SYMBOL OF ETERNITY

– Do not spill the beans. – Guaranteed Pavlik. In order to convince me for a long time it was not necessary. I ran towards the enjoyment of the game for boys and girls. On the way, did not hear the voice of the teacher. When Pavlik stopped me before I regained consciousness:

– Here I am to you! You punished?! Go here?!

And I, his head down, walked to the side which calls upon Aunt Olya. Next to the teacher smiled slyly Lenya Ochkolyas. His right hand held the teacher already behind, a good sign for me. I approached cautiously, watching this hand hidden behind his back. It can be seen, there is something extremely unpleasant and frightening pleasant sight awaits Lenya Ochkolyasa. It is not difficult to guess who passed me and helpfully brought educator stem nettle. When I approached within arm’s length educators, it is something, as I suspected, it was stinging nettles, which rustled in the air, dropping to the ankles under the sweet wild laughter Leni Ochkolyasa. Resentment and grief Tears on my face, I began to cry softly, rubbing swollen red bumps on my legs.

– Well, that was! – Taunted, grinning happily Ochkolyas. This boy grew up in a large family. He was my same age, and was the most fragile small and sickly kid from all the boys in kindergarten. Thin legs and a big belly, made him a comical figure, obscuring even the puppet facial features, but always malicious smile and a penchant snitch all the tricks of boys made it a sneak. I felt hurt not so much on the teacher, and rather to sneak Ochkolyasa Lenya, who not only spoke about AWOL, but what I was sure even brought punishment instrument nettles. And now, smiling, happy torment his victim. I would like at this moment of humiliation to run away from everyone, hide, no matter where, whether in the distant dark corner to hide and be alone. I vividly remembered the house. Cockerel rooster, which I received blows and not take offense, because the cock was never a close friend. He was a friend, an enemy, and nothing more. And Lenya Ochkolyas could be so, and others. It sowed distrust Lena as a friend and did not cause any feelings of anger and desire to win, as the enemy. The only feeling that is evoked Lenya in my mind, it was a feeling of pity, even born when my mother told me how was busy before the kolkhoz administration, to a large family Ochkolyasov, who had five children, build a house. As the working collective farm family of the deceased from the bandits, announced after the amnesty. She told me the terrible conditions in which live Ochkolyasy. In the tiny hut, thatched, with a dirt floor, hastily cobbled together, after burning down of a good home. Mom told about the difficulties of a young woman, a mother, Leni, remaining one with the children.

Congenital envy of the wealthy, as he thought, children, engendered hatred and anger in poverty wounded soul.

By lunchtime burning feet subsided and almost do not care. The mood gradually came back to me, and has a carefree laugh; I paced in the ranks of children, exposing tripping who was walking in front of Cole Ponomarenko, thick and clumsy little boy…

The next day I went to kindergarten without a grandmother. Granny flatly refused to drive me into the garden. A mother’s remark, she answered:

– He knows the way and can it have to go there. Not small, it soon turns six years, let grows up! – The mother replied to a comment grandmother.

– It is also weak. A wanders somewhere?!

– Do not get lost, no great loss! And drown in the toilet, and would not have suffered! – Mother silently swallowed the insult and has already asked me if I knew the way. I said, which way to go to kindergarten. Mother agreed to the affirmative. And the first time I went out one morning. The road was a park. Ahead in the bushes I saw Ochkolyasa Llonyu, who furtively looking around, there is something looking for. I have not seen it, and I’m glad I’m not alone in the kindergarten named after him:

– Hey, Lenka, you wrote that there is, or what?! Let’s go into the garden! – Lenya, threw scared look in my direction.

– Go yourself where you are going. – The answer is not friendly Ochkolyas.

I walked closer to him. And just now I saw that he was looking for a suitable stem nettle for educators to this instrument of punishment she frighten children, and Lenya, as always, will be deserved to enjoy great trust and favor. I have waited for him, for fear of being late, left alone. When I went to the playground and looked at the children swarmed in the sandbox, from the corner of the sleeping body seemed to Aunt Olya. The called me to her and said:

– Valik, tell me, probably something in the forest has died, that you are with her grandmother in the garden not late today? – Educators in a good mood, and she spoke these words with a good- natured smile, showing straight and white teeth. I looked puzzled watched her mouth, responding:

– It’s in the garden something has died, so smells from the kitchen that much can not breathe. – I said these words without thinking, stink or not, but my remark getting through his boundless derogatory form of address in relation to my grandmother, who was a friend to me. At the moment, Aunt Oli smile, as if someone wiped out. She blushed, did not say anything. She turned and went for the nervous walking dormitory kindergarten towards the dining room. Soon, from the dining room were heard hysterical screams of educators:

– Are you here spread, eh?! I, Claudia, you ask?! – A voice of Aunt Olya my answer broke the scandal. That justify telling that poisoned rats, and that some might die under floor and it stinks in there. Soon the playground came Lenya Ochkolyas. In his hand he held as a rod, a temple nettle stalk height in its growth, with a thick and sturdy stems and serrated leaves. His face shone solemn smile made request educators and his Kresna mother, Aunt Olya. And in the dining room at this time cook, Aunt Claudia, after the morning catching up, nervously tapping utensils, distributed food to children for breakfast…

Chapter Six

In the morning, as always, at the kindergarten children I met and Aunt Olya:

– Well you told parents that today will be a total solar shading during the day, which happens once in a hundred years? – All the children responded in unison that parents react to this in different ways. Some children did not lead to a kindergarten, using the pretext of a total solar shading. Those children whose parents have led to the garden, added a smoky bits of glass, so it did not hurt to look at the sun. Someone even brought a pair of binoculars, and the boys took turns looking into it. It was very interesting and do not understand why on the one hand the binoculars closer objects, and when you look from the back side, then separates them at a great distance. I took with me my blue piece of glass and looked through it at the sun. But the blue piece of glass is not good enough to protect the eyes, and through it hurt the eye when looking at the sun. After the dead hours and the subsequent snack children tend to spend time in the yard for games. The teacher warned the children that at four o’clock in the afternoon will blackout the sun satellite of planet Earth Moon. To no one do not worry, it’s just for five minutes, and no more. And the children will come the parents, and will work together to look at blackout. It would be better if the teacher did not say that. Children were silenced fearfully glancing around. It was only ten children, instead of twenty- three. Solar blackout began with the advent of the parents of these children. My mother came in off clothes. She wore a black velvet jacket and skirt. She told me that after the blackout it will be taken to the district Party committee in Svyatoshino party organizers to a meeting of the Kiev- Sviatoshynsky area, and it will arrive in Kiev late at night. I really wanted to go with her. I asked to take me and the happiness it promised that he would take. Suddenly it became dark. Twilight were coming very fast. State Farm herd of cows passed by the kindergarten, as board decided to drive the cows in the stable, to avoid unwanted reaction step of this rare natural phenomenon. Cows became loud and disturbing hum. Somewhere a dog barked in the distance. Chirping birds suddenly stopped. In my subconscious I began to creep animal fear. Feelings of anxiety and impending disaster after dark more clearly felt in the dim and irrevocably impending night. Sun extinguished in his eyes and suddenly disappeared from the sky. The sky had taken refuge scattering of stars. There was a silence. Even dogs We stopped barking. You can hear the howl of a lonely and distant dog. His mother pressed me to her, stood silently in the middle of the playground and trembling from the terrible state suddenly had come the night among a summer day. This went on for ages; it did not seem to be the end. Suddenly a breath of coolness. Sun did not have and darkness came into their possession. Coolness was palpable by the sudden disappearance of the hot sunlight, and it adds fears irrevocable effects. I had the feeling that now will never be the sun, and is darkness. But gradually, bright strip in place of the sun grew wider and wider. And about! Miracle! The sun was in the sky and grows reappeared. Heat again poured a generous river park, the leaves, on children and children’s playground. They began singing rural males. Chirped the bird, and all returned to normal. I was happy and was filled with the expectation of the promised trip with my mother to the meeting in its regional committee. But the mother seemed to have forgotten his promise. I reminded her about it, but the mother did not answer. She was talking with other parents who have come for their children. Finally the mother drew attention to me and told me that I have, today, take Nyuska. Not doing mother promise to take me with hurt hit annoyance. Instead, even a surprise that Nyuska take me. What I do not I will go to the house? I asked myself this question. I was determined not to go home with a cousin. After his mother left, along with other parents, I asked Aunt Olay’s permission to go home, referring to the fact that her mother allowed me. She said yes, and I left. Nyuska, of course I did not find in the garden, and complained to his mother. In the morning I got a soft spot for the rods from the mother, under the approving grin sister…

Oh, time rushes rapidly. In one year we are older. It’s time to say goodbye to kindergarten. After lunch in the dining room, the teacher announced that all children who have reached the age of seven, including me, that today they are on the last day in the garden. With regard to the first of September they left exactly one month later, they almost schoolchildren.

A month later, on September 1. I 7th years. I am waiting for the first class. New comrades, almost adult care.

– «And I’m going to read and write A, how to count?» – I thought. – Vaughn Ponomarenko Kohl knows the alphabet, Llona Ochkolyas can count to ten.»

With a bitter heart complained Vasya Ponomarenko, this brother Kolya? No, not that Kohli, who slipped me the boiled bacon and other Koli, has a first- class student.

What Vasya said authoritatively?

– My brother did not even know the first letter. And, that’s reading primer. – Gordo Bob said.

– Really?! – I was delighted. And my soul became calmer. With all my heart I reached for Basil, but Basil was still in the garden, he was in school until next year. Here’s how friends are learned in the last day.

– You tell me, what’s in school. I w- as much as slid year? – Asked Bob. Bob and Nick Ponomarenko lived next door to us, and I often went to see them play. It is necessary to go through the neighbor’s garden, and I have Ponomarenko…

Dead Hour. The children were sleeping in their beds. Last dead hour in kindergarten, the last day of preschool childhood I sighed and turned, and could not sleep, worried. I was plagued by fears:

– «How do I go to school? – with horror thought, tossing and turning in his bed, during the dead hours – Well I do not know how to read or write, do not even know the letters.»

I began to recall the letter. Easily remembered the letter «A» as the two telegraph poles, summarized above, and fastened the bar. Its something easier to remember, these pillars there, all you want on state farm fields. It is easy to remember, and the letter «O», similar to the hoop, which Uncle Theodore holds the barrels for pickling cucumbers and tomatoes my mother at work. How not to recall another tried to cushion at least one, or at least some, whether the letter did not come to mind anything. I began to toss and turn. I lay down on his back looking up at the ceiling, remembering somehow the grandmother at the stove and its poker.

– «Yeah, it looks like the letter» G». – I thought, poking in memory devices that Grandma deftly wielded by putting iron pots on the stove, heat rake. But the more I could not remember. I turned light brown head to one side, listening. The pillow crackled, crushes the hay. The bedroom could be heard puffing sleeping children. Buzz, a fly flew. Everywhere reigns sleepy silence. And then on the pillow next to my head I flopped crumpled green leaf linden. I looked up, the springs creaked treacherous. Carefully looking around, the parties discovered that everyone is asleep:

– «Pavlik? It’s not like sleeping like a log». – I thought. Look slid cot in the far corner of the bedroom, then stopped at the neighbor on the right. But blanket Wasi Ponomarenko rose slightly in tact snore, boy slept. In his open mouth we could see two white teeth, and it is all my sleeping view reminded today rabbit, sleeping peacefully on the pillow. I turned to the right, looked on the bed Leni Ochkolyasa, down, rustling, pulled back the blankets and furtively beneath beady black eyes glittered.

– «Oh, you sneak! From me to you! "– My small little hand gripped the edge of the cushion and in a moment a soft shell, describing the arc in the air, fell on his head nestled Lenya. Blanket with lightning speed exposed areas. I was staring wide- open black eyes Leni.

– I’ll give you – the person said. And in answer to me flew cushion Leni. Fighting boys hurried footsteps stopped outside the door. When Aunt Olga entered the room, the picture appears in front of her seemed undisturbed sleepy atmosphere. The teacher looked anxiously sleeping. When her eyes fell on my bed, her eyes flashed sparks of evil. I lay on the crumpled blanket crib feet to the side cushion. The head is lying there where legs should lie. My eyes closed eyelids fluttered treacherous. Of all the forces trying to portray a dream, I struggled not to blink for centuries. However, in vain, treacherous lashes his flutter spoiled pretense. Strict aunt Olga is already understood. She quietly left and a moment later reappeared. In her hand, swinging a long stem, gift Leni Ochkolyasa, sandwiched in the right hand, nettle. She came to me «sleeping» and began to drag nettle bare my stomach. Eyelashes closed my eyes desperately fluttered, but her body lay motionless. Lenya Ochkolyas tenderly watched from their «hiding place» for a while. He was very flattered that nettle, which he so lovingly chosen this morning on the way to kindergarten, do not fade in vain. Thus ended my preschool childhood…

Chapter Seven

At home, I met my grandmother.

– Tomorrow, on Sunday, go to Buzova on the market. – Solemnly informed me Lavrentevna Eugene. Bazaar was far, six kilometers from Shpitek. The locals call this place «Bazaar in Buzova». Location Farm Buzova ranges from Kiev on the thirtieth thirty- first kilometer of the highway Kyiv Brest- Litovsk. Grandma announced this news, and happily added:

– Maybe I cannot go. I’ll go even in the last…

Morning I was awakened by a light touch of my grandmother.

– Get up already. – She leaned over me in a clean white handkerchief and patted me on the head.

I rubbed my eyes. Rose, sleepily trudged into the kitchen. It stood on a stool bucket of water and a mug, and nearby, a stool near a garbage can. Scooping a mug of water, scored in his mouth, then poured out of his mouth his arms on a garbage can. And, soaped wet hand soap, wash. For my grandmother went to two middle- aged women.

It had two aunts in white colorful shawls. A distant relative, Aunt Manya from the neighboring village from Lychanka. And another, the eldest daughter of the grandmother, Maria, or, as everyone called her, too, Aunt Manya. They were, like the grandmother in white kerchiefs. At Aunt Mans from Lychanki wearing red woolen skirt and brown shoes without heels. Aunt Manya from Shpitek dressed in a light and spacious long cotton skirt in gray and brown peas. On her feet she had sandals. And my grandmother was wearing soft slippers, in which she was, she said, it will be convenient.

The sun with its rays touched the tops of the trees, coloring it with soft pink color. On the grass glistening with dew. Potatoes in the garden bloomed white flowers. It was a calm field work. That time when the crop absorbs moisture, fertilizer and heat – matured.

Farmers could make a break. End of July, beginning of August. Then, to gather strength and to harvest, to stock up for the winter.

– Cam on, let’s go soon, the still us go. – Quickly said goodbye to Kate, we moved on. It was nice to meet tribeswoman as «away» from home and we have to see it, too.

A field passed when the sun warmed significantly in the back. But the first trees by the side of the highway hid shadow walkers, and go easier. Grandma decided to rest under a tree and sat down on the grass, at the same time and shod. Buzova with its bazaar was across the highway. It is enough to just two hundred meters. Noise trading crowd, grunting, bellowing and growling animals, merged into the distant hubbub is near the bazaar.

In the bazaar of Aunt Manya Lychanki bought a pig. He hid in bag wild cries. With this pig, endlessly screaming in the bag, we went to the bazaar, attracting everyone’s attention. Trade here all the horses, cows, puppies, kitchen utensils, shoes, clothing, animal feed, seeds and so on… I could not understand that looking for my grandmother. But when Aunt Manya from Lychanki went to a woman, holding a child in the hands of school uniforms, began to bargain, I understood. Grandma made me wear a jacket. All at once I nodded approvingly, and the form became my ten rubles. Pig in a poke, then died away, then again frantically yelled at the whole market. And only then, when Aunt Manya from Lychanki stayed with fellow villager, fodder- trafficked, we got rid of the pig screeching. She left on a cart with a fellow villager. And we have come in the same way home late at night.

They came. How nice it was after a hot sunny hike dip in the cool clean house. We were met by the mother in a white scarf tied at the Bolshevik- style red kerchiefs. Nice to see her welcoming smile, this was extremely rare.

– Well, bought form? – See the purchase; she said she was glad grandmother. And Grandma pushed the knot. And I got a school uniform there.

– Have you tried on Valik form? – She asked anxiously, – Go ahead, Valik, put on.