The Rascally Romance (in a single helluva-long letter about a flicking-short life) - Сергей Николаевич Огольцов

But she did not reply and walked silently on. A casual city idiot. The executioner's son murdered her. Late at night, in the Loony park. He did not want his Homeland to be trampled by quiet idiots. Lyalka had to see the purist off in the grated stolypin car from the railway station.

And so as to make sure that the likes of Newsya would never dare anymore infest the sacred sidewalks of Homeland, that son of the Smersh hero…

(…SHUT UP!. Certain things shouldn’t ever be told even to grown-up children!..)

I don't know why, but some of the stories are darker than all the thousand and one night put together…

Yet, even in the tragic layouts, you could always find nooks for optimism!

In that winter the frost was reaching absolutes and if walking streets you turned your head too sharply, no matter left or right, some tiny sounds came from inside – they were your thoughts turned to ice and tinkling against the frozen convolution walls within the gray matter.

And smack in the middle of that pole of cold, you came across a broadsheet on the wall in the plant check-entrance, "Those who wish to partake in a ski trip to the Seim, please, apply at the Tourism Group."

Haven't I told it was a very modern and advanced plant? In the basement of one of the five-story apartment blocks in Plant Neighborhood, I was once making the screed for the rubber covering of a mini football stadium…

I found the Tourism Group's room. They told me: on Saturday, at the check-entrance, with own skis. I brought my skis, the ones I was running in the forest at the Object.

A small PAZ bus at the check-entrance waited for those who did not feel like skiing that morning. Nonetheless, there were 3 volunteers to ski all the 12 kilometers; some girl with a guy courting her, and I. The ski-track in the deep snow was being made in turn.

But what a beauty! Especially when we entered the forest. Because of the frost, the snow became as fine as flour and the sun was setting ablaze each and every of those tiny crystals…

The other two skiers knew the location of the plant recreation camp, but I saw it for the first time. The houses made of timber had steep gable roofs, like in the Swiss Alps. The whole forest around drowned in the snow and only the roofs stuck out because of their steepness. Classy view! My room was just under the roof and from inside I could once more admire how steep it was.

The roommate turned out one of the veteran tourists, not a rookie like me. As I understood, their group was sort of a closed shop at the plant, and the advertisement was just to show to the Management that they were active in attracting the working masses. They did not ever expect there would turn up a curious yokel of me…

On the other hand, the bozo got a fresh listener for his stories about their hiking in the Urals where all week long they walked in the rain. From morning till night. Yet afterward, at every outing that he was taking part in, there was not even a drizzle. That's why in the Tourism Group they nicknamed him "dry talisman". Whenever they ventured without him, they got drenched by the rain and quite the opposite with his participation.

Then he left and returned with a bottle of the medicine alcohol of which he poured me a full cup before measuring out twenty drops for himself. We drank and had a snack sharing the sandwich brought by him. Soon he left again and did not return, and from the first floor there came the sounds of music.

Fully aware that free medicine alcohol was a means to switch me off so that I did not mess around with the group's cultural program, I lay down on the bed. However, I noticed that the steep roof was in the state of too active swaying, and for that reason, I got up and went downstairs.

They were having a quick dance in the hall with the lights turned off and only colored lamps were blinking rhythmically. I also hopped for a while in their wide circle. Then I moved to the next room. It was lit brightly and along the walls there sat ladies of non-skiing age, probably, the tourists' mothers from the bus.

In the center, there stood a six-pocket billiards table. Dry Talisman was fooling around with rolling the smooth balls before the mothers. He was surprised to see me up but submitted the cue to me when I asked.

Believe it or not, but with just 3 biting strikes, I send 3 different balls into the pockets. Even I myself got stunned because I never was anything but a flounder at billiards. I stopped at that, returned the cue and went out into the yard.

The darkness outside was as dark as in the middle of the forest mingled with the light from the windows and high fire in the barbecue box to make coals for the meat processing. And not a single alive soul was around…

I went up to the fire, looked at the flames and felt blues – everyone was like everyone else and only I was such a slice, forlorn and clearly cut-off. And those blues drove my intoxication away, I went up into the room and fell asleep because of grief…

~ ~ ~

March 8 another red-letter day in the tear-off calendar on your wall, however, it is not a totalitarian holiday. The Day of Spring, the Day of Beauty, the International Women’s Day. Absence of the all-out demonstration saves me a day-long non-stop marching along the vicious circle. Instead, I snugly land at an out-of-the-way table in a kinda detached pub among the blocks of Motor Detail Plant sleeping area. The place is roomy and murky because of the incessant rain outside whose cats and dogs kept festive minded folks home. We’re not