Sunlit oak tree

Augustine sat down on a chair and began to recall forgotten moments of life in his memory. — Small windows let some sunlight into the room. Early morning always came to me from the veil of dreams. I loved to sleep when returning from tiring violin and horse riding lessons. I loved reading books, and after the lights in the room were turned off and the servants went to rest, I would turn on the flashlight and read, read and read until about five in the morning. Only then did I go to bed. I’m already used to getting up early and walking around all day with a terrible headache. I was willing to accept that side effect of nightly reading. I had no other choice. I couldn’t give up my favorite activity and quit it. This was the only consolation for my soul, allowing me, at least for a minute or two, to forget about what I had to do every day. I remember that another favorite pastime of mine was to wake up and, completely motionless, lie in bed for about thirty, or even forty minutes. Listen to the silence of the world going on. The way the driver starts the car, the way the servants move around our house, stamping their feet, the mother sits down to have breakfast. And I also loved listening to how the two governesses assigned to me always whispered behind the door and argued about who would wake me up now, whose turn it was now. They didn’t know that I had already woken up a long time ago and could hear everything. I also loved listening to the birds jumping outside the window and the neighbor’s cat meowing outside the window. I also heard my father’s steps around the house; his steps could not be confused with anyone else — heavy, loud, clear, echoing throughout the house so that the windows rattled. And as he passed, everyone fell silent and disappeared somewhere — no one wanted to catch his eye. Everyone knows that an angry owner can fire you. My father is a retired officer with the rank, he went into business and was a rude man. Although he did not use cruelty towards me, he could have hit me for an offense or for something else. Although it didn’t come to me often from him. Now, so many years later, I understand why my father never showed me any love or at least respect. He was a man in uniform, the whole house obeyed and feared him. And no one, not even his mother, spoke to him much. My father loved to take me, when I was already grown up, to the training ground, show me weapons and explain how to use them; he also loved to take me hunting. But I was never one of those boys who was interested in this. I was always interested in something completely different. My mother’s steps, compared to my father’s, were barely audible — she moved so easily around the house, as if fluttering along its long corridors. She was fragile and meek. What was definitely in her blood was a belief in justice, although this principle did not always help her. But she never betrayed her morals. Looking back on her now, I think she has changed a lot since then. She always had lush red hair that shimmered in the light, and her mother always said that she was the daughter born of the ancient Greek sun god. Although I now understand that she was not ideal, like each of us. Behind her care there was only one thing hidden — the fear of loneliness. She understood that although her father was a retired officer, he was a sharp-tongued person. But it is unlikely that this left any imprint. Although, maybe it was left. But my parents never argued in front of me, which I was very grateful for. Probably the worst thing for a person can be that the soil on which you stand and the structure of the house in which you live suddenly collapses. But I think they understood everything. I also have a sister, she is very beautiful and looks like her mother. And there are younger ones, brother and sister. They are twins and are very friendly with each other. It’s probably hard to remember anything else. One night we were picked up and taken away from the house, and we never returned there. You know, I really wanted to return there someday and walk around those rooms again, again feel the peace that my father’s house gives us. My father was arrested and accused of treason, and all his property was sealed. I don’t know why this happened. The mother was also imprisoned; she returned completely different and took us to Austria. That’s why I came here, but everything is in order. When father came out, we completely forgot what peace was. But they couldn’t do anything about it. What happened next, I remember with great difficulty, because for me all this is covered with the shame of my conscience. Lord, how stupid and incredibly cheeky I was then! I thought then that all I could do was believe that the power was in my hands, as they told us. What could be worse for a person than blind faith in something that he does not even control, something that he does not even see? It was we who were trash and crazy to them, but then it seemed to us that we were gods, peacemakers. Ah, it’s interesting to remember the times when all this was just beginning. I remember one night I woke up from a loud scream in the street and the light of torches. The streets were dirty — they were all covered in paper, in books, in dead people. It was terrible. The crowd of madmen destroyed everything in their path; if they caught anyone, they immediately destroyed him. Everything was mixed up: laughter, fear, horror, despair, people did not know what to do. They destroyed everything and everyone. Women were dragged by the hair, and men were immediately killed. Houses and shops were set on fire. Thank God my house remained untouched. That night I experienced fear for the first time — real fear, creeping up from somewhere outside and challenging me. Saying that either you will be afraid or you will be afraid. I remembered my sisters, my brother. Their images suddenly appeared before my eyes, and I understood why I was so afraid. I was afraid for them. They lived in a dangerous place. After many years of living in fear of my father, I never wanted to experience anything like that again. I got ready, got dressed and went outside. Although it was cold, it seemed to me that it was summer outside and someone turned on the stove. I made my way through the oncoming crowd of people and could barely breathe. It was important for me to find my family. It was important for me to know that they were safe. Although at that moment I was not sure about it. I ran, tripped over dead bodies that were everywhere, but still made it to their house. The house was already on fire, and the people who ran out into the streets did not realize anything. I wanted to rush into the house, but the entrance to it was blocked, and no matter how I tried to overcome the crowd to get there, it did not allow me to pass through in a tight ring and threw me back every time. I tried again and again until I was exhausted. Someone finally pulled me away from the crowd. It was, as I later recognized him, Fritz — a man slightly older than me, he was about twenty-five, maybe twenty-six, now I don’t remember exactly. He tidied me up, took me aside and said: — Buddy, stop rushing there — can’t you see there’s a fire there? Why are you so crazy? “He looked at me with sincere misunderstanding. “People…” I said quickly. — They… Everyone who lived there, where are they? “I grabbed his jacket and said this with tears almost falling in my eyes, my tongue was tangled from the heat, and my hair was all on end. — They died. And your sisters and brother are alive. What are you as a victim? The house has been burning for an hour now. They will be taken out after they are extinguished,” Fritz said with calm in his voice. I didn’t believe him at first. I sat down on the sidewalk, breathing heavily. Fritz is next to me. I didn’t hear anything. All I could look at was the house, which was slowly crumbling into pieces and people were lying somewhere in its rubble. Many years later, looking at this, I understand that I should not have let them live alone. Only a miracle saved them. Now all that remains from those emotions is sadness. Past emotions faded away in me forever after that night. Having met the dawn on the sidewalk and feeling empty inside, I looked for a long time at the destroyed streets and broken shop windows, at the dead people. On clothes, on things thrown away in a hurry and now meaning nothing. Where are their owners? This bear lying on the street, who did it belong to? Is its owner still alive or no longer alive? That night I stopped feeling anything at all. This was the last night I was alive. *** “And you never returned to them again?” To these emotions? To these memories? “Agatha sat silently all this time and listened. Some things in her echoed Augustine’s story, some did not. She only now decided to ask him questions, worrying about their appropriateness. “No,” he whispered quietly. “I promised myself that I would never return to them again.” My life has changed too dramatically. I had the feeling that the ice I was walking on suddenly gave way beneath me and I found myself in the water. It was icy, but it seemed like you could get used to it. But I didn’t even know how to swim; no one prepared me for this. I understand now that I shouldn’t have rushed so headlong. I was fascinated by life, just like you probably are. — Turning to Agatha, he took a cigarette from her cigarette case. “I wasn’t exactly fascinated by this life. I was full of desire to prove to society and my family that I was fit for more than just getting married. At that time I was very opposed to these words and concepts. Now I know that maybe it wasn’t worth it, and maybe what was in my life might not have happened. But then I was stupid,” Agatha said sadly. Dusk was gathering outside the city. The clock struck deep night, but the two of them could not sleep. Agatha was quiet and thoughtful. Augustine too. They looked at each other, holding their gaze for a long time. Augustine was drowning in sadness; he suddenly remembered his mother, remembered everything, and now he wanted to cry like a boy. — Did you love your parents? “Agatha, having asked this question, quickly regretted it, but Augustine, scratching his chin, shook his head. — Yes. I think that if you had asked me about this before, I probably would have said no. “He warmed his hands with his breath. They became cold again. “I thought for a long time and looked for the answer within myself whether I love my father.” And the answer to that is also “yes.” I think every child loves a parent to one degree or another, no matter how good or bad he is. This is the only love that is not conditioned by external circumstances and is not subject to them. It’s unconditional love, you know? At least a mother’s love; it’s hard to say about a father’s. Although, I think that if you are very similar to him, then he gives you his love. But fathers usually question too much, unlike mothers, and prefer not to show feelings. I think this is genetic and we humans are unlikely to be able to do anything about it. “If we had met earlier, Augustine, I would have argued with you and bet that this is not so.” But now I silently agree,” Agatha giggled, remembering her own childhood. Throwing her head back and looking into the darkness, she inhaled the cold air. He sobered her up and gave her time to think, refreshing her memory one picture after another. She went through pictures of the past, which, like photographs, froze before her eyes, but now emerged one after another. — Why? — Augustine became interested. They sat half sideways to each other, and her silhouette gave off moonlight. “Probably because I didn’t know what parental love was, but everything is in order.” It’s not a very long story, but I think I have something to tell you. I grew up in the care of first one relatives, then others, passing from hand to hand, like an unwanted kitten, abandoned in the care of everyone possible and impossible. I was completely left to my own devices. I wandered the deserted city streets day and night. Often the police caught me, but I ran away from them, not wanting to obey. I was brought to one shelter, then to another, until one family, then another, took me. However, they always brought me back. I don’t know if this is good or not. Now I understand that I could have learned most of the foundations of this world if I had simply grown up in a family, and not having gone through such a difficult school of life. Many children are lucky in this regard. Its laws were explained to them, while I had to deal with myself. It was hard and unpleasant. I don’t even know what would have happened to me if I hadn’t been born with such a strong and stubborn character. My aunt, who took me from the last orphanage at the age of eight, wanted to receive the inheritance of my deceased mother. She kept asking me, an eight-year-old child, where my mother left the money. And when I didn’t answer, she beat me, so painfully that marks from her shoes remained. As a matter of fact, later, when I was already in first grade, I met another relative of mine. With my grandfather’s brother, and it was he who took me to live with him when he saw my boot marks at our first meeting. I don’t remember what year it was. For the first time I realized that I was in a very quiet place. The house to which I was brought was of average income, but furnished with special taste, warm and very well fed. We always had cookies or toffees at home. Although I behaved with restraint, I became very attached to this family. We walked a lot and spent time together. We went to the sea, to the mountains and did a lot of shopping. I remember how his brother… I called him uncle, just uncle, without a name. So, my uncle, one day he brought me such a beautiful dress, embroidered with gold threads. And then, after his arrival, I remember we ate cake and laughed. We laughed a lot. It was warm and it felt so good; I think that was the only time I felt loved. Afterwards, I don’t think I ever felt that way again. I already understand that I should have hugged them tighter when I left home. I then went to Paris to a fashion exhibition that my uncle organized for me. And this was 1933. Then I met a man who later left me. We talked a lot, walked and had fun. This was probably the first time something moved in me, and I thought it was love, but it wasn’t. He took advantage of me as best he could, and in the end I, humiliated, left Paris when I found out about that night that happened in Berlin. I remember I woke up the next morning and, as if nothing had happened, I got up and walked through the streets, bought a newspaper, and on the front page I saw burnt houses and read what happened in Berlin that night. At first I didn’t believe it, I thought that foreign journalists had “embellished it.” I quickly returned home and started calling my home address, but no one answered the phone. I took the first train that came along to the place I called home. But it turned out that there was no home. Everything was sealed. And all I could find out was that both grandfather and his wife left two weeks ago. They left me only small savings, which I lived on at first. Now I understand that he knew everything, but then I was so angry with them, I was terribly offended and looked for them, but I could not find any traces. Having arrived back, I don’t even remember how I started living again. But I wanted to get out into the world, I wanted to do something, and I got a job as an accountant in the first company. I was so alone. It seemed to me that only something more could fill the hole that had opened in my heart. I felt betrayal and anger. Slowly the emotions subsided, and I basically stopped remembering it, believing that it did not play any role at all. Now I know that it was precisely this resentment that pushed me to choose my life. Augustine listened to her attentively. Agatha forgot for a minute or two where she was and what was happening to her; she looked up to prevent tears from falling. She forgot herself and became confused — she spoke either loudly or barely audibly. Augustine himself understood that resentment against relatives can cost a person too much; besides, a person never becomes cruel without reason. Having finished her story, she looked at Augustine for a long time with a great desire to hear at least something, but he had no words. “I think it’s good that you left during this horror.” Your uncle and his wife did the right thing by not letting you participate in this. They did not accept the system of the country and left. You weren’t their daughter and might not agree with their views, so they left in silence. — Yes, maybe that was right. Why didn’t they at least let me see them off? Why didn’t they tell you where they were going? Why? Yes, I can partly find the answer to this. Maybe I would start looking for them or something. But… — No, they were afraid that if you found them, you might die yourself. I know many families who died this way. Believe me, the worst thing that can happen is when a person knows the truth, because if you know something, you have to do something with this information. Do something. A lie is not like that. The lie is quiet. Having learned the truth, a person must do something. He must either turn over someone or something, or die. This is a difficult fate. “I became cruel, and resentment forever cut off the way for me to look at them as people.” I have always seen a person’s many emotions under the shadow of his past, but I have never seen just a person as he is in general. — Hatred and resentment block access to oxygen, and you remain forever in their oblivion. These feelings are like gas: you don’t see them, but they kill you from the inside. — Is this worse than self-dislike? “This is partly what gives rise to the feeling of self-dislike, Agatha.” Besides, self-dislike is like a tumor that grows, and you don’t even know about it until it sucks all the juice out of you and until you collapse and die, which is what usually happens,” he finished. The pre-dawn hours were soon to begin. These were the most terrible hours, and Agatha and Augustine knew it very well. The quiet voice of the songs from the record began to reach their ears from somewhere above: people returned to their apartments, and someone safely turned on the music. Who else can hear it except the barely alive, who are neither here nor there, but somewhere in the middle? Augustine suddenly desperately wanted to go home to Germany, to sit with Agatha in her dilapidated apartment. He suddenly wanted to be with Agnes and Alex again, to see how Yunna and Yum had grown up and who they had become. For the first time in all this time, he wanted to go home, and not just, but instantly. He remembered the last meeting, how they drank and had fun, and then how he and Alex helped Irene drag away Arthur’s corpse. I wonder how this story ends? Agatha, seeing how Augustine was thinking, did not disturb him, understanding that now you can often meet people just sitting with glassy eyes, in whose eyes simple unspoken words were frozen. “Tell me, Agatha,” Augustine turned to the girl, still sitting with a glazed look, “have you ever wanted to go back?” “It depends on what moments we’re talking about,” she stammered. — If they’re good ones, then yes, but they’re so small that I’m afraid I simply wouldn’t fit in them, and if they’re bad ones, then no, they’re big, like black holes that suck you in. — Yes, I just thought it was time to return home. — Right now? — she said in fear. “Are you really going to leave me here alone?” “No, of course not,” said Augustine slyly. He wanted to go home, and nothing would stop him from fulfilling this desire. The sun rose slowly, illuminating the edge of the earth with its dark border. Upstairs the record stopped playing and the whole house fell silent. And Augustine and Agatha sat and breathed heavily, saying nothing to each other.