Читать книгу Flying in the cloud - Агриппина Битар - Страница 5

Nina had a long-time friend Boris, her former colleague. They’d met fifteen years ago at the school where he worked as a teacher of the Russian language, and Nina then organized children’s holidays. Their paths have been different since those times.

Nina started working in a different field, and Boris stayed. However, despite this, they kept in touch in social networks and their communication has recently become more active because of the theme of detachment, which worried them both.

Boris had been long married and had a teenage daughter. Nina was familiar with his wife and believed their alliance to be very strong. Yet recently, she was surprised to find out that he had divorced.

Nina wanted to express sympathy, but Boris told her that he was happy and had found new love. He gave Nina a hint that she’ll be among one of the first to be invited to his wedding. So little by little, they started talking and their chats became more frequent and trustful.

Boris was a very interesting and enthusiastic person. He enjoyed “living history” and was a member of a historical reconstruction club, which focused on the Medieval Russia of X – XIII centuries. The members of this club reconstructed the lifestyle, art, and craft of Medieval Russia.

They were crafting leather, fabric, making authentic costumes and decorations, and utensils, weapons, musical instruments. They were learning ancient languages, sang hymns and epics.

They went to different places and festivals, where members of similar clubs from other cities and even other countries gathered. They lived in tents there, cooked over a fire, danced and sang.

In this club, Boris met his new love, Nadia. She was an accountant, and used to sing old songs in a vocal ensemble in the club. She was forty years old; she was the same age as Boris.

Nevertheless, if Boris had already been experienced in family life, Nadia had never been married. She had plenty of unsuccessful love affairs in her life, as well as no children. A spark ran between Nadia and Boris immediately, and they fell in love with each other.

They started dating, spent time together in the club and outside of it, and couldn’t live without each other. Boris was in seventh heaven, it seemed to him that he had found his destiny and he soon proposed to Nadia.

However, Nadia rejected his proposal and suddenly distanced herself from him. She didn’t explain anything, just stopped talking to him, didn’t respond to his messages and calls. If they had been inseparable before, they now went home separately, not even looking at each other.

Boris didn’t know what to think. He couldn’t talk to Nadia, since she avoided him and didn’t even let him near. Darkness came into his life, as if black clouds had covered the sun forever.

A week had passed, another one, and Nadia suddenly smiled at him when they met and was the first to speak to him. Then it went on as if there had not been such alienation. She was, just as before, laughing at his jokes, taking his hand, and they were walking home together after the rehearsal at the club.

Boris decided not to try talking about it again, he was too afraid to frighten off this state of happiness, as a patient, who just got rid of his sharp pain, tries not to make any sudden moves and walks with caution, fearing that the pain may return again.

They soon went with the club to a festival of martial arts. There Nadia was inseparable with Boris, looked after him and literally fed him with her hands. Boris was happy. In that manner, two months of non-stop communication had passed.

In the days when they didn’t see each other, they were like teenagers, constantly exchanging messages. Nadia was indeed like a little girl, and Boris protected her and took care of her.

She could call him late in the evening and say: “Tell me a story!” And he wrote her fairy tales until she fell asleep…

However, that happiness didn’t last long. For no reason, Nadia distanced herself once more from him. And the avoidance and his despair began again.

Therefore, two years passed with periods of flaming passion and then of chilling cold.

Nadia used to distance herself about once in two or three months, suddenly ceasing to speak, write, call, and pushed Boris away. He used to wonder, why? Even she couldn’t explain her behaviour at that time.

“I don’t know,” she said. Boris reacted in different ways, depending on how she did it. He either tried to be near, or kept his distance and endured.

“I know now,” he told Nina, “that, in the end, it will be over… But I’m bloody afraid that one day she may never come back…”

“Have you asked her how she feels in such moments?” asked Nina. She was worried about this topic because, she too, had a similar experience with the boy and wanted to know at least something about it, even though another person’s experience.

“Nadia feels deep loneliness,” replied Boris, “and I become a stranger to her. It’s painful for her. She suffers and cries into the pillow at night…”

“What do you think, why is she doing this?” Nina asked.

“Try to understand, people used to hurt her a lot…” began Boris, “this is understandable, she’s scared, she’s scared that I’ll leave her. Besides, she was used to living alone…”

“It’s clear that nothing is clear,” thought Nina.

“But I don’t lose hope… After all, she’s my hope!” he finished.