- Woman, woman! Yes, yes, I’m calling you! Look, your bottles with pickles have broken and are all around the ground. Take them away, clean up! You’re blocking people. You make it impossible for them to pass.
After all, what a strange way it is of referring to a representative of female sex, as “woman”. Almost as if she, the one who is being called that, doesn’t have a clue of that herself, thus all the people surrounding her seek to remind her of that.
“Woman, your tights are torn! Woman, your mascara is running down your face! Woman, let me pass!” and now this “Woman, your pickle jars are broken!” – that has become the last drop in the kaleidoscope of the disorders of her life.
The woman to whom it was referred, was walking through the city market, loaded with countless string-bags. Her face was seemingly bearing no expression at all, which made it difficult to define the nature of her thoughts and whether she had any. It was one of many detached, snatched from the crowd faces, looking at which we pass by blankly.
The woman was of undefined age. At first glance she could be thirty, forty or even fifty. And just like many other women of undefined age she was wearing a baggy-looking, oversized trench coat and a pair of comfortable black boots. Everything in her appearance was so plain, so unremarkable as if she made a special effort to look like a shadow smeared on the dark street.
The day when the woman’s pickles made an accidental escape on the street, attracting much of undesired attention to her, the woman was just on the way to her little booth, where she year after year sold her home-made jams, salted mushrooms and, naturally, pickles. And that day destiny, which has never been favourable in her regards, was very cruel to her. All the prickles she was going to sell that day, all of them made their way to the dirty sidewalk in the middle of the market.
“Woman!” – a loud, ringing voice, causing gnashing of teeth, shot through the market cackle. “Pick up your pickles! It is impossible to walk on the sidewalk! Come on. Don’t just stand there!” Some other “women” of the same constitution and of the same gnashing voice decided to join the first loud ringing voice and form a chorus. Now the chorus was repeating the same request almost as if they were singing. Glancing at each other, as if the whole scene had been previously rehearsed, they kept interrupting each other, yelling and drawing incomprehensive figures in the air. The “woman” felt herself suddenly a spectator, an interloper among these “women”. After some time other “women” who earlier had only been watching, decided to interfere and joined the chorus. The chorus was increasing. And there was such a rich linguistic diversity that passers-by automatically stopped to join in the heated discussion. The newly arrived were quickly given the overview of the whole scene and they in their turn, made sure to pass on the awareness. The chain of the dissatisfied was steadily growing, just like cucumbers after storm. Some claimed, broken pickle jars were entirely government’s fault, others blamed magnetic storms. It even came down to bringing in the paranormal activity, blaming an unburied politician for all their misfortunes.
It got dark in the meantime. The clatter was gradually dissolving in the night. Having discussed all that went wrong in the country in the past decade or so and having stated that someone had to bear the duty of changing the present circumstances, but no one could, the crowd resigned quietly and swept itself away, having completely forgotten about the prickles, the broken jars still lying on the sidewalk and the “woman”.
And only the “woman” of indefinite age and an indefinite expression in her eyes, was still standing there, on an indefinite street of an indefinite town in an indefinite country, expecting a miracle.
Her face was flooded with memories running down her cheeks in an unstoppable flood of tears. Salted and cold, just like her pickles, the tears were trembling on the edges of broken pickle jars. Memories made her heart rhythm more frequent at times and at other times they would make her heart stop. She felt as if she would take wing and fly so high in the sky, a beautiful starry sky full of enigmas, sky that held the memory of that man whom she fell in love with once. Oh, how much did she want to abandon her own body, stepping out of her own body as if it was an old, worn-out dress, and direct herself towards angels. Could it be that he too became an angel. An angel, who folds his wings beside her booth every day. If only she could become weightless like a cloud, if only she could take off that old and darkened dress, and take off to travel on his wings, there, where stars seem closer and brighter.
“Woman, you don’t feel well?” – a comment from a passing-by market guard. Oblivious to the guard, she was drying her face with a sleeve. She glanced at him and instantly, so fragile and solitary, was overwhelmed by a strong desire of throwing herself into his arms in search of consolation. But in that same instant the guard noticed the pickles and frowned at her. "Are these your pickles lying on the ground? Don’t just stand there! The market will be full of people tomorrow morning, and someone will surely slip on your pickles!"
She broke off with a little shudder. An unusual for early October sudden cold shrouded her in and made her tears little crystal beads of ice. “Pickles, - she thought, - he loved my pickles so much. Kept telling me he’d never tried such tasty pickles ever before. Maybe that’s why he fell in love with me”.
Every night he’d come home and find the table already set, with all his favourite dishes on it, including prickles. And at the sight of this, his heart would fill with love and warmth. “You know, Lyuba, I have never felt so good before. You are taking care of me, just like my mother used to do. And I.. How did I deserve you? I’m a homeless tramp, thief, fresh out of prison. And you do not even fear me in the slightest, you feed me, dress me, gave a place to live, even found me a decent job. I don’t deserve you, Lyuba. I’d have to die, to make up for all my sins. I'd have to die to thank you, but you don’t let me. You’re just like an angel, watching me, guarding me” – he used to say while crunching his favourite pickles, washing them down with vodka. And she would gaze at him, smiling through the tears and say “Would you like another helping, Lyonya?”
Damn the pickles! Damn it all! How is she “woman” to live without him, without his guitar? How is she to sleep at night when he doesn’t snore beside her? All right, he was a thief and did drink a lot, hardly a flaw, for he too was the man who loved her. He even talked about having a baby. “Its time to change life to better”, - he used to say, -“ it’s a sign from above. You didn’t save me for nothing”. Everything was going to be all right. He even started working as a driver – Lyuba helped. And she too had a job. It’s a universal truth, you can earn more, selling in a market, than working in a supermarket. Everything was going smoothly, calmly. Life just like many others: work, home, guitar, football on Sundays, strolls on a esplanade with friends. And how did she, Lyubka, deserve such happiness? Nights spent fully awake with this thought possessing her mind. She had always feared her own happiness. What if something happened? What if something happened to him? And one day it did… two months ago. Lyonechka was dozing off at the wheel of his truck and crashed.
“Bloody hell!” – instinctive and heart-rending scream came as a thunder. Red veins of dawn were pulsing low in the morning sky. The narrow sidewalk was seized by cold and reminded of guard’s moustache richly splashed with snow.
“Why are you squealing for Christ’s sake? What happened?”
Lyubka was lying in the pool of her own blood. In one of her hands she was still holding a splinter of broken glass, in the other one – Lyonya’s old black and white photo from the army, that he sent her from prison with one of his first letters to her.
“What do you mean "what happened"? Don’t you see it yourself? Broken pickles jars everywhere on the sidewalk”.
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