AFTER THE SHOT
A shot rang out, and the Estonian girl put down her rifle and frowned amusingly when she couldn’t find enough space for a new notch on the butt of her M-16. It was like a child’s game. For each notch, she was paid a thousand dollars, regardless of the rank of the deceased. Girls like that killed everything that moved. Often their own. The main thing is that there should be chaos, so that no one relaxes. The bullet hit me in the leg, and I crawled on, writhing in pain, while the sniper was already looking for a new victim. This time it was an old Chechen who was driving milk cans on a cart that caught her eye. The war caught a peaceful city unexpectedly. Markets and movie theaters were often open during the fighting. She pulled the trigger because she didn’t like the old man. She didn’t like old men.
I was overtaken by bandits. They tore off my cross and trampled it in the dirt, as if it was something disgusting to them. They stole my boots. My head was impaled on a stake and given to Chechen boys, who ran around the yard with it for several days, scaring the girls. My soul was restless. I wandered through the ruins of the city, mourning my torn body, leaving bare footprints in the wet snow. I don’t remember how I ended up in the broken mosque. A few tank shells had made huge, terrible holes in it, but it stood in the middle of a similarly ruined city, like a proud and defiant mountaineer in the last moments of his life. Then I heard the sounds of dhikr. It was rhythmic music pouring directly from the sky, through the shattered and sagging dome. Chechens were dancing somewhere. I saw a circle of them, as if in some kind of sacred, almost savage redemption, they were running around in this circle, holding each other’s shoulders. Sometimes they would stop and move their arms and legs in unnatural movements. Their bodies were airy, and their feet barely touched the ground. This dance exuded incredible energy. It was as if I was being sucked into this vortex, and I would have stood in this circle and run with them too, but I was uncomfortable. I was like an uninvited guest at someone else’s party. In addition, a very scary red-haired Arab was standing with his back to me, cursing at everyone as if they were small children. He was brandishing a very sharp dagger, and his speech was incomprehensible to me, I could only hear two or three Russian words. This is «cutting» and «killing». I think he was encouraging them to do some blasphemous wrong thing. And I was very glad that the Chechens did not pay any attention to him and were passionate about dancing.
Suddenly the Arab turned, and his angry grin startled me. I wanted to run, to hide behind rocks and exposed rebar, but he was already calling out to me, shaking his beard.
«Ah, Vanya, you tricked us so well,» he growled, and invited us to a table that stood against one of the walls of the mosque. On the tabletop lay the carcass of a bull, its belly slashed open and its throat slashed. Its entrails were steaming, and the poor animal was still kicking its legs in agony.
There were already several Chechens who did not want to dance dhikr. All of them had been slashed by bullets, and blood still dripped from their pale bodies, but they didn’t feel any pain or hatred for me. I recognized them and sat down next to them, waiting for something. Strangely, I didn’t hate them either.
«Allahu Akbar…» the militants I had killed suddenly threw themselves on their knees, and I followed their example.
In the bright light that flared up, I suddenly saw God. There was no doubt that it was a God, and I can’t describe it, not because of the bright light, but because of the emotions that filled my soul, after which you don’t understand anything. All I remember is that he had a white beard, soft as silk, that hung down to the ground, and we touched it with trembling fingers and kissed it with trembling lips. Animal fear permeated our unhappy souls. And there was no hiding from it. I knew that my fate depended on the severity of that gaze. A fiery sword flashed in the God’s hands. He swung it and sliced the animal into several pieces. He took the head for himself, gave the heart to the Arab, the liver to me, and the legs to the others. We felt a terrible, almost animal hunger and greedily began to eat, desperately tearing raw meat with our teeth. Blood trickled down our lips like wine at someone’s wild wedding, but I couldn’t taste it.
— You are lucky, brother, you became a shahid! the Arab whispered to me. «Here you go!»
And he gave me his terrible dagger, with which he had wanted to stab me while he was still alive. I thanked him dryly.
«The Almighty is very angry with me,» he said sadly, swallowing the bull’s heart.
— For what?» I was genuinely surprised. — You fought bravely and killed many of my comrades. And if it wasn’t for my desire for life, he would have killed me, too.
The Arab’s name was Valli. He still has a home, a wife, and a horse named McBoot in the United States. And Allah was angry that Walli hid a bank account in one of the Swiss banks from his relatives. And as the Holy Book says: it is a grave sin to be a usurer or to deal with him, because all the banks of the world belong to the God Yahweh.
The meal was coming to an end. We sated our dead stomachs, praising Allah for His bounty.
— You’re just a kid, «He smiled, patting me on the shoulder,» and you don’t even know how to chew meat with your teeth.» You’ve never even kissed a girl.
I was ashamed that everyone knew my secret. The bearded men laughed, rattling their gnawed bones on the table, but the old man’s stern gaze dampened their ardor.
— Why did you kill the Russians? The God was angry, his eyes flashing menacingly. — Didn’t I tell you that you can’t kill a man, because I give his life, and only I can take it?»
They looked down, and I began to cry.
«Go, child, in peace!» You deserve better company, «He told me, and I obeyed.
Valli came up to me and hugged me like a brother. I reciprocated. We were silent for a while.
«Good-bye,» I finally told him.
His red beard, stained with bull’s blood, tickled my face painfully.
— I’ll see you again, «he smiled,» when you know what it means to love a woman…»
«I wish I could find her,» I sighed.
«You’ll find it! Just promise me something… " and he stole a glance at the Chechens dancing dhikr.
— Stop Amina, — the Arab suddenly stammered — - She is my Chechen wife and will soon become a shahid, stupid girl…
Some heavenly force caught me and carried me away. My spirit hovered over the ice-bound swamps and the slumbering forest. When I was little, I used to wander there with my father, picking mushrooms and berries. It was winter now, but I recognized the places of my childhood. I remembered how my father had become rich, and instead of going out, I began to buy off expensive gifts, since there was no time left for me. My mother left us when I was six. My father was worried, and he blamed all his personal failures on me. Money and power have replaced love and created a chasm in our relationship. Now I flew into my parents ' house like an invisible shadow and saw my father. He was sitting in a chair in front of the fireplace, surrounded by luxury, silently leaning over the fire, trying to warm himself. He was holding my funeral card. His hands were shaking. I’d never seen tears in his eyes before, he’d never cried in front of me, and now I couldn’t bear to be around him. He didn’t know that his only son was looking at him, wanting to hug him, to tell him that he loved him. He had a bad heart and I was afraid to scare him, so I left him. But he still felt something, and he rushed to the window and shouted my name. Long and shrill. To the point of hoarseness. And I wept with him.
I used to walk along Tverskoy Boulevard before I was conscripted. It was always fun here, lovers were kissing on the benches, and I decided to take a walk here to recover a little. Suddenly someone called out to me, and I froze in disbelief.
«Who are you?» — there was a hollow voice from the monument to Sergei Yesenin.
— I am a Russian soldier who was killed in the Caucasus by a sniper’s bullet. I said.
«Have the English really not calmed down yet?» the voice sighed. — Have you seen Allah yet?»
I nodded and moved closer, careful not to trample on the red carnations at the foot of the monument.
— He let me go in peace because I’m still a child.
«Did he say ’child’?»
I nodded again. I wanted to look inside the monument.
«Children are the most amazing flowers in the universe,» the voice said sadly. «They’re like stars. There is no evil or vice in them. I would like to remain an eternal child, but I have already, unfortunately, known a woman.
— Why are you here?» I asked the stranger.
«Because I don’t want Heaven!» Give me my homeland!
And the stranger told me that he was quite happy here, but his beloved was waiting for him somewhere on the bank of some river. He suggested that I watch the monument while he went on a date with her. I agreed, and he breathed a sigh of relief, because he was afraid that in his absence, the monument would occupy the souls of the bureaucrats who constantly hang around McDonald’s. It is strange that I believed this patriot, even though I never saw his face and only heard his muffled voice.
«You, my Rasea… Ras… seya! Asian side!
And above me, a whirl of carnations shot up to the blue, blue sky.
