Old stories about love.

Current page: 1 (total book has 7 pages) [accessible reading excerpt: 2 pages]

Dina Rubina
Old stories of love

Other people's entrances

Ilya had a house where everyone loved each other very much, but no one respected anyone.

It has been that way since time immemorial. The natures of the household were wide and noisy, and the area of \u200b\u200bthe apartment was cramped - two small rooms and a kitchenette, so it was tricky to turn around and not step on someone's pride.

A long time ago, one such nature could not stand it, it seemed to her that the rest took up more space than expected, and since then Ilya's mother received transfers by mail every month. Even now, when Ilya himself is already over thirty or, as his mother sometimes says in her hearts, under forty, no, no, yes, the spine of the translation flashed in the mailbox.

“Dylda,” mother Ilya said then, “look, unshaven child, again the old goblin sent alimony for you.

“Oh, Semyon, Semyon ...” the woman sighed then. Mother has not sighed about this for fifteen years. For sighs, another object has long arrived in time for her - Ilya.

Ilya, mother thought, turned out to be unlucky. He did not justify what he had to justify, and did not achieve what he should have achieved, judging by the compositions written in the tenth grade. His mother took care of his writings and resorted to them in critical situations, when Ilya needed to be “persuaded”. It was not easy to pester him, but sometimes he succeeded, and a thin bundle of essays flew around the room, like a flock of birds descending from heaven into a swamp.

Throwing away notebooks, Ilya slammed the door and disappeared for three days. For half an hour, a mournful silence reigned in the apartment and the rustle of notebooks picked up by the mother.

“He could become a man,” his mother said, looking past the grumpy grandmother, “he has a wonderful sense of the word, he has a style, it is very rare when a writer can boast of a style, he had to work on himself, look, mom, how he wrote in the tenth grade: “In a black oily pond, a swan with an exclamatory neck swam leisurely ...”

Babania was not well versed in swans, but she completely trusted her daughter, who had rattled off at school for thirty-five years.

The woman loved Ilya with a blind, furious love, and this mad love did not let her understand why it was less prestigious to write the column “About this and that” in the “evening” than to write about swans in a good style.

The grandson was called the sonorous word "journalist", was with everyone on "you" and did not take anything into his head.

“You, woman, listen,” he confidentially advised her, “allow everything to the bra, but let it not go to the heart. Understood?

The grandson was the core and meaning of her life, she unconditionally accepted his trashy blue pants called "jeans", and the eternal mess in his drafty life, and idiotic words, and midnight drunken appearances. Babana passionately wanted only one thing: that Ilya be healthy and marry a good girl.

So that Ilya finally forgets Natasha ...

The fact that even ten years later he loves Natasha, the woman believed sacredly, and nothing could shake her indestructible faith in the noble and selfless heart of her grandson.

- Who does he love? - Mother asked mockingly and bitterly, and a cheap cigarette - an ineradicable military habit - walked from the right corner of her mouth to the left. He doesn't love anyone!

Mother was wrong. Ilya liked Natasha, of course. You can even say that she suited him in every way: she was unobtrusive, quick-witted, not stupid. During the three years that they met, none of the friends was closer to Ilya, and no one wanted to tell as much about himself as Natasha. Perhaps another year or two and Ilya would have thought of marrying her. But Natasha did not wait for this day and married some graduate student.

It happened just that summer, when Ilya drove off to a youth camp on the Black Sea. At first they thought to go together, but in the last week they quarreled, Natasha grew gloomy, thought about it and handed over her ticket. Ilya left alone.

A month later, he burst in, sunny and freckled, with burnt hair and eyebrows. I called the whole city, washed myself in the bath and rushed off to Natasha in the evening ...

The grandmother was waiting for her grandson in the kitchen. All day long she tried to tell him about Natasha and could not - she was cowardly. Now she sat in the dark kitchen on a stool and trembled with fear and longing. Everything seemed to her that the grandson would either kill Natasha, or her husband, or jump out the window himself. The daughter had long since gone to bed in the dining-room, and the grandmother was still waiting, anxiously looking out of the night window.

Finally called. She jumped up from the stool, fussed, wiped her dry hands on her apron, and ran to open it. On the threshold stood a very cheerful drunk Ilya.

- Hello, come in! - he affably invited the grandmother to the landing.

- Don't yell, mother is sleeping! - she shouted menacingly, although she was frightened. She did not yet know how to behave with a drunken grandson.

- It's blowing here ... - Ilya remarked cordially and meekly, - let me in, master, into the hall ...

He embraced the woman and very seriously explained to her in a whistling whisper:

“You see, babe, you can’t argue against an indisputable fact: I’m a man, right? The way it is!

“Well done,” said the grandmother reproachfully. - pissed off. - Then Ilya stood for about twenty minutes under an icy stinging shower, slightly sobered up, and he and his grandmother chatted for a long time in the kitchen, and his grandson told about all sorts of wonderful things in the world. Here, they say, you live, a woman, you cook borscht, you stand in lines, and they are hanging around somewhere nearby on their unidentified objects, looking out for something, scoundrels. And, by the way, it is not clear what they want from us. So, one day...

The grandmother was horrified, gasped, and her whole appearance spoke of the fact that she would be glad not to believe, but how not to believe if Ilyusha speaks. And suddenly, breaking off in mid-sentence, somehow convulsively threw up a greasy apron from her thin knees and, dipping her face in it, quietly shook in soundless weeping.

- Ba, what are you? – Ilya asked dumbfounded.

- Oh, Ilyushenka-ah ... how did you miss Natashka, missed it ?! Woe, what a grief! .. - For three years, the woman became firmly attached to the affectionate Natasha, and now the thought that Natasha would give birth to great-grandchildren not to her, but to a completely strange woman, was unbearable. - Oh, Natasha-Natasha, what have you done to us ... oh, woe! ..

- I found grief! Ilya interrupted rudely and mockingly. - Well, let's cry, well, let's: woo ... - but suddenly something squeezed in his throat, disgustingly ached in the depths of his chest, he wanted to howl to the woman.

- Why do you feel sorry for him! - in the doorway of the kitchen, disheveled, gray-haired, in a short, knee-length nightgown, stood her mother. Slippers on her sinewy cock-like feet looked into different sides. It was funny, and Ilya didn't want to cry.

- Why do you feel sorry for him? - mother repeated with a frenzy. She grabbed a pack of Prima from the refrigerator and lit a convulsive cigarette.

"Damn tribe!" They don’t believe in anything or anyone, they don’t even believe in themselves! When they finally fall in love, they rush to convince themselves that it's only for real. They are afraid of stress!

Quiet, Valya, quiet! the grandmother pleaded, blowing her nose into her apron.

- They are afraid of stress! - mother repeated harshly, poking a cigarette in the direction of Ilya. “They want to live their lives with nothing to do with anything. It's fashionable now. They are afraid to put a family on their shoulders, they are afraid to give birth to children, they are afraid to put their lives on a serious worthwhile business! Natasha is right, a hundred times right! How can you rely on this varmint, mother? Look, he's good for nothing but this! - She snatched "evening" from a pile of old newspapers on the windowsill. - Here you go: “The enamel on my dishes has deteriorated. Where can it be restored and is it possible to salt vegetables in such a dish? They answer ... here he answers, mom: “In a bowl with chipped enamel ...”

“Enough,” Ilya said.

“Hush, Valya, hush…” the woman repeated imploringly.

- And if he were mediocrity ... And how he wrote in the tenth grade! What an innate sense of the word he has, what a musical phrase! I remember by heart: “We entered the entrance, shaking off the raindrops. From above, from the attic, a smoky kitten was descending to us, on the steep back of which, like darning on a stocking, two tiny leaves were sitting ... "

- All? Ilya asked, getting up. - I went to bed.

- Do you know who? the mother said softly, looking into her son's eyes. - You are a snail. You are a mammal.

“Well, one thing, mother, don’t mix the views,” he asked calmly and left the kitchen.

After that day, Ilya was swirled by a crazy whirlwind. The train of his heart's aspirations raced at a wild speed in an unknown direction, and barely distinguishable female faces: Irina, Angela, Veronica ... And although the name of Natasha was often remembered in the house, especially in the evenings, this whole story no longer had the slightest relation to Ilya and did not hurt him at all, just as the tops of the trees do not touch the clouds floating somewhere in an incomprehensible above.

* * *

On Saturdays, the grandmother washed clothes in the old washing machine "Hurray ..." Many years ago, the machine was called "Ural" and regularly grinded the rag contents in its motorized womb. But the years passed, the car grew decrepit along with the owner, interruptions began in her heart, and the letter “l” in the name was erased. The absence of the usual exclamation point at the end of the word made the car look very tired, as it really was.

Ilya exercised his wit on this occasion.

“This gallant washing machine,” he said, “this is a warlike salvage… this jubilant junk…”

The car agonized. Her decrepit body needed constant qualified help, and the woman agreed in advance with Ilya about the day of washing. The grandson had to be present and insure.

Today was Saturday, and although a strong agreement was made with Ilya in the morning, the woman, as always, could not sit still. At two o'clock in the afternoon, Valya came from school, had lunch, laid her textbooks on the table, and sat down to write plans.

- Ilyushka should call! Grandma called anxiously from the kitchen. - After all, he will forget that we are erasing today, he will roll somewhere.

“We’ll manage without him ...” the daughter muttered, neatly filling out a notebook in girlish handwriting.

Grandmother looked out of the kitchen - in front of her over the table hung the long gray bangs of an elderly daughter. The bangs fluctuated in time with the movement of the writing hand.

- Call, eh, Val ... - asked the woman. - I'm afraid without Ilyusha ... electric shock will kill.

Valya, cursing, straightened her tired back, dialed the editorial number.

“Department of Letters…” the voice of a child was announced in the receiver.

“Ilya Semyonovich, please,” said her mother dryly.

Valya waited a long time for her son to pick up the phone.

“Dear editors,” she said also dryly, “we bought rabbits, and they got husks in their ears. Advise in your rubric "About this, about this" ...

“Well, in short…” the son interrupted. - What happened?

- Have you forgotten that the woman is waiting for you at six?

“Dear readers,” Ilya replied affably, “in order for the rabbits’ ears not to peel off, you need to refrain from calling the editor for at least one day, even we are talking about such a sacred act as washing.

He hung up. Mother quickly dialed the number.

“Get half a loaf of rye,” she said.

* * *

... Semyon Ilyich was sitting on a bench at the exit of the editorial office - long, round-shouldered, in a spacious gray raincoat.

- Greetings, Semyon Ilyich! Ilya walked over and sat down next to me.

- Hello, son! - exclaimed the father, embracing Ilya with one arm, with the other he was holding some kind of bundle. - Well, how are you, how are you at home?

- Yes, as before ... Listen, again you are wearing some kind of mantle.

Invariably freshly shaven, with a neatly trimmed gray head, Semyon Ilyich still always looked unkempt, "unkempt". Perhaps this was due to the fact that he bought too wide shirts, trousers, jumpers for himself - in clothes he liked to feel free, the habits of the old geologist affected.

“Where is the cloak?” asked the father, looking at himself. - Oh, I bought this in GUM, it is imported, Polish. Do you think it should be narrowed down? Well, I'll sew on a typewriter. Ilyusha, that's the thing, I wanted to agree with you ... The local committee promises me a ticket for May for Valya. to Evpatoria. They firmly promise. There, from our ministry, there is a wonderful sanatorium - baths, diet food, chickpeas, you know ...

- It is necessary for her liver - once a year to heal. So you will tell her that you took it from your editorial office, well, as it was in those times with Kislovodsk ...

- OK then…

- Just don't talk, look!

- And start early ... Come today and casually like that ... at dinner, they say, they promise ... Is there?

- That's fine. What's new at work? Katashev hasn't quit yet?

Ilya grinned merrily, with a click knocked a dry earring that had fallen on his father's shoulder from a tree.

- I was always surprised by your memory, you remember all my nonsense ...

- Crazy? the father objected. - Why are your business - nonsense? I have only one son. How can one not remember his deeds?.. Oh! - his face suddenly became haggard, he looked dumbfounded and frightened at Ilya.

- What?

- Oh, she won’t go in May! exclaimed Semyon Ilyich in frustration. - Ugh, old fool, I completely forgot - she has the tenth grade, graduation, exams in May! What is Evpatoria! Here's an old fool, but ...

- Well, do not be upset.

- Ask for June? June is unlikely to be given. Then for August ... Huh?

- Well, of course ... - Ilya nodded at the bundle, - what do you have?

“Yes, yes,” said the father. - Ilyusha, a colleague bought it for her son, it turned out - great. I took it for you and I don't know: by the way, out of place?

- Come on, let me ... - Ilya spread a dark gray "turtleneck" on his knees, felt the matter.

- Well, you're a hammer, Semyon Ilyich, the glitter of "turtleneck"!

- Do you like it? the father rejoiced. - Tear on health, Ilyusha.

“All right,” Ilya said, getting up. - Excuse me, the woman is washing today, such a great day ...

- Of course of course! exclaimed the father. - Why didn't you say it right away? The houses are worried, go!

Protecting his eyes from the sun, Semyon Ilyich squinted at Ilya. He turned out to be a handsome son, no one will say - the sun plays in a chestnut forelock, his eyes are gray, mocking.

Before turning the corner, Ilya turned around and saluted his father with a bundle.

"Goodbye, goodbye, be healthy," muttered Semyon Ilyich to himself.

Ilya opened the door with his key, put half a loaf of rye on the nightstand, listened. Mother's voice could be heard from the kitchen, professionally distinct, with a teacher's intonation.

- And if there are eighteen dunces in the class, then in history there will be eighteen deuces, I say ... You are the head teacher! Are you afraid of your parents? I say. Bring eighteen parents to me, I will explain to them what History is!

Ilya silently put on his slippers.

- I am a teacher of the old school, - I say, - and you can’t put me on my knees before the sheet! I didn't give a damn about your ninety-eight and seven tenths of a percent.

Without turning on the light, Ilya groped for the old cherished purse behind the door, in which the grandmother kept apples, felt for one, wiped it on the sleeve of his shirt and took a bite.

“You know, Mom,” the mother continued in the kitchen, already quieter and more thoughtful. - I must have grown old, something happened to me. I again, as in childhood, began to give to the poor. I went to the market yesterday...

We don't have beggars!

Mother and grandmother turned around as if on cue. Leaning against the jamb, Ilya chewed juicy apple - cheerful, pleasantly located to everyone.

“We don’t have beggars,” he repeated, winking at the woman, “there are only parasites and drunkards left.

“You are a fool, Ilya,” said the mother wearily.

- But what essays I wrote in the tenth grade! - he walked around the kitchen, gnawing an apple with pleasure. Grandmother fussed, put a pot of borscht on the fire - she was going to feed her grandson.

“Don Quixote, smelly, smoky,” Ilya said heartily, sitting down opposite his mother, “eighteen boobies will have not eighteen, but thirty-six parents, and you won’t explain to all of them what your Is-to-riya is! By the way, who needs your story? By the time these Gavriks finish school, she will have changed three times already.

Who will change? the mother yelled. - What are you talking about, hack? When did history change?

“Anytime…” the son answered affectionately and amiably. - All right, maman, no need to beat with hooves.

“Well, you are an oak, Ilya,” exclaimed the mother.

- Valya! Grandmother threw up her hands in indignation. - Well, roosters!

- Nothing, old woman, you are my dove, oak is a valuable species of wood! - Ilya got up lazily, went into the hall and returned with a bundle.

- I brought you three greetings. Do you hear, mother? From your husband, my father and babani's son-in-law.

- What does he look like? - Grandma got excited. - Thin?

- As usual. – Ilya unwrapped the bundle. - Here, I brought it.

- Hey, Semyon, Semyon! - the grandmother smiled, shed tears of pleasure. “Nice sweater, dear, huh?” Put it on, Ilyusha, isn't it small?

Mother lit a cigarette, for some reason slipped a box of matches into the pocket of her dressing gown, and left the kitchen.

“Pampering,” she said loudly in the room, as if to herself.

Grandmother stomped around a hefty grandson, stroking new thing on it, beautiful, dear, the father gave:

- Resounded, resounded ...

- It resounded ... - said the mother in the room, - it will soon knock out the bottom and go out.

- Well, I said, women, it's fine!

Did he make bridges for himself? Was going to…

“Baban, you know, I haven’t looked into anyone’s mouth since I was fifteen years old.

“In vain,” the mother put in sarcastically, “maybe someone would have gained some sense.”

Ilya went up to her, hugged her straight, thin shoulders.

“Mother,” he said tenderly, “finally, let’s be friends.” Wave something at me, let everything go to ...

- To the bra, I know ... - interrupted the mother and sighed: - It's amazing how we raised such a pig.

Washed together silently and quickly. Ilya wringed out the laundry - the machine had not been spun for seven years - and hung it on the balcony.

“Today, you see, it will do without adventures,” the woman inadvertently dropped and jinxed. After about five minutes the roar broke off, the chirring of a small alarm clock in the dining room became audible and the voices of the neighbor boys splashed in the stairwell.

"Shut up, damn it!" - the woman in her hearts waved her wet, soapy foam hand. - Come on, Ilyusha!

Ilya wiped his hands with his mother's unwashed skirt and climbed into the engine.

“When this is over,” he muttered, “it’s time to dump her, this old idiot ... Even if a person survives old age out of his mind ...

Why did you nod in my direction? - the grandmother was worried.

- "Hurrah" ... She will soon begin to salute. She would be on the parade ...

- Do not talk! mother called from the room. Ilya grinned, winked at his grandmother, and continued louder:

“Besides everything, there is something seditious in the car. What is "cheers" without an exclamation mark? This is caustic irony.

The grandmother angrily pinched her grandson's hand, saying, don't start, don't get involved. Mother appeared at the bathroom door.

"By the way," she said calmly, "what's the new rubbish on your cluttered horizon?" In editorial. With a squeaky voice.

Ilya slowly squeezed out Grandma's jacket, said with a Georgian accent:

“Why do you offend a person, darling?” This is a trainee, a student, Lenochka. Innocent child... And you are like that - wah! - you say the words!

“Well, he lived,” said his mother bitterly. - And an innocent child with you on "you."

- Valya, what's on TV? Grandma asked quickly.

- All right, mother, I'll puff out my cheeks. - Ilya peacefully shook the ashes from the sleeve of his mother's dressing gown. – As the father of Russian democracy…

* * *

Egor called in the evening. Ilya lay on the couch and watched "Obvious - Incredible" on TV. Yegor, Ilya's university friend, was recently appointed head of the culture department at a large republican newspaper, and he persistently persuaded his friend to go to him.

“Ilya,” Yegor panted (he recently picked up the phone), “well, how is she?”

- Oh, this woman is rather tired of me.

- What kind of woman? the grandmother asked from the kitchen.

“Life, woman, life ...” the grandson replied. - Throw an apple.

- What's new?

- I can advise what to do so that the bread does not stale.

“That’s what I’m talking about,” Yegor perked up. - Listen, Eremeev left us. Will you take his place? We've got some good guys, and things like that can be wrapped up.

- You're on fire ... well done, Goshka! And I've been bullying jokes for five years now.

- I see you feel comfortable salting vegetables.

– Yes, I like to tin and solder pans. I am of direct benefit to housewives.

- You are invincible! For the last time: will you go instead of Eremeev?

- No, goshka.

- But why?! How much do you end up with on your pickles?

- You are an eccentric ... What do you have to do with it - you don’t have it. I have enough. And then how much will they charge you? Ten more? Do you know that a stomach ulcer, by the way, is caused by nerves?

- You will get it! - muttered the mother, not raising her head from the notebook.

– Play, boys, serious journalism. I'm not bothering you.

– Here is this deal!

- Something I still wanted you ... Yes! Look, you know who I met?

- Guess!

You won't believe Natasha!

- Which Natasha?

- Hello! Yegor exclaimed in his hearts. You are in your repertoire.

“Oh, well, well…” Ilya chuckled.

– Did you see that the high-rise building at the corner of Kirovskaya and Novomoskovskskaya was built for scientists? He was handed over ahead of schedule, we were doing material about the brigade. So, Natasha got an apartment there. We collided at the entrance.

– Is the planning successful?

You should at least ask how she is!

- Well, how is she?

- Ilka, I was stunned! Tale of Scheherazade. Eyes, legs, waist - the devil knows what it is! Magic transformation! Wait, I'll take a cigarette, this damn thing goes out all the time.

Ilya put the phone on his chest, yawned and stretched out his legs. A grandmother came out of the kitchen, covered her grandson with a blanket, put two apples next to him. Ilya caught her plump wrinkled hand with beetroot fingers from cooking borscht and kissed it.

- Baby, do you love me? he asked in a lonely whisper. “Is it true that you care about me, old lady?”

The grandmother was moved, kissed her grandson on the head. - Bah, is it true that I am a prominent man?

You either talk or hang up the phone! the mother shouted. She had already written plans for Monday and now sat in an armchair, read newspapers and wrote down the main events - after school she did political information in her tenth graduation.

- Hello, - Ilya chewed an apple, - the obvious, the incredible: waist, legs, chest - further?

- Pah! mother said.

- Yes? You should have seen her yourself,” Yegor replied. - Married, two boys, it seems, but the main thing - the main thing, she defended her thesis in statistics, the leading specialist of some institute, she said which one, I immediately forgot.

- A woman's hammer ... - Ilya praised. - This vein always beat in her - to aim at the end of the railway track.

- But it got prettier - fantastic!

- Don't choke, Egor! Ilya chuckled. - What, Ira at the mother-in-law?

“Serpent, if I had known that you were so indifferent, I would have taken her away from you ten years ago. I liked her, you know?

“Well, you were always strong in hindsight. In fact, I would jump in sometime.

“Call, call,” the woman prompted softly. - I'll bake a "Napoleon" ...

“Here, the woman promises to bungle a commander for you,” said Ilya. - Come. With Ira, with the boys, Well, be ...

He hung up, slowly, without taking his eyes off the screen, took the second apple and took a bite.

What is Gosh saying? the mother asked. Ilya paused, chewing a piece.

"Matveyka's tooth has cut through," he finally said.

* * *

Lyalya was scheduled for Sunday. And an empty apartment. Or rather, Lyalya in an empty apartment, which belonged to a friend of Yegor's wife's cousin. A friend from time to time went on long business trips, the guy was single, friendly and laid-back, and asked only that they do not leave dirty dishes, empty bottles and an open bed behind him.

“I’ll be late,” Ilya said into the space between his mother and grandmother. “Maybe at night… Or maybe in the morning.” Do not call the morgue, do not beat with hooves, do not laugh in a ringing voice.

– Where do you eat? Grandma got excited.

“Listen, marry her already,” said the mother, “tired of it!”

- Whom, muthen?

- On this Jeanne.

"Remember, mother!" Which Jeanne? – sincerely amused son. “Jeanna passed out last block. Do not fuss, allow everything to ...

“Get out,” her mother said quietly and went into the kitchen, slamming the door.

Ilya famously brushed his shoes, straightened up, kicked his slippers away with his foot and, blowing a kiss to his grandmother, went out. Grandmother sighed, groaning, knelt down, fumbled under the bedside table for the left slipper of her beloved grandson and carefully put it in its place.

Going into the kitchen, she was dumbfounded: looking out the window, with her back to her, in the pose of a lone traveler, hiding from the rain under a tree, stood Valya. Embracing herself with both arms, shuddering as if from cold, Valya was crying. And below, outside the window, with a light dancing gait, in a suede jacket and a donated gray "turtleneck", - poster-like handsome - her accursed son was walking around the yard.

* * *

... On the way, Ilya decided to go to a grocery store, take something light, dry. That's how it worked out in last years that it was a necessary prelude to everything else. Mentally, he called it: "liberated", and on that he got along with himself once. He accumulated a lot of mental brief definitions of the motives of many of his actions. It was easier that way.

He stood under the canopy of a vegetable kiosk and wondered which grocery store is closer: the one near the Old Market, or the big, new one, on the corner of Kirovskaya and ...

“I got the apartment…” he suddenly thought. - Scientist. The house is entirely for leading specialists. Well, let's see what kind of house this is ... Yes, it's on the way, near the supermarket, - he casually told himself. - To the thirteenth trolleybus, without a transfer ... "

* * *

... The house turned out to be a typical sixteen-story tower, the balconies painted in wild pink. It had not yet been fully settled, and it looked uninhabited, naked. It dripped. Ilya stood on the sidewalk and tried to determine which windows could be the windows of Natasha's apartment. “Didn’t you ask Yegor what floor?..” he thought unexpectedly and cut himself off immediately: “Why do you need it? Sports news - Natalya was needed in seventy years ... ”He suddenly wanted the curtains on the windows of Natasha’s apartment to be also some kind of wild pink, vulgar, and for everyone to notice it. And then he grinned and, calling himself a strong word, turned in the direction of a large new supermarket, next to the house.

He entered the store, looking for Natasha with his eyes, and was not even surprised when he saw her in line. Now it was already clear to him that he had come here on purpose, hoping to see her. He stood leaning against some kind of shop window, and looked at Natasha, as far as the figures scurrying before his eyes allowed.

"So what? he thought, nothing special. Absolutely nothing. Baba is like a grandmother. Come up, right? Why not? Ah, are you a scientific lady? Ahah!"

After about five minutes, he nevertheless forced himself to go up to her and, looking over her shoulder, asked mockingly, imitating simple women:

- Woman, what do they give, huh?

The woman turned around. For several seconds they silently looked at each other, and finally, as it seemed to him, Ilya said at ease:

- Hello…

“Hello, Ilyusha,” she answered simply and calmly. Ilya looked at her without stopping, looked against his will, and wanted not to look, but everything looked. Yes, now close up it was clear that Natasha had changed unrecognizably, something had happened: a girl's face, simple in her youth, had completely changed. Significance of an open forehead, high eyebrows, staring brown eyes and the surprising combination of dominance and suffering in the expression of her lips and chin did not let her eyes leave her face. It was an icon, which can still be found in the northern Russian villages.

- What's up? he asked with a convulsive smile, nothing else came to mind.

“A little,” she said. - Do you all go in boys?

“Yeah, I like it,” he replied, narrowing his eyes. Not from annoyance answered, so, by virtue of nature.

A boy in a red jacket was circling nearby.

- Citizens, we give only to veterans! - the saleswoman shouted into the crowd, - the rest do not stand!

“The rest of us,” Ilya grinned, “let’s go out, or what?”

They began to make their way to the exit, and all the time the boy in the red jacket got in the way.

It was drizzling outside, and the pavement shimmered in generous puddles. And above, in the dirty rags of the clouds, overturned puddles of the pale blue sky slowly floated. These celestial puddles moved, changed their shape, crowded, spread ... In general, it was unfavorable at the top.

Ilya and Natasha stopped under the canopy of the bus stop.

It was hard to sit on the wet bench. In general, everything around was not adapted for such unexpected meetings. Natasha silently looked at Ilya, an inquiring expression of her eyes was added to the imperious-suffering expression of her lips. She looked as if she wanted to find out why Ilya met her again. An annoying boy in a red jacket for some reason did not lag behind them.

“Boy,” said Ilya, “go home, what are you doing here?”

“This is mine,” Natasha said, smiling softly. - This is the eldest, and there is also the youngest, four years old.

- Well done! - Ilya said incomprehensibly to someone - either to the boy, or to Natasha herself. However, he himself did not understand now what and why he was saying. He kept looking at her.

Are you still there? she asked. - I met Yegor the other day, he told me.

- Yes! Ilya briskly confirmed. – I am faithful to my rubric “About this, about this”. And if you pickle cucumbers according to a newspaper recipe, then know that ...

“I don’t salt,” Natasha interrupted him with a soft smile, “I don’t have enough time for cucumbers.” Work makes my head swell.

- I don't get swollen! he said defiantly cheerfully. “You know I treat my head with tenderness.

She suddenly looked at him without a smile.

“Yes, I know,” and she took her son by the hand. - Well, goodbye. All you…

- Wait! he exclaimed, for some reason frightened that Natasha was leaving, but, seeing her questioning look, he broke off:

- I ... wanted to ... Come on, or something, I’ll see you off.

- And we are nearby, over there, in the third entrance. Natasha nodded towards the house. “Hello to Mom and Baban,” and having moved a few steps away, she said to the boy in a low voice: “Put on your hood, Ilyusha ...

- What?! Ilya quietly asked himself, looking after them, although he almost immediately realized that this was the name of her son.

They entered the entrance, and Ilya sank down on a wet bench and sat like that for a long time, not feeling the heavy wet jacket on him, small evil rains running down his face. He sat, looking blankly at the stopping buses, as if in the name of an ordinary boy, in an ordinary red jacket, one could hit an adult so painfully.

Babania and Valya sewed pillow cases out of blue chintz. The TV depicted Sophia Rotaru, so they didn’t hear how Ilya entered. When they saw him - wet and dumb as a stump, the grandmother directly gasped, and the mother, just in case, said:

- Well, right - the namesake Repin, "They did not wait." - But I was worried.

Ilya silently undressed. The tension was rising.

- What happened? - shouted the grandmother.

“Nothing happened,” the mother said, building up tension. – What can happen to him? Probably fell into a puddle.