Since 1950, Russian proletarians settled here, moving to warm and fertile lands where there was a high demand for labor. Their children grew up with Mark, and he adopted their habits and customs. Together with them, he ran through dangerous areas of the city and fell in love with their Russian girls.

Chapter 2

Yes! Love adventures – light, playful – already then stirred the imagination of children living in the yard. They matured quite early and plunged into their first romantic feelings. Probably, human nature required such early maturity and understanding of the essence of being. The eastern climate, an abundance of flowers, and the aroma of love in the hot air contributed to this.

Thus, the great poet Dante Alighieri was born in emotion-filled Italy, with the southern color of the surrounding nature. Therefore, it is not surprising that at nine years old, he fell in love. And his childhood love for Beatrice Portinari became a stimulus to create, years later, the immortal work – "The Divine Comedy."

However, Mark's romantic passions led to more prosaic and even dramatic events – harsh reality invaded life and controlled the fate not only of him but also of many of his young friends.

Often Mark saw in the yard a neat ten-year-old girl with slanting Tatar eyes and fair hair when her mom led her by the hand from music school. The girl held a music folder and always stuck her tongue out at Mark when they met – he responded in kind. It seemed this was their first reaction, the first clash of two little humans sensing some common energy field.

Attraction or conflict? Apparently, nature predetermined for them a natural attraction to each other, thanks to which the human race has not yet died out.

But this happened beyond their consciousness. Instinct?.. One could say so, although it sounds crude. What then? No one has yet properly answered this question, and I will not attempt it.

In any case, it is not romantic love like Dante's, and certainly not sexual attraction like most bipedal humanoids. Rather, an unconscious realm of the unknown, curiosity – that's probably what Mark felt in the first minutes of their meetings.

As a rule, girls mature faster. And Lara, as this ten-year-old girl was called, was the first to give a sign and show signs of a feeling resembling infatuation.

At that time, there was no internet, so the children used sign language. They quickly mastered the signs of this language and enjoyed communicating at a distance with gestures. For them, it was a game and entertainment.

Both of them lived on the top floor of a Stalinist four-story building. Below, under the lower floors entwined with grapes, small green gardens were outlined. Further, a large common yard was visible, covered with dense trees reaching the level of the highest balconies. Mark sometimes even had the temptation to fly a few meters and, grabbing the upper branches of trees, hang on them.

He loved looking at the world from the height of his floor, especially at night, when the darkening trees seemed mysterious and frightening, and the light-blue sky – fabulous from the sparkle of many scattered stars and the shining, like an angelic eye, moon. He often, falling asleep on the veranda, gazed into this enchanting space, promising something very good and kind, and listened to gramophone recordings of Haydn's symphonies. It was his favorite pastime on the veranda.

One day, Mark saw that Lara was looking at him from her veranda. When she caught his gaze, she began to speak to him in sign language. He understood her airy message to him. These were the words "I love you." This was the only expression in English that the children knew and often used playfully.

A strange, unfamiliar feeling caressed his heart and slightly excited him. He seemed to respect himself more and felt needed by someone else besides his parents. That is, he was already a person too!

Mark did not respond to Lara with the same love message but decided – now her feelings belonged only to him! And he behaved from that moment as the master of her childish soul; he wasn't thinking about the female body then.

However, Lara did not expect a reciprocal declaration of love from Mark, feeling his virginal naivety and inexperience. She was already mature enough to be aware of her feminine charms, and it was enough for her that she herself confessed her love to him. Now he belonged to her! So she thought. Her nature, inherently authoritative and frivolous, was already manifesting itself here.

And romantic, inexperienced Mark eagerly carried this new feeling that unexpectedly arose in his consciousness and completely captured him. He plunged into an unknown sweet world, about which everyone talks and writes, dreams, and creates works of art.

It is a world of great achievements, diseases, feats, and crimes. It is a world where the meaning of life is found and lost. This is what the Almighty punished Adam, Eve, and all humankind for, binding them in the chains of love and the slavery of passion.

Yes! Mark was in love!

When he, returning from school home, crossed the entire large yard, his eyes looked only upward. No, not at the sky. At Lara's veranda. He thought: maybe she's there now?

They often communicated with mysterious gestures from their verandas. And in the late evenings, they spent time by the fire, which they kindled from golden dry leaves and baked potatoes on it. It was a special, unique smell of smoke from autumn leaves and wonderful evening hours when all the children of the big yard gathered by the fire together and told each other extraordinary stories, played "stream" or other children's games. And inevitably, someone was in love with someone. Children's romances were born and disappeared like singing night crickets in the bushes growing everywhere in this large yard, and they seemed to chirp about the same.

All the children knew about Mark and Lara's infatuation and treated it with understanding, even with some reverence, despite their young age.

Fourteen-year-old Vitaly, who lived with his aunt because he had no parents, advised Mark to send Lara a love letter with poems he wrote especially for Mark. Vitaly, like many teenagers, was fond of poetry and composed poems, apparently having certain abilities and youthful creative fervor. The poem consisted of a set of high-flown words about love that he heard or read somewhere. He imagined the author of the poems as a knight in love with his lady heart, just as children fascinated by a game imagine themselves as captains on long voyages or pilots of spaceships.

But Vitaly himself was in love with another girl – Natasha. She was dark-skinned, pretty, and looked either like a gypsy or a Moldavian. Natasha was a few years younger than Vitaly and reciprocated his feelings. He promised to marry her when they grew up.

The most interesting thing is that all such relations between children were platonic, without any touch between them, and nevertheless were called love, bringing both pain and suffering and moments of happiness – all that usually accompanies true love.

Vitaly seemed like a leader among the children, as he was older and more confident in himself and his views on life, which form in a person simultaneously with growing up. He was engaged in boxing, trained yard kids in this sport, rode his motorcycle, and taught Mark to be brave and not afraid to tell the truth: "don't cheat like a Jew," as he expressed it, being under the influence of his proletarian environment.

However, he treated Mark with special sympathy, though his ideas about Jews were distorted by communist anti-Semitic propaganda. If he knew that the revolution, which brought rights to disadvantaged proletarians, was carried out by Jews together with Lenin; that the idea of communism was put forward by the Jewish dwarf Marx; that in World War II among the Heroes of the Soviet Union were one hundred seventy Jews; that in the church where their grandmothers pray every Sunday, all the icons are Jews; and that Sunday is the day of the resurrection of the Jew Yeshua, the Son of Man, then Vitaly would understand the entire drama of this people and, with his youthful noble impulses, would speak of them more delicately.

But for the most part, the proletarian children were primitive and with a certain plebeian tinge, often harmful, evil, and aggressive.

However, some turned out to be quite smart, capable, and believing in truth and justice. Their parents worked hard for low wages and dreamed of higher education for their children, as it elevated them to a higher social level, into better conditions of intellectual labor and life. In the country of communists, this was very important, and parents faced the main task of getting their children into institutes through connections and the favor of influential people. Few of them studied well in school themselves, although everyone wanted to live better. Most proletarians had no acquaintances or connections with influential people. Many very capable children could not realize their talents and remained on a lower social rung, like their parents.

One day, a neighbor organized a trip out of town for the children of their large yard. Mark’s parents forbade him to participate because the goal was to relax on the shore of an artificial sea, and the transport was an open truck. The organized group of children left early in the morning, and Mark, lonely and sad, sat in the yard when Vitaliy saw him from his yard, where he was boxing with a punching bag.

He approached Mark and asked:

– Why didn’t you go with everyone?

– I wasn’t allowed, – Mark replied meekly.

– But you wanted to go?

– Yes, of course! Very much.

– You must be more persistent and achieve your goals, – Vitaliy said. – Do you want to go to the sea on a motorcycle right now? We’ll swim and come back immediately.

– But it’s two hours away, – Mark noted.

– While everyone returns home, we’ll make it, – Vitaliy assured. – But we’ll achieve our goal. Tell yourself: ‘And went towards the sea!’ And sit in the back seat.

Mark obediently sat on the motorcycle, and they rushed to the sea, feeling like brave travelers. On the way, they had to stop: the chain came off. And while they were repairing the motorcycle, they heard squeals and shouts – the children from their yard were already returning home and noticed Mark and Vitaliy by the roadside.

– We’ll still achieve our goal, – Vitaliy said.

They reached the sea, quickly took a dip, and rushed back.

At home, panic had already begun. The returning children managed to tell that they saw these two brave travelers on the road. Of course, there was a big commotion and scandal in both Mark’s and Vitaliy’s families.

The next day, Vitaliy met Mark in the yard and proudly declared:

– We still achieved our goal. ‘And went towards the sea!’ – he proclaimed his slogan with pathos once more.

– Yes! – Mark agreed, like a faithful student sharing his ideas of courage and belief in justice.

However… Mark was more impressed by images of a different kind – not heroic; he loved to dream, listen to classical music, read books, and compose something, that is, engage in creativity.

Vitaliy’s native Russian soul, with his courage inherent to Slavs and his people, evoked deep respect and even admiration in Mark. But he found it all rather dull.

However, courage is inherent in any people when threatened with danger or destruction; in this, all peoples are similar. But in everything else, all nations, like people, are unique and diverse, which makes them interesting.

Of the Russian national values, Mark liked folk tales the most. Therefore, he loved to read fairy tales, for which his father scolded him, urging him to start reading more serious literature.

Mark constantly thought about Lara and eventually sent her a letter with poems composed for him by his ideological inspirer Vitaliy.

Of course, the letter ended up in the hands of her parents, but they treated the poetic confession with understanding and respect. Moreover, they began to hope that someday, perhaps, Mark would be with their daughter. They liked him because, unlike the primitive courtyard children, he was intelligent and engaged in creativity.

Lara’s mother had no education and worked in a kindergarten, while her father, also uneducated, took orders as an artist: he painted advertisements, posters, and the like. He loved to drink with fellow artists but behaved modestly and with dignity. They were one of the simple Russian families with a very delicate and noble soul.

Once, Lara’s father, a bit tipsy, came to Mark’s mother. She opened the door and, in the official tone of a pediatrician, said: «I’m listening to you». He was confused and stood silently, unable to utter a word. Apparently, he hadn’t thought in advance how to say that he and his wife would like their daughter and Mark to be friends. After a few minutes of silence, he simply turned around and left. However, even a more educated and sober person would find it difficult to find the right words to express such a delicate wish.

In the future, Mark often recalled this strange and comical visit, as everyone’s life turned out to be so dramatic that Lara’s father’s behavior was probably explained by his paternal intuition – some wise and anxious foreboding of future events and even tragedies. Mark was unlike the simple guys surrounding their daughter; he had refinement and blue blood. But their dream that Lara and Mark would remain together was not destined to come true.

While the intelligent, dreamy Mark was running after Lara, she, responding to his feelings, increasingly realized her power as an attractive girl and showed more and more interest in other guys who were older, more confident, and had a Russian soul and courage. Mark was very appealing to her externally, but she was already drawn to something new, unexplored, more muscular and manly. To say – «manly»? That would be too lofty for such girlish inclinations.

Once Mark returned from school and looked into Uncle Yakov’s garage. The garage had an exit to a small inner courtyard where Uncle Yakov kept pigeons. He often let them fly. His pigeons had become lazy from the excessive care of their loving owner and, after flying one or two circles in the sky, landed on the roof of the high-rise building, right above the veranda where Mark admired the fairy-tale eastern sky every night.

Uncle Yakov, being a leading pedagogue of the institute, an associate professor, and head of the department, behaved like a child when fussing with pigeons. He even threw stones on the roof like a courtyard prankster to make the birds rise into the sky. Pigeons, like people, from excessive care and kindness, degenerate, grow fat, and lose their ability to fly.

Stones fell on the roof of a neighboring apartment where two elderly women lived – twin sisters with the surname Talskys. In the past, they were famous doctors, descendants of former aristocracy, fate cast them into these Asian lands, they lived together all their lives and had neither family nor children. The Talskys sisters were angry at Uncle Yakov because his pigeon chasing spoiled their slate – the roof covering over their apartment; outraged by his behavior, they said he had a disease of infantilism – immaturity in development, although he was a pedagogue and lectured at the institute, and even on educational TV channels.