Alyona Gryoz - Mark Makkfein and the Find

«Равнодушие – это паралич души, преждевременная смерть».

А . П . Чехов

One day, I found a star. I was just walking home after the lecture, and I almost got my foot on some shiny thing.

I was afraid to take it with my hands, and I really didn’t want to get burned if it was hot. What if it was a cold star? It would also be very unpleasant.

I’ve never, ever held a star in my life, so I don’t know what their temperature is.

As I approached the shiny thing with my palms, I felt neither heat nor cold. Curiosity got the better of my fears, so I wanted to pick it up and study it at home.

I never would have guessed that this could be lying on the road… Taking a handkerchief and putting it on this ball-shaped miracle, I picked it up, put it in my pocket and went home.

You’re going to tell me I’m a weirdo. What’s a star in your pocket?

That’s my beautiful humor. I know perfectly well that I’m not a star. But this thing seemed curious. Since I was a kid, I’ve been making up my own fairy tales to escape this cold, dark reality… What is my reality? It’s very ordinary, it’s so ordinary, it makes me want to howl.

I live in the apartment of a two-story brick house in the center of a small Russian city. I used to live with my grandmother in this apartment, then I inherited it.

As soon as I reached 18, my grandmother passed away, leaving me alone in the whole world, I have no family, and no real friends.

It’s not that I’m not friends because I have a very strong personality, it’s just that I have some strange abilities, but I have that later…

The feeling of uselessness and loneliness has come to me today with somehow tripled strength than usual. As always, I used to walk down the streets in the evenings, getting an appetite. A walk is also very helpful for insomnia. Lately, I’ve lost my appetite and my insomnia.

But if the appetite never showed up, the walk didn’t come for nothing, I found this. What’s happening right now in my jacket pocket is freezing and heating my right side at the same time. It’s a strange sensation.

I’m afraid it’s the last time I’ve had a lecture today because I have no money left to continue my studies.

I used to moonlight as a salesman and a security guard at night. But I got fired because I was always tired, I couldn’t sleep.

You have to go to work to get some money, but you don’t have the time and energy to study, which is what this money is for. A vicious circle.

I don’t know how to handle money. I could spend two days' salary not knowing how much I spent. I think I went to a cafe a couple times. I bought food at the store for a week…

«Life went downhill», – I thought, stepping on the autumn prospectus. Thought about it until I saw the strange shine of my find. Now all I could think of was coming home and looking at this shiny ball…

Maybe the fairy tale will come true. Or maybe I’m just in the middle of a madness…

– Hello, Ma-a-ars! – there was a squeaky voice behind my back, belonging to Christina Polyakova, my neighbor.

She goes to the same university as I… studied. She’s attractive, but I can’t stand her at first sight. Stupid pretty face. And nothing more. Stupid, with bright makeup eyes, red lips on a powdered background never said anything clever, I have not heard.

Bleached, yellow hair (no personality) – not hair, but straw. For some reason tries to look older. But why? Even old ladies don’t wear that layer of powder and lipstick.

But maybe I shouldn’t say such a bad thing about her. I’m in such a bad mood today. A nice girl should be for all normal people.

I felt the heat and the cold in my right side. There was a sparkling ball in my right pocket. There was a feeling of cold and heat at the same time, and then with a triple force. Never felt that way – heat and cold at once. What if it’s dangerous? However, no, it was a sign of fate to go more away from Christine. I don’t want to look back like I didn’t hear her call, so I’m moving on, two steps from home. No, there’s that squeaky voice again.

– Mars! Hi! Are you deaf?

– Hi, – I had to stop. – How many times have I told you I’m not Mars, but Mark!

Well, now she’s gonna ask me to fix the faucet again, carry the heavy bags, help her grandmother whitewash the ceiling, walk the dog… He’s using me, like he always does. I don’t understand why she always wants something from me.

– Mars… uh… mark, do you have any organic chemistry literature?

– Are you crazy? – I’ve run out of patience, she’s the one I’ve always wanted to be rude to. – Where did my chemistry textbooks come from? I’m learning foreign languages. I don’t do chemical gibberish!

– Mark, why are you being so rude when I’m trying to talk to you? 'Cause…

– Why are you calling me Mars?! – You probably expect me to call you Venus? Never!

And why does she make me so angry?

– What a fantasy – Christina laughed. – You have manic-depressive syndrome!

– For now, I said, so I don’t have to be rude again, I don’t like her jokes. I don’t care about her diagnoses. He studies psychology and attributes new «syndromes» to me every time.

With my back turned, I walked towards my own concrete porch. And Christina’s voice is still in my ears, laughing. What’s she doing with me today?

– Your jacket is all white in the back! Ha-ha-ha! Well, as always, you’re a confused weirdo in your repertoire! Or rather, a schizoid personality! Ha-ha-ha! Look, it’s all white! Oh, I can’t! Ha-ha-ha!

– It’s funny, I believed it, she brought me to the point of boiling with her stupid ridicule. So I forgot everything. I took off my jacket and started shaking it and cleaning it. But most of all I wanted to erase my identity from Christine’s stupid head!

– Oh what is it? – She screamed (not a jacket, but a silly Polyakova).

Christina was looking at a sparkling ball rolling over a muddy, wet asphalt. Oh, hell, my find fell out of my jacket pocket. Now I can’t keep it a secret. Christina is the last person I want to share this secret with. And this lunatic’s already bent over to a sparkling ball and reaching for it with her hand.

– Don’t touch!!! – I screamed.

But the pest ignored my warning and touched the star. I rushed to her, she’s about to lose her fingers…

– Ooh, what is that? – Just saying stupid Polyakova, holding "it" in her palm.

– Give it back, why did you take it? I don’t know if "it" can be taken with my bare hands, if it’s dangerous… I wanted to take away her star. But Christina held her in her fist and pulled her hand behind her back, and I tried to grab her fingers, and I caught her hand, and…

All of a sudden, I can see everything floating around… (Don’t think of it as passion). I felt my legs falling off the ground and we were sharply thrown up. I looked down, and I saw the tops of the trees of the nearby small park being far down, and we were moving faster and faster.

Already thinking that I had gone mad, I decided to close my eyes, expecting that if I opened them again, everything would be the same. But, feeling that speed was only increasing, I opened my eyes and I saw stars and dark blue. Sky above my head and under my feet, everywhere I looked.

The closest stars were moving faster and faster. And we were all going at the speed of light. Actually, we were on a "it" flight that I found today – so small and shiny.

With all my strength, holding Christine’s hand in which she held my find, I saw her closed eyes.

I wondered if she was conscious or just decided not to look fear in the eye. In order not to get lost from each other, I had to hold both of Christine’s hands.

But what distracted me was that one of the stars was getting bigger. I swallowed, and I realized that it’s not the star that’s increasing, it’s the distance that’s decreasing.

It was very similar to the planet Earth, our birthplace, but different in color, everything was painted purple, green, pink with a golden light of some sort.

Where are we? Where are we going, like we’re on a rocket?! It’s over. We’re going to collapse. We’re going to crash in full swing, and there’ll be nothing left of us.

I felt like a rag doll. Christina’s hand slipped out of mine, but a moment later I felt her hands around my body. She held me.

Well done, Christina, now we won’t get lost. I had to follow her example and hug a hitchhiker – I had to save her. «Now we won’t get lost» – and that was the last thought at the time. I passed out…

– Mark! Mark! Wake up! Wake up!

Christina’s voice again. What does she need? She’ll be talking about her organic chemistry or manic depression! What’s on her mind? Where am I?

– What do you want from me again? – I shouted.

– You’re crazy! We’re in the middle of nowhere, and he’s resting!

It brought me back to a cruel reality. I remembered we had to crash into some planet. When I opened my eyelids, I saw the most ordinary sky – the blue, with the white fluffy clouds. «I just had a bad dream», – I thought, looking at the clear sky. Only the sun (or it is not the sun) shined softer, muffled light. My eyes would hurt if I looked at the normal sun… so it’s not the sun. I could look at that pretty, shimmering ball with no sunglasses.

After I finally got my back off the ground, I started looking like a crazy person who woke up, but was still delirious. I was sitting on the sands of a golden pink shade, behind me was the sound of waves of the sea. Christina, with her usual grin on her face, looked at me, sitting two feet away.

Beside her stood a tall man, on whom I unwittingly delayed a surprised look, which was not very polite. And to be surprised was what. There was something "different" in it that was unfamiliar to anyone from planet Earth. «Different» was dressed in something shiny, like that ill-fated thing that began this strange story with the flight.

It was some kind of strange matter, remotely like silk tissue. It sparkles even with that kind of muffled light. How would she shine under the burning sun? That robe was to a stranger’s toes. His face is covered with something white like powder, his lips are covered with bright orange, his eyes with emerald eyeliner, his eyebrows were blue, his eggplant hair fell to the waist. His hair wasn’t human at all, it was too thick, a millimeter in diameter. He had a brighter makeup than Christina, and she seemed to fade.

He was different from Earth people, or I would have mistaken him for one of the singers, there are some on our planet. But the main difference was that he had large (larger than Christina’s) eyes like a doll, which is not the case with ordinary Earth man. Eyes like ice, a cold shade of blue.

– Enjoy the day and the daylight! – Suddenly the Wonder Man said. I got on my feet, and he was a little taller than me.

– What? – I don’t understand him.

Christina came to the rescue.

– «Enjoy the day» – it means in our «Good day», – she explained, – «Enjoy the morning» – «Good morning», «Enjoy the evening» – «Good evening» also «Enjoy the night».

– Yeah, I’m glad. And you already studied all that while I was unconscious,– I said.

– I was also greeted, so I started asking questions, – and Christina smiled at me like I was flirting with her.