The real story: how people become homeless. The story of the homeless man Sasha: a school teacher helped a homeless man start a new life How he lived as a homeless person read
Hello, all dear readers! I want to tell a story from the life of my classmate, with her permission, of course, yesterday she gave the go-ahead via Skype. So, 1999, we are 18 years old, we are in college, ordinary girls, like everyone else. And we had a stupid habit of walking home after partying late at night. Uzhgorod is a small town, it’s not a problem to get around on foot, the trouble is that there are idiots everywhere, unfortunately. Now, already being a 33-year-old aunt, I can’t imagine how I could roam around at night on my own, where was the instinct of self-preservation? On that fateful evening, we buzzed in Intourist, there was a night bar, a disco, we drank vodka - we drank quite a bit, to be honest. There were three of us, my friend and I had to go in one direction, but M. - in the other. We led her halfway, and then she did it herself. My friend and I successfully got home, but M. did not. The next day she didn’t come to college, well, you never know, maybe her head hurt as a result of too much drinking, I didn’t go to classes then either. There were no cell phones then to call her, so we decided to go to her house after class, and grabbed some beer and cigarettes along the way. So, we came to her, she opened the door, not herself, it was clear that something terrible had happened to the person. We went into the kitchen, opened a beer, lit a cigarette and she burst into tears. What we heard shocked us! It turns out that when we separated at night, she walked normally to her yard, but she felt bad and, sorry, she vomited, which is why she moved towards the bushes. Suddenly, some guy comes up from behind and asks, what’s wrong with you, baby? M. answered him, like, don’t you see something and turned to go into the entrance, and he grabbed her hands, held her two hands with one hand and covered her mouth with the other. M. said, choking with tears, that he stank terribly and he was dressed like a tramp, a homeless person. He dragged her into the basement, and here in Uzhgorod, damn, the roofs and basements are open, the handles on the entrance doors are broken, such idiots have somewhere to hide. So, she could not break free, alcohol also made itself felt, in a state of alcohol the concentration was reduced, she herself had problems either with stray dogs or with maniacs. In general, he raped her. After her story, we sat in silence, there were no words, we came to our senses and began to mutter some words of consolation. Slowly she returned to normal life, but at night we accompanied her home. She hid the fact of rape from her parents. Summer was approaching, exams, bustle, parties, beer, etc. So more than a month passed, when suddenly, sitting in a bar, we started talking about periods, she’s oops, girls, but I haven’t had periods for more than a month. The next day, the three of us were already at her house, a pregnancy test showed that she was pregnant. Shock. Horror. Panic. In the end, we chipped in some money, about 200 hryvnia, and she had an abortion in the city hospital, and it also turned out that that homeless man had infected her with the disease, she, the poor thing, was treated for a long time, at home she lied that the money was for this and that needed. So the parents never found out about it. But M., after these troubles, seems to have aged five years. After college, she got married, gave birth to a son, but her husband left her two years later, she started drinking, we talked, and now I keep in touch with her, although many of our mutual friends do not communicate with her, citing the fact that she drinks . Drinks or doesn't drink, what's the difference? Everyone has their own destiny. A childhood friend after all, and we went through a lot together. The conclusion from this sad story is this: girls, be careful, be attentive, otherwise such carelessness or stupidity can ruin your whole life, as happened with M. Thank you, dear ones, for reading, I wish you all good luck!
A homeless man named Boris no longer remembers how long he has been living on the street. The closest person in his life was his brother, but he died, and he doesn’t want to live with his grandfather. We met him completely by chance: he came up, lit a cigarette and began to tell how he had recently met a transsexual Sasha, who took him to a hotel, and after the date bought him a phone and new clothes. We wanted to hear other stories and Borya gladly told us about his life.
I feel embarrassed when I ask for money. You know, alcohol helps me in this sense. And I don't like to drink. Well, I smoke - I smoke. But I don’t like to drink.
I started being homeless, one might say, at the age of 13. I am an orphan, I studied in a boarding school for mentally retarded children. When the teachers started beating me, I began to run away to spend the night at the Kursky Station. So I felt my fate, how bad it was. I have relatives, they live in Saratov. I don't know them well enough. There is also a great-uncle, I lived with him for some time, but then we quarreled. He is a creature. He wanted me to do renovations in his apartment for a thousand rubles. But I said, I don’t want it - it’s too cheap.
I was after the hospital then - I couldn’t strain myself, carrying these bags full of cement. And this is how I ended up in the hospital. Here, at the station, two people came up to me and sprayed nerve gas in my face, and started cutting me in the stomach and groin. I ran away from them, ran out onto the road, onto the highway, the Garden Ring. I decided to run away from them and got hit by a car. My knee was knocked out, my whole leg was in a cast. I don't know why they did this. Maybe they wanted to take my backpack?
I last saw my grandfather three months ago. If I return to him, he will be very angry with me because I did not help him do the repairs. He will remind me of this matter. He’ll just grumble all the time and say, when he gets drunk in the evening: “You’re Boris, you’re a bastard.” And he drinks every day. He drinks Putinka. Who wants to listen to his nerves? I would rather be far away from him than live next to him. Right? And that year I made gardens for him, dug them up. I used to go to see him sometimes, but now I’ve stopped. He starts to fuck my brains when he's angry. I can’t watch TV, I can’t watch the movies I want. And because of this, I don’t want to be around him. I can be homeless on the street.
I even lived one winter outside, two years ago. This is where the tent used to stand, but then Sobyanin removed it. Sobyanin banned all tents. And then I could go to the tent and a friend would give me beer for free. I stood all night, stood on the street. During the day I slept either in the subway or at the station. And so, I just didn’t sleep. I just caught up with beer, “Hunting”. Or I drank coffee.
And this winter I lived in the Center for the Transfiguration of Russia. So I visited them in Tula, in Ryazan. This is purely a center for homeless people and drug addicts, yes. Alcoholics and drug addicts. You can live and work for them for free. And they feed you for it.
Just imagine, I had three rooms, and now I’m homeless. Three rooms, in a communal apartment. I sold the first one because I wanted to open my own business. She was on Vykhino, on Veshnyakovskaya Street. 10 and a half meters, I got it from the boarding school. And I sold it for 650 thousand rubles to open a business. We wanted to make ice cream. I agreed with my brother that we will be businessmen. He said - come on. If anything happens, he says, I’ll put you in my room.
We rented a basement on Razgulev. They wanted to open an ice cream production shop there, but it didn’t work out. He went bankrupt. You know, inflation was there in 1996. I had to sell all the equipment back, throw all the people I hired out onto the street.
My brother worked at a factory as a milling machine operator. He was actually poor, God punished him because he sinned a little. Oh, how I felt sorry for him. Not once, I don’t want to say this, have I ever been fucked. I’ve never even gotten laid, can you imagine? He had no phalanges. His foreman shouted, but he was drunk, and his fingers were cut off. He was given the first group.
He once told me, “Introduce me to those with whom you communicate, bring them home.” Then I worked as a realtor, earning about a hundred dollars a day. I could afford to go to a club, I could buy myself things, jeans. I went to the disco in “Chance” on Ilyich Square, there was a nice aquarium with big fish: on Fridays people swam naked there, and everyone looked at them. Can you imagine? Basically, all sorts of blue people came there. There were both girls and boys, but mostly gay.
In “Chance” I met one guy, his name was Andrey. At first I gave him fifty rubles for vodka. And he suggested that I invite him to spend the night with me, like he’ll give it to me. Well, I took it and brought him to my brother. We bought two bottles of vodka, “Three Bogatyrs”, a cheap one that used to be sold, and snacks. Bread, a little sausage and that's it.
We arrived, and at my house there were two more bottles on the table. And that evening my brother drank too much and died. I wake up in the morning and think, why doesn’t he snore? He usually snores, especially when he's blue. I push this one, who came with me. And he ran around the apartment like a dog, he didn’t know what to do. I tell him, go to the neighbors, call, call an ambulance. I called and called. She arrived. And he says: “Excuse me, Boris, I’m running away now. I’ll have to go on business, see you at the disco.” And he left. Well, aren't you a bastard? I'm sad, but he ran away.
And they kicked me out of the room where my brother lived. The neighbor got everything. There were new sofas and wardrobes, his grandmother bought them for him. Everything went to the neighbor, can you imagine? All things that were acquired were acquired with great difficulty.
After my brother’s death, I stuck around for a year. He lived in Tsaritsino and rented a room there. The woman who I brought into my room offered to fuck me. I refused the first time, and then I agreed. I liked fucking under the screw. I could fuck the woman for an hour. I could also solve large crossword puzzles and guess words in them that I didn’t know. And be relaxed. I could work like a dog and not get tired, it was good.
I don’t want him anymore, he gets on people’s nerves and attracts people. For some reason I began to be afraid of the police under the screw - but I had never been afraid before. I began to fear that I would be caught.
I taught myself how to cook screw, they even called me “professor” for my skill. I will make a screw out of any ephedrine, as long as there is ephedrine. Need acid, alkali. I went to Lubyanka to get the components.
Previously, a friend used to smear me, and then I started it myself - and overdosed. It started to seem like glitches to me. I see cockroaches crawling out of all the cracks towards me, flying, crawling. They fly and land on your face, hitting you in the eyes. At first I waved them off with my hands, then I had to run away.
I jumped out of the window in the kitchen - thank God it was on the first floor. I went to the sanitary and epidemiological station and told them that the Chechens had planted cockroaches in my window. An ambulance and the police arrived - it’s good that I was in the yard at that time.
I decided not to return home and went to a friend. I’m on the subway, and there’s a little witch on a string, and cockroaches are crawling around me. I crush them with my feet and say get out of here, get out of here. I come to a friend and say: “Seryoga, cross me, please. I see cockroaches everywhere, some kind of devilish obsession.” He crossed himself, but five minutes later it all started again. I felt so bad, I suffered for five days. I thought I was going to die. And Seryoga thought I was crazy.
Then I had another overdose. Well, I was hooked, I wanted to fuck. I picked up the naked card and wanted to jerk off. I'm holding this card, a naked woman. Do you know which one? Queen of Spades. Can you imagine? I’m holding the Queen of Spades, naked, with tits, and I want to jerk off. And then I pass out.
First I found myself in a black basement and there were forty women there, all naked. And I fuck everyone in turn. Then, I’m tired, I don’t want to fuck them anymore, and I run away from them, they follow me. Forty naked women are running after me, everyone wants me. I run into the room, there is a table there, covered with all sorts of dishes that I want. There are grilled chickens, all sorts of wines. And there stands a huge man, three meters tall, long, white hair. I realized that it was the devil, his name was Asiel. And he tells me: “Boris, stay here.” I say I won't stay. For some reason I wanted to go outside. I had some kind of premonition, intuition. And he answered me, if you don’t want to eat what’s on the table, then leave. I went out and woke up immediately.
P.S. When Borya finished talking about the overdose, the police arrived. We insisted that the empty bottle of beer standing on the bench near the playground could under no circumstances belong to us. As a result of the discussion, only one of us was taken to the department. Borya continued his story, but after a while a second patrol arrived. By this point, it was already difficult to talk to Boris, and we decided to part ways, handing him two hundred rubles.
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MOSKVICH
I personally knew two people who became homeless. One, a former military man who was a regular at jingoistic rallies, simply got drunk and stopped working, after which he was quickly thrown out onto the street by his next wife. The second is a special case. This one, being already mentally not very healthy by nature, cleverly mimicked for many years. Having rejected military service under the so-called “Kroese”, having received a basic higher education in the humanities (Institute of History and Archives) and not having worked a day in his specialty (“to sneeze like paper dust!”), bought somewhere a fake second diploma in the so-called. "psychology". Having failed to get a decent job with two higher (!) ones and categorically not wanting to work hard, I took up the so-called. "tea business", which consisted of the following. Purchasing, in his own words, not from resellers (like everyone else), but from “the suppliers themselves,” i.e., directly from Chinese village farms specializing in growing tea, the so-called “elite” varieties, he rented them in the capital a couple of small rooms, calling the whole dubious establishment “LLC”. For several years (in his own words - as many as 11), without much success he tried to sell these “collection” teas to visitors in small portions in bags, costing 1,000-8,000 rubles per 100 grams (this is not a joke!). In response to the cautious remarks of former classmates at the institute, who hinted that prices should be lowered so that people would buy more often, he categorically replied that all this was “marginal talk”, characteristic of “social infantiles” and “losers”, and for him, for the “brown one,” the tea is “not simple, but golden,” i.e., “exclusive,” selected. I think everyone knows how many tea boutiques and shops there are in Moscow. And is it necessary to explain that over the course of literally a couple of years, colossal debts accumulated for rent, tax, etc. Having borrowed several million rubles and several tens of thousands of bucks from classmates, relatives, acquaintances and simply “suckers”, in the end I went broke finally. To top off all the troubles, as many “Russian” would-be businessmen do, he prudently transferred his “birthmarks” to his wife (so that they would not be arrested by collectors). The latter, making sure that he was a complete m...c and, among other things, was cheating on her with another, quickly threw the “tea expert” out onto the street. Now the former “General Director of LLC” is hiding somewhere in distant frosty Yakutia, shamelessly “fucking” everyone he knows on the Internet, with persistent requests to “urgently transfer” to him, “offended” and “deceived,” 10,000 - 20,000 rubles , and “even better in dollars.” They say that now he is a homeless person, starving and cold, who was “robbed” and kicked out by “unkind people.” Think about it, all this is not about an illiterate visiting gypsy from the “nezamozhnye”, but about a non-drinker (!) Russian Muscovite - with two diplomas of higher education! In distant Yakutsk, the “humiliated” man also had his fingers frozen (they were exposed to 50-degree frost for non-payment?), and now he is disabled! But to obtain disability legally, you also need time, money, and most importantly, regular care and housing. And, of course, for all these misfortunes of the “masters of the tea ceremony” (as these idiots call themselves on the Internet), literally everyone is “to blame”: presidents (Russian, American, Ukrainian, Chinese), prime minister, head of the national bank, minister of finance, Federal Tax Service , the bailiff service, the late Yeltsin, the living Gorbachev, the “insidious” Jews (who, by the way, mostly gave him loans - from Russians, Tatars and crests with Belarusians - there was simply nothing to give), the “world behind the scenes”, etc. ., etc. And, meanwhile, none of this would have happened if official permission for IPD had been given to us not for bribes, but only after a thorough medical examination of each such overly “enterprising” citizen, and also introduced legislative restrictions on prices set in the trade of at least food products. And this “cunning-ass Vasya” worked somewhere in a factory or in the housing and communal services sector - exclusively for the amount in “wooden” money that his own stupidity or schizophrenia was valued at!
Vsevolod Koshelev, 48 years old
Who was: homeless
Who did you become?: administrator at the social adaptation center
About loss of housing
I was born in Moscow, graduated from school and medical school here. After completing my placement, I worked in intensive care for 4 months and then joined the army. Changed several jobs. I was even married for two years after the army, but I chalk it up to hormones.
I lived in an ordinary area, on Aviamotornaya, the house was nice, old, maybe even Stalinist. I occupied one room in a communal apartment. Feasts happened rarely, but they still happened. Once during a party, the thought occurred to me: shouldn’t I exchange my room for another, smaller and worse one, but with an additional payment? The drinking buddies were not my colleagues, just acquaintances. We met one day and decided that we could go for a drink. They also offered their help in exchanging the room. I was in such a state that it didn’t matter to me what I signed, as long as all this fuss with documents would end soon. As a result, I'm nowhere.
There were friends and relatives, but it was a shame to turn to them for help.
About life on the street
Former Muscovites who have become homeless prefer to live in the place where they once had housing. Probably, this is the desire of any person - to bring back good memories, at least by staying in the same place. I lived in the places where I once lived.
I spent six years on the street. The entrances and basements were not yet closed then, so there were no problems with overnight stays. I was never kicked out of the entrances, except that a couple of times they said: “Listen, don’t sleep here anymore.” Every day in the afternoon I began to feel some tension: if I was of sound mind, I would begin to work out options for where I would go at night. But this is only in the cold season; in the summer there are plenty of lawns.
I never sat in crowded places, I didn’t go to parks during holidays, I didn’t bother anyone. That’s why the police never took me away. We can say that I didn’t touch it at all, except for the time when there were still special detention centers. At the very beginning of my homelessness, I checked into special detention centers 4 times. I spent 8 days in one, 30 days in the others. They are detained there only until their identity is established. I didn’t have a passport then; it sunk into oblivion along with the apartment.
It was not difficult to make money. At any market, you come early in the morning and help the seller set up a tent, then unload the goods there. It will be good if you agree that you will remove this tent in the evening. And it’s very good if you don’t deceive. Then the seller begins to get used to you. This results in a more or less stable income.
For one and a half of these six years I worked as a janitor. There was only one person with the documents, and I was the one working. Then I had income every morning, because I also shook everything out of garbage containers. All the beer bottles were mine. Every morning I was full and drunk after returning the glass containers. Department stores throw out expired but still good food in the morning. Our citizens are correct, and they often hang good clothes that do not fit them, and there is no one to give them to, on the fences of garbage containers. I walked around in the morning - you can update your entire wardrobe.
About the social center
At the very beginning of my homelessness, when I ended up in a special detention center, the director of the center for social adaptation (at that time it was still called a night stay house) came there and told me about this center. But at that time I worked as a janitor, I had a furnished basement, and I was not going to change anything in my life according to the principle “no matter how bad it gets.” If I leave, I will lose my permanent income, not only monthly in the form of salary and advance payment, but also daily in the form of glass containers. I would exchange permanent housing for who knows what. That’s why I didn’t go to the center then, but did so 5 years later. I was just tired of hanging out, being nowhere and no one.
Once on the subway I saw an advertisement - a large poster with information about social adaptation centers, I chose one of them and went there. This was the Lyublino center. I briefly told my story during the shift: I was deceived several years ago, I am a Muscovite, but there is no housing. I was sent to the emergency department and processed. You could say that’s when I stopped being homeless.
At the center they provide a bed with bed linen and allow you to wash. They helped me restore my passport. They simply offered me help with finding a job, but I wasn’t afraid of work - I went to grind bearings at the factory. Then he quit the factory, switched from bearings to a broom: he began working at the Lyublino social adaptation center as a janitor.
One day I was sweeping the area and saw that they had brought a car with a logo, and out came a man who had already been working in social patrol for two years by that time, collecting homeless people around the city. I talked to him and for some reason decided that it was mine. And not because of the salary, although it was higher than that of a janitor. I just understood what it’s like for those who end up on the street. I passed the interview and began working in social patrol.
I met my wife at the Lyublino center. She is the same poor fellow as me, also a victim of scammers, only her husband turned out to be a scammer. I also ended up in Lyublino and worked in the social patrol. We have been living together for 13 years; we officially registered our marriage 7 years ago.
About work
At first I worked in social patrol. We traveled around the city, identified homeless people, and motivated them to change their lifestyle. I rarely told them that I myself lived on the street and knew about it firsthand. This argument works for homeless people, but only when the person trusts you completely.
Now I have moved to work at an emergency social assistance center. It is close to Three Station Square, where many homeless people are known to congregate. First of all, you can eat at the point. This area was created and developed so that public organizations could bring food here and feed the homeless. These are mainly religious organizations: there are Orthodox, Catholic, and members of the Russian Union of Christians of the Evangelical Faith (Pentecostals). It doesn’t matter to them what religion a person is, they feed everyone.
Closer to winter, a heat gun is placed here for heating. At the point you can get advice from a lawyer, psychologist and employment specialist. We also have intellectual games - checkers, chess, dominoes. Film shows are held on Saturdays and Sundays. Most of all, homeless people love old Soviet cinema: “Beware of the Car,” “Soldier Ivan Brovkin,” “Ivan Brovkin in the Virgin Lands.”
The point has been standing for two years now, and I have been working for almost two years. Although I call myself an administrator, I am essentially a social worker. My job responsibilities include more than 20 items. If we exclude everything that I am obliged to do as a citizen (call an ambulance for those in need, the police if I notice an offense), everything else fits into literally two points. This means talking to people and transferring those in need to the mobile social patrol service. Conducting surveys of homeless people, consulting, explaining - I simply call all this “talking to people.” During the whole time, two or three people came and said: “I work, I live in a hostel, I just came to say thank you for explaining everything.”
Now I receive a salary sufficient for independent living, and I rent an apartment. I never had my own home and never will. I won’t be able to earn money, I won’t be able to get a mortgage.
About other homeless people
These people are initially determined to never trust anyone, because they were all once deceived by someone, otherwise they would not be on the street. If Muscovites try to live where they once had housing, then nonresidents gather near train stations. They come to work full of bright hopes, and most often it is at the station that these hopes are dashed for them.
Some have been scammed about their housing, and most of those who come to the aid station have been scammed about their jobs. As usually happens: I came from the region, they promised a stable income, but in reality it turns out that this is just a recruiting agency, which still needs to be paid in order for them to get a job. There are also those who came to Moscow, at the station someone offered to drink beer, they went and drank, and woke up without money or documents. He tries to get a job without a passport, negotiates verbally, but, naturally, he is not paid. This is the most standard story. The employer says: “So, we won’t register yet, let’s see how you work.” A person works and works, sometimes he gets some money for food and cigarettes, and then he is kicked out. Such people do not want to return home because they are ashamed: they wanted to provide for their family, but they will also come without a passport, if they manage to get there without documents at all.
A minority end up on the street due to family problems. They go to Moscow because they want, if not a beautiful, then at least a separate life. Someone is kicked out of the house.
One day I found a homeless Pole on the street. He is a highly qualified builder, he came with a company under a contract, they built one thing, then another. One day he saw a Russian woman, fell in love, poor fellow, and did not return with his company, he remained in Moscow. The visa had expired, and this woman stopped liking him after some time, and she kicked him out. The Pole, like all men, began to treat this case with alcohol and homelessness. It all ended with a happy ending. I took this Pole to the consulate. The consul was very surprised that a Russian government organization brought a citizen of his country to him. Out of surprise, he allocated him a room in the hotel. Then they bought him a ticket home. He returned to his homeland, earned something, and is now preparing to retire. I sometimes correspond with him on the Internet.
There are also those who like to live on the street. There is no way to come to an agreement with them. There is nothing you can do to convince them, because they have already convinced themselves long ago. They enjoy this imaginary freedom from obligations to someone. But you cannot be free from society and at the same time demand something from it.
I learned about “professional homeless” back in 1997. I was selling newspapers in the square and noticed that they were gathering nearby in the passage. Since then, I have remembered one expression from their slang - “spread over.” This means “change into work clothes or back.” Many homeless people can be suspected of professional begging, but this is very difficult to prove. Such people refuse any help from social services. Begging is an administrative article.
The story is real, telling about some moments from the life of a man who currently has the status of a homeless person, but who was once a completely successful Muscovite, with good living space, high-status parents and a beautiful ancient surname, indicating that his ancestors belonged to a princely family (the surname is in the title slightly changed).
He became homeless according to a well-known scheme: his business partners set him up and asked him to take the blame on himself in order to get by with “little bloodshed,” while guaranteeing full support and financial compensation upon his release from prison. Well, it’s not worth writing about the fact that he was released with only a clear conscience. I lost everything, including my apartment in Moscow. I tried to start life from scratch, but I was so overwhelmed by resentment at my unfair fate that I started drinking. After much wandering, I made a little sense of my life and found a job as a 24-hour watchman, for pennies, free lunches and a small corner in a trailer cabin in an industrial area. The conditions suited him, and they suited his owner even more, who found a 24-hour worker for a minimum wage, so Andreika was sometimes allowed to abuse. Over time, the abuse took on a very serious form, but the boss, feeling sorry for the person the whole team liked and offended by fate, did not kick him out.
One day Andrei came to my colleague, who fed him and gave him his old things. Completely sober, which raised many questions from a friend. And this is what Andrey told him. Now on his behalf, it will be convenient.
“The boss refused to pay me because I practically didn’t do my job. But he didn’t kick me out of the trailer, and even fed me. I drank while I had some money, then while my friends lent me money, then I started begging on trains and also drank. But, at one fine moment, all resources ran out, and I decided to quit. I haven't drunk for a week. It was breaking and shaking, but he survived and thought that he had completely let go. And so I sit during the day in my closet, opposite the TV, next to the TV there is a chair. I turned away for a cigarette, I turned around, and there was a man in the chair. Well-groomed, sleek, boots shine like a mirror, black coat, expensive. Outwardly he looks very much like Ivan Urgant, he smokes so arrogantly. I ask him: “How did you get here?” And he answers me: “Can you see me?” and already towards “Hey guys, he sees me!” And then something unimaginable began. Some people started walking past me. They entered through the door and exited through the window. And everyone giggled so disgustingly, pointed at me and said: “Yeah, you see us!” These were men and old aunts and grandmothers. I sat and was afraid to move. And Urgant says: “We are watching you, Andreika!”
And suddenly everything disappeared, once, and there was no one. I was happy, I thought, well, this must be a dream, but just in case, I went to check if the door and window were closed. The door was closed, the window too, but outside the window, on a tree, they were sitting, all those people who had just passed by my eyes. And they also giggled and said laughing: “He sees, he sees us!” I couldn’t stand it and ran out of the trailer, ran up to the tree, started shouting at them to get out, and they, laughing, started throwing branches from the tree at me. I ran into the trailer, grabbed the phone and ran away from there. Having run away a little, I called a friend and asked him to pick me up and put me in the hospital, because I assumed that not everything was okay with my psyche, it had malfunctioned. We agreed to meet on a suburban railway platform. I ran there, saw a friend in the crowd, tried to approach him, but on the way I came across a woman with a string bag on wheels. I try to get around her, but she doesn’t let me, I go to the side and she goes there too. I had to take her by the shoulders and move her away: “Mother, why are you spinning around under your feet, there’s no way you can get around.” I approached my friend, and he asked me: “What kind of body movements are you making?” I say that, they say, the grandmother got under her feet, there’s no way around her, there’s no way around her. And he said to me: “What kind of grandmother?” I turn around, the grandmother is standing, looking at me sarcastically. I point it out to a friend, and there it is. And he twists it at his temple: “Andryukha, what are you doing? What kind of grandma? I turn to her, and she: “Do you see me?” and shout: “He sees, he sees!” And then people from the crowd started pointing their fingers at me and again the same words with a malicious laugh: “He sees, he sees!” I try to fight them off, I run, I shout to my friend: “Run, follow me, hide from them!” But my friend, seeing that I was completely out of my mind, got scared and ran away from me.
I got desperate, sat down on the platform, and began to think about what to do next. It was already evening and it was getting dark. And I decided to return to my trailer. When I arrived, everything seemed quiet. There is no one. I sat down and started watching TV. And then there was a knock on the door and at the same time on the window. I looked out the window, and there the Urgant smiled and said that they will come for you tonight, Andrey, wait for us. I started rushing around the room, and through the window I saw that people were already gathering in the tree. And then a scrap from a magazine caught my eye, and there was an image of the Virgin Mary. I grabbed this scrap, fell to my knees and started screaming, I don’t know the prayers, but in my own words, I ask you to protect me. And as soon as I finish screaming, this evil spirit flies up to the windows and knocks. I begin to ask the Mother of God for protection, so they fly away from the window and watch from the side.
I don’t remember how much time has passed, but I see a woman in my room, beautiful, wearing a headscarf, standing and saying to me: “Why, Andrey, will I help you? You behave badly, you drink, you don’t value your life, you don’t know prayers, you don’t believe in God or the devil. Decide in life what you need.” And she disappeared. I began to swear that I would improve, that I would find the strength to get out of alcohol addiction. How to decide? With what? As I understand it, it’s either to hell or to God. Those outside the window scared me, so I began to assure that if only all this ended well, I would go to church, try to pray, just give me a chance!
I screamed and cried for a long time, I didn’t notice how morning had come. And it’s light right away, and no Urgant. Well, I think I’ll see it when I’m drunk. Of course, I didn’t go anywhere, I fell asleep. Everything seemed calm, I slept until the evening. In the evening I took my place in front of the TV again. At first everything was fine, but then Urgant came again. He sits and smokes. Beautiful, fashionable, shoes polished again to a shine. I remembered that he reacted when he found out that I saw him, and I decided to sit quietly and not show that I saw anything. For three days this “Urgant” sat there, watching me, I stubbornly pretended that I was watching TV. On the fourth day the Urgant disappeared. By that time I had gone to church and tried to find out all the rules of believers. Now everything is calm, I don’t drink at all until I feel like it. He took a vow of sobriety to himself in front of the icons.
Andrei finished the story here. This story could have ended, but it had a continuation.
So to speak, the second part of the famous ballet:
Andrey didn’t drink for a long time, almost a year, but he said that fate kept tempting him for a glass. Once I was tempted. This was exactly a year after the first damn visits. Andrei broke down and drank for a week, wandering around unknown homeless places. And one day, returning home at night, he was hit by a train. This happened at 04:00-05:00 in the morning, and my colleague was driving to work at 08:00 in the morning and saw Andrei lying in the bushes. He was alive, but unconscious. The right side was torn and internal organs were visible, all in the ground and grass. A colleague called an ambulance, they arrived, but began to disdain to take the dirty and drunk homeless man into the car. They had to make a scandal, to which the orderlies, assuring that the poor fellow had only a few minutes left to live and that it was necessary to call not them, but a corpse truck, suggested that their colleague drag Andrei onto the stretcher himself. He did not refuse and, with the help of a man passing by, tried to shift Andrei from the ground to a stretcher. And then Andrei came to his senses and said: “They gave me the last chance, please, I hid money in my trailer, I saved it for a year, I really need to go to the Ivanovo region to the monastery, I saved for this, but I lost it, started drinking, save it my money, and I know that I will survive now.” When leaving, the paramedic from the ambulance gave his directions and said that Andrei was dead, there was a lot of blood loss, a rupture of the liver and, on top of that, infection of the body due to the earth that got inside. However, an operation was performed, after which Andrei recovered surprisingly quickly. He had almost no fever, which is usually present in post-operative patients; the doctors called this recovery nothing less than a miracle, assuring that with such injuries one would die almost immediately. He was soon discharged. What happened to him this time, and who gave him another chance, Andrei did not discuss. My colleagues supported him with food and medicine for some time and, when he was fully recovered, they took him to a monastery in the Ivanovo region, where a perspicacious elder lives. Andrey is now in this monastery. Half year already. So far nothing is known about his fate, but my colleagues go there sometimes, and are planning a trip in the near future, and if anything is known, I will definitely write.
P.S: Do not try to suspect religious propaganda in what you read. I know that stories that involve such topics as the monastery, prayers and God are subject to similar attacks. I stated everything as it happened. I believe in what I believe in. What others believe doesn’t matter to me. If only they remained PEOPLE at the same time.
Golden sparks of morning light fell on the first snow that had fallen at night and it lit up and sparkled with myriads of small flashes, blinding everything around it. Each snowflake was unusual and beautiful in its own way, emitting its own special wonderful light, bewitching and attractive. But this splendor will not remain for long. In a few hours, the awakened city will trample it into slush with millions of feet and car tires, smearing it with brown mud across the sidewalks and squares.
Troshka was an ordinary homeless person, a tramp, of which there are many on the streets of Moscow. Every morning he got out of the basement or barn where God had vouchsafed him to spend the night and went to beg or collect bottles on the street, dragging his simple belongings with him. Kuzya, a yellow-gray dog of an unknown breed, could always be seen with him.
Troshka found Kuzya several years ago when, fleeing the cold, he wandered into the entrance of a residential building. The tramp crawled under the stairs and fell asleep there, wrapped in a blanket, and the next morning he noticed that a puppy had perched next to him, snoring, curled up on his chest. “Oh, you fool! Well, if he came himself, apparently now you and I will have to grieve together,” Troshka thought and took the dog with him. When he picked up Kuzya in his arms, he suddenly noticed that a small keychain was tied to his neck.
“Look at the medal! And the dog is purebred! Maybe even some rare breed!” - the tramp was in his seventies and his eyes were no longer the same, he could not see what was written on the label, and so he simply wrapped it in a scarf and carefully put it in his pocket.
Since then, Kuzya accompanied him everywhere. He turned out to be unpretentious and quickly got used to a wandering life. Troshka taught him different commands and the dog even helped the tramp collect bottles. True, he often cheated - instead of glass beer bottles, he brought plastic soda bottles, which cost absolutely nothing.
Troshka never hit his pet, but he told him something like that, that the dog would tuck its tail between its legs and run away in search of the “right” bottle. - Well, he’s a real homeless person, no matter what. “Just look at how carefully he handles the container,” joked Troshka’s friends, who were just as homeless as he was.
Troshka was offended by this: “Well, what a homeless person he is! He's purebred! He also has a medal, if you want to know! He and I will still take first places at exhibitions!” And if the debaters did not subside, Troshka would take his handkerchief out of his pocket and slowly unfold it for effect, showing the public the dog’s “medal.” One evening Kuzya did not return. And he showed up only the next day. The delighted Troshka rushed to his pet, but noticed that something was wrong with the dog.
The dog hobbled dejectedly, leaning to the left. Troshka rushed to him and was horrified: the dog’s entire side was scalded - the hair on it had almost completely come out and stuck out from the reddened meat only in rare tufts.
“Lord, who are you?” - Troshka shouted and fussed, “What is this? How can this happen? He ran up to the dog and took her in his arms. Apparently Kuza was in a lot of pain, because he whined. But at the same time he did not growl, but quietly licked his owner’s face, either comforting or encouraging him.
“Comrade policeman! Where is the hospital for animals? - Troshka rushed to the guard. He muttered something through his teeth and stared at the ground, as if not noticing the person standing in front of him. “Well, where is it?” the tramp insisted. Without waiting for an answer, he turned to the first passerby he came across, then to another. Finally they showed it to him.
Troshka flew into the waiting room of the veterinary clinic, holding the dog in his arms. People, seeing him in dirty, tattered rags, in holey, long-worn shoes and more than once darned pants with bulging knees, holding a mutilated dog in his arms, recoiled to the sides, stood near the walls so as not to accidentally get dirty, not to get dirty on him, but He, not noticing anyone, burst into the surgeon's office. - Look, what's wrong with the dog!
- Don’t fuss, citizen, don’t fuss! What's happened? – the doctor looked up from the paper. “Lord, how are you...how did they even let you in here?” Who it? – he suddenly wheezed.
-Wait! Well, wait! Well doctor! - Troshka began to lament humiliatingly. - Yes, this is not an ordinary dog! She's not mine!
-Whose is it?
- Well, I found her in the entrance. But she’s purebred,” he quickly began to assure the doctor. - Such a thoroughbred! She has a medal! Now you will see for yourself! Give me a sec! Troshka took the medal out of his pocket and showed it to the veterinarian: “Here! Look! The doctor studied her for a few seconds, then looked carefully at Troshka and suddenly softened. “Okay, now I’ll bandage your dog. Let's save your medalist." He smeared some medicine on Kuzin’s side and then wrapped it with a bandage.
“Just don’t set foot here again! Clear?" Troshka nodded.
Several months passed, and Kuzya still did not recover. Troshka denied himself everything, but gave the dog the best he could get.
- Lenochka, give me some whiting? - he begged a familiar stall owner. – My dog is sick, she needs meat. Well, for Kuzi's sake, eh? Well, what does it cost you?
“Eh, old parasite, I suppose you’re gobbling up these whites yourself,” she said, but still did not refuse.
- Thank you! God will not forget you! You'll see, the dog gets better, what prizes we'll take!
We will win at international exhibitions!
“Eh, you’d better stop talking... What prizes are there!” the woman waved her hand tiredly.
- That's right, that's right! Let's take it! The doctor saw Kuzkina’s medal and said: I will save the breed. And he didn’t take any money for treatment!
With the onset of cold weather, Kuza only got worse. His back leg gave out and he now walked stumbling and limping. But Troshka could no longer show him to the vet.
He himself got sick. He was constantly tormented by a dry cough, from which even the best blanket that the tramp had once sewn from several mattresses could not help. He probably could have gone to a homeless shelter, but dogs weren’t allowed there, and he was afraid that Kuzya would be lost without him. Therefore, he lived anywhere, most often under a railway platform. That very night when the first snow fell, Troshka became very ill. He suddenly twitched sharply in his sleep and reflexively hugged the dog to him with all his might. Kuzya yelped in pain and jumped to the side. But realizing that the owner was feeling bad, he returned to him, sniffed him and began to lick his face.
Troshka did not move, he was already barely breathing. Kuzya began to run around the owner and bark desperately. It happened at two o’clock in the morning, the street was deserted, but he still ran into two young guys who were returning home, heavily drunk. They tried to drive away the strange dog in dirty bandages covered with dried blood. But he did not lag behind, as if he was calling them somewhere. Suddenly the dog disappeared into the darkness and returned holding a bottle in its teeth. A real “Cheburashka”, for which at any glass container collection point they give at least five rubles. He stood in front of them, wagging his tail and bouncing unnaturally on one hind leg.
- He knows how to perform tricks! - Passers-by laughed. - Ale-Up! Well! Export! Fas! Ugh.
Seeing that the dog was not listening, the guys gave up on him and moved on. And Kuzya returned to his master. The next morning they were found together - a man and a dog.
“Damn, again these homeless people’s blind man’s buffs, and even a dead dog,” muttered the orderly, picking up the corpse. “And when will these scourges finally be settled on a desert island, so that they don’t interfere with normal people’s lives?” Something shiny suddenly fell out of the corpse's hand.
- What is this? – asked the nurse standing next to him. The orderly turned the metal plate over in his hand: “Yes, this is a keychain from jeans.”
You see here in small letters it says: “Levi’s, USA.” -He took a closer look:
Only this is not Levi's and not the USA in reality. They don't do things like that. Fake. The Vietnamese market has plenty of this stuff. He indifferently threw the record away and the car drove off.
When the sun rose and the first clean snow sparkled towards it, the small metal sign lit up with another light on the snow-white blanket, making its contribution to the colorfulness of the new day. It sparkled with bright, genuine rays and this light went far into the sky, disappearing into the clouds.
