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First Day in Sharm
Sharm El Sheikh. Evening. The first people I met were a lovely couple: a young girl and a guy. It was strange that they clicked with me, considering I was older than them.
“Let’s go for a walk around the streets of Sharm,” the girl suggested to me.
It was already getting dark, but the streetlights were on, and it didn’t feel scary at all. The evening was wonderful, with a gentle breeze carrying the scent of Egypt with its Arabian spices, perfumes, and the colorful atmosphere of the East.
We stopped at a street café, sat on soft couches at a table. The guy ordered a hookah, and I got coffee. The purple outfit Marianna was wearing reflected a special shade under the lights, adding to the mood. I looked good today.
Eastern music was playing, and a dark-skinned waiter approached the tables, serving food. There was a special tenderness between the girl and the guy, I noticed, and it was pleasant to watch this couple. After a while, they went to dance a slow dance, entwining like two lilies illuminated by the dim, shimmering lights of the café. Marianna admired them. Then the hookah was brought. The guy took a drag and blew out some smoke.
“Try it,” he said to me.
“I’ve never smoked this,” Marianna replied.
“It’s apple-flavored, it’s nice.”
Marianna took a sip of the hookah and coughed.
The young couple laughed. The evening was wonderful. My thoughts were still at home; I had just arrived today and already found myself in a cozy café.
The Guide
There were two guides, she remembered clearly.
One guide met us right away and held a meeting about the excursions. Everyone gathered in a large hall. Marianna remembered that guides often try to sell excursions, and you shouldn’t agree to unnecessary ones.
The guide gestured actively while speaking and spoke Russian well. He said that today you could go to Jerusalem. The trip takes only two days, and you can see the Dead Sea, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and the holy places. The journey is very tough, he warned immediately.
At that moment, her phone rang. It was Nikolash calling.
Marianna stepped aside to talk on the phone, no longer listening to the guide.
“Mom, how are you?” Nikolash’s voice asked.
“Son! I’m at the hotel, everything is fine.”
“Did you eat? I left some food in the fridge.”
The connection was poor, and it was hard to hear.
“Son, I’ll call you back, I’m at a meeting with the guide right now.”
Marianna sat down on a chair. Should she go to Jerusalem? But it costs a hundred dollars…
No, I won’t go, maybe later. I’m very tired from the journey and the flight. Perhaps I just won’t be able to endure the tough trip to Jerusalem.
Lucia
Beach. Sharm El Sheikh. How great… just yesterday I was at home, and today I found myself on a beach in Egypt, thought Marianna, sitting on a sunbed and sifting sand through her feet, which were clad in swimming shoes she had bought for three dollars. She was examining them.
This meeting was not accidental. At first, I didn’t notice a certain woman behind me, blonde, with her hair tied back, narrow eyes, and a round face. I turned around and saw her… She smiled slyly, a bit like Mona Lisa, and was peering into her phone while lying on a sunbed. Then she started talking to me, and I, as if under some hypnosis, couldn’t take my eyes off this woman. We found out that she was from Kyiv and a psychologist who consulted her clients. I was interested in everything she said. Psychology, so to speak, from the horse’s mouth. She could talk about lovers, about rich people, my God… how little we know. Her voice seemed to lull me; we walked from the beach along the alley, and I listened to her intently.
“I am a member of the association of psychologists. And now I consult online; I moved away, but my clients still need support.” Marianna looked at the stranger with interest: that’s why she was always on her phone, probably writing to her clients. The woman and Marianna walked along a flower-lined path, passing by a table where an Arab was sorting out rental beach towels. I realized that evening was approaching, and people were leaving the beach.
Marianna and the stranger passed by the pool.
Marianna tried to ask about her own, pressing issue:
“I don’t understand why things are like this with my husband… maybe he’s just sick, or he had a childhood trauma… and things aren’t quite smooth in sex.”
“Many people find lovers here and live wonderfully,” the stranger continued.
“How so?” – asked Marianna.
“One of my patients, a friend, has a regular lover in Egypt, while her husband is a very wealthy man; she comes here and is quite happy; she compensates for what she lacks in marriage. Of course, her husband knows nothing.”
Is it really like that… (thought Marianna).
The stranger finally introduced herself: “Lucia” and, for some reason, also gave her surname – “Lyashinskaya,” laughing and saying, “If you don’t remember, better write it down.” An unusual name, noted Marianna – Lucia.
“I practice transactional analysis,” Lucia mentioned in the conversation.
“What’s that?”
“Well, it’s the whole life of a person, from birth to death, the events are interconnected.”
Wow… I would like that too… from the very embryo, and Marianna imagined a person still in the womb, growing up, growing up… I would also like to understand (thought Marianna).
This was not the last meeting with Lucia.
In the evening, Marianna saw her again, and they ended up at the same table.
Evening. A table in a restaurant in Sharm El Sheikh. Lucia is sitting opposite Marianna. There are coffee cups on the table. The festive evening began, drinks were being served, the tables were filling up, and a show with dancing and music was starting on the stage.
“And how did your husband let you go alone?” asked Lucia.
“So what…” Marianna shrugged.
“Lucia, tell me… you’re a psychologist, if someone sends me emojis, they probably feel something for me.”
“Show me…”
Marianna showed the emojis from Alex on Viber:
“Or maybe he doesn’t care at all that I left.”
Lucia smirked:
“He’s just teasing you, laughing at you; send him how you’re spending your time.”
“Here,” she turned and nodded towards a passing Arab with a cocktail in hand, “take a picture of him and send it.”
Marianna looked at the very dark-skinned Arab and smiled.
For some reason, Lucia began to laugh, looking at her phone, then burst into an indecent fit of giggles without stopping:
“Oh, I can’t…,” she continued to laugh and look at her phone.
Who is she laughing at? Marianna thought – can she see everything, read my chat with Alex, and is she reading my thoughts, and am I really ridiculous?
“Yes…