Short stories 4 страница

Outside the window it was still dark, but the fluorescent lamp over the bed being switched on all night long lit a figure of the nurse’s aide in a white dressing gown and with a mop.

– Get up! Girls smokers, to the cleaning! – she shouted.

My ward neighbors began to stir, some started stretching themselves drowsily. At last, a thin old woman rose up and another old woman, a thicker one. The thin one was sent to a mental hospital for running drunk through the village. The thicker one was taken for coming drunk to wish her mother a happy birthday. I made a bed and hid cookies and nuts under the mattress, in case of a check. There already was a pack of juice and a bag with bagels – a stock for a hard-set night.

In the storeroom there were four sinks. Ten mops, one for each ward, hung on the wall. Cool fresh air from a window leaf was mingling with a bleaching powder smell. Some people stood in a queue at the door. They took the mops and filled the buckets with water from a separate sink, and the nurse poured out the detergent into a bucket to everyone.

All patients washed their own ward, and some, dreaming of two or three cigarettes – the corridor. I was allotted with dust wiping in the general room and the corridor " by inheritance" from the discharged patient. The easiest work. But n the corridor I noticed a certain being. Nobody knew what her name was, and she wasn't able to speak. But everyone knew that she was biting nurse’s aides and even nurses. And once she nearly scratched another patient’s eyes. Having departed to a safe distance of three meters, I dipped a rag into a bucket and turned to work. Someone turned on the radio, and it became a little more cheerful there.

6. 30

The nurse’s aide led our small company of " working patients" into the smoking-room. Having opened a window leaf and having turned on the fan, she got the packs of cigs from the box and started calling surnames and distributing cigarettes.

– Even three to you? Try not to become stoned!

We were smoking silently, exchanging a few words now and then. It seemed that we had known each other for ten years. From time to time somebody got up from a bench or from the floor and went to the bucket, to shake the ashes.

– Earlier when there had been two separate departments, it was paradise here. And now they even don’t allow us to smoke quietly, twenty people are crammed into one smoking-room, there’s so much smoke as if it’s a fire.

– Yep, just look over there, there’re beds in the corridor. People do arrive every day, and there is no place for them.

7. 00

– On meds! – voices of the nurse’s aides were heard, and the patients started gathering quickly at the " distributing point" – the nurse's office. The queue of sixty people was moving ahead slowly, and there was time to look round. Some " regular" patients carried the tablets to the old women suffering from marasmus.

– Take a glass, wash it down and open your mouth, – the nurse told me.

8. 00

– To breakfast! – The voices of nurse’s aides and patients rang out. The timer’s peep at the chief nurse’s post was heard. The entrance doors opened, and the crowd of patients rushed to the dining room. Old women in the wheel-chairs were slowly chewing their socks on their way to food.

Two rows of tables were located opposite to one another, and the patients were slowly taking their seats, squabbling for the best places. Meanwhile the nurse’s aides were distributing the breakfast. To everyone – a plate with rice porridge, just a little at the bottom. One piece of cheese, one slice of butter. A spoon.

8. 30

In a smoking-room it was noisy and stuffy. Some started quarrels, others smoked silently. Some women with a zeky look quietly watched things happening, standing aloof. Two well-fed schizophrenics were excitedly discussing something in the corner.

– Well, you don't know, who my friend is! He is from rogues! We have the most expensive car in the city. I had been put here accidentally at all, and then I will be in another hospital, much better than it!

– Well, I won’t tell here yet, who comes to me! I have such friends that you can’t dream about!

– Who comes to you, only militia!

– Well, and militia comes too, so what? Mom is old, she calls the police when I have voices, she is afraid I will kill her or myself. Well, just the last week – I’ve been washing in a bathroom, and suddenly they come.

– They?

– They, the very them. They say to me, psych up and come out. And I say, and here I am, as it is, what should I do, to go out naked? I’ve come out naked to them. Made me put clothes on. Do they have a right to come to people when they’re taking shower?!

– Yea, it’s complete outrage!

– This chief physician is from Nazis, I know for sure. Such doses of meds are only given at concentration camps.

9. 00

Lyda came near me and we went to have tea. Lyda once lived with an alcoholic father who beat her, and the cousin who tried to rape her. Now she lived in the nutbin and liked to have tea very much. It was better for her in the hospital than at home. She browsed the wards and collected the tea bags remaining from others patients.

We came into the bathroom, filled the plastic glasses with hot water and made some tea.

– If you get out sometime, call me. I will be home if the father is taken away on treatment.

– And will he agree to go to the hospital?

– The main thing is to catch him with militia, when he’s drunk. Look, don't go alone on the streets in the evening when you are discharged. Men feel when the person is from a mental hospital, and can attack you.

10. 00

After a poor breakfast everyone was hungry, but is there was nothing to eat. However, under many mattresses there was some food hidden. But sometimes during the inspection the nurse’s aides looked under the mattress too, especially to their unloved patients. Therefore the majority carried food with them, in the dressing gowns.

I went into the common room, opened a book taken from Katya, and tried to read a bit. It was hard to read through the fog of neuroleptics. Then I saw Svetlana.

Svetlana went everywhere, leaning on a chair back because she had sore feet. I named her Frida. Her spiteful relatives were guilty that she was in the hospital. As well as everyone’s. Once she worked at the plant where pianos were made. She liked me because I wrote out to her from the Bible " God shall arise, his enemies shall be scattered".

– God sent me such trials. I know, there were artificial icons at our house, a fake. I wanted to check. When abbe came to visit us, I found an icon in his bag, sprinkled water on it and put there crumbs. And it turned out to be from paper! They’re all against me; they all are only thinking how to keep me here till death. I threatened to kill them all, well I won't leave the hospital anymore …

" And those who hate him shall flee before him! As smoke is driven away, so you shall drive them away; as wax melts before fire". All of them are fated the God's judgment at the other world. Nobody will be bypassed by him.

– And you know who I was in my past life? – I whispered something into her ear.

– I believe you. And your birthmarks don’t lie.

Looking at her kind tired face, it was impossible to think that she will never see her grandchildren, won't enter her own home. But it was so.

11. 00

Before the lunch all patients were nervous. The oncoming three hours without tobacco are a trial too. In the smoking-room a dispute on cigarette butts nearly developed into a fight. Vika as the one having the greatest intelligence resolved the dispute, having forbidden Sasha to beg for cigs butts from others and to pick them up in a garbage can. All were irritated by the continuous running with stubs.

After visiting the smoking-room we approached a nadzorka’s window. There was a men's department on the opposite side. Unfamiliar faces of young guys were looking out the windows. We began to wave hands to them. They showed something by signs too. Some girls were going to pass them on little notes through the nurse’s aides.

12. 00

We were sitting on the window sill and watching the beginning of spring. Nature was waking up in front of our eyes. The streamlets ran, the birds flew from a tree to a tree, and in some places the green grass already began to make its way. And we sat in the " hen house". There is nothing worse than the feeling of uncertainty. Perhaps, you will be let out in a week, and perhaps in a year …

13. 00

Masha approached me in the corridor and asked how to make it so that " these shining features" were gone from her head.

– How is it?

– When I close my eyes, there are dots and multi-colored strips. I am afraid of them.

– But they don't really exist.

– I see them, and I’m scared.

Masha was married and had two children. Her husband left her when he learned that she was ill.

14. 00

Lunch. This time – potato soup. And after the lunch – time of meds. I was given some two unfamiliar pills. In half an hour, having visited a smoking-room, I slowly sank onto the floor. My neighbors dragged me to the bed. The aid-woman came. I wanted to tell something, but there was some gurgling in my throat.

– Make Cordiaminum injection, – I heard.

17. 00

In two hours I came to myself and left into the corridor. Everything was as always. The patients were walking along a long corridor. One of them took me by an arm, and we began to trudge.

– I have a child, but he is not here, but in the orphanage in Siberia. Don't allow me to see it. Alina is my name.

– And what are you here for?

– I took ten sleeping pills, they hardly brought me to life.

17. 30

– I hope, God exists, – I said.

– God doesn't exist. – Nadya answered.

– How do you know?

– Well, you will be taking meds, and you will be convinced of it. I was running mad after religion when I had a psychosis. And then I had stayed here for some time and it passed.

A patient passed by with a strange look on her face. She took a glance at us and smiled mysteriously.

– Don't come close to her, – Nadya warned, – When she goes crazy, she can attack, then they fix her. She strangled her mother.

18. 00

Supper. The patients working in the dining room told everyone that there will be cutlets with stewed cabbage. And a piece of white bread. And it proved true. And there was compote.

In the lavatory it was crowded and noisy. Someone was washing one’s lower parts, another was engaged in other things. In the corridor – a queue: the nurse checked if there were any louses and cut patients’ nails.

18. 30

The nurse led all the smokers to smoke again. It was dark outside, and it was good to look at the pink light of street lamps, inhaling cigarettes’ smoke. And to calculate, how many cigs will be left till relatives’ arrival. And sometimes to save, asking neighbors for cigs. A fellow knucklebone from " long-time residents" was smoking Belomor, but I didn't want to try it.

Vika was talking about the guy who hung himself with a bed sheet in the next, men's department, on New Year's Eve.

19. 00

And, at last, the most cheerful time in hospital – the tea time. A small holiday. During that time patients were gobbling the supplies brought by relatives or were eating each other’s supplies. Someone had always been stealing my candies and bagels, and often I found there wasn’t everything in a bag with peredachka, that had been there the previous day. But something remained, and we shared our food with each other and changed chocolates for cookies, cookies for sausage and bananas, and bananas on processed cheeses. Fifteen minutes were allotted on eating up all the food.

19. 30

The nurse allowed us to turn the radio on, and we started dancing. Valechka joined us too. She was elderly and ugly, but sometimes kind. Having critically inspected dancing, she addressed to me:

– And why didn't you give me bagels at supper? A meeeanie!

Then she changed the topic:

– And you are pretty. Not beautiful, but pretty. Why are you looking at me? Why are all of you looking at me?

Valechka’s eyes started to roll up, and the nurse gave her cyclodolum from side effects.

20. 00

Suddenly the shouts were heard. We left the ward to have a look and to see what happened. Valechka, having cut herself a hand, was walking and smearing the blood on the walls. She was taken away into the ward, tied with belts and made an injection. Smokers the volunteers started erasing the blood. They were engaged in it even for half an hour.

20. 30

Turned on the TV, and we started watching news. There was about an earthquake in Japan. I was sure that I was guilty of that. But I preferred to keep my ruminations to myself. All places on chairs and sofas were taken. When I passed by one " local" granny, she hit at my knee with much force by her foot. I had to complain to the nurse’s aide who told that nothing can be done with such ones, it is only necessary to avoid them.

– Here are some violent ones, they will kill you, and they will get no punishment for it. Stay away from them, especially from those old grannies, – Vika warned me.

21. 00.

– To meds! – the unfamiliar voice was heard. The nurse’s aides and the nurse already handed over their duty to the others. And again – a long queue. The granny of eighty years old sitting in a wheelchair in the corridor suddenly slipped on the floor and started undressing. The nurse’s aides rushed to her.

21. 30

Having come into the smoking-room, I felt that everyone is talking about me. I was sure that they know my thoughts and speak about me. But I didn't tell them about it. After all the hospital – only cover for providing safety to me. Well-selected actors, that is all. But I knew the truth. All relatives and neighbors are talking about me. The whole world is talking about me, and everyone wants to kill me. This hospital is my only shelter.

– Tell nothing to nobody, or they will keep you here longer. – one already discharged girl warned me, – Don't laugh, don't cry. They will notice and they will write it down. Then it will be worse.

22. 00

By the evening the patients gradually dispersed into their wards, to eat their stocks waiting for breakfast. Some earned their living in theft, rummaging in others’ bedside tables. Those who were on friendly terms with nurse’s aides – went to smoke once again or to drink tea.

In our ward patients were eating bread with garlic, looking back at the glass door every minute. Smelled delicious. I was given a slice too.

The meds started to work. I contracted and turned into a point, a small point on my body. It could be a mote on a finger or a trace from the blue pen on paper. But it was me, and I was disappearing.

Abulia

The ringtone melody of the alarm-clock was seeping through my dream. I pressed the button and fell back into the slumber. And the alarm-clock again. Eyes wouldn’t open, but I pressed the button once more and fell asleep again.

The sun was shining right into my eyes, and it was already impossible to ignore the third alarm-clock. I started to get up from the bed slowly. On my way to kitchen I stumbled into several corners and chairs. Didn’t want to go anywhere. Didn’t want to do anything. No thoughts of the future were sweeping through a tired head.

Coming to the kitchen, I brewed coffee, added some sugar, clove and cinnamon, poured out some cream. It was the only way to wake up. In ten minutes I realized that the morning began. After the shower and dressing up it became even more evident that a new day has arrived.

Having slowly cooked the breakfast, I tried to eat it. The food seemed to get stuck in the mouth, just as my thoughts got stuck in my head.

After the breakfast I tried to read, but my words got stuck on paper, not reaching my brain. After five pages I gave up this meaningless task. Having written a couple of messages to my friends, I decided to go for a walk.

Having checked whether I didn’t forget to put some clothes on, I got out onto the street. Everything was ordinary. The people, the cars, the trees. It looked like everyone was waiting for something and spying at me insensibly.

I had to talk to a shop-assistant at the department store and it wore me down. I could hardly understand what she was asking me about. The words were sweeping through, passing me by, not leaving any traces in my tired head. Finally I reached my house, put out the food into the fridge and got onto bed. I was very tired. It seemed like the whole day had already passed.

To spend time somehow, I turned the music on and tried to dissolve inside it. The long hours had to pass, till the long-awaited evening would come.

My thoughts were scattered, and rarely somewhere from the deep sensible ideas emerged. The whole chains of thoughts were sweeping past me, and I couldn’t catch them. Thus a few hours passed. I tried to have a clear-up of my room, but I had already no strength at all to do that.

In the evening I took my meds and went to sleep.

2013

The chess players

All things were done, the computer switched on, the music turned on, and the beer is poured. The evening began. I was going to play a little, as usual, on my favourite chess website. I chose the opponent and started a game. It was sad in my heart and I wanted to talk. Sometimes I chatted with strangers.

Rummy persons, as usual, began to come into my game. They knew that I am a woman, and began to call me names and to threaten to deal with me irl. " S*ck, b*tch" – they wrote. They never allowed me to play quietly, and for some reason I couldn't switch off the chat. It seemed to me that someday I will attain their sympathy and understanding.

– Again you won, the wh*re. – Wrote next anonymous nickname.

Sometimes I answered them, but more often I didn't know what to answer. It was unpleasant and fearful to me. But I tried to rejoice in chess and not to think of bad things. Sometimes I used to cuss them out.

There were also joyful meetings. We discussed Dostoyevsky and metal music with some, chess programs and philosophy with others.

– And are you a believer? Read LaVey.

– Read " Notes from Underground".

– Don't pay attention to them, they just mock. Don't talk to them.

– Fell in love with a chess player, went to her, but I didn’t succeeded to pass across the border, they sent me home. They told me, I am a loony.

The visitors of the chess website also wrote me emails where they described their mistresses and said how they hate women. Some enticed me into ICQ, elicited naked photos and called me names. Others wrote me hundreds of threatening SMS. And once I met one of them. He was a man of about forty years old, he met me in the subway and invited to bed. After five minutes of a conversation I went home. With other chess player we drank a can of beer each in a bar.

That evening, as always, several men appeared in my chat and began to call me names. " All women are wh*res" - they were saying. I began to cry and left the website. It was time to go to bed.

Moments of happiness

It was a cold autumn morning. Wrapping themselves up in light jackets, a few pedestrians were running. Near a sports complex, on a deserted street, I noticed a woman with three small children. It was my former friend. It was difficult to tell by her look, that her husband drinks in the mornings. She hasn't greeted me. Me too.

In the sports complex it was also deserted. The chess competitions had to start soon. Our coach was already there, and, it seemed was delighted to see me. Once in the evening he called me and suggested me to play. I refused. My health mattered more to me than chess. " There is no one except you". I agreed, like I often agreed at that time with people who tried to manipulate me.

The coach let me sign some papers and led me to the gaming hall. The huge cold empty gym, serving for football and other trainings in the usual times. Little chess tables looked very strange in that place, and I felt uncomfortable. I started to have some gloomy premonition. I wanted to refuse to play, but I couldn't make myself do it.

I went outside to have a walk. The chess players soon begun to arrive. I knew practically every face, and they knew me. It became a little more cheerful to me.

Having glanced into the lists, I understood that I was visited by rare " luck": there were two of my close acquaintances registered in them. Having come into the hall, I found them at once. They sat side by side. The wish to punch them in the face felt strange and somehow detached. They hadn’t caused any emotions in me. I didn't greet them, and they didn't greet me. In the hall it was cold and stuffy.

At last, the long-awaited tournament begun. All of my life I was dreaming to get into the region’s championship, and it was a very joyful event to me. Women and men played separately, the line-up was rather weak. It seemed, there was nothing to worry about.

The game began well and proceeded perfectly during the first hour. But I knew from experience that something was going to happen. And it happened. I slowly lost concentration. The hands began to tremble. Having visited a toilet for a couple of times, having drunk mineral water and having eaten chocolate, I felt a little better. But it was not for long. Soon I blundered away out of the blue and lost a piece. Having played a little more for show, I have gave up and with a relief went outside to breathe fresh air. There was one more game ahead.

Having had dinner at my acquaintances, I got to the game with fresh strength. I had to play with the strongest participant of a tournament, the master of sports. It seemed to me, she treated me in a alert way. I remembered nothing her except that some time long ago in a children's tournament she has blundered with a mate in two moves to me, and I, of course, hadn’t noticed it. In general, I was little interested in people. I was always attracted by the fact that in chess it wasn't necessary to show particular interest in people. It is possible to learn a lot about a person, having just played with him a game or two. Besides I didn't like extra talks.

In the beginning the game, as usual, went well. At first my position was better, then worsened, and after some complications began to pass into the endgame. But in this fascinating activity more than an hour passed, and it " started" again with me. The hands began to tremble. At first I thought that it was from cold, but when the teeth began to knock, the whole body began to shake and I got nauseous, I understood that there won't be a draw. Though by the last effort I offered a draw, but she refused. Hands were shivered more and more, the consciousness began to interrupt for several seconds. At last, I blundered away. More precisely, I have up when it seemed to me that I lose a piece, that actually wasn't true. But I didn't notice it. The boyfriend of a chess player approached her, they began to wonder at such strange game end and to laugh over me. I left into the corridor and told the coach that I won't be able to play further. After ten minutes of admonitions and requests I convinced them to do without me. And still it was necessary to keep calm, to remain correct and not to name the reasons of such decision. I didn't want to tell them, what is my illness.

I went outside, sat down on a bench and got lost in thought. More precisely, I had no strength to think anymore. Later, having looked at the watch, I found a memory blackout for twenty minutes. Which was strange as it seemed to me that only a minute passed. To distract myself, I was recalling minutes when I was especially happy. It often helps to distract from sad thoughts. I remembered people and events, facts and words …

… a woman who gave me money for bus fare

… a meeting with unfamiliar guy at a friend’s wedding. Our eyes met, and it was a miracle.

… a casual acquaintance whom we chatted with on twitter

… an unfamiliar guy who treated me with coffee in a cafe somewhere in the mountains

… a gran on the street who asked me what time it was and wished me good health and good luck – " all of you are always running somewhere"

… the dad whose image remained in my heart. He always called me a princess

… a shop assistant of CDs who paid a compliment concerning my smile

… a kind nurse in the hospital

… a fellow chess player always giving pieces of good advice to me, whom we embraced with and parted forever at the station

… a card from my friend from Canada

… tender sms from mom and the dad

… a congratulation card and a small handmade souvenir from the former pupil

… several people who could listen and understand me

… fine books

… rare teachers who told us to think with our own heads at the lectures

… the terrific thickets of flowers in spring near the bus-stop where I as studying

… that feeling with which you are watching the road in the car, sitting on the front sit

… the kindness of my grandmother and my talk with her

… the smell of milk mushrooms in the autumn forest

… sitting on the river bank in summer, far from people

… fishing on the lake and that feeling when you pull out a large pike

… talks with the father about the stars and space travels

Having come up from a non-existence, I understood that I overstayed. Memory blackouts weren't something new to me. A suggested conclusion was only one: I couldn't play chess. There was a struggling wish in my mind – to remain, let it be for a short time, in this atmosphere of competitive struggle and high ambitions. But I was very tired, and it was time to go back home.

2014
Eternity

The midday Pyatigorsk sun a star was shining brightly, but near the cemetery it was cool and silent. She turned to a narrow small street and came out to the church. The high iron fencing near the church closed an entrance to the Necropolis. Fortunately, the gate was open, and she stepped inside. She wished to hide from everyone and to stay alone with herself …

… She recalled her classmate whom it was in love with. Their first meeting. He smiled at her and greeted her. She didn't pay attention to him, but that moment was kept in her memory.

Then – an accidental meeting on the first of September. It stood under the tree on the schoolyard, and she didn't recognize him at first. His surprising beauty and intelligence in his eyes struck the eye …

… Despite August, there were lots of old leaves and the decayed wreaths at the cemetery. Ancient graves the long-forgotten people seemingly radiated quietness and reminded of the inevitability of death …

… New Year's evening at her school she recalled. They were having fun when the light suddenly went out. They lit candles and sat in the twilight. Then he came into the room. She sat on a chair in the center, but he didn't notice her. Perhaps, because it was dark.

She was lucky to share the same desk with him. However, it lasted for only several weeks. And he never talked to her. But once the cover from a Beatles CD fell out of her notebook, and he stopped to pick up that piece of paper. " Oh, the Beatles! " - he was rejoiced. She didn't know what to answer him. Was afraid to show her feelings not to make a fool of herself. So the moment was missed …

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