Читать книгу Stories from Lyubavino. Chronicle of an extraordinary Incident - - Страница 4

That evening, a considerable portion of the male population of the settlement was forced to live through one of their most terrifying nightmares – a nightmare that any devoted football fan could only conjure in their most feverish dreams.

Just minutes before Zhenka stumbled upon that ill-fated cable, the television was broadcasting a football match that the settlement’s football-crazed males had been eagerly anticipating. The men, heated and intense, with a beer in one hand and dried fish in the other, were frozen before their television screens in a state of the highest possible mental tension, at times even forgetting to breathe.

Zenit was playing against Spartak, and the broadcast was at that very moment showing the match’s climactic peak. A player from one of the teams was taking a free kick from thirty-five meters out. He began his run-up from the center circle and, covering the long distance with immense, powerful strides, made an impressive wind-up with his kicking leg and, with all the passion of his footballing soul, connected solidly with the ball…

It was a curling shot… The ball spun and soared towards the goal on a trajectory known only to the two of them. The stands erupted in a frenzied roar… The supporters – both of Spartak and of Zenit – in a single, unrestrained surge, leaped from their chairs and sofas in unison with the fans from the television.

Frozen in ridiculous, contorted poses on half-bent legs, with bulging, crazed eyes and agape, twisted mouths, they were suspended in a paroxysm of rapturous ecstasy – some in anticipation of imminent victory, others in the face of inexorably looming defeat. A moment later, practically in an unconscious state, they were already completely and utterly glued to their television screens…

When suddenly, at this very (and let us not shy from the word) MEGA-DRAMATIC moment, the iron bucket of Zhenka’s excavator treacherously severed the television broadcast!

The light died in their eyes – both literally and figuratively… A sound, something between a piercing shriek and a heartrending wail of disappointment, tore from the chest of every poor soul who had jerked upright in convulsive agony before their now-darkened TV screens!

This collective cry of despair, bursting from the open windows of numerous houses, rolled like a thunderous rumble over the settlement, suddenly plunged into the darkness of night. It instilled a most unpleasant feeling in the entire “ooh-ah crew,” who were standing in utter, pitch-black silence beside the freshly severed power cable.

But this football-related disappointment was the most harmless of what was to unfold in the settlement thereafter…

And now, dear reader, we shall delve, step by step, into the abyss of the ensuing events, so as not to disrupt the integrity of the picture – so endearing, at times absurd and comical, yet so dear to the heart of every Russian. For in the place of each hero described below, any mortal could easily find themselves – including you and I…