which nearly constituted a difficult to understand parable, formed a whole thing, as already fallen snow in February did with drifting snow; people could get it only given that they were bright enough to make some speculations… The old lady spoke:
“Well, surely, I cannot conjecture what was the reason for that unprecedented story to happen, however, I say, why unprecedented? Have I never seen what the human brain can reach together with the progress? What can the human language reach? For my long life, I have seen stranger things occur, yet that time the stars formed not so usual constellations that they made me ponder this way… Imagine: the USSR, fields around, rivers, groves, lakes, Gorky, 1965… Summer. If I am not mistaken, it was June, or, perhaps, July – anyway, all that happened sometime between the first and the hottest months of the summer… Here came the night, crop fields, just fields… The air was filled with warmth and, seems, moths were flying or stars falling… I, maid, stood on a hill awaited a tryst with my sweetheart, which was arranged at 3 a. m. precisely there and everywhere; he promised that he would show me literally everything, and if I wished, we would go to the sea… And there, elsewhere far away, few cows were put in pasture, a cowherd was sitting on the grass and flicking his cigarette lighter as if he was playing with the night: he winked her, and she, as he thought, should have sent him something in return… Silence! It was so quit that if I were not Liubava Sergeevna, but a popular Soviet poetess, I would definitely be famed for a poem about that silence… It was so quiet that I managed to hear the Volga river rippling, sturgeons and carp splashing around and a lost tractor mourning his last hope and aim in life. It was so quit that I started singing my song. That song was a song of pure love, and it even calmed down the tractor, so that he moved forward and roared; as to me, I saw my beloved and experienced those sweet feelings, which now Zhenia had when he guessed with the present, Earlyborn. And the morality of such a parable is that if you are unhappy or exhausted and reckon that you simply cannot get down to business—just walk a bit and wait; there is power in waiting—come out and gaze at the stars if not in the sky, try to find them in your imagination and inner world. It won’t take happiness much to appear, then. So you got this joy today: you, sad, went to buy some Dominican coffee, yet at heart you were waiting for you dreams to come true. You’ve met your expectations, and any day now you are going to Antarctic… So did you, Zhenia, you were getting here, to sister’s, with no knowledge of how she would welcome you, but you travelled, travelled and waited, and the morning, January 1st, could not be better than it is now. Either way, I assume, if it wasn’t like this, it would be so tomorrow or the day after tomorrow or it would be already like this yesterday; all this keeps the secret of life—to wait, to live and wait, and try to see the beauty everywhere. The case was that I didn’t go anywhere with my sweetheart, moreover, we didn’t marry, and everything happened not according to the plan, but that day gifted me the idea of the importance of waiting, and my life never lost the meaning…”
The cake was delicious, and the brother and the sister spent all their time almost till lunch sitting at her table.
Chapter 3
At first, Zhenia was astonished, as Earlyborn did, “How is it possible to live here, in Paris, in front of the Eiffel Tower, and be not contend?” That is true—any person reflect in this way when comes here. Yet life is hard, it is sophisticated as the picture of the human DNA, the fundament particle of the whole creation, and it is also challenging to learn the life. Furthermore, life, as the human DNA, is very slippery, for it was not in vain for this acid to be the basics of anything. When some people say the life in Paris is mint, other argue that it is salt, life can be really a palatable pie. In which, no doubt, salt is used for baking, and mint for decorating. But you should put a lot of effort to find an oven, in which that pie would be baked thoroughly. However, looking at faces of citizens, touched with French snow, Zhenia still could not realize how people lived there and were unhappy… Admittedly, such a state is typical of a colossal number of people, including those who live on the outskirts and from there come in Moscow and wonder: how can Muscovites not see all this magnificence? How can Muscovites be that angry, always in a hurry and not manage to do things in time? Meanwhile this corresponds with civil laws and cannot be vice versa. Yet the essence of the human is to develop, but Muscovites gradually stopped noticing the beauty of massive buildings contrasted it with their life trifles and unimportant events and, finally, dismissed that richness. Muscovites forget that it is thank to them in the past and their ancestors they are now in the present. Thus, they simply should love the life, save all that you have and do not dwell on something huge. Unfortunately, the majority of Muscovites do not appreciate a thing. That is arguably the reason for the USSR collapse; maybe authorities, maybe citizens or even some higher forces in space influenced people so that they at once gave up collaborating around their idea of communism. Most likely, since the idea is not folklore and needs to be written down constantly. But the thought conveyed from mouth to mouth during that time as the normal state of things, so only Lenin and, perhaps, the members of his party could perceive the real message hidden in it. Continue you doings, dear Muscovites, and do not back out of what you started.
As soon as Zhenia came in Paris, he began dreaming about one. He scarcely considered that city as his future residence. Zhenia simply wanted to go for a row on the Sena, then set sail with Earlyborn: he intended to go round Africa or Cape Horn and go back to Paris to move towards home—Russia. He imagined how he, terribly jaded, tanned and with that outstanding glimpse, would sit on the train to Amsterdam from where he would go to Moscow by bus. He saw himself, exhausted, yet full of spirit of ventures and happiness, coming in his hometown, Irkutsk to continue his job as taxi driver, to exult at life again and again; he even hoped to gather with friends to go fishing on the Baikal and to visit his parents in the countryside in summer, and, perhaps, life would bring him some more golden raffle tickets for he bought the trip for his sister with one of them. Let us see whether Zhenia’s dreams on his and his sister’s future will come true. But now he simply decided to have a walk.
Speaking about Dionysius, a friend of Luisian, the chef of drunken bulls, created by Earlyborn’s imagination. How was he there with no money and no friend settling his life? How would he find Luisian who had forgotten his mascot—a bronze bee—in his suit pocket? Yet would Luisian bother looking for it? However, Dionysius knew and saw with his own eyes how the mascot could affect that person. So, probably the lost bee was to be blame for the broken caravan… Yet Luisian found it roving over the ground near the place where they stopped. Fellows soon managed to mend their car. As Dionysius was a meticulous Argentinian he understood that as soon as his old friend discovered his lost mascot, something would definitely occur. Dionysius could not help leaving his acquaintance without his talisman, hence, he would directly pop into a shabby hut of one old fisherman, a bowing acquaintance of his, to drop belongings, and then he would go in search of money for Luisian. It turns, dear readers, that we have clinched at least one matter.
Some words about Luisian. It was hardly possible for Dionysius to seek for Luisian with no coordinates of his, even if he was in the nearest hut… What an idea, however! Maybe Luisian naturally made up his mind not to sail away from the Costa Rica shore and waited for some time, say, in order not to go to sea at night. Eventually, he had to do it as Earlyborn met Zhenka2. Instead of developing the story on the way to the shop, our heroine made Luisian sleep. Moreover, Earlyborn, seems, forgot that she located him back to France where he was to find his father. Well, doing it was forgivable. For a drowning man will clutch at a straw, and the play with imagination was that straw in waiting and grief for Earlyborn. She possibly created Ded Moroz as she remembered her brother… It is he, by the way, Italian, whom great half of this book is devoted! So Luisian decided to wait a bit and noticed the loss. Then he moved back towards the place where he said goodbye to Dionysius; apparently, he made his home in a neighbor to Dionysius hut. A hostess Lunight put him for the night. Yet she was not that sociable and immediately went to another room. I deem her a witch. There was a caldron in her closet where the smell of sour and mint filled the air… Luisian did not mind her absence and came out on the porch and started pondering, skipping pebbles across the surface of the water.
Chapter 4
Earlyborn and Zhenia started a long journey. They went out after lunch, walked along and across the Seine, visited the Notre-Dame and enjoyed the time, only they did not get into the