive now. He is cheerful and matter-of-fact.

You know some oddly intimate details about Ilya—his favorite McDonald's side, his preferred brand of yogurt, his daily routine. You know little of this about most of your so-called friends. Yet you don't know if Ilya has a girlfriend (or boyfriend), what his day job is (or is he only a YouTuber?), what his real lifelong dream is. What are his worries, what are his true fears? You are only skimming the surface of his life, like any other acquaintance.

That night, you write to Nick: I heard you moved back to Brighton? Sorry about your dad. Before sending, you consider for a moment revealing that your dad passed away, too, some time ago, before the virus, but think better of it. This is not about you, even if the act of sending a message to call him to your attention is, in a way, about you.

May 1

You have the day off, but no plans, so you lie in bed scrolling through your social feeds, until you see a photo of Nick. He looks paler and thinner than you remember, and he's standing with an older man. His father. A caption: In February, my dear father... Finally, he shared it with the world that his father passed. You tap to like, then remember the message you'd sent him. It is at Read. No response. You become anxious, wondering if you should un-like the post, or maybe now you can share about your own long-gone father.

To escape the anxiety you get out of bed and put on YouTube. Ilya is there to tell you about how the Russian media is covering the special military operation. You click on it, and Ilya's measured cadence soothes you, and you forget.

June 12

You dream you are in St. Petersburg. You don't see the Winter Palace or the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood—instead, you're walking between stretches of residential Communist blocks to meet Nick. The blocks are so long they feel more like walls sliding past you on a rolling walkway. And it is Nick who greets you, Nick with the slightly squarer jaw and the perfect white teeth. It is winter in the dream, as the trees are bare and you're wearing coats. You walk and talk but really glide into a cafe you had seen in one of Ilya's videos, recognizable from the inverted lampshades. Nick seems his usual sullen self, but you bring out a brightness in him. He laughs about something. He asks you questions. You sit there for so long you realize you're going to miss your plane, and when you say goodbye Nick has become Ilya, with the same glasses and same chipped front tooth.

July

This summer, just like the past two summers, you drift, often alone, through the forests and the mountains not far from the city. Haley goes home for a month so you don't see her at all.

You aren't watching as much YouTube, as you're spending less time at home on your PC and more time outside, but whenever Russia comes up Ilya naturally floats to the top of your mind. What does he think of it all? In his coverage of Russian news, his words are measured as precisely as baking ingredients. Even his tone of voice is indiscernible. Russians who have left vocally oppose the war, are clear they are never going back. You expect that his reticence betrays his true beliefs, that he does not support the war.

You've thought of Nick sometimes, but your message remains at Read. You figure he doesn't want to get in touch with you anymore, yet no move is made to unfriend or unfollow. You see that he was on vacation in Spain, from the photos he posts, but you don't reveal that you've seen them.

August 24

It is a lazy late summer afternoon, and you're scrolling while lying in the shade, the tower visible in your peripheral. On your news feed you see a reminder: It has been six months.

It has been six months. Life resettled into a sense of normalcy, accommodating the new disturbances of refugees and inflation and travel chaos. The early anxiety either dissipated or has simply become the new baseline. You remember the shock you felt when you first learned the news. Now it's just another story in the bad news noise. How soon people forget, how soon we get used to things.

Ukrainians who remain probably got used to the air raid signals, having to hide in bomb shelters at any moment, so many shops being closed, so few supplies available. Russians got used to the sanctions, the new McDonald's, no more Netflix. You got used to being alone and silent for days, keeping all your thoughts and feelings to yourself. And this, you think, is why the world will fall apart. We will just get used to it. Like we always do.

From the corner of your eye you see Haley's ginger hair glinting in the sun, her new partner not far behind. You smile and put your phone away.

September 10

You're at the cafe with Haley when the topic of Russia comes up, and you think of Ilya. Perhaps because you haven't talked to anyone so close since the last time you saw her, you blurt out what you hadn't said before: "Actually, I've been following this Russian YouTuber and he kind of looks like Nick."

"Really?" It's been ages since you've seen Haley's eyes light up with such interest. "Show me!"

You take out your phone and show her Ilya's latest video, and you study her face as she scrutinizes your claim. "I do see the resemblance," she says with a nod, and you let out your relief with a sigh.

She asks, "What does he think about the war?"

You answer, "I haven't talked to Nick for ages, but I guess he's against it?"

Haley laughs with a mocking accent. "I mean Ilya, of course. I don't know what Nick thinks about it myself. He's gone AWOL even with Zuzka."

You laugh too but it stings. "Oh, I mean, I think Ilya's against it. He hasn't said anything directly, but."

Haley frowns. "Why hasn't he?"

"Who knows what will happen to him if he says what he really thinks?"

She scoffs. "There are ways to make yourself clear."

"I think he is clear by not saying anything."

"But saying nothing at all means anyone can think you agree with them. Typical people-pleaser."

You feel a wave of anger, as if Haley had just insulted you, which in a way, she has, and you excuse yourself to the bathroom.

September 21

It's evening when you hear about the mobilization order. You immediately think of Ilya—what does he think of this? What will he do?

Ilya's channel has surged in subscribers since you started watching him, especially after the invasion, and he has posted even more regularly. Might he have something to say about this already? You search for his channel and there's nothing new. You figure, okay, this is breaking news, it may take a day or two for him to make a video. You watch his last one, from the week before: another Q&A, updating on the situation in Russia, and most of all, his explanation for why he would be staying: for his girlfriend.

Aha, so he's straight, you think.

Did you know? you think to write to Haley. Ilya has a girlfriend! Love is what's keeping him in Russia!

How sweet, and sad! you imagine her replying. But you quickly forget about it, and the topic goes unmentioned.

October 3

You wake up to see a message from Nick.

Hey happy birthday! Sorry I didn't reply for so long. It's been a rough year. I moved back to Brighton, if you didn't know. I hope to come back someday when things settle down for me.

I checked out that YouTuber you mentioned and he does look a bit like me, if I wore glasses. Seems like a nice guy ;)

You feel warmed from the center of the chest, which spreads into a smile. For a moment, it feels like old times, those early days when you both were new to this city, texting every day. But glancing at the gap between the date of his response and the date of your last message, you feel hollow. Honestly, you don't think much of him anymore when you see Ilya. In a way, Ilya is a better friend to you than Nick. At least he gives you news. You leave the message at Read, with no reaction.

When you check YouTube, you see that Ilya has a new video out, titled "I Left Russia." A ripple of relief moves through you: he's safe! You knew he never supported the war, and this, to you, is proof.

He sits in an empty room, looking at the screen as he scans the chat. He frowns slightly. His shoulders look stiff. His forehead shines in the lamplight with sweat. He takes a deep breath before he begins.

"Hi, I'm Ilya, and I'm from Russia, but I no longer live there."

And so he begins, at long last, to open up.

"I love St. Petersburg. It's not my hometown but I got really attached to the city in my student days, and I always knew I would go back there when I traveled in Asia. Then I met Vera, and for a moment I thought I would live the rest of my life here. But you know, life doesn't always give you what you think it's giving you.

"When the mobilization order was put out, I actually started to get nervous. I wasn't too afraid to get drafted, but the next day after the order my friend Pasha told me the news. He was going to war. And I—"

He stops to take a breath, looking somewhere off camera.

"I felt really afraid for him. He is a peaceful soul, he doesn't eat meat, he works with computers for his job and with animals on his spare time. And his attitude is quite like me, pretty easygoing about life. But he sounded so scared when he talked to me."

He stops again, and apologizes, glancing at the chat as if searching for a distraction. The chat, in your view, flashes past with repetitions of oh no! I'm so sorry! That's so horrible!

"Thank you, guys, for your support. And thanks to your financial support I was able to get a flight out of Russia. It took a few hours though and I wasn't able to sleep at all the whole night before my flight. At least I could be with Vera one last time."

He is in Istanbul, beginning a new chapter for his channel: days in the life of places around the world, adopting the life of an exile. He still has a smile on his face, he answers questions, even personal ones that he declines, with a kind patience. There are many questions about the war. About Pasha. About Vera, who for now remains in Russia.

You missed the livestream, so you can't ask him a question. But finally, you subscribe so you can catch the next one.

October 8

That morning, you see the notification for a scheduled livestream in the afternoon: "Walk and talk around Istanbul." You have to go out for a while, but you make sure to get back in time to open YouTube and watch it.

On your way home, you have a craving for kebab, so you stop and get some takeaway. As you wait for the livestream to start you're too anxious to eat, but you unwrap the kebab anyway, the scent of meat and spices filling your work area. The live chat starts scrolling right away, and you wonder how people get the courage to speak.

Ilya is showing you around Kadikoy in Istanbul, the Bosporus reflecting the bright blue of the sky. Someone is playing a guitar in the harbor, and a mosque rises majestically above it all. He goes to sit inside an empty Starbucks, with the bright blue view all to himself, and you. You can practically feel the heat seeping from the window, the condensation on his cup.

Then Ilya looks directly at the camera and says, "Sorry if I haven't replied to your message or your email. To be honest, I'm very bad at keeping in touch online. Like my friend Emre, we are very good friends and spend a lot of time together every time I am in Turkey, but we hardly keep in touch at all when I was in Russia. I don't know why this is the case, maybe just life gets busy sometimes, but I just am not very good at keeping up with people online. So sorry to the people who wanted to hang out but whose messages I didn't see. I'm trying to get better at replying so maybe we can see next time."

You know he was saying this to all three thousand of his viewers, and you never sent a message, but you feel this was for you.

All this time, you never wished for him to know you. An invisible friend, supported by numbers of views and subscribers. But something stirs in you as you drink in the view of the Bosporus, and his words seep in. In the chat box, you write: It's okay, Ilya! It's always nice to see you online!

As only words on the screen, it is banal. Unoriginal. But in a room full of acquaintances, it is a way to say: "I'm here, I'm listening."

You press "Comment," sliding a drop of yourself into his life.