What does a child who is bullied by his classmates and teacher go through? This feeling of grief is imprinted in our brain, and even as adults, we can remember in detail the day we were humiliated. Poet and journalist Marina Alekseyeva continues to share stories with the site about her difficult and happy childhood in Yalta. Her wonderful story has already been published on the site”Poems and cigarettes”.
***
In Yalta, in one of its mountainous residential areas, there is a small church. Not everyone will find it. To do this, you need to get off on a bypass road and go down parallel to one of the ditches — old Tatar rainwater wastewater. This is especially cool after the rain, when water from the mountains rushes down the ditches. Or you can launch the ship and run after it. I've always done this on my way to school.
Nothing has changed here in the mountains for years. Water runs through the “stone veins” laid for her between one-story houses with colorful red, yellow, blue and green roofs, between fences, each with a garden with apricots and figs behind it. And so on, all the way to the church.
She meekly settled into these houses, as if there was nothing special about her. Well, too, it's just a kind of house. It's just that not a person lives in it, but God; he also needs a place to live. White walls, blue roof, and instead of a weather vane, a cross. There are also richer houses. But it's very cozy here. It seems that you are looking beyond the fence, and then Christ is standing on a stepladder and collecting apples in a bucket, or raking orange leaves off the ground with a rake.
— Autumn has come! Yes? - you'll shout to him.
And he'll wave after you and smile a little sadly, saying, summer is gone, and you're all running somewhere. And then you'll come back, go inside.
The church inside is also very small. You're pulling a heavy old door by the cold cast iron ring. And you find yourself in a tiny, narrow corridor with two doors opposite each other on either side. “Don't go in! It is strictly forbidden!” , — it is written on both. But it's always funny for me to read this. I know what's behind them. Like no one else. I know every crack on the floor, on the window frames in dried oil paint. Even from Moscow, I can easily get inside. Because there used to be no restraining sign on these doors. And there were our changing rooms — boys on the left and girls on the right, where we changed for gym clothes. It's just that this church was our school's gym.
Yes, it was so.
And even now, when I get inside, I can see our class. I see floorboards painted with maroon paint in the color of dried blood. For some reason, people in the Soviet Union liked to paint floors with this paint. I can see low, long blue benches on the walls. I see us running the traditional ten laps around the hall in colorful sweatpants amid the rays piercing the hall through the huge church windows. Dimka, the smallest and big-eared loser in class, in purple knitwear stretched heavily at her knees; Anya is an excellent student and pianist whose parents beat her for deuces with a belt — wearing imported red sweatpants with white stripes; Tolik is the school's main bully with an eternal smirk on his round and kind face — wearing a tight green woolen tights that make his legs thin and knotty, like a horse's. My friend Oksanka is wearing fuchsia shorts and has a big black labrador... We run and run in circles. And now at a gallop! And now jump in! And now jogging!
I was even happy at times like this. But I should have lived to see them. Walk through this small narrow corridor with two doors opposite each other — our changing rooms.
And that wasn't easy. Because I didn't say anything about my leggings. And they... I had the crappest leggings in class. Brown, woolen, patched in all places, they hung on their knees like an accordion that had survived more than one wedding. But the worst thing is that from autumn to spring I wore them over knitted tights. I didn't have any other clothes to warm up. Therefore, before exercising, you should take off both your leggings and tights, and then put on just leggings on your bare feet and go to study. But that was the worst part.
Because there were underpants under the tights. And it's just nothing — not my coat, which my grandmother bought me in first grade and couldn't fit on my chest by fourth, nor the hood my grandmother made me out of a worn doodle coat — none of this made me funnier to my classmates than these damn underpants. Their grandmother used to sew me from sheets, simply cutting it out of the pattern and inserting an elastic band into it. And when I stayed in these shorts in this locker room, the coven started. As soon as I took off my clothes, the girls screamed me out the door happily and supported me firmly from the inside so that I wouldn't be able to come back until the boys saw me. So I only managed to run into the locker room and quickly put on my leggings just before the lesson started.
However, the locker room was only purgatory. Hell started right after class, right after the warm-up. After all, I was waiting for a meeting with a physical education teacher there. And if the kids just laughed at me, she really hated me. And there was a reason, of course: I was the last in my class in physical education.
The center of the church is now anal. Behind it is a huge beautiful iconostasis. Candles gently illuminate the beautiful kind Christ in white with open arms: the owner of the house is glad to see you, he comes to meet you halfway to cuddle you.
But that day, of course, he was not standing in this place. And the horror of my whole life is a sporty goat with high metal legs “with hooves”. Everyone lined up. First, second, third — my classmates were skillfully flying over the goat when it finally came to me. I started running. And it stopped. Then she ran and knocked down a goat. Then she ran again and jumped at him...
The gym teacher watched my efforts with increasing hatred. But she wanted to jump again and again. She yelled something, making fun of every failed attempt I made. Everyone laughed.
At some point, I was completely desperate that I would be able to do anything. I started to cry and turned around and left the hall when suddenly... From behind, I heard the teacher's quiet, almost whispering voice.
— Snot! - she said softly. - Jump, scum!
***
Why do I remember this moment as it is now?
Has anything like this ever happened to you? When are time and space different from what they were a minute ago? Something very hot started to boil in my head. The air seems to have turned into a jelly that inhibits any movement and kills sounds.
I turned around and started running slowly. Half the color of blood turned into hot coals. My classmates were screaming something. But I didn't see anything anymore. Except for the goat standing in the middle of the hall and the teacher behind him, opening her mouth silently...
And all of a sudden, something incredible happened. When I reached the goat, I took off. For a second, but that was the case with me, I became weightless.
But just for a second. As soon as I flew over the goat, it was as if the weight came back to me twice as much. And with my arms and legs wide open, I hoisted all this weight on the gym teacher, clasping her tightly in my arms and legs. My aunt didn't get a chance to dodge. So, out of inertia, she wrapped her arms around me and, with me in her arms, slowly ran backwards right into the king's gate. Which we crashed into a few seconds later. She's on her back and I'm on her back.
The class was filled with wild laughter. The children were lying on the floor laughing.
I can still hear it now—that laugh. And now, when I raise my head in church, I see that right above the floor, on a huge icon, covered in white, Christ is laughing with his head thrown back. Wiping his tears, he waves: go already, saying, OK, I know it's time for you to run. I raise my hand goodbye and go out.
If you keep going down the ditch, you'll come to town. Now the road is getting wider, and the houses are more scattered. Below is an old park-cemetery with mossy graves, some of which show names. Right next to the cemetery is the house where the long-eared Dima lived: he died several years ago of a heart attack after drinking too much hot vodka. A little further away is the five-story beige building. They are called “Georgians”, where Anya lives. She did not pursue a career as a pianist, as her parents dreamed, but she gave birth to five children. In the distance, on a hill, you can see Tolik's green nine-story building: he has just recently been released from prison and, they say, got married successfully. And the last one will be Oksanka's house — she got married in America and now lives near the White House. And then a stream from the ditch will flow into the river. She is alone in Yalta. In autumn and spring, it is turbulent and full-flowing; in summer it dries up.
The locals call her Stinky.
But if you follow it without turning anywhere, you will definitely come to the sea.
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