25 May 2020

Once Again a Child by Oleksandr Sainchuk

It happened in summer
when I was walking under the sun that was shining so brightly and I couldn’t help squinting, I don’t know why, but it seems to me as if the springs were closing my eyes. However, when I stepped into the shadow I could take control into my hands and open them to full amplitude. All the way I was chewing a gum with the strawberry taste, my new headphones were sitting on my ears so tight I couldn’t hear any usual noises. Everything was just beautiful. Nothing could ruin the greatness of the day, I thought. Suddenly, my mouth became over dried and throat began to burn. I stopped to take a translucent bottle of water from my bag, which I was keeping on the shoulders, then I took a sip, one more, and one more, thinking that the third time is a charm. After that I lowered the head and, closing the bottle, made a small exhale through the mouth, and while I was breathing in through the nostrils, I caught something, I couldn’t remember the origin of this scent, and neither could I see where it was coming from. At this moment I became numb and motionless, digging into my memories, I was trying to recognize this sweet and pleasant scent. I took the headphones off, but could hear nothing, neither the engines of the cars, nor people talking around me. I was concerned with the smell, mysterious smell, which, I felt, I haven’t nosed for decades, since I was 47. Then the tear dropped down from my cheek, and I found out what it was. The picture occurred in my head, in which my mom was standing next to the cook, making some delicious biscuits. Not just usual biscuits, but those, her favourite ones. One was of bear shape, another of rabbit. But I didn’t miss the taste of biscuits, no, they just kindled my memory, but the one I was crying for was my dear mother. She was 29 then, so young and so beautiful, her eyes were burning when she was looking at me, it must have been mother love. Her hair, neither long nor short, was closing the eyebrows. Her cheeks had small circles of the scarlet colour and the lips were always smiling at me. What a madcap I was those times, I thought. Suddenly, someone’s whistling woke me up and after that I got back to my real life, wiping out my tears I was going home. No, not to eat or drink, but to pack my bags. Tomorrow I’ll be eating my mother’s biscuits, but now with my own children already. And it was not an obstacle that we were living in the different countries.

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