Unnecessary pattern

      The lessons were held one after another. Dima was lying on his desk, and I was sitting and looking at him, remembering the moment in the toilet. Why did he decide to drink? For courage? Maybe out of grief that his boyfriend stayed at home? But then why was he waiting for me in the toilet? Beat up?       Why are there so many questions and so few answers?!       They tormented me for a long time, but suddenly disappeared when the bell rang from the last lesson. While I was walking down the main staircase from the second floor, I noticed Ilya out of the corner of my eye, walking alone towards the wardrobe. He was so sad that somewhere deep down I felt sorry for him.       Boys ran past me. They frolicked and played shouting something to each other. One of them, the last one, hit me without having time to slow down:        — Oh, I’m sorry, please, — he quickly rattled off and again set off after his friends.        — It’s okay, — I whispered. “They’ll leave you soon. You’ll be alone,” flashed through my mind.       After changing my shoes, I took my jacket, went outside, put on my briefcase and walked towards the house. Autumn was really very warm. I remembered the words from the song: “It doesn’t matter: look, no one cares that you’re sad today…” It really was sad.       Suddenly, I was grabbed by the hood and dragged back, and so abruptly that I didn’t even have time to react. That made me cry out and close my eyes.       — Don’t shout. Someone said in a low, feminine voice. He was very close, right over my ear. — What happened?       At that moment I opened my eyes. It was Ksyusha, my classmate, who also didn’t talk to anyone. Her freckles were laughing on her face, and her bright green eyes looked at me with such a soft and kind look, like mom’s.       — Sorry. Scared.       — Forget it. What happened?       — What are you talking about?       — Well, — she drawled a little. — Between you and Dima. Did you have a fight?       — Yes no. Everything is fine. — and there he is again. I didn’t want to think about him. Why did she remind me?! Now that moment in the toilet came back to my mind.       — Don’t lie to me!       — Why don’t you lie?! I’m telling you the truth! — escaping from her tenacious “paws”, I accelerated my pace, almost turning into a run. Even though the pain was shooting through all my muscles, I couldn’t slow down. Catch up.       -Hey! Where are you going?! — the girl shouted after him, and then there were sounds of running.       At the moment, something heavy fell on my shoulders, heavier than a backpack and those thoughts that haunted me. But why did it become so easy for me after that?       — Ha-ha-ha, — a ringing laugh was heard.       The extraordinary lightness turned into a piercing pain that enveloped the whole body. It seemed as if some crazy guitarist decided to play on the muscles of his legs and back, as if on a guitar. For some reason, it seemed to me that these were the first chords of one of the many songs by Alyona Shvets. And this damn guitarist kept playing and playing, dropping notes from his strings. His melody at one point seemed so attractive to me. I wanted to forget myself in it. It was a melody that was playing, which at one point I heard to the holes, without removing from the replay for several weeks. “Stars at 3:05”.       No matter how unusually the guitarist played his melody, there were still not enough words in it. “Today you will kill me three nights, it’s already loaded late, there are two bullets on the table, air…” — the lines flew through my head, remembering the voice and timbre. How I wanted to sing! But then the song broke off on the notes I most loved, on the last: “Today you will kill me for three nights, two corpses are lying late on the grass…”. The body was pierced by even greater pain, from all over the chest. She burned with a terrible flame, from the song of Ivan Reis “Fire”.       “Why am I remembering tracks all day today? Maybe a music lover is waking up in me again?” — a thought flashed in my head.       — What are you doing? Ksyusha exclaimed, sitting on my buttocks. I didn’t answer her. Just stayed down.       She poked me in the back. And having made malicious sounds, she got up from me, came and sat down on the asphalt next to my head. Her skirt was pulled up.       — Can you at least cover yourself, — I suggested quietly.       — Found the problem. I have tights. You won’t see anything anyway,” and in fact, she was wearing black tights that depicted a kitten’s face closer to her knees. — Moreover, as far as I know, you are not interested in women.       — What? — my heart started beating like crazy. Have I been discovered? I immediately started to get up on my hands, but again there was a sharp pain.       — What I heard. Moreover, these are only my assumptions. she continued with the brightest smile on her face. — What happened between you and Dima? And then I have no one to write fan… — she stopped abruptly, but I understood what she wanted to say.       — Fan fiction? For us? I’m begging you! I laughed, although I wanted to howl in pain.       — Well, what about it? Isn’t it?! — she probably noticed how difficult it was for me and started helping. — You were always together, on— bi…       — Gay, — I corrected her, but immediately realized what a fool I had said. I just told you about his secret…       — Even more so. He doesn’t communicate with anyone except his boyfriend, you even go to your house together.       — First of all, what about my brother? Secondly, have you been following us?       — No, — I looked at her with a sinister look. — Okay, just a little bit. — the look became even more malicious. — Okay. Watched. So what?       — So what?! I exploded. — Would you be pleased if you were stalked? — you could tell from her face that she clearly wanted to say “YES!”.       — YES! It’s so romantic! I even have one episode so spelled out! The brave knight Dimelterion begins to track down a fragile prince from a neighboring kingdom, whose name is Vladislarius. But then, one bright summer day, the prince’s kingdom is attacked by the king of the third kingdom, Hilarion. And the mighty ryts…       I cut her off on the floor with a word: — What the hell are you talking about?! What the hell is a Dimelterion? Which Hilarion? Which kingdoms?       — Medieval! What else could there be?! Isn’t that romantic?! — she shouted at me. Okay, it was really romantic, and I would have read it. But it was a fan fiction about Dima and me… Okay, who am I kidding, I wouldn’t have passed by, and I probably would have liked it.       But I stubbornly stood my ground, not giving up. So we fought for a while, but I lost and asked for the name. To which Ksyusha said that she does not publish anywhere, but only writes to the table. I was outraged. How can you hide something like that?! This is unthinkable!       So we walked for quite a long time. They reached my house. That’s where we said goodbye, and the time we spent together turned into distant memories. Which I will return to, as it turned out, every minute. The world was full of colors. He was as bright as he hadn’t been for a very long time.       The dust in the buffer zone didn’t seem so bothersome. And the greyness that was here all the time has disappeared somewhere. Wings grew on his back. They made me so light and fabulous. I was literally floating above the floor.       But when I entered the house itself, my father met me. But why? He wasn’t supposed to arrive until eight o’clock to pick me up from training. I thought, “What happened? Why did you arrive so early?” But it turned out that I asked that.        — Go to hell, — he barked and, pushing me away from the door, went out into the garage.       I remained rooted to the spot while I heard him noisily putting on his shoes and closing the door with a strong slam. Silence reigned. I walked a little into the room, put down my briefcase, hung up my jacket and stopped. Why is it so quiet? My brother should have been back by now.       — Brother? I called him in a low voice. In such silence, this question could be heard even from the most remote parts of the house from me. However, no one responded. — Brother? I repeated. A cat meowed in the distance. He jumped down from the windowsill, walked impressively towards me. Usually this did not happen, he just lay in his place, sometimes he could lift his head and look tired.       The cat came up to me and started rubbing against my legs. I squatted down and stroked fluffy. But then I immediately got up and with careful steps went inside the house, towards our room with my brother. The floor creaked softly under my feet as I stepped into a short corridor that divides into two rooms at the end: to the left — the hall — the parents' room, right — the office — the place where we did homework. Eh… I remember how my brother and I sat and pretended to do homework, but in fact we were playing sea battle.       Discarding though pleasant, but still superfluous thoughts, I turned left, lightly touched the wallpaper and noticed that the door to my brother’s room was closed. It was weird. The door was never closed, and if it was closed, it was only for Sunday airings, which did not always work. Walking into the middle of the room, I heard that someone was in it. It was clear from the rustling of the fabric on the first floor of the bed, which was never made, and on the second, too. When you get up at six o’clock in the morning, you don’t really want to bother with a sheet, blanket and pillow, and in the evening there is no point.       I listened better. There was a quiet ticking of the clock in the study, a small breeze from an open window somewhere and a rustling. So familiar. I have often heard it, but why do I not want to admit that it really is exactly what it seems to me? I took a quiet step towards the door. It turned out so silently that even I didn’t hear anything. Pressed his ear to the door and touched the bodily handle curved under the palm. The sound of rustling cloth stopped. I remember… no. Stop. Stop remembering.       I put a little pressure on the handle. She didn’t give in. The door was locked. Locked on the other side. “What’s going on?” the question rang in my head.       — Brother? I called him, then knocked lightly on the door. From the other side, the rustling was heard again, which this time was accompanied by a quiet sob. Although was there really a sob? Maybe it seemed?       Recoiling from the door, I went to the kitchen with quiet, neat steps. For the knife. It was the only thing that could solve this little problem.       When I went in there, the cat started getting in the way again, as if holding me back. He didn’t want the knife lying in the very first drawer, near the sink, under which there was a trash can in the locker (I think, like everyone in Russia). But, ignoring him, I pulled this time by the wavy silver handle, and took the first knife I came across, as it turns out later — for fish.       And again I went into the room. Why is there such tension?       Approaching the door, the knife touched the lock located just below the handle. It was arranged simply in an ugly way. The door was closed from the inside, an iron beam moved out from the side of the door, preventing it from opening. And on the side of the hall there was a washer that repeated the shape of the screw on the minus. When someone locked the room from that side, he turned a special lever, the extension mechanism worked, and the washer turned. It could be carefully turned from the side of the hall with a knife, ruler or something else.       At least I managed to get such protection from my father. I remember he clacked his teeth hard, pulling out of his wallet “extra” one hundred-twenty-five-rubles-ninety-nine kopecks. I have remembered this figure for the rest of my life.       I inserted the knife into the hollow opening in the center of the washer and turned it slowly. She gave in easily. Now I also pressed the handle. But she didn’t give in. Someone or something was holding the door on the other side. But taking into account the fact that it was forbidden to bring chairs and any other furniture into our room, as well as, in principle, into any other bedroom, under the pretext that it was very dangerous, this someone held the door.       — Brother. Dad’s gone. It’s just me. Please open it,” I asked in a plaintive tone. But there was no response. I had to push the handle a little harder. She didn’t give in. Just a little more… I listened to the click — the support fell. I opened the door.       My brother was lying on the second, my, floor of the bed, wrapped in my blanket, facing the wall. He was crying. It was clear from the heaving shoulders.       — Hey, what are you doing? — I went to the bed and wanted to touch his shoulder, as he said:       — Don’t touch me. His tone was very, very quiet, subdued.        — Please talk to me, — I asked him.       — Don’t touch me! — he screamed and hit my hands, which were very close to his shoulder.       — I believe in us, and I really do, — I began to sing in a quiet, thin voice, realizing that I was out of tune. — I can barely take it, can’t get over you, — I continued, my brother turned a little. — If you’re trying to lose me then you’re going the right way boy. — still continuing to sing, the brother began to turn around, his eyes were red. — I can’t turn back the clock, take what I got, — I jumped to the other end of the verse. — Give me everything…       — Are you trying to make me cry, — he picked up. — Stop trying cause I’m die die dying.       So we sang until the end of the song, after which he wrapped his arms around my neck and burst into tears completely. I hugged him really, really hard.       — I’m sorry I made you cry… — I sang these words, after which I lifted him out of bed and carried him towards the office, and he continued to cry and cry. My heart squeezed every time my brother sobbed and it lasted a long time. For a very long time.       When he finally calmed down, I made him wash his face. Later, my brother told me that they had a fight with dad, that he hit him. And it was all because of the grades. Because of the grades that did not reach the grades of my older brother, me. He was worse than me in school, which greatly upset Dad. They quarreled quite often, sometimes the father beat his brother.        We had a heart-to-heart talk with him. He told me everything that had happened that day. It was interesting. Then I went to the bathroom. I had to take a shower. Cold shower.       Standing under it, I had a strange unpleasant feeling. Guilt. “If I hadn’t studied so well, wouldn’t my brother have been scolded? — there were questions: Are they really going to fight like that. It’s all because of me.”       «Blame yourself?” — this voice was very loud, instantly interrupting all the others. It wasn’t like any of the million that sounded before, it was very angry and low. “What?” — this was already my personal voice. “Ha ha ha. In such a situation, people usually feel… — a strange voice quieted down for a few seconds, then added with terrible force: Guilt!” “Which one?” "In the destruction of other people’s lives! You’re a master at it!”       “What?! No. It’s not true!”       “What about your friend? You’ve not only ruined your brother’s life, but also his .”       “I wanted to help him! It wasn’t spr…”       «It’s not true! — a voice roared in my head: You were just jealous! I was very jealous and couldn’t help myself.”       My voice in my head was silent. There were no words.       «Why are you silent? Were you ashamed?! — he shouted: Shame! Very embarrassing! He was your best friend, and that’s what you turned out to be. A brawler, a bad friend, an incredible rag and a man who breaks his brother’s life. So also a faggot!”       I couldn’t argue with him. It all seemed true to me. A truth that was inescapable, with which it was impossible to argue. That was the truth I hated the most. At one point, I heard my brother crying.       «It’s not true! My brother is not like that! He is kind and good. The best brother in the world. You’re wrong! After all, he has never offended me, at least on purpose ,” my brother’s voice screamed in my head. Right after he added: “ Get the fuck out of here! “How do you know such words, little brother? I didn’t seem to teach you that.       «Fuck off, you fucking fucker!” — this voice was painfully familiar. He was so close and dear that you could say that my very body smelled of him. Dima.       The voices were momentarily silenced. There was no one. And this silence was painful. The silence made me go deaf, become invisible, faceless. “Somebody talk to me!” my voice screamed from inside. I started tearing her up myself, I shouted at her, tried to drive her away. But no one answered.       I opened my eyes, which I didn’t know when I closed. The glass walls of the shower cabin were still in front of me. The water, now icy, flowed from the watering can. When did she become so cold?       I got out of the cab, quietly closing the door. He glanced at the clock hanging over the bathroom door. The time was on them — 18:23.       There is a little more than an hour left before training.