You Have Unlocked the Memory

      An ordinary counselor's day begins with an early rise and a terrible hangover. Rolling off the top bunk and almost falling to the floor from severe dizziness, I carefully sat down on the lower bed and cried bitterly. Despite a few hours of sleep, it seems I was still drunk. The condition was so bad that I couldn't leave the room.       What are you crying about?” Katya asked, coming out of the bathroom with a towel at the shoulder.       "I'm still drunk," I said, holding my head in my hands. "I can't go out to exercise in the morning like that."       "That's right." Yesterday they dragged you like a dead woman from another counselor’s room of the neighboring squad and barely threw you up.        "It's all dimedrol wine from Vazgen," I whined. “You drink it like juice, sip by sip, and then darkness. What the hell should I do?!”       Katya got angry.       "I'm going to put a glass of water in my mouth and spit it out in your face if you don't come to your senses."       I found salvation in her threat. Removing my hands from my head, I offered my swollen face to her.       "Katya, please do it."       "You're a fool" she said, took water and pollinated me with the strongest fountain.  The icy water touched my cheeks soberly. I felt better.       "Katya, thank you!"       Nika entered the counselor's room, holding in her hands the cards of the children who needed to go for medical procedures after breakfast today. Our camp was of a sanatorium type and was located in Anapa, every year accepting children according to quotas from northern regions such as Ukhta, Norilsk or Surgut. In the north, children did not have enough sun and warmth, so their parents sent them to soak up the hot southern climate, swim in the Black Sea, sunbathe and eat plenty of ripe fruits and berries. We were put as counselors to the solyanka from Norilsk, where the youngest was six and the oldest was seventeen. Fifty active and loud children for three counselors. There were disproportionately few of us.       "My God, what are you doing?" she was surprised.        "Katya helps me sober up" I replied.       "Okay, we'll do the exercises and "cheers" ourselves, without you" Katya decided. "But this is the first and last time. So that this doesn't happen anymore."       I nodded. When they came out, I called my mom and burst into tears again, asking her to give me the secret she had learned from experience, how to sober up quickly. Despite the fact that Mom drank very little, for some reason it seemed to me that she knew. Maybe because she also worked as a counselor in her youth. After arguing and lecturing me, Mom sighed and shared.       "It's simple. Take a paracetamol pill. And it will get easier."       That's what I did. After drinking two more glasses of water and washing in a cold shower, I got dressed, put on sunglasses so that no one could see my red eyes, hid my head and half of my face with a cap with a voluminous visor, and left the counselor's room. The children were already waiting outside the canteen in a discordant and constantly crumbling row. After breakfast, half of the children went to medical procedures, others to lessons, with the third group we went and drank oxygen cocktails, and when everyone returned, we commanded:       "The twenty-second squad, change into swimsuits and get ready for the sea!"        In the southern camps, the sea was considered another medical procedure, so children had to be taken to their own beach with large canvas awnings twice a day: after breakfast and the third meal. It was mandatory to visit the beach, and the children, unless they were ill, could not refuse it. But most of the children were still very happy to splash in the salt water.       "You bathe them. I already got sick after this sea" Katya said.       I didn't mind. Of the three of us, I've been relatively healthy so far. Katya's tonsils were inflamed, and Nika had been treated for sinusitis for a week. The only thing that bothered me so far was an unpleasant cough. The sea was cold and inhospitable this year, so already in the second week of daily bathing we felt unwell. But the children didn't care.       Having barely built fifty people, I led them through the vast territory of the camp, passing an alley of roses, gushing fountains and a large amphitheater. The camp owned eighteen sports facilities, including football and volleyball courts, two swimming pools and a climbing wall. Everything was here so that the children could feel happy.       When I got to the gate, counted the children, checking that no one was lost on the way, I signed the guard's account book and gave the go-ahead to open the fence. We went out onto the hot sand, taking off our shoes, counted again and walked along the dunes, coming out onto a golden and clean beach.        Leaving the bulk of the children at the canvas awning called the "Daisy", at the whistle of the rescue sailors, I came forward and held out my hand, calling ten children to me. The change immediately took off, shouting and pushing to get into the first batch that would swim. After the second whistle, I had to go into the water at a comfortable distance, raise my hand up to show my readiness, and immediately after the third whistle, the children had to rush headlong into the water.       "The twenty-second squad, and now a creative way out!" I shouted, deciding to cheat. "Show me the snake! Grab each other by the waist and go into the water like that. If the snake breaks, you lose!"       The children loved games. And creative trips into the water, for which the rescuers then awarded them with special badges. And adults loved it when children were safe. The main job of the counselor was to trick the child into following the rules of the camp and still make them happy.         After the beach, I was completely exhausted, bringing the children and commanding everyone to go to the shower immediately. If the older children could wash themselves, then the little ones were constantly required to keep an eye on. We helped them wash their swimming trunks and hang wet clothes on high rungs, made sure that they washed their heads thoroughly, and no one got lice.        After bathing, everyone was more or less obedient at lunch, and when they came back to their rooms, they went to bed. They were not allowed to sit on the phones, and they were not allowed to talk either. The Quiet Hour was meant for rest. They were allowed to read books and draw. Here we had to fend off two misfortunes at once: the little ones constantly tried to get out of bed and make a farce, often quarreled, called each other names and started fights, and the older ones were constantly on the phones. Armed with a book, Nika walked along the corridor and read a soothing fairy tale. Taking advantage of the moment, Katya and I lay down in the counselor's room and, closing our eyes, immediately fell asleep. The counselors are the only people in the entire camp who dreamed of sleeping in the Quiet Hour.         The traditional disco with DJ and dancing came after dinner. Since we had a solyanka, we usually split up: one went to the playground with kids, the other followed the teenagers at the disco, and the third stayed in the building if some of the children decided to stay in the room. Children should never have been left unattended.       At discos, counselors usually gave their last strength, showing the children the movements of the dances learned in preparation, and also just jumping and “sausaging” in the back rows of the amphitheater, feeling a piece of free time. The most difficult thing was to gather the children after the disco. But we already had a learned scheme. When I left the stage, I raised my hand and shouted the squad number, everyone who heard me had to come up to me and join the chant, calling the rest of the squad. The children just loved to shout and participate in a little activity.        Returning to the squad, I met with the remaining Katya, who was sitting on a chair in the common squad room with a serious face, Alexander the security guard was sitting next to her, three ten–year-olds were opposite.        "What happened?" I was horrified.       "These little things escaped" Katya answered seriously. "At the moment when the food was delivered, the service gate opened, and these three ran away. They wanted to go for a walk in the city, but a juvenile police inspector caught them at the fence."       "Damn it!"  I was worried mentally. "We didn't keep track in the dark. There is also a security guard here. As long as we don't get reprimanded… How bad that is."       At the evening meeting, we sat like squeezed lemons. There were no faces on the usually cheerful counselors, charging the children around with their bursting energy. Everyone was sitting tired, sweaty, shaggy and silent. Many, leaning on their hands, were already falling asleep.       "Tomorrow is Valentine's Day theme" the senior counselor was broadcasting. "Everyone will have to use the colors of other buildings and declare their love in the evening at the event. We will prepare a small concert."       Writing down the plan for tomorrow in phone notes, I almost didn't think of anything. I was incredibly sleepy.        "Let's go to the city for shawarma after the meeting," Nika whispered to me. "Last year, just before I left, I tried shawarma with Korean carrots and dreamed about it all year."       "Sure" I replied.        The counselors' free time was just beginning. Many people bought and brought alcohol to the counselors’s rooms, someone went for a walk in the city, and others went to the beach. After eleven at night, life in the city was just starting, all establishments and shops were designed for the fact that the counselors who were released from the groundhog days would run to rest outside the camp.        But today I really wanted to sleep.