Were not were

Tree

It was an old pear, fairly worn by time. She grew up in the backyard and under her shadow grew more than one generation of the inhabitants of the grandfather’s house. The best place in the whole wide world. In the spring, when the pear blossomed, we played in its shade, and in the summer we sat on the branches all day long and ate the still green fruits, and these were the most delicious pears in my life. When autumn came, it was always mourning for the best days of the year: the pear dropped its leaves, and we were forcibly separated from it and sent to school. Only on New Year’s Eve did we meet again and rejoiced at the opportunity that had happened to spend the entire winter holidays together again. Only now the branches served as a place for hanging homemade bird feeders for bullfinches and tits, and around the trunk they made a snowman and played snowballs and drove each other on sleds. And so from year to year, until one day we grew up and stopped noticing the old pear: our world tree, huge as the sky, strewn with the fruits of goodness, around which our entire childhood passed and which raised us and let us out into the world. And I am grateful to fate that such a tree happened in my life, a real tree of the knowledge of goodness.

Dilemma

Just now, a friend broke his arm. Well, not exactly a hand, but a finger. On the foot. But it still hurts. I met him in a cast and with a black eye. I’m keenly interested in what happened. And he in response, they say, slipped and fell. I sympathize with him and assume that this happened due to obvious negligence on the part of city utilities in the face of idle janitors. It would be necessary to sue them, if only for the sake of compensation for moral damage. He sadly agrees with me, but clarifies that he was not quite sober at the time when he actually fell. Why, he’s not sober, but he was downright drunk in zyuzyu. About what in the emergency room they made a corresponding entry in his medical record. There, you know, he got excited with the doctor, who, because of his intoxication, refused to treat him, and cleaned his clyster mug for him. Well, so as not to forget the Hippocratic Oath and know that the victims also have some pride and rights to free medicine. In the same place, he broke his finger on his leg while kicking the doctor. And he knocked out his eye. Now this victim of “gravity” does not know whether to write a complaint against the Aesculapius, or to thank him for the help in eliminating the consequences of the fracture, when he plastered his finger. A real moral dilemma.

Debt Above All

– Well, Katenka, how will you please us today?

The student lays out the drawings of her ridiculous club on the table in front of the teachers and looks wistfully at the professor, trying to understand from his expression whether she will be able to agree on her idea or will have to redo everything again. And the professor stared into her empty black eyes and imagines what he would do now if he were given free rein.

“Don’t you have any ideas?” “Nope.”

“Do you want me to show you now why you need your head?”

Without waiting for the student’s answer, the professor takes out a hammer with an elongated claw-claw from his briefcase and hits the student on the head with all his strength, breaking her skull. There is a crunch of bones and the lazy voice of his assistant comments:

“However, I did not expect, colleague. Pleased, at least some variety, otherwise you can die of boredom.

The professor laughs ominously and with the help of a nail puller deftly opens the student’s skull like a tin can, licks his lips carnivorously and exhales:

“Fresh brains. Colleague, do not lend your spoon, I forgot mine at home. I’ll give it to you as soon as I try.”

Having received a spoon, he scoops up a pink gelatinous mass from his opened head with a slide and swallows it greedily, squinting like a cat with pleasure.

“Well, how?” the assistant asks.

“Fresh,” exhales the professor and greedily stuffs two more spoons into himself, munching loudly.

“Shouldn’t I call other colleagues, what is now in the department?” – the assistant is interested when the professor returns the spoon to him and kindly gives him the opportunity to taste the contents of the student’s head.

“You eat, colleague, eat. There is nothing to scatter the brains of our students. They have their own. If there is anything left, then we will invite you.”

Alternately changing the spoon, they devour the brains until they are saturated.

“That’s it, I can’t do it anymore,” the professor sighs and orders, “Call the rest, colleague.”

The assistant exits and immediately returns with a group of professors, mincing one after another and happily mumbling: “Brains. Brain. Brain”.

The meal continues until there is nothing left of the student but an unsuccessful club project on paper.

The professor sighs, slowly pulls the drawings closer to him and begins to correct them, cursing himself for the fact that professional duty is always above all for him.

Job title

Petrov, having spent half his life trying to become a director, found himself in an absurd situation. Because of the epidemic, which happened as a childish surprise, he felt humiliated and insulted. Petrov could not go to work because of the quarantine and refused to believe it. All ways to get around the ban did not work. The state did not need his services, and all attempts to obtain a permanent electronic pass failed. His company was not included in the list of enterprises vital for the city and he was forced to stay at home. As everybody. This was something that pissed me off. As everybody? But he could not be like everyone else, Petrov was a director and, therefore, he should have had privileges. Which, as it turned out, was not. From resentment for being leveled with everyone, Petrov could not find a place for himself. He sat at home like some kind of castrated cat, and gloomily looked out the window at the street, along which only couriers moved freely, as if quarantine was nothing to them. And it dawned on Petrov. He decided to enroll in couriers. Fictitious, of course, to get the coveted pass. I sent out my questionnaires to agencies and waited. But all his attempts to secure a vacancy for a courier were a complete fiasco. Nobody wanted to hire a director. Even the former. Apparently, they either did not believe him, or were afraid that he would sit up. Petrov became a victim of his own ambitions, because there are no former directors.

Dear Lenin

My mother once gave me a whole two rubles for my birthday. metal. Anniversary. Both with a chased strong forehead profile of Ilyich. And she promised that one day they would be worth a fortune. I put them in a beautiful metal montpensier box and waited. It was my very first investment in my bright future. Years passed, a lot of things changed in life: both in my and the whole country, but the rubles remained lying at the bottom of the same box where I put them as a child. I just didn’t need them. Do you know why? I grew up, but the future is gone. Together with the country in which I was born. But Lenin remained. It still lies in the granite box like the fiat ruble where Stalin put it. The main value of our entire state. An investment in the bright future of my entire country, which is also gone. Apparently, when they put Lenin in the box of the mausoleum, they believed that he would grow in value. And they were wrong too. And it’s a pity to bury it, this mistake cost everyone too much. I, too, cannot throw away these two rubles, the toad is choking. I’d rather leave it to the kids, maybe they’ll be lucky. Get rich.

A worthy end

When they met, they immediately came up with playful nicknames for each other. He called her Baby, she was his dad Carla.

When they began to live together, she turned into a bee, and he into a bear. Having married, he became a Boy, and she became a Cannibal. Children appeared and they did not even notice how they changed the luxurious Boy with the Cannibal to the banal Father and Mother. Hello Mother. Hello Father.

And so for twenty years, until they suddenly discovered that everyone called him Grandfather behind his back, and her Boy-Baba or, in short, Boyboy. So she remained Boyboy for him, as if she had always been called that.

But for her, the evolution of his nickname on the banal Grandfather did not end. Pretty soon he became Old Man, then Old Stump, then Senile, Beast, and finally just Animal.

When she buried him, she wrote on his gravestone: “Here lies the animal that ruined my whole life.”

A worthy end to an obsolete love.

Friend

I have a friend. No, neither he nor I think so. Let’s just say, a friend. Although this is too strong a word. More like an interlocutor, but so unpleasant that I prefer not to talk to him. I can’t see him, his face is so annoying to me. He is a complete egoist: he always and everywhere speaks only about himself, as if there were no other topics. He is convinced that he is a genius. And I am sure that the genius is me. Least. Or maybe someone higher. And he is nothing, in essence, so – a burp of God. Therefore, we always argue, but silently. He is condescendingly silent when he sees me, hinting with all his appearance that I am nobody for him – a real bunch: a shameful misunderstanding. You could say it’s nothing. But I don’t go into my pocket for a word and eloquently keep silent in response, loudly hinting that I don’t notice him either. When he calls me on the phone, I know for sure, without further ado, that it is he. At the other end of the tube, they are so expressively silent. And there is no point in fussing and saying “Alla, I can’t hear you” or “Speak”. He has no suitable words for me, only contemptuous silence. I answer him the same. So we, sometimes, are silent for an hour or two, until we are separated. But, here’s what’s strange – I can’t be without him for a long time, and he can’t be without me: he immediately stops missing something. There is nothing to breathe, as if from within the breath intercepts. Therefore, once a week we meet on neutral territory, take a bottle of vodka for two and drink it silently. Like two old friends who no longer need words to speak. And then we silently disperse. Without even shaking hands, without looking into the eyes. This is all because a person desperately needs someone whom he can hate sincerely and from the bottom of his heart. At least once a week, but to really, like the last time. And for this, you need someone like him. Real. Friend.

Thought about death

I’ve been thinking about death all night. I really didn’t want to die. I even cried from resentment that this should happen to me. Twice. And then he was afraid, lying alone in the dark. Abandoned by all. Nobody needs. I fell asleep by accident, and then in the very morning.

I woke up with a brutal appetite. To life. He made himself some toast of Prague bread, anointed them with melted cheese, put thinly sliced smoked salmon on top of them and covered all this splendor with fried eggs, richly seasoned with dry garlic and freshly ground pepper. And ate with a glass of hot, strongly brewed black tea. After breakfast, I decided that I would definitely dine in a Georgian restaurant. I will order khinkali. Piece five. Hot, juicy, with lamb. And always with sour cream, but with chopped garlic. And a glass of tea. Better two.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

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