The Bridge Across The River Blise

Part I
Chapter I
“Night is falling. The sky is dull; it is drizzling. I am standing under the bridge that crosses the river Blise leaning my back against a cold wall painted with tacky graffiti. The river is rolling lazy grey waves with foamy whitecaps just a few steps away. There is not a living soul around and no wonder - nobody loves hanging out in such cursed dampness.
I don’t even know whom or what I am still waiting; it is hard to believe that I can gain anything tonight. I would better go home, have a drink, get warm, and spend the rest of the night in front of my computer to go to bed later and sleep like a baby. I am fed up with my night job.
The problem is that Alex would start shouting again that I’m a good-for-nothing he has to keep. Though it is hard to say who keeps whom actually. Sometimes I make more money a night than he does a whole week. What’s more, he can easy loose his fists. It happens more and more often, say nothing about his tongue - it is always ready for insults. I would tell him to go to hell but I’m scared of loneliness.
This is why I am still staying under the bridge, despite the nasty weather. It is not dripping here, but the dank, wet wind is chilling me to my bones. I cannot hide from it; the wind is buzzing and ruffling water in Blise, throwing prickly drops right into my face.
 It smells of rain and fading lilac. Deep puddles are spreading everywhere on the wet asphalt. They reflect overturned dark green crowns of trees, bright skyline, and low light of street lamps, gleaming like some dim stars from the depth of a distant park. Darkness is falling fast.
The park, which borders with the railway station at one end and the embankment at the other, is worth a few more words. During the day, respectable pensioners and loving mommas with strollers are walking its neat graveled crunchy paths. While at night, it turns into the work site of local hustlers.
They do not call themselves “hustlers”; they just say “boys” - boys, who offer sex for money. Their clients are not women; they are homosexual men.
Whom I am trying to fool saying “they” though? I should say “we,” of course, as I am one of them. However, I’m not hanging around with other boys at the railway station or at the park. I prefer staying here, under the bridge, which crosses the river Blise. This spot is somewhat special for me, and who ever needs me, will find me here anyway. And they do – with any luck four or five times per night (I’m usually staying till two o’clock in the morning), but only if the weather is not as bad as today, of course.
Our town, Bliesweiler, is not big but rather lively; if you can call lively a typical German town, where everything is as proper as can be, sometimes even to the level of absurdity. Dogs are walked on the leash, kids are walked by the hand, and pedestrians walk strictly on sidewalks. Something like that Alex usually says praising the German order. However, I was growing up in a town almost like that but little bit bigger, so I know too well that prim and neat facades may hide something completely different to one’s expectations.
About seventy percent of my clients are tourists. Most of them are coming from neighboring France, couple of times I met the Dutch. I do not know what brings them here, but it can hardly be our local attraction – the abandoned factory buildings and gigantic steel-smelting furnaces, turned into the museum of industrial culture a few years ago.
It is hard to believe that somebody may be interested in these ugly rusty monsters. They look like tremendous octopuses, scratching the sky with their hard tentacles and disfiguring fragile beauty of our northern landscape. I swear, never in my life I’ve seen anything more hideous than our, blast them, industrial constructions. However, the Government protects them more lovingly than beautiful ancient Catholic churches. On the other hand, what a boy like me, who does not even have a high school diploma and works as a hustler, can understand in culture.
Oh! I am sorry. I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Johnny Maverick. I am nineteen years old and I have been living in Bliesweiler for four years now. I was born in Saarbrucken in the family of Jewish emigrants that moved to Germany from USSR.
I will tell about my childhood some other time. For the beginning, I want to describe the real attraction of our town. It is not monuments of industrial culture or depleted coal mines. And it is not the park near the train station where gays pick up boys. There is nothing interesting about it, believe me. It is just a job to make some money, not a lot but enough for a living. Sometimes I am working at the clients’ apartments, sometimes in cars at the parking lot next to the park, but more often right here, under the bridge. Why not? The place is lonely, hundred feet away from the nearest street lamp. Wintertime, it is rather cold though. Even in our mild winter, there is no fun in kicking heels in freezing wind at a frosty night, especially next to the water. It’s hard to hold a charcoal with frozen stiff fingers, while scribbling Russian letters, which I learnt in my childhood, over colorful graffiti. I’m writing poetry. Sometimes it is my own verses but more often by other authors.
I know that nobody will ever read it. Next evening teenagers with their spray cans will come here and a fresh layer of paint will cover my scribbled lines.
 I do not expect anybody to read my writing, neither on walls nor in my diary. I do not need readers, as I know they do not give a damn about me. All these respectable Burgers and their wives; pensioners full of proper pride; the French, those frog-eaters; longhaired teenagers in low loose jeans, daubing walls with anime characters, emblems of soccer clubs and swastika – they don’t care. I do not want them to read what I write. I do not want them to run indifferently, line by line, through my thoughts, verses, disappointment, and pain. That is why I am writing in Russian.
Oh no, I do not love what I am doing. I am not enjoying it in any way, morally or physically, forgive me my straight forwardness. Actually, I am just wasting my life in the most vulgar and useless way. It is a real shame, as I am not the illegal; I have a German passport. I know that I should stop fooling around and start studying to get some profession. Otherwise, what I am supposed to do after my thirty? Hustler is like steward. As soon as you are over thirty, your career is over, and it is not an old age yet. I also understand that with each passed year it will be harder and harder for me to get back to normal life. One can get used to anything, but priceless time flows away without any chance to get it back. However, so far my good intentions have brought me to no action. So far, I am only nineteen. Summer just started, fading lilac is falling off, covering the soft lawn with tiny light violet stars, and drizzle is too cold for June.
 I am standing under the bridge that crosses the river Blise, and as I have no clients and nothing else to do, I am telling you the story of my life. Actually, I am doing that for myself. I know that nobody will ever read it.
Even Alex has not looked into my diary once, though it is always sitting under his nose. No, he is not too delicate and tactful for it; such feelings are alien to my friend and lover. The reason is that he, like anybody else, does not give a damn about what is happening in Johnny Maverick’s soul. I bring some money to the household and that’s it.
But wait… I keep losing my train of thought.
Yes, I was going to tell you about the main attraction of our little town. That is the river Blise in fact, though neither locals nor tourists can see anything special in it. For them it is just an ordinary leaden-colored river, rather dirty and not so much transparent.
It’s not true, the water in Blise is very clear indeed. So clear that even fish live there, and sometimes, when sun is lighting the sand bar, one can see tiny young fish that look like silver sparks, frisking right at the edge of the water. In autumn, there are bright spots of fallen leaves floating downstream. In early spring, the river carries chips, broken twigs, dry blades of grass and other small things. Probably, far from here, somewhere in the upper Blise, snow is melting, bringing all that stuff down. We hardly have any snow here and the river has not frozen over even in coldest winters, when temperature goes as low as five below zero Celsius.
At any time of the year, the water is cold and strange to the touch. If you dip your hand into the water, your head starts swimming from the feeling of touching something unreal.
It is always the same river yet it is different any other second. The moment you peer into the dimly glowing, alluring depth of the river, it feels like you start floating away like a falling leaf or a twig, captured by the ruthless current.
Sparse silver threads of rain and fast gathering dusk make contours and shapes of surrounding objects fuzzy. Even in broad daylight and serene weather, some foggy mist is curling over the Blise. It never clears away, so you cannot get the details of the other bank. All you can see is a sloping woody hill, surrounded by dodging road, and a little village, sitting at the foot of this hill. It looks like an ordinary German village. Neat white houses are sinking in soft clouds of greenery. Smoke is gently turning into light violet curls above the red tiled roofs.
In falling dusk, just like now, you can see the bright shiny stars of far street lamps and dim yellow squares of windows. Some people must be living there. What do they like? I do not know and nobody knows as no one has ever been there, I am sure.
Why I am so sure? The thing is that it is impossible to cross the river Blise. I have tried it and not once. For a few months, when I just moved here I’d been trying to walk to the other side of the bridge a few times per day, but all my attempts had failed. You reach the middle of the bridge and then it appears that you have already turned out in such a neat and unnoticeable way that you have no idea when it happened. Just a moment ago, you were walking towards the other bank of the river and the next moment you are already going back, to where you started. It is always the same. You can roam about the bridge all day long but you will be back at the start point no matter what.
You must be thinking that scientists from all over the world lay siege to our town trying to examine and explain this mysterious phenomenon. That they are writing about our miracle in newspapers, scientific magazines, and thick encyclopedias. Not at all!
I guess I am the only one, who found out this supernatural feature of the bridge. I do not think anybody else attempted to reach the other bank ever. The average Joe does not care about mysteries of nature, or people, who live on the other bank of the river. I am the only crank here, which was walking on the bridge there and back hundreds of times, or better to say “back” as I have never got “there.”
May be I could swim across the Blise, the river is not so wide really… but I cannot swim. Besides, even if I could, I would not risk going into the strange dark water that sends shivers down my spine at a single touch. It would not let me out. It could never let me go to the other bank yet it would not bring me back. It would swaddle me up, suck into a whirlpool, and send to the bottom of the river. I know it would happen exactly this way.
There is something in this river that fills me if not with fear, at least with respect, unspoken respect.”

Chapter II
Johnny Maverick, wet to the skin and chilled to the bone, came home at two o’clock in the morning. Sure, Alex was home, annoyed and frustrated as usual. For the last six months, he had been working at a little Russian restaurant. He played the guitar or some other instrument three hours a day for such pennies that if not Johnny’s earnings they could hardly make the both ends meet. Life is expensive nowadays. Rent of a small apartment and utilities cost a lot, but you still should have something to eat and dress, if not in the latest fashion, not raggedly either, especially if you work with people. Of course, you have to pay for the Internet too; it is simply impossible to go without it. Happily, Alex was not smoking five packs of cigarettes a day, like John’s ex, with whom he parted two years ago. Alex drank socially and, what’s more important, did not bring home companies of strangers. The other guy was Turk and all his Turkish fellows were constantly partying at the apartment, which Johnny shared with his friend.
After those visits that could last until morning, their home looked like a whorehouse after pogrom. As neat as a German, Johnny was hardly bearing it for almost four months, and then packed up his things, and moved with Alex, a thirty years old German born in Russia. He met him at some party for Russian-speaking youth and stuck with him for two years. Did Johnny love Alex? He would never answer this question even to himself (he was too timid for it). Probably he did, as he stayed with his partner despite all Alex’s heartlessness, tactlessness to the measure of brutal indecency, and sometimes, even cruelty.
To tell the truth, if they were not so tough with money, their life together could not be so bad. If Johnny did not have to work as a hustler to support both of them, Alex probably would treat him with less distaste. Finally, their life would be definitely better if Alex, who came from some Siberian backwoods seven years ago, could display and use all his numerous talents. So far, it never happened. He spoke rather fluent German but his dialect was hard to understand for locals. He was chronically jobless. Besides, he lived with a boy of a typical Semitic appearance, a hustler, selling himself for twenty euro at the park next to the railway station. No wonder that the German guy, who was not really bad by his nature, felt like a loser and wreaked his anger on his helpless partner.
Johnny knew his friend’s musical talents rather well, so he concluded that the restaurant, where Alex was playing his guitar, was specializing on serving only the deaf-and-dumb clients or at least pensioners, who lost their hearing due to old ages. Otherwise, they would whack him in the face and throw away on the street long time ago.
Alternatively, it could be no music at all. May be he was just washing dishes or cutting vegetables in that little restaurant. God knows what he was doing there in fact, but he always came home tired-out, gloomy, and mad at the whole world. At those nights, it was better to stay away from him in the heat of the moment.
Johnny quietly took shoes off in a faintly lit hallway; the shoes were full of water - rain caught him, eventually, on his way home. He went into the room and carefully hung his wet jacket on a chair. There was a variety of different pieces of furniture there, as it served as a living room, dining room, and a study at the same time.
There were a plush sofa of sandy color, an armchair near the window, a dining table made of some light color wood with two much darker chairs, an entertainment center with TV, and a few books on empty shelves. And of course, a computer was sitting on a little table just in front of the entrance. The TV looked antique and pieces of furniture did not match. First, it annoyed Johnny and he started looking through catalogs trying to find some better matching sets for descent money to make their home cozier and more comfortable, but after a while, he gave up.
When life goes wrong and your beloved one meets you with slaps in your face instead of warm kisses, you do not care anymore if the color of your table matches the color of the chairs.
Alex was dozing in front of TV reclining on the sofa with a remote in his hand.
“Hi,” Johnny was trying to speak in a low voice not to disturb his friend with unexpected hallo.
It was needless; Alex immediately opened his eyes, got up, and without a word stretched out his hand. Maverick searched his pocket, took out two crumpled twenty-euro bills, and gave it to him.
“Is that all you’ve got for the whole night?” Alex raised his brows with unpleasant surprise and suspicion.
Johnny gave a sigh and looked aside. “I’m sorry… There were not many people there today. It is not just me… Some boys did not go to work at all. Look, it is windy and raining. The owner would not send a dog outside in such weather.”
Alex’s eyes turned cold and evil, his right arm muscles lightly strained. Johnny noticed it and cringed in fear.
“Nobody makes you fuck dogs. Why did you come back so early? It’s only one thirty!”
“No, it’s two.” Maverick failed to evade a blow and was almost knocked down.
The hurt lip started bleeding and Johnny’s eyes filled with tears. For a while, he stood still with his hand next to his face; it looked like he was trying to say something but he could not say a word. He just gave a scary glance at his offender, quickly grabbed his wet jacket, and rushed away.
“Where are you going?” Alex inquired suspiciously.
“To draw myself in Blise!”
“Come back, you, loony. Sit at the table; I will make you some coffee.”
Johnny came back obediently, sat down, and covered his face with both hands. He was still shivering with cold or, maybe, not just cold alone. Alex scornfully looked at his side and disappeared in the kitchen to come back five minutes later with two cups of hot black coffee. One of them he pushed to his friend while keeping the other for himself. He sat comfortably in the armchair next to the window, relaxed and took a sip of a thick, bittersweet drink. With some dismal pleasure, he was listening to the heavy raindrops, knocking against the drip cap, rustling like big sleepy bugs.
It is true, the weather is rotten, and the summer is awful. The boy was not to blame; he beat him up for nothing. If somebody felt an urge for a whore, he would rather add a few coins and make an order over the phone before dragging himself under the rain to pick up a street hustler.
“John,” Alex was very serious and strict. “If you don’t stop crying I’ll beat you up really hard.”
Johnny took his hands away from his face, looked at the blood on his palms with disgust, gulped down a sob, and took his coffee with the trembling hand.
“It’s a perversion to drink coffee at night and then suffer from insomnia till morning.” He gave a remark capriciously with a shade of loathing on his face. “I would better have a little bit of mulled wine. Don’t we have any?”
Alex, who had no sleeping problems, just surged his shoulders indifferently. In another fifteen minutes incident was completely forgotten.
Indeed, it was not easy for Johnny to fall asleep that night. For a long time he was turning, sighing, staring at the ceiling, counting glistening paths that rain drew on the window glass and the young crescent highlighted with lemon-green shining. Around three o clock the rain stopped, clouds drifted apart, shades grew darker, and moon got brighter.
The sleepiness did not come to Johnny yet. Instead, obtrusive and annoying thoughts were attacking his brains like some dung flies. Maverick was laying in the darkness with his eyes wide open. He was thinking about Alex, constantly beating him for nothing, about his mom and stepfather, whom he left in Saarbrucken. He did not hate his parents but secretly blamed them for all his misadventures deep in his heart. John run away from the family four years ago and still could not admit that he was trying to run away from himself, in fact.
Many things were going through his mind.
He even thought of some of his clients; most of them he knew by face, though, he never tried to memorize their faces. After all, his work more often came to simple physical act except for those cases, when a client brought him to his place for role-playing. Sometimes it was just ridiculously stupid but at times incredibly brutal. Johnny hated those guys with sick fantasies, he was afraid of them.
In addition, newspapers were feeding his fears, publishing every other day new stories about maniacs, cannibals and other madmen with hopelessly diseased mentality, who lure boys and girls into dens, cars, nearest woods and bushes to torture, rape, cut them into pieces, castrate, eat them alive and what not. To make things worse, Alex got a habit to read aloud all these stories at breakfast. That is why poor Johnny had troubles with sleeping.
Eventually, when he realized that all his attempts to fall asleep were doomed until dawn, he gave a deep sigh, and got up. The night was chilly and an unpleasant draft was coming in through the slightly open window. Maverick put on a warm terry robe and quietly slipped out to the living room.
There he stopped trying to figure out a better way of wasting a few hours before morning. He could watch TV, but even little noise could wake up Alex and then Johnny would face a real trouble. So, all he could do was either reading a book (and he loved reading, indeed) or turn on the computer to surf the Internet. He chose the computer.
Whoever invented the Internet was a great guy. Definitely, there is some secret magic in browsing web pages, forums, and blogs, searching for thoughts consonant to you, yet, expressed by people living thousands, and thousands miles away. You would not dare to approach those people in real life, probably. Some of them might not even talk to you but turn away with disgust.
They could also be your neighbors and you might soil their doors with a charcoal or throw something uneatable in their soups at the shared kitchen.
Nevertheless, if you, two, meet in the Internet, you just write “Hi” and that’s it - you are friends. Yes, virtual communication is a strange yet wonderful thing, as no matter how many masks you are trying on, you cannot hide your real nature.
You are opening your mailbox, anticipating…what? A miracle?
What can be compared with those exciting seconds, filled with suppressed hope that divide the moment you timidly click a blue envelope of Outlook Express and an appearance of a sacramental notice “There is no new messages in your mail box”.
Johnny turned on the computer and started exactly with checking his mailbox, which, naturally enough appeared to be empty. Nothing ever came in his godforsaken mailbox except persistently sent advertisements.
He shrugged his shoulders and started surfing through his favorite sites, such as “Gay Romeo,” some Jewish portals, or “Kryon.” The last one reflected, as the authors said it, a commitment "to evolve and grow as the energy expands in the light." Johnny was not sure if he was the right person for such a commitment but he loved reading reasoning of strange people about strange things.
There was some other site - literary; there, under different user names, Maverick posted his poetry. Unfortunately, no matter what nickname he was choosing - masculine, feminine, startling, or modest - nobody read his masterpieces, alas! While he was just craving to share what was seething in his soul. Of course, he did not describe in his verses how his clients fuck him underneath the bridge or how his lover beats him up; he was ashamed to write about such things. In his poor doggerel, he was glorifying the beauty of his hometown, the spring floods, and sweet flowering of lilac in the park.
He wrote about the faint smell of burning, pouring out in the transparent as amber, frosty air that one could catch stepping out of the house in the sunny winter morning. The sunlight, reflected by icy pavement is dazzling and thin ice crust is crunching under feet. Germans are stoking their stoves and chimneys that stick up in glaring sky. They are letting out gentle hot smoke, which is clearing in the pure blue right away, turning into tiny prickly snowflakes.
He also loved writing about the turbidly grey, ever cold Blise, half-hidden by the glowing mist; and the bridge, which is not a bridge really, as it is not possible to cross it, but rather a mirage or a phantom just like rainbow.
Who on earth would read such rubbish? Would you?
Johnny left the literary site and went on virtual journey via Google. He found himself on some unfamiliar Russian chat where users were discussing private life of an American star. Unwillingly running through lines he stumbled over the last message, which had nothing to do with the discussion. It was confused and disorderly, with many misprints.
“This is the last day of my life…I cannot bear it anymore … I’m desperate…I cannot stand this emptiness which is million times worse than death itself. I do not want to hurt my beloved ones or betray them the way I was betrayed… I just cannot stand it anymore…”
That was it – dots at the end and no sign.
Johnny was looking intently at the luminous screen trying to guess if it was somebody’s joke or a cry from the heart, poured out in the impersonal emptiness of the worldwide net in hope that somebody would notice it. What kind of a looser would leave the suicide note at some stupid chat? However, his recollections didn’t last for a long time and his fingers started running quickly around the keyboard.
“Wait. Do not do that. Let’s talk. Sometimes things are not what they seem to be. Do not hurry to leave this world. It is a wonderful world. It is full of joy. I do not know what happened to you but believe me you will be OK. Everything will be OK. Write to me.”
He put his email at the end of the message and after a minute of hesitation, added the famous Solomon’s saying, “This too shall pass”. Then, he clicked “send.”
John Maverick had no idea what else he could write to keep a stranger from a fatal step and we cannot really blame him for it. After all, he was not a professional psychologist but a young guy without even a high school diploma and with no experience of helping people in critical situations.
What made him write to a stranger in such a way, as there was no gap between them?
Probably it was a stereotype delusion, according to which, somebody who has the same way of thinking must be of the same age, sex, way of living and so on. He thought it was a boy like him, Johnny, who was mixed up in adult problems that were way too much for his still childish nature. Neglected and lonely - who did not feel like that being a teenager?
With a sigh of relief, Johnny turned off the computer. He had done all that he could and the rest was not in his power. At last, he felt sleepy. Indeed, as soon as his head touched the pillow, he fell into the blessed, empty, and dark, as a locked room without windows, sleep.
 Maverick was not afraid of the darkness, vice versa, he was afraid to turn on light in his room. It stored too much sad and scary stuff that Johnny did not want to see.
Luckily, that night he was sleeping soundly until twelve o’clock afternoon when Alex, who lost all his patience, shook him out of slumber.

Chapter III
They got breakfast at twelve thirty, when the good Germans usually have their lunch. Johnny had slept as good as never before. Therefore, he was happy to meet a new day drinking very strong and very sweet coffee, screwing up his eyes at sunshine flowing down the window, washed clean by last night rain.
Alex was inertly chewing a sandwich, with his nose buried in a newspaper. He was making such mean grins that it was easy to guess - things in the motherland were rotten again.
“Listen, Johnny,” he gave a broad smile, and Johnny started frowning; he had no desire to listen to Alex’s stories.
Meanwhile, Alex started reading aloud about two perverts from Mainz. To be more precise, only one of them, an electric engineer, was from Mainz. The other one, a programmer, was from Bochum.
They met online and then arranged a date. There would be nothing wrong with that as many people nowadays are finding their dating through the Internet if they were not arranging something absolutely crazy and despicable.
When the programmer from Bochum came to visit the engineer in Mainz, the cordial host castrated him by their mutual agreement. Then, they cooked amputated organ together and ate it together as well. After that the hospitable engineer killed his new friend, cut him into pieces and put the meat in the refrigerator to feast later all by himself.
“Alex! What bosh are you reading?” Johnny could not stand it any longer. “Don’t you have any shame at all?”
“It’s what they are writing,” Alex shrugged his shoulders with perfect calm. “So it might have happened just like that. Professional journalists never lie.”
“Journalists are always lying through their teeth! It could never happen in real life, the hell with your stupid ‘Bild’”
“It’s not the ‘Bild’” Alex objected in offended tone. “It’s ‘Saarbrucken Zeitung’, the paper with reputation. Anything may happen in this world, Johnny. My grandmother was a psychiatrist, she told me such stories that no journalist would even imagine. The human psychic is so fragile that it breaks quite easy. Good if it is evident to everybody at once but sometimes a person with such a problem looks like normal, and nobody has a clue how far he is off his rocker, and what he can do to himself or the others. This guy, I mean, the victim, was mentally ill, just for sure.”
“But it’s not the reason to kill him!” Maverick protested. “This is a good story, Alex, but are you sure you must read it at the table? I just want to eat my breakfast without listening about any maniacs, psychos, and crazy perverts. Such disgusting stories make my food stick in my throat. Please, Alex, I beg you, read your dirty papers, no matter what their names are, to yourself.”
“What? Myself? There is nothing about me here” Alex was trying to joke, though not funny as usual.
“Well, they will write about me soon!” Johnny blurted it out but immediately held his tongue being scared.
Strange, but Alex did not laugh. He just looked seriously at Johnny’s pale face and changed his tone.
“Take it easy, John, everything will be ok. You are just thinking too much about all that crap. Do not mix up with anybody through the Internet and nothing will happen to you.”
“Alex, try to understand, there is nothing to do with the Internet.” Maverick’s voice was trembling, making him mad at himself. His hands were trembling also, so he had to put his cup on the table not to spill his coffee.
“My work is connected with constant risk. Who can become a victim of some maniac easier than a hustler? It is different for you, as you are always in view. While I am standing there, underneath the bridge all by myself, not to mention that I have to get in strangers’ cars, or go to their places from time to time.”
“Bullshit,” Alex interrupted impatiently. “All that is bullshit. It is a small town, everybody knows everybody. Even tourists are the same every year. Do not go with those who look untrustworthy that’s all. You do not have to and nobody can force you. And if something happens just yell and somebody will hear you. There is no risk in what you are doing just do not forget about condoms to protect yourself and everything will be ok.”
“You think I’m an idiot?” Johnny got indignant again.
He lost all the desire to argue so he did not tell Alex that very often he was staying later than the other boys in the poorly lit park. That is why it wouldn’t not matter if he were yelling or not. If there were no living sole around nobody would hear him anyway. Besides, it’s not really hard to shut somebody’s mouth before any single sound comes out and Johnny knew that also.
However, he said nothing. He finished his coffee and went to the kitchen to wash the cups. After he was able to let out some old fears, Johnny felt a bit of relief. He was glad that Alex did not mock at him but on the contrary, showed understanding. He tried to set Johnny at ease, gave him some reasons and arguments... but in Maverick’s heart some sort of splinter was still sticking - those few stupid words he let drop in that conversation.
He heard the door shut - Alex left. God knows where he went; Johnny never worried about it. He did not think that his partner could go unfaithful. Actually, Alex didn’t have any friends except two Germans, born in Kazakhstan. All they could talk about was applying for different subsidies and subventions. To add to that, they just loved recollecting their life before immigration to Germany, describing it in such warm and nostalgic tones, that Johnny had to restrain himself not to ask “Why did you leave your country, guys, if it was so wonderful there?”
They looked down on Johnny, even displayed contempt, and called him Jew to his face. “What happened to your little Jew, Alex, why he is not in a good mood?”
 John could only guess what they were saying behind his back. Those half Kazakh-half Germans had slanting eyes, not typical for Aryans but possessed real Aryan arrogance.
Johnny did not like them. He was trying to sneak out of the house every time they dropped in, the more so because in their presence Alex changed out of recognition, treating his partner worse than a dog, slighting and humiliating. If any stranger could see the four of them together, he might think that times of the Second Reich came back.
That is why Maverick was even glad when Alex went out for the whole day. Let him drink beer with his friends somewhere far from the house while Johnny is cleaning up and sitting at the computer. These were his favorite pastimes besides walking along the embankment of Blise in nice spring or summer weather.
It’s nice to walk when sun is shining gently and beams are glistening on the glossy river surface like fine spider’s web. Careless breeze is ruffling pearly waves and slightly disheveling your hair. Silver and gold sparkles from water are dazzling. You are walking without even looking where you go, seeing no streets, no buildings, no faces, but iridescent light, moving through flaring flood of colors thinking of nothing.
A few years ago, such lonely walks literally cured Johnny of nightmares from which he used to wake up in tears, cold sweat, sometimes in a wet bed. They helped him to get rid of unbearable aversion for life and suicidal thoughts.
Maverick remembered the suicidal message he saw last night and started worrying. Is the stranger still alive? Who knows may be he had killed himself already; or maybe he accepted Johnny’s invitation to talk? He turned on the computer and impatiently clicked the Outlook Express. The thin blue line appeared immediately showing a new message loading.
“I don’t know who you are, my mysterious savior,” Maverick read holding his breath, “but I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your support at my worst moment. It was the moment of unforgivable weakness. If it were not for your simple, wise words, I would hardly survive last night and two kids would become orphans. They would stay all by themselves in this world. I’m writing to let you know that you saved not just one but three lives.”
Johnny raised his brows with surprise – the person appeared to be quite different to what he was imagining; to make things worse, two kids were in the charge of a mentally unstable parent.
“You said I could write to you… I would love to. I have nobody to talk but kids. My oldest son is three and his brother is two years old. They are too small to understand what is happening but they can see that something is wrong. I am trying hard not to cry in front of them but they can feel my despair and suppressed tears. The man that I loved more than myself, even more than my kids; the man I loved so much the whole life seemed to be not long enough for my love, betrayed me. This is an old story, as old as the world itself.”
“Yes,” thought Johnny to himself. “All the same is happening in life over and over again”
“I gave him everything, gave him my help and support. And now, when I’m thirty five, I’m left without any profession, any money, but two little kids.”
Oops, she’s not a young girl actually.
“Do you know what it feels like to be absolutely helpless and powerless? It means you wait for nothing and have no hope. You just want to stop being here, you want to go back in time and erase the very fact of your birth. I am not afraid of death but I have to think of kids. They will get lost without me. We can do whatever we want with our own lives but should care about others.
Last night I almost made a fatal mistake giving way to despair. Almost betrayed my sons the way I was betrayed.”
Johnny was nodding thoughtfully, biting his lips. It was true – one betrayal involves another one. He was familiar with that better than anybody else.
“I had prepared two packs of sleeping pills and was ready to take them. May be it would work but I still wanted to pour out all my pain for the last time in my life in hope that somebody would see that and understand; and you did. You are the person, who heard my howl of despair and did not ignore it. Who you are? I’m looking forward to get to know you.
My name is Kristina. I live in a small Russian town on the river Oka. Have you ever heard about that river? Oh, I forgot to mention. When I eventually fell asleep last night, I had a scary dream. My boys, muffled up in shaggy fur coats, were making their way all alone, holding hands. It was dark and there was no road. They were walking through falling snow in the vague light of stars and I was not around.
Sorry, my letter is so confused and mixed up.
Thank you again
Kristina”
Maverick got thinking. The woman was old enough to be his mother. Yet, she was writing boldly, even obtrusive, definitely expecting him to reply. She must be in a big trouble but how he, Johnny, could help. She had no money to live on but he was hardly making the ends meet either. Honestly, there was not much to do there. Perhaps, he could try to support her morally, distract her mind from her problems somehow. Besides, Jonny was terribly sorry for kids.
Alternatively, he could simply delete her letter and forget about it but something kept him from that. May be he was afraid that Kristina could eventually carry out what she was going to do last night. Wouldn’t he start dreaming about the kids, lost in a winter night himself in such a case, in addition to his own nightmares? It would be too much for him!
Yes, he must write her something encouraging, only he had no idea what. His own life story could hardly sooth anybody, it would sooner work the wrong way round.
Here Maverick was mistaken to tell the truth. People usually like listening about those who are in the same bad or even worse situation. The misfortunes of others serve like healing balm for wounded and bleeding hearts. A word of somebody’s success, vice versa, may put you in deepest depression if your own life is a hopeless mess.
Happily or not, our character belonged to the different breed of people. Envy was unfamiliar to him and sorrows of others made him suffer. He sincerely believed that any person would feel better after listening to some good story.
Of course, they taught him that lie is not good, he remembered it from his childhood but why he could not write a beautiful tale, telling how wonderful and amazing life can be, like in faraway Germany, for example, where everybody has a job and a roof. Government works hard to support young families, to help poor, to educate youth. Kids are always laughing and adults greeting each other with warm smiles. After all, it must be the truth as there are many happy faces around him. Does it matter that John Maverick himself is a complete mess?
“Dear Kristina,
I was glad to get your answer.
I am sure nothing happens accidentally in this world and of course, your message caught my eye last night not without reason too. I had to go through some betrayal also, just like you. And I know how painful it is.”
Here, all of a sudden Maverick remembered his mother and his face distorted with pain. Somehow, he was able to chase this inappropriate thought away and entered the role of a self-confident, problem-free man, who wends his way through life with pride and dignity. He must be just a bit lonely and has some scars on his heart, but that’s all.
“My name is Paul. I live in the west of Germany next to the French border. The name of my town is Bliseweiler that means ‘the town on the river Blise’.”
Johnny let his fantasy go. He was dreaming up joyfully like a boy who found a new game. Actually, he was doing that not for Kristina but for himself, imagining the man he wanted to be.
Paul is thirty-five years old, independent, mature, and experienced. He has his own little business, let’s say, in the field of web design. He lives all by himself in a small but cozy house in the most prestigious district of Blisewiler (Johnny was not sure that there were such districts in his town really but it’s OK) Of course, the house has all the amenities and it is surrounded by a little garden.
Oh no, Johnny was not boasting, he was just weaving a marvelous, colorful tracery using tiny beams of dream. He went describing how much he was enjoying his sunsets, sitting among flowers, watching sun gilding softly the tops of magnolias and cypresses, trickling down window glasses and tiling roofs. At such moments, he especially loved poetizing.
Why does he live alone?
Oh, there was a story back in his youth. Johnny had to give a delicate hint about his, i.e. Paul’s, love of a young girl, as it would be just stupid to tell Kristina that he was a gay actually. Well, this mythical girl betrayed him and married somebody else. Naturally, Paul forgave her, but he had never married since. Not because he was trying to be faithful to her to the rest of his life, it just never happened. May be he didn’t meet the right person yet.
“After that love fiasco, I was thinking a lot about ideal relationship between a man and a woman and came to the conclusion…”
Johnny gave a deep sigh. He never actually thought of relations between men and women; what’s more, it was not even interesting for him.
“I came to the conclusion that most important thing is mutual trust and sincere interest to the inner world of your partner”
“Yes, it must work for any relationship no matter who participates” Maverick thought. He reread carefully what he had written. It looked true to life, and what’s more important, life asserting. Of course, all that was a lie but Kristina knew neither Johnny nor Paul anyway, so what was the difference? Whatever he would tell her would be just a virtual tale, so let it be at least a beautiful one. Without any further remorse, he sent the letter.

Chapter IV
“It is still two hours before sunset. I sit down on a warm parapet and happily put my face in the wind saturated with smells of flowers and mowed grass. Low noise of distant lawn mower is blending with insects buzzing in one continuous boom vibrating with life. It’ summer at last. The other bank of the Blise is already sinking in deep shade. Only the mist, rising from the river is still impregnated with the sun. It is so bright and glowing as if it were woven with the fine fiber of some precious golden thread. If I strain my eyes, on the opposite side of the river I can see some dark moving spots and strange flushing lights. Amazingly, it seems that since yesterday the other bank got a little bit closer as I could not see such details before.
I am wearing a blue tennis shirt and light pants; I took off jacket and put it on the parapet next to me.
It is warm; the earth, heated by the sun during the day is giving away some whitish steam: the world is drying up after incessant rains.
I am blinking and squinting from caressing sunlight screening my eyes with soft yellow shroud. Lazily I’m looking through the minute details of my morning that my memory stores. I got accustomed to live the day without thinking too much about the past or the future. This way it’s easier to endure any jokes of fate, even cruelest ones. It is easier to concentrate on the moment, observing your own life as an endless row of views, which are segueing one by one behind the window of speeding train, a long train of bright days with no resemblance of each other.
Such stand is comfortable but has a big minus also. It causes passivity, which means that you have no wish to change anything. All you have is submissiveness to circumstances and ill luck. I know where my main mistake is. Even concentrating on the present, you should still do something for the future.
 And I do nothing as I don’t want, I can’t, and I don’t dare.
 I had surrendered long time ago, kneeled with no strength to stand up.
So now, I am sitting here, on the parapet, basking in the last beams of the gold-orange sun that is leaving for the day. I am recollecting the morning quarrel with Alex. It was not even a quarrel but a conversation that left me some disgusting tinge of a bad joke. I believe that some things should stay away from jokes. You should not even mention those things to avoid opening the door, which can let them into your life.
I am also thinking about my new virtual acquaintance, Kristina, who so suddenly appeared in my life. I used to believe that women are not inclined to suicidal thoughts really. A man is a warrior by his nature, he comes to life to fight hardships and die in a battle. A woman is programmed to create life and take care of it. It has nothing to do with a pile of pills and suicidal note on a computer screen, while two kids are sleeping soundly in the next room. It is against nature and that’s why it is especially scary.
May be it was just a trick? Women love tricking. She could get lonely, craving for attention. Even if so, I would not blame her, as I had the same feeling many times, almost ready to howl at the moon out of loneliness.
As for my virtual alter ego, Paul, it was not a bad idea. I like him. Why not to play some other role in life just as an actor plays on a stage? I could escape from my own captivity, get rid of myself. It could be so close to happiness.
With a sigh, I close my eyes and ask myself if I could, or better say, would be able to become such a Paul. In twenty years, for example, when I approach the age of my character. Will I be as self-confident, self-sufficient, and well established in life as him? Unfortunately, I have to sadly say “no”.
I will never be such a man despite all my dreams. Too many things are broken and spoilt already. You cannot glue a broken cup or fill an old wineskin with young wine.
You may think I am ashamed of my so to say profession, but I am not. It’s just for a while... I hope. I’m not proud of it, but – I’m shrugging my shoulders – so what? May be you think that I have inadequacy complex because of my sexual orientation? Absolutely not, I accept myself as I am, no matter what others are thinking of me.
My real tragedy has nothing to do with all these things.   
The muddy spring of sewage and swamp instead of fresh water is coming out from a crack, which is gaping like an open wound somewhere in the beginning of my life. It is flowing through my entire life, soiling it and poisoning. It feeds my nightmares and makes me endure humiliations because deep in my sub consciousness I believe that I deserve nothing else.
I was marked of stigma in my childhood and the name of it is “Eule,”which translated as  “owl” from German. However, I am not talking about a goggle-eyed night bird. “Eule” is the name of a shabby little bar in one of the industrial areas of Saarbruken. May be it has a different name now or they pulled it down at last; I don’t know and don’t even want to know.
When I’m thinking of my childhood, it looks to me like an old misted mirror covered with a spidery of tiny cracks. I am peering into its vague depth trying to discern my face but all in vain. The mirror is not just misted and cracked. The worst of it is that it’s mud-stained and the mud is not washable as it belongs to the past that nobody has power to change. What’s more, it does not just cover the surface; it has already penetrated so deep that almost displaced my memory.
I hardly remember what happened; I can see only some separate episodes as if they were pulled out on light from the darkness. My step-father is shaking his fist in front of my face, threatening to kill me if I say a word to anybody; the stout woman, the owner of the bar, stalking along the tables with dignity; me, throwing up in the restroom of the bar.
I also remember painful endless questionings; for some reason it’s stuck in my memory especially hard. However, what happened and not once in a little room behind the steel door is completely erased from my memory… probably, for the better.
Of course, now I know what was happening there, but those times, when I was seven years old, I got some kind of amnesia. I realized that something bad took place in my childhood but couldn’t figure out what exactly for a long time.
Until one day, the hurting scraps of my memory tired me out so bad that after school I went to the local library, where looking through old newspapers I found an article about scandalous pedophilia trial. The owner of the bar “Eule” in Saarbrucken, Mrs. X was offering her regular customers some spicy entertainment with kids. It was cheap, only ten those deutsche marks. A five years old boy, named Dominick, was accidentally smothered during such adult entertainment. Nobody knows how many kids went through “Eule.” All victims were either disadvantaged children or they were from the missing list.
The article said they found only one child, who survived sexual abuse – seven years old Johnny M. He was brought there by his own stepfather and had been tortured for about a half a year. Blood rushed into my face. They didn’t give the last name of the victim, however I got an idea that everybody must know about my disgrace. My neighbors, teachers, parents of my classmates and therefore kids themselves might know everything. They were not saying that in my face but could be gossiping behind my back. I could not be sure of anything no more.
When I found that newspaper, I was fourteen. An age, when a person can understand some sort of things but still is too young to judge on them philosophically.
What finally crushed me was the conclusion of the article - the violators were discharged.
The police never found the body of poor Dominick. There were suspicions that it could be cemented in the basement of a supermarket, which was being constructed next to the bar those times. No body means no case. The more so because little Johnny M. (blood rushed to my chicks when I realized they were writing about me) was inconsistent in his testimonies and contradicted himself in his evidences.
There were lots more details in this article but I do not want to talk about them. I have already told more than enough. Do not ask me questions; I do not remember anything. If not my damned curiosity that made me dig in newspapers issued seven years before I found them, my life could be completely different. What for I opened this Pandora’s Box? There my suffering started.
At night, I was having such nightmares that I would not wish it on my worst enemy. At daytime, I was so ashamed to look at people that I started avoiding them. I saw myself as a dirty outcast that may defile at a touch, not because of my abuse from the childhood solely but also because of my disgusting nightmares. Even before, I was a problem child and a poor pupil. My mom and a new stepfather (I have never seen the first one after his arrest) were always in troubles with me. When I found the article I simply went berserk.
I stopped talking to mom, as I was sure and I am now that she knew everything. I started running away from home, and a year later, I left forever. I took my Birth Certificate and two hundred dollars from my stepfather’s drawer, jumped on a passing suburban train and left for the wide world. I don’t think they were looking for me. I was almost an adult and had all the right to go independent. Out of sight, out of mind. Nobody really wanted to stop me.
Here, in Bliseweiler I settled and started working as a hustler. I had to survive somehow and had no idea for what else I could be suited. I felt better at last. Nightmares stopped torturing me; the only thing that still left was insomnia. The more so, because damned Alex was giving me coffee at night and was blacking my eye on a regular basis. It is hard to fall asleep when your whole body aches and moon, as bright as a projector, is shining right into your face, while stupid and ugly thoughts are attacking your brains. Not memories, just thoughts; I’ve already told you that I don’t remember anything.”
 
Chapter V
Actually, Johnny Maverick was not sincere when he wrote in his diary that he remembered nothing. He just didn’t dare to tell the truth even to himself. If only he could really forget it! Unfortunately, it is simply impossible to erase memories about something like that. 
Can you imagine a seven-year-old boy in the arms of three adult men running wild out of lust? They almost tore his inside; it’s a miracle that he survived at all.
Even after all these years he could still hear his own piercing shriek and feel somebody’s horny sweaty hand, immediately covering his mouth, while other hand was seizing his throat so hard, that little Johnny could hardly breathe.
When it was over they just dragged him in the rest room and thrown on a cold spitted floor between urinals and a sink like some trash. There he was throwing up for a long time - weeping, standing on his knees, clutching at a toilet bowl, which was too big for his height. And when he saw blood on his underwear he got into panic as he decided that he was going to die.
What a seven-year-old boy could not realize was the essence of manipulations that he underwent. He was too young and couldn’t understand the sexual meaning of it. According to the record of evidence, John Maverick had been sexually abused for six months. Maverick himself couldn’t tell anything about it, as for him all these days blended together in one line of pain and fear or better to say blind horror.
Little Johnny was so terrified that he was afraid to talk about it even to his mom, but couldn’t she really see anything? Can any mother, even if she is blind and deaf, fail to notice that something is happening to her son if he learnt no single letter during his first year at school, plus, forgot all that he had learnt before? If he was never playing but sitting, shrinking into a corner; if he was not eating properly but suffering from nausea, and as a result lost five kilos; if he suddenly started peeing in bed?
In the courtroom, John’s mother was crying, repeating that she had no idea what was happening, that she couldn’t even imagine anything like that. Everybody believed her and felt sorry for the poor woman; everybody, except Johnny, who never believed his mother and never forgave her.
He did not have to attend the trial due to his health conditions. Doctors said he was too weak for it. The questioning itself was already too much.
He remembered how they pushed him into a little smoked-up room, where a fat guy with a growing bold met Johnny with a cunning, unpleasant smile. He raised himself behind the table, lit by the fierce light, pointing at the empty sit in front of him.
“Sit down, Johnny. Don’t be afraid. Relax, I won’t hurt you. We’ll just talk a little bit, OK? I’ll ask you a few questions and you will try to answer. Are you OK with that?”
“Yes,” Maverick whispered, frozen with fear as a rabbit in front of a boa. 
“You are a big boy… What grade? Do you like your school?”
The man didn’t care about Johnny’s study actually; he wouldn’t mind to skip that part of a talk. However, prior to the questioning it’s necessary to chat a little bit to a kid to make a contact and win his confidence. On the other hand, what confidence one could expect from a boy who had been stuck between catatonia and hysterics for months, a boy so weak and scared that he could faint at any moment.
“Johnny, try to remember, it’s very important”
Unfortunately, John couldn’t understand how important it was. All he wanted was to finish the hurting questioning and go home. He had no clue that depending on what he would tell, the violators would either go to prison or set free. He was all mixed up, so he started making stories where he couldn’t remember the truth. Unfortunately, such evidences were not appropriate for the court, so the trial was doomed.
The rapists avoided prison and Maverick is to blame for it. It’s only Maverick’s fault and nobody else’s. Poor Dominick could give no evidence, as his dead body was laying somewhere, cemented in a basement and other victims were never found.
Yes, after he had found and read that newspaper, John realized lots of things. To say that he was shaken and shocked is say nothing. Even before, some hurting memories were coming to the surface, breaking his induced amnesia just as spring water breaks fragile ice. And then, all the dirt and darkness that he was pushing into his sub-consciousness all these years surged up and buried him with his head. He was thrashing and suffocating like a fish, which instead of pure water got into thick sticky mazut.
He was suffering from disgust, shame, and fears that others would find out about his disgrace if not already found. For example, the math teacher – why he was looking at Johnny so strange? Vice versa, the chemistry teacher was always looking away with embarrassment. The kids were constantly gossiping… May be about him? It was real paranoia.
In addition, as if paranoia alone was not enough, Maverick got sickening “reverse” nightmares. He was reliving all that they did to him but in a different way. That time it was he, who was raping and torturing some skinny helpless body. Out of wild, blind fury, he was squeezing somebody’s throat with steel fingers to keep a little bustard from interfering with his, Johnny’s brutal pleasures.
How anything like that could be happening at all, for God’s sake?
Johnny was waking up sobbing, biting the edge of his pillow not to scream out of horror and unbearable guilt. Why it was happening to him? He didn’t do anything!
The rest of the night, he was crying, being afraid to fall asleep. He couldn’t understand why he had to be punished so hard for somebody else’s crime. He was too young, poor Johnny Maverick. He hadn’t learnt yet that it’s always the victim who pays for the sins of his butcher.
Well, John, stretch the truth now, pretend that you remember nothing, lie to yourself. Now, you are walking on a much thinner ice than before, and ice is already cracking under your feet… when it breaks, your fall into cold, dark water will be so dreadful and pain so severe that you won’t be able to bear it.
How many troubles can arise from inability to be honest? First, you deceive yourself, your memory, and fate. Then you start lying to others. After all, the beautiful lie, pouring as a healing balm on bleeding wounds, winds round your arms and legs like flower garlands and lashes round your neck like a stranglehold. A lie multiplies like a computer virus, endlessly replicating itself. It grows so big that it fills your entire small world. You cannot escape to breathtaking colorful illusions. They are as real as drying drops of rain on a window glass – sparkling like precious diamonds to turn into steam the next moment and disappear. All tales are lie. You are old enough to come to the mirror and simply peep into your own eyes.

Johnny was sitting all alone, with captious curiosity examining a woman’s photo on the computer screen. She had dark-brown hairs, smoothly backswept, opening large, clean forehead, delicately arched brows, and big grey eyes with a soft hint of yellow. The nose could be a bit smaller. However, it was not aquiline as Johnny’s but noble and straight, reminding the Renaissance pictures. He noticed some fine wrinkles in the corners of lips showing her age.
They had already exchanged a few letters, simple but warm and sincere, so she sent her photo to establish a visual contact. For her it meant a new step of trust, for him – a new round of lie. Even if he wanted, he couldn’t send Kristina his real photo. A nineteen years old boy in no way could look like a distinguished thirty-nine years old man.
Johnny was biting his lips thoughtfully, tapping the table with his fingers. He didn’t want to lie so much. On the other hand, what is the difference? He could send her any photo; some nice one from a gay site would work; Kristina would hardly check such sites.
Maverick looked closely at Kristina’s face once more. Though he was indifferent to a woman beauty, he liked her face. He was wondering what “straight” Paul would feel on Johnny’s place, examining the photo of a beautiful stranger.
He smiled to his thoughts. It was nice to feel like a strong and self-confident man, a real one. All he needs is just a beautiful and faithful girlfriend like Kristina, next to him. He got a feeling that Paul’s personality started flooding over him just as Blise’s water is flooding over the dirty embankment and fallow lawns of the park in spring. His own fears began melting like a snowflake on a warm palm, looking small and insignificant.
Watching Kristina with Paul’s eyes, Johnny suddenly went admiring her. Why did her husband have to leave such a charming woman? May be he fell in love with a guy? Here he smiled ironically, coming back to his own personality. Time to look for a photo, for example at “Gay Romeo.” It was his favorite site; there was always something, pardon, better to say somebody, to look at. Maverick looked through dozens of men photos. Some of them were very attractive but still not good enough to represent Paul. After all, he picked up the photo of Axel Schmidt from Dusseldorf. The middle age man was stunning handsome. Looking at his jet-black hair, spiritual and determined look, the eagle eye, expressing sternness and tenderness at the same time, Johnny got a desire to write him himself. However, after thinking over the distance between Dusseldorf and Blissweiler and comparing appearances, he realized that there was no chance for the reciprocal feeling. Therefore, he had nothing to do but copy the photo and attach it to his message.
“Dear Kristina, I’m sending you my photo. It’s not the best one but I hope you we’ll like it…”
Honestly, John was rather doubtful that somebody may not like such a man but who knows those women. Johnny was hoping that “Paul” would be to Kristina’s liking; after all, he was trying hard picking him up.
When he clicked “send,” cold wave of guilt and disgust covered him once more. He knew that lie was not good but he couldn’t stop the nice correspondence because of such a trifle as a photo. Plus, he always remembered the quote by Antoine de Saint - Exupery “You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed”
Exactly, just by typing a few meaningless words in the Internet, you are taking responsibility for somebody’s life and if you lie once you have to go on again and again.

Part II
Chapter I
Summer was over. Exciting bright colors changed into warm transparence of fall. In grey waters of Blise microscopic algae started propagating, making the river glow with soft emerald green at night. It looked so phantasmagoric and charming that Johnny could not take his eyes off glowing waters where fall leaves were gliding like some sunny butterflies. He was walking on the narrow embankment, looking at the river, and sky was stretching over his head like a vast bowl filled with liquid silver.
Nights in September are rather cold but Blise, twisting between two banks as a shining green snake was emitting soft living warmth. It seemed that the river was breathing evenly and deeply as though it was sleeping. Maverick, having sensation of being the part of the river’s dream, was trying to step carefully not to disturb sensitive, magic silence by harsh sounds of tread.
At such moments, even his purposeless existence seemed to have some mysterious meaning. He did not feel like a non-invited guest at the feast of life anymore; he turned into an enigmatic and wise creature with thoughts and emotional impulses interweaved with the fine and harmonic fabric of the Universe. It is a pity nobody else could see that creature, or rather, only one person could. It was Kristina. During the summer, the correspondence grew into close friendship and Johnny shared with her whatever came to his mind without ceremony, since he had nobody else to share.
It appeared to be a stunning new experience. For the first time in his life, his words could find a response in some other person. He could see his own reflection in her even if  it was slightly distorted, the same way he could see his face in the calm, dark emerald green mirror of Blise waters.
It was very unusual to wake up in the morning and realize that besides humiliation, quarrels, and everlasting self-torment something completely different was ahead - a letter from the distant friend. She was telling about her own troubles, responding to his thoughts, ready to mourn and rejoice together. Kristina shared with Johnny the sad story of the downfall of her happiness. She told about her love… the fun she and her husband had together in the beginning despite all the hardships, which they were trying to overcome with jokes and laughter. However, with the time, their relationship started losing joy drop by drop until the hardships, money shortage and everyday misery eventually displaced it. Kristina’s husband fell into depression. She tried everything to shake him up but all in vain. It seemed to her that she was knocking hard against some transparent but amazingly strong wall as a silly butterfly is knocking against the window, breaking wings, crushing itself, choking with pain.
It was also bad for kids. The atmosphere of despair affected them also; the older boy was three years old still not talking.
While thinking of Kristina’s husband, John was imagining Alex. He was the same type – spoilt, always displeased, venting his bad luck and bad mood on weaker ones. They even had the same name. Sasha, Kristina’s man name, and Alex were both the derivations of “Alexander.”
After all, Sasha left his family and moved somewhere else. It was not clear from Kristina’s letters if he left for the other woman or just decided to look for better luck. After all, it does not matter.
Johnny’s father left the same way. He could not endure the hardships of emigration and went back to Russia alone, without his family. Then, Johnny’s stepfather took his place.
Naturally, Maverick mentioned neither his father nor stepfather in his letters to Kristina, as it had nothing to do with consoling of her. Instead, he tried to draw her attention from her grief, describing in details his, or better to say, Paul’s colorful life.
He was enjoying those stories so much that started believing in them somewhere deep in his heart. He wanted to believe that all that could happen in his life also.
Sometimes, in his sleep, he saw himself as a handsome Paul but with John Maverick’s past. He knew that he must hide that past from others not to be disgraced to the end of his life. Otherwise, the beautiful tale would go to pieces like glass over asphalt, and vanish like a mirage. However, he failed to conceal it, so he woke with tears in his eyes and with such a dreary hopelessness in his heart, that he was almost ready to jump out of the window to put the end to everything at once.
Everything changed when he was writing to Kristina, glorifying the beauty of his home town, neat little gardens with flowers blooming all year round, cozy park paths covered with rustling dry leaves.
“I’m going to tell you the most banal thing in the world. I love my country, the place of my birth,” John wrote and it was the truth.
Only the enchanted river Blise he never mentioned in his letters. For him, it was something intimate, which was hard to share even with the closest friend.
Instead, he loved imagining Paul and Kristina walking together along some other river - rapid, clear, and bright like the sun. The name of the river sounded clear also, pure, and very unusual – “Oka.” They were walking there and charmed Autumn was quietly slinking after them, generously showering trees with gilding, dusting riverside grass with soft yellowness. He was writing poetry about it and capricious Muse was visiting him more and more often, staying until late. Because you know, he got a reader, the only one but still real, compassionate and what’s more important, not indifferent.
Maverick showered Kristina with verses, and she, surprised with his writing zeal, tried to interpret vague but beautiful and melancholy images to give it back to him as a clue to some intricate charade.
This was the innocent game they were playing together.
The only problem was that Johnny was lying, and lie, as we know, is not a good basement for building anything worthwhile.
He never complained about his own problems, though sometimes he was craving for it. He couldn’t step out the framework of the image he had created himself. Moaning would be inappropriate for such a strong man as Paul. Men don’t cry. Otherwise, women wouldn’t’ respect them.
Unfortunately, Johnny was strong neither bodily nor morally. Anybody could hurt him and he couldn’t even go to police if something. Any kind of prostitution is illegal in Germany; say nothing about homosexual. In such circumstances, asking the police protection means looking for troubles. It may result in your own accusation. Anyway, Maverick already lost his belief in justice.
A month ago, in the beginning of August some group of teenagers beat him up hard right there, at the embankment. Why? Without any reason, just because they were a few and he was alone.
They were ordinary, somewhat foolish, and playful boys between thirteen and fifteen years old. Such kids love gathering in flocks like sparrows to crowd in parks and under the bridges. They are skateboarding or covering walls with cheerful graffiti, using spray cans of different colors. Usually they are harmless and not attacking.
God knows what came over them but they beat him so bad that he had to stay in bed for a weak and was afraid to look in the mirror. Happily, he got over, even no scar left on his face. Alex insisted on calling the police but Johnny refused it flatly, though his friend was just boiling with righteous anger.
“What the hell! We live in the legal community! So what if you are a hustler? You think local authorities don’t know what is happening right under their nose in the park? Whom you are afraid to surprise? You have the same rights as any other citizen of Germany, including the right for security of the person. Nobody can beat on you!”
Look who is talking! One may think Alex has never beaten anybody.
“You right,” John didn’t want to argue “But you must admit that there is no job as a “hustler” in Germany. Even if everybody knows everything, if I try to start a case I’ll be the first to punish. And the boys will get off with just warning.”
“Wonderful, Johnny! So, any rouge, any Nazi can whack you in the face and you will just keep silent? It’s how it should go in your opinion?”
“They are not Nazi, just kids. I don’t know what came into their minds, may be they were dopey or something. It was an accident; I got in the wrong place at the wrong time. Shit happens. I’m not afraid of them, Alex.”
Maverick was not sincere again. Violence always causes fear, especially if a victim cannot get any protection. After that incident, as soon as the embankment became deserted Johnny hurried up back home, even if he had to risk incurring his friend’s displeasure. If it is inevitable to be beaten, let it be by Alex. At least, Johnny knew what he could expect. As a rule, execution came to nothing more than box on the ear and slap in the face. It was unpleasant, humiliating but not fatally. It’s different when you meet a group of drunken teenagers. Without any intention, they can beat you to death or mutilate so bad that you would regret they had not killed you at the spot. Better not to tempt fate.
However, the night was as stunning beautiful as only serene nights in the beginning of September could be, and Johnny forgot all his fears. He was roaming around deserted promenade along glowing Blise. With some melancholic pleasure, he was breathing cool air, smelling with grass and freshness. He was listening attentively to living alerted silence; the whole world seemed to be empty, just bright silver drops of stars were flickering on the dark violet sky like flames of thin candle under the gentle night breeze. Overturned stars were twinkling softly and mysteriously in the green depth of the river, shading strange unhealthy yellowness of the fuzzy moon disk. 
Johnny walked down and came so close to water that tiny river waves started licking the toes of his shoes. He got a feeling that the moon was lying at the bottom of Blise, shining through the thickness of water as bright as a projector. He got so dazzled that felt like closing his eyes not to look at it any more. But he couldn’t take his eyes off the moon; it was hypnotizing, calling for him, attracting him like a magnet, depriving of all thoughts and wishes except the desire to follow the moon. Without hesitation and any attention to creepy coldness in his legs, he started walking towards inviting flaring golden lights of the other side of the river, which suddenly appeared to be scary close.
Maverick came to himself with a start and realized that water was already up to his knees. At the same time, his head began swimming and he almost fell in the reflected sky, which was calm and full of light.
It must be awful to sink in the sky, yet wonderful - to choke with the brilliance of stars and iridescence of green waters, falling down into the great emptiness until you reach the bottom to be burn in the light of the merciless bright piercing moon.
What the hell is he doing? He must lose his mind to go into the river! Johnny was paralyzed by sudden horror; he realized that for a few seconds his life was hanging not even on a piece of hair but on finest gossamer, which could break any moment by the slightest motion of the air. If he went little bit further he could get into some deep spot, current would knock him down and as he couldn’t swim, he would be gulping down cold water until his end. In a few days, police would fish out a monstrous disfigured body, pasted all over with shells and grubs. Isn’t it loathsome?
Trying not to look down Johnny slowly made his way back. When he got out of water, he sat down on a cold concrete and took off shoes to pour water out. The night was cold and wet pants and shoes made it even colder. He knew he should hurry up home but the very thought of coming back to the apartment he shared with Alex filled him with despair. He had to admit, that he, John Maverick, didn’t have a home and never had.
All of a sudden, he was seized by stupid pity for himself. Did he really deserve such a death? Why he was constantly trying to punish himself, what was his fault? And what for the others are punishing him?
Right in front of him the black enormous bulk of the bridge was rising against the background of the flaring sky - the bewitched bridge, a ghost. It seemed to be transparent, as though widely pouring milky light of stars was piercing through.
But Maverick didn’t care any more about the beauty of a fall night. He felt as if he unexpectedly found himself inside of one of his nightmares. Anything could happen in a nightmare, even some scariest things, Johnny knew that and what’s more, was sure it was going to happen any moment. He was sitting curling up, cold at the night wind, shivering and crying, ashamed and weak, and could not wake up.

Chapter II
“What the hell, John? Where were you bumming around all night long?” Alex’s warm greeting came from the depth of the apartment.
“I was working.” Maverick answered simply.
 He had no desire to go for wordy explanations. All he wanted was to get warm under the hot shower, drink some hot tea or wine, and fall asleep, if any luck, until next evening.
However, to fall asleep in the morning was even harder than at night. Maverick could easy drop off to sleep only in complete darkness; even subtle moonlight was too much for him. Only that time he was so tired that it seemed he could fall asleep even standing like a horse in a stable.
“Working? Until eleven o’clock in the morning?” Alex was amazed first but then added more friendly “I hope such hard work was generously rewarded?
“You hope,” John mumbled, entering the living room… and there he was dumbfounded. “Alex! How you dare to read my letters!”
His friend was sitting in front of the computer with Maverick’s last letter to Kristina on the glowing screen.
“Yes, I was just going to ask you – what is that? What the bosh you are writing and to whom? In all my life I never…”
“Alex!” Johnny started shouting again, this time with tears in his eyes. “You have no right to read my private correspondence! You lousy bastard!”
Johnny’s verbal level seemed to be almost blocked, probably as the result of his night hysterics. So he grabbed the chair and with all his strength thrown it at his Aryan friend.
For Alex such words, all the more, actions were not to tolerate; so just in a few minutes, after a short but fierce fight, those one who made bold to throw a piece of furniture was lying on the floor showered with hail of blows, trying to shield at least his head with his hands but all in vain. Alex was so furious that he was thrashing Johnny without stopping until he realized that his victim was not crying anymore and not even twitching; he gave no sign of life at all. Next to him, on the floor, a dark spot was growing, looking like blood.
At this moment, Alex’s anger completely vanished giving way to fear in a flash. He had no intention to beat the guy to death. He could easy get a couple years in jail for that. What could be more stupid than ruining your own life because of such a damned nutcase? Alex kneeled next to the prone helpless body.
“Johnny, are you OK? Are you alive? Johnny?!”
Here Maverick (thanks God!) stirred slightly, raised himself with a moan, and sat up.
“Are you crazy? You could kill me.”
“He is as tenacious as a cat,” Alex thought to himself with a relief and said loud “You, bastard, better think next time before opening your mouth. There is no way I would allow anybody to throw chairs in my house! Try again and see what will happen.”
“I’m sorry,” Johnny whispered. “It won’t happen again.”
“Won’t happen,” he mimicked with a grimace. “I’ve heard it million times! Are your bones OK?”
Alex had no desire of bringing that idiot to the hospital with a fracture or something like that. He had no doubt that Johnny would rather let them cut his arm off before he would say a word against his friend. He would be repeating the same story about falling down the staircase until his mouth gets dry. The doctors may not believe him, but nobody would care to report to police. They put “an accident” In the column of the reason of the visit and that’s it. Alex didn’t worry about responsibility, he just hated wasting the whole day for such foolishness. Next time he should better be more careful.
“I don’t know… I think I’m OK…”
Johnny was trying to wipe his face off the blood dropping from his nose but instead, he just clumsily spread it all over his face.
Alex dropped him a clean napkin. “Wonderful! If so, stop whining and let’s talk”
He easily picked up Johnny under his arms and seated on the chair. After that, Alex sat in front of Maverick and crossed his legs.
“Well, John, what were you going to say?”
It was his usual way, after he let off some steam he became very amiable and easy to talk.
Johnny felt so giddy that he had to set his arms against the table not to fall down.
“I…”He was trying hard to pick up the right words. “ I almost took my life last night”
“Idiot,” Alex commented scornfully. “You better explain what for you were writing all this shit to… what is her name…”
“Kristina” There was no use to deny anything; Alex probably read all the letters. “Listen, Alex, I was not right to grow hysterical like that, but you must admit… there are some things that you shouldn’t do.”
 Maverick was trying to talk firmly but instead sounded miserably what was really upsetting.
“You cannot disturb other people’s privacy. How it came to your head at all to read my letters.”
“Relax, I’m not going to steal your girlfriend,” Alex interrupted with irritation. ”But what the hell do you want from her? You are a gay, and she is old enough to be your mom. And on top of everything you are lying like a dog! Why are you pulling her legs pretending to be “Paul,” rich and lonely, dreaming of nothing, but coming for her to bring with him to wonderful far-away Germany?”
“Wait! I didn’t write that” John protested. “I never promised anything like that! Don’t misinterpret my words.”
“Isn’t it implied? You think an adult woman would be toying with you. There is no way she would mess with such a brat. She is looking for somebody mature, who could support her and her kids. You are penniless, what for she needs you, loony!”
“Alex!” Johnny uttered a groan frantically. “It was not even mentioned! Try to understand that it is quite possible for a man and a woman to keep relationship without any mercenary interests! I don’t interfere with her private life; she can look for the right man, why not. What is my fault? I never promised anything… As for Paul… It’s just a tale, an entertainment. I’m like Scheherezade from “Thousand and One Nights” who was telling the sultan fascinating tales, each night a new one. I’m just making up beautiful stories for Kristina to make her feel better. What’s wrong with that? Anyway, she will never find out the truth; we live too far from each other, not just in different cities but also in different countries.”
“Scheherezade!” Alex almost choked over laughter. “My God, Johnny, I always knew that you are an idiot, but it’s too much even for you! Wait, what did you say? You live not on different planets but in different galaxies? John, both, Russia and Germany are still on the same planet Earth, and not so far from each other that one could not expect a meeting face to face.”
“Sometimes I have such a feeling, Alex, that it is you and me who live in different galaxies,” Johnny replied sadly.
He felt more and more giddy, both from beating and incredible tiredness.
“You don’t understand me, and you don’t want to understand. It’s only virtual friendship and nothing else… nothing serious. I just want sometimes… I don’t know how to explain that… want to imagine myself to be something different from what I really am. I feel like making up some different life, character, and fate to share it with somebody.”
 He knew he was talking bosh but couldn’t help it. His thoughts were mixed up and eyes were clouded by thick, non-transparent, and shaky shroud. Wiping tears with soaked bloody napkin didn’t help.
“Johnny, God dammit!” Alex started losing his patience. “Come down to earth! Who needs your tales? She has to feed kids. What the hell do you want from her? You decided to change your sexual orientation? It’s not possible, sweetie. You are a gay by nature! And even if you could go straight, it would be better to find a woman with money. You are penniless and she is the same. You would better look for some rich widow. Try to rope in wile you are still young or otherwise you will have to work with your ass till the rest of your life.”
“Alex, I feel sick,” John whispered slipping down the chair. “I’m not going to change my sexual orientation… just… please, let me lie down. I’ll fix it up with Kristina later. Don’t write anything to her, please, I beg you.”
“I won’t, don’t worry” Alex caught up Johnny right in time before he fell down on the floor.
Through dim drowsiness, Maverick could feel how he was dragged to his bed and thrown on it in a rough way, but pain had already turned less acute anyway. Then it completely disappeared in stiffing unconsciousness filled with wrecked lines and tenacious nightmares.
“Word by word, letter by letter I’m making a better me with a new life and a different character. May be after that the invisible masters of our fortunes will let me cross out my miserable existence, crumple it, and throw away as a feeble rough copy, and then I will be able to write it all over again, the way I want it to be.
 I’ll open my eyes like a child who had a bad dream and realize that everything is fine. The sun is shining through the window and my little cozy room is full of warm golden light. Behind the door, in the kitchen, my loving mom and dad are drinking tea. They are real parents, not a traitor who left his family because of his ambitions, and not a bitch who gave away her own child to torture. I’ll jump out of bed, sleepy and frightened and throw myself in their arms to feel their love and support. ‘Mom! Dad! I had such a scary dream… about such a cruel life!’
I know all these dreams are stupid. Life is not a piece of paper to throw away and rewrite then neatly, not a sleep you lose as soon as you wake up. It is what you deserve and you cannot run from it and hide in lie or games, or the intricate world of your fantasies.
I’m raising my head from the pillow to glance at the clock. It is five p.m. already, I slept for a long time. My whole body aches as if some big truck ran me over, but head cleared a little bit.
This morning Alex beat me almost to death. I even fainted at some point. He always let loose with his fists but last time he went crazy. I thought he would kill me. On the one hand, it may look like nothing special, we both lost temper, that’s all. On the other hand, open any newspaper and you’ll see how many tragedies are happening because of lost temper and self-control, how many victims of accidental murders, even kids are reported! I hate newspapers. It’s hard to read anything good in them.
 Sometimes I have such a feeling that we all live at the bottom of one big side gutter among garbage and sewage. I wish I could yell so loud that the entire crazy world, devouring itself could hear me: ‘People! Are you out of your mind?!’
However, this morning I got my just deserts. Alex was right to beat me up. I’m just a miserable liar, absolutely worthless and useless, a na;ve idiot and the worst kind of an egoist. Now I can see my correspondence with Kristina in the true light. Though I tried to argue with Alex, deep in my heart I knew that he was right. I must admit that I was behaving despicable and dishonorable regarding Kristina. I’ve been fooling her with my stupid tales, blocking her way to a new love, diverting her with hollow mirages. And I dare to call it friendship?
Anyway, now it’s too late to change anything. All I can do is to bring the correspondence to the end somehow. I cannot tell her the truth, it’s too shameful. I’m ashamed not only for who I am but also for lying to her for such a long time. Why I was doing that? Nobody was pushing me; it’s my and only my fault.
Now, when I know Kristina much better, I think she would understand if I told her the truth about me from the very beginning. May be she would even write something like, ‘Johnny, it is not your fault that it happened to you. This dirty spot is not on your life and not on your conscience. Anybody could be at your place. Don’t be ashamed and don’t be afraid that it could happen again. Let the things go hang, forget about it and enjoy life!”
I told it to myself many times but it didn’t help. Who knows, maybe if I heard the same words from somebody else it would work and at last I could believe that I deserve something good in this life also.”

Chapter III
When something is going to happen, it doesn’t appear right away. It’s getting started long before the culmination moment, growing slowly as a seed in the warm soil. The thunder in a blue sky always follows the lightning, which comes first and sometimes can be too quick to notice, say nothing about enjoying its ominous, fatal beauty.
It’s only an illusion that guillotine falls down quickly - just a second and a chopped head is rolling over dusty paving stones, scaring away idlers, while beheaded body is twitching in convulsions on the scaffold, covered with the warm, steamy blood. Execution is the final step, following arrest and trial. Before, one has to languish with fear and mortal agony in a cell, waiting for the sentence. Sometimes it is much more poignant than the very short moment of guillotine knife coming down to a defenseless neck.
However, sometimes it’s happening in a different way. Sometimes we have no idea that our trial as well as prosecution is over, the severe sentence has already passed on without the right of appeal and we’ve already been languishing in prison for a long time waiting for execution. We are hiding in blissful ignorance, avoiding to see what is approaching, sneaking up to us little by little like a huge cat with burning crazy eyes till it comes close and put heavy paws on our shoulders.
Though John Maverick’s sins had already exhausted the patience of those, who watch us from the skies and the bill of indictment had already been filed under sacramental header “execute not pardon,” nothing special had happened yet in physical world. Or rather, something insignificant and unremarkable was taking places. It was a chain of events, which could be just a numerous cases of unfortunate misunderstanding, but being lined up they looked like little alerts, portending something cruel and scary ahead, so scary that Johnny was afraid to think of while alarm sounds were becoming louder and louder. Still Johnny didn’t want to hear them; he was covering his ears while making plans for the future. He didn’t do anything that could possibly save him.

Two days before Jewish New Year without rhyme of a reason, Maverick said at the breakfast, “I want to go to college”
It was so absurd that Alex almost dropped his coffee cup out of surprise.
“You must be off your head, how many grades have you completed?”
“I could get my general education diploma part-time,” Johnny was serious. “I’m only nineteen and I gave good brains.”
“How do you know?” Alex argued.” It doesn’t take brains to fuck under the bridge for twenty euros. Do you remember anything at all they taught you at school?”
Maverick shrugged his shoulders indefinitely.
“I could refresh it. I was not studying hard at school…not because I was stupid… it’s not important why, anyway. I’m tired of such a senseless existence and I want to change it.”
John told the truth. He felt so worn out that he was almost ready to throw his things in a bag and leave for nowhere, for pure obscurity, just as he did four years ago. Only that time he was old enough to realize that it’s not possible to run away from yourself. It’s as impossible as chasing away your own shadow that is creeping at your feet.
“Life is not an entertainment,” Alex grinned, “Look at him, tired from working hard he is.  I would say, my dear,” He brought the discussion to the end; “You’d better stop fooling yourself.”

Five days later Maverick came home in the early morning, shivering as if he had fever, so bad that his teeth were chattering. He didn’t take off his shoes, didn’t even say “hello” to his friend and lover. He just groped his way to the living room and fell down on the chair.
Amazed, Alex was ready to give some comments about such offhanded behavior but after he looked at his friend’s face, he changed his mind.
       “Johnny, what happened? Were you drowning yourself in the river again?”
“Me? No”
Maverick’s clothes were dry, only locks of hairs on his forehead looked damp and bounded together as if from sweating.
“Has somebody hurt you?”
“I don’t know,” Johnny whispered, barely heard. “I don’t remember anything. It’s OK, Alex, calm down.”
However, Alex didn’t calm down; vice versa he got all worried. He’s never seen his friend in such a state, and he has no idea of amnesia that John had in his childhood. All he knew was that his fellow had already gone through fire and water, so Alex just couldn’t figure out what one could do to Johnny to make him look like that.
“I don’t remember anything,” John was repeating. “It was late, I was going home walking along the embankment… there were no light in the park…I don’t know why…only one dim street lamp next to the park entrance… but it was not dark… probably because of the river … I think I met somebody. I’m not sure. And then, I found myself here, in our apartment.”
Alex gave him a glass of water, but Johnny couldn’t bring it to his lips. His hands were shaking, making water spill on his pants.
As for Alex, he couldn’t figure out how John could meet somebody in the park late at night, and right after that appear at home in the morning. It could happen only if John met an alien that knew how to transfer objects through time and space. And how it could be light at night without any street lamps?
He didn’t care much about street lamps though; he was worrying about some different things. “Did they beat you on your head?” He asked suspiciously.
“Probably not. I don’t remember,” Maverick touched his forehead; he looked puzzled. “I don’t have a headache.”
“Take off your clothes.” Alex said sharply. He set Johnny on his feet and started tearing off his shirt.
“Stop it, please,” Maverick resisted but rather weakly
“Johnny! God dammit! Take your hands off!”
Alex pulled off Johnny’s T-short, lowered down his pants and examined him carefully, but didn’t find anything suspicious except a few bruises. It didn’t look like somebody had really beaten him up, unless they hit his head with something heavy. But if so he would probably had a bump?
After all it could be anything – influenza, encephalitis, meningitis and what not. Alex was not so good in medicine. Anyway, he was not at all enthusiastic about playing a nurse for his buddy who got sick so unexpectedly. Yes, he ought to find somebody to look after John while he is out. It would be nice to get some beer with friends. Then, if nothing changes in a day, he would bring Johnny to the doctor.
Therefore, he left John alone, went to the hallway, and started looking through the phone directory trying to figure out whom he could ask for such a favor. Who could agree to help but wouldn’t hurt Johnny. Who knows, somebody might want to get a free load. It would be too much for the situation.
He remembered a boy, a little bit shy and strange but always willing to help. His name was Pascal, Pascal Klamm. Alex started dialing his number hastily. He seemed to be the right person, just a little lie about a roommate who fell ill inopportunely and needs help, and it’s done.
Pascal came running out of breath in twenty minutes. He told Alex who was about to leave to go and worry about nothing and hurried up to give help to the patient in the way he thought it should be. Even if he was not a professional nurse, he turned to be the right person. He was a simple dull blondish guy in ridiculous glasses with thick lenses, but somehow he was able to spread the aura of silent sympathy and warm unobtrusive care. First, he gave Johnny a cup of warmed red wine, then helped him undress and go to bed. After Johnny lay down, he carefully wrapped him up in two woolen blankets.
“If you need something, I’ll be in the kitchen,” – he said quietly and left his patient alone.
John curled up and closed his eyes, falling asleep or may be just getting warm. He was glad that Alex disappeared and this shy guy in funny glasses came instead. He didn’t insist on anything, didn’t ask unpleasant questions and was not rude to Johnny in any way. Quite the contrary, he looked embarrassed and somewhat cautious as if he was careful not to burn himself with somebody’s pain.
At one moment, John was plunging into the transparent drowsiness filled with vague images and colors, at another, falling into the black well of unconsciousness. From time to time, he was coming to the surface, to dull mumbling of simmering coffeepot and the fine silver ticking of the clock from bedside table. These simple sounds brought him back to reality and the horrors of last night; he started moaning through clenched teeth again, shivering with wasting fever, burying himself deeper in prickly blankets.
Nevertheless, little by little, his body started relaxing in pleasant warmth, shiver came down, and breathing became easy and quiet.
By the evening, he completely came to himself. He was staring at the ceiling with his eyes wide open, trying to understand if all these lines, which were moving chaotically, interlacing and creating fanciful designs, came from headlights of cars passing by or they were the outcome of his own mind that hadn’t cleared up completely yet.
Dense coffee-color twilight had already thickened, it was dark and stifling in the room and Johnny couldn’t say what time it was, try as he might. Alex was not there yet, so it was not too late, probably. Had his strange nurse left already? Most likely, he had, if only he was not going to stay over the night.
Maverick quietly got up and half-dressed as he was, slipped out of the door and entered the kitchen. There he found the blond guy sitting at the table in the spot of dim yellow light reading a book.
John stopped at the door. “Hello,” he hailed hesitatingly his late guest. “Your name is Pascal, if I’m not mistaken.”
He remembered vaguely Alex was mentioning that name before leaving for his very important business.
“Yes,” Pascal raised his head. Through convex lenses, his eyes looked out-of-focused and little bit confused. “How are you, John?”
“Little bit better. Why don’t you go home?”
“I promised your roommate to stay here till he comes back. He was all worried about you.”
So, Alex called him a roommate. It was almost funny to hear that he could worry.
“I could stay by myself. I really feel better, I told you. Or, if you want, you can lay down on the sofa in the living room. There is no need to stay sleepless all night long.”
Patrick smiled wide and open and Johnny liked his smile.
“No, thank you. I would better read a little bit more. What time does Alexander usually comes back?”
“Around one in the morning. I don’t know when exactly as I come later than him.”
Pascal closed a thick book with a black leather cover and put it on the table, the title page down.
“What do you do for living, John?”
Oops, Johnny even got embarrassed. He was sure that all Alex’s pals knew about his occupation. Their sardonic grins while mentioning John Maverick made it clear. After all,why the hell he should tell everybody where and how he is making his dough. He doesn’t steal money, he earns them honestly the way he can.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Maverick said giving a sigh. “I’m sorry, Pascal.”
“Of course, Johnny, it’s your choice.”
For a few minutes, they were just looking at each other. John wished he could hide his eyes behind thick rainbow lenses too. There are at list two advantages in wearing glasses; while you are wearing them, they are masking your feelings and the moment you take them off, the world becomes vaguely wonderful.
“It is me who should be sorry, John.” Pascal pronounced at last. “I was not going to worm myself into your confidence, sorry. Curiosity is my biggest vice,” he added with authority and got an expression of relief on his face, after he saw that a skinny guy with sad Jewish eyes started smiling timidly.
Though Pascal Klamm was unfamiliar with some sort of things and knew about hustlers as much as about inhabitants of the Alfa Centauri, he already learned from his life that a careless word may cause a painful wound.
“Yes, I am serious, Johnny. It is a vice. Those ones who ask people too many questions force them to lie.”
“It’s OK, you didn’t ask anything extraordinary. It’s my own oddity. I hate telling people about myself, that’s all. Look, if you are not going to sleep anyway, may be you will read me something from your book?” Johnny asked unexpectedly for himself.
This time Pascal got a little bit embarrassed.
“It is The Bible,” he said apologetically and turned the black leather book the title up. “Of course, I’ll read it to you if you are interested.”
“Are you a member of some sect?” Maverick was surprised.
“No, why? I’m reading it because I want to figure out how and why things are happening in this world.”
“So, have you figured out?”
“Not yet,” Pascal answered honestly. “It’s rather complicated. Well, if you are ready to listen, sit down, Johnny, here, next to me.”
Sit next to him in the warm circle of light, close enough to feel each other breathing; it would be nice. Read aloud beautiful and wise words, complicated yet simple even for a child to understand. May be they could comprehend the world and it would change their lives?
However, to find the answer to this question was not Johnny’s fate, as before he replied to Pascal, the front door slammed; Alex was back. Even from the kitchen, John could hear him whistle cheerfully though not musically in the hallway.
Maverick had no desire to see Alex, say nothing about talking to him in front of Pascal, so he went to the bedroom, back to his bed and buried his face in the pillow.

Chapter IV
“A thick notebook with a blue tattered cover is almost written up, only a few blank pages left. I think that will be enough, as my story is also coming to the end.
At least, it’s how I think. I have some sort of premonition on the border of sad belief. You can call it the surge of intuition.
It’s an ordinary blue notebook with lots of poetic quatrains on the cover, written with very small letters in all possible directions. This notebook contains the whole life - the life of John Maverick. It’s not very long and not well-rounded but it’s all I have; I’ve written everything. Though I don’t have much hope that anybody would want to read it. Nobody is interested in others’ lives; everybody has own problems to sort out.
As for me, soon I’ll have nothing to sort out at all.
Too bad, I didn’t drown in Blise last time; it would be an easy and beautiful death - no dirt, no snot and almost no pain. Intense but short agony caused by cold river water stormed into lungs, followed by precipice and emptiness. And all the rest just doesn’t matter. Let them fish out a rotten body and bury it on a state expense like some bum. I’m not so na;ve to hope that Alex would fork out for my burial, though, I know for sure he has some stash. May be not much, but he has some, as he’d been fleecing me for two years. Anyway, I would be dead and wouldn’t care, so I don’t give a shit.
So far, I’m still alive and I’m in such a pain, that it’s hard to run a pencil over the paper. That pain seems to be the only feeling I can still experience.
I’m dying slowly in a snow-white-sterile hospital room, all by myself. Only a nurse comes from time to time to check a dropper and as soon as she has done, retreats hastily; she is very busy. Couple of times I was trying to talk to her, but she answered curtly and left in a hurry. For her I am just an empty spot, already dead. Who would talk to a dead body? There is not time enough for those who are still alive.
The room is for two but I’m all alone here. May be the hospital is near empty or they just don’t want traumatize other patients by the spectacle of the death. I’m describing last night as quick as I can, to ask my nurse some sedative and sleeping pills after I finish. Jesus, I wish everything would end for me as soon as possible.
I’m crying and my tears are dripping right on open pages; the pencil is slipping on the wet paper and tears it. I have to turn the page over. Damn it. It was already not enough space left.
I was always afraid to stay alone at the embankment in the darkness, with black silhouettes of trees, vaguely seen against  the satin-grey night sky, and pale street lamps, drawing some blurred lines over narrow paths of the park. However, what happened yesterday took place in day light. Or rather in twilight, when sun already went down the horizon, but the dark didn’t fall yet.
It was raining incessantly all week long. Blise stopped glowing, grew dim, swelled with rainwater, filled with small debris from flooded banks. The river came close to the bridge piers, leaving just a small strip of land, no wider than five meters. There I was standing looking at motely puddles and scraps of newspapers dancing in the wind.
There were still some people in the park, though somewhat farther away. They probably couldn’t see me behind evergreen branches of cypresses; I’m not sure. Anyway, nobody rushed to help me, when that group of young guys, eighteen-nineteen years old, gathered around me. There were seven or eight of them. I’ve never seen them before, though our town is rather small and everybody knows each other at least by sight; they must be visiting.
I was surrounded in a dense semicircle in such a way that I couldn’t escape, as there was the river behind me. If I could swim, I would plunge into the water, in its grey, cold stream. Who knows, maybe it would bring me to the other bank, like a chip. Unfortunately, I’ve never learned swimming.
Oh no, I was not afraid of beating or raping, I experienced both many times. Both cases are possible to endure, it just needs to grit the teeth hard and push deep inside the cry of pain that is desperately bursting from the very bottom of the heart. What scared me was something strange in the eyes of these guys, lurking in the ominous darkness of unnaturally dilated pupils. I got at once that they were going to do something worse to me than beating or raping. Those black spots of craziness, sharp as a lit cigarette ends smoldering in the dark, said it quite clear.
They approached, silently and scary, pushing me back, to the water. I failed even to cry as my throat was squeezed by horror. And then, they simply plugged my mouth not to draw attention by any noise. I was not afraid of beating, outrage, or assault. I was afraid of death.
People, why? I don’t want to die! There are so many wonderful things in the world and I’ve seen nothing yet. Absolutely nothing.”

When they brought him to the hospital, Maverick was in the state of deep shock. He couldn’t answer any question but mumbled something unintelligible. No wonder police failed to get any useful information; it was simply impossible to examine him.
First hour and a half Johnny was crying out of pain almost without stopping, writhing on a narrow hospital bed. Delirious, he was calling Alex’s name but they could reach him over the phone only by the morning. Then anaesthetization, which they failed to give at once due to the bustle, started working and he calmed down. He didn’t fall asleep but was lying motionlessly with his eyes open. It was unclear if he was aware of what had happened to him and where he was, or not.
Alex appeared only next day, closer to the afternoon. He looked lost and couldn’t tell anything to clear up the situation. All he could do was shrugging his shoulders with the puzzled look.
Johnny, who had already come to his consciousness, started begging his friend to bring a notebook in a blue cover, explaining that it should be somewhere on the computer desk.
He was so desperate with tears in his eyes that Alex yielded and brought the notebook, since the hospital was just fifteen minutes away from the house. He forgot to take a pen, but John managed to borrow a pencil from an old Russian grandma who was washing the floor in his room. The rest of the day Johnny was trying to write something in his notebook, but he was too weak. He was crying all the time; the pencil was slipping out of his awkward fingers, falling down the floor and poor guy couldn’t pick it up by himself. A sheer torture.
He was waiting for death but it didn’t come. Then he was trying to fall asleep, in vain also. Time was dragging incredibly slowly, just like rubber, melting on the sun. To say better, time was not dragging, not even creeping, it just stopped dead. That hospital time smelled of chlorine, blood, and medicine. There was some other smell, familiar from childhood but thoroughly forgotten – the smell of pain, fear and bitter powerlessness of a victim in front of the exposed knife of the fate.

Chapter V
“The fifth day I’m lying in the hospital bed looking at the dull window pasted up with the slick cobweb of rain. The fifth day I feel the same – neither better, nor worse. May be it’s not the end yet?
May be, if I’m still alive I’ll get over? It’s rather a faint hope but on the other hand, why not? To tell the truth I didn’t even understood what exactly they did to me, those morons. All I know it was a terrible pain, all my body cramped, and even breathing broke, but I didn’t lose consciousness.
Probably it didn’t last long, I think no longer than half an hour as when they left, it was not dark yet. For me this half an hour was an eternity in Hell, though. It crossed out everything that had happened to me before. If only I struggle out alive, my life will be completely different! I’ll learn how to appreciate my life, not to fool away for nothing. As soon as I’m out of hospital, I’ll face Alex with the fact – no more prostitution. Any job will be better to start with and then I can try to get some school grant. Good education means a good job.
If Alex doesn’t like my plan, then we are just going different ways. I’ll leave him and move to some place where nobody knows me. Enough, I don’t want to cling to mirages of the past no more.
NEVER AGAIN -  I’m writing that with capital letters on the blue cover of my notebook over all citations, verses and pencil drawings, over all my previous life.
Never again - let all that what happened to me be a lesson. It’s a very cruel one, but learning is always for good. I swear to put the end to this humiliation. It’s fair to pay for reckless life, but life itself cannot be the price!
I’m begging somebody, don’t know whom, “Please, please, give me another chance!”
Yesterday, a grey-headed doctor was talking to Alex for a long time. After that, Alex was unusually kind to me, even affectionate. Did the doctor tell him that I’m going to die? It’s strange as I feel not too bad, at least better than first day if not to count dull ache in the lower belly when I’m trying to get up. They don’t let me get up, though, and they give me no food, only some cold tea with peppermint. I would never drink it in any other circumstances but now it tastes like some divine nectar. Is that really necessary to put me on the rack of hunger and thirst on top of all my torments?”
“Why do they give me just tea and nothing else?” Johnny kept asking Alex. “What’s wrong with me? When do they let me eat?”
Cold and indifferent darkness of autumn night already thickened behind the window, but soft golden light of a night lamp reigned inside of the room. Maverick asked Alex to turn on upper electric lamps, though they irritated eyes with sharp light and ears with unpleasant buzzing. There he was reclining on slightly elevated head of the bed with his weakened arms crossed over the blanket.
Alex gave a sigh and looked into Johnny’s eyes, straight and calmly.
“I’m afraid they will never do. I was talking to your doctor yesterday and he explained me everything. You got life-incompatible trauma.”
Tears gushed from Maverick’s eyes.
“So, there is no hope. Are you sure? May be they are mistaken?”
His friend just simply shook his head.
“It’s what your doctor said. I don’t think he can be mistaken. Not in your case, John. Honestly, he didn’t recommend me to tell you the truth, but…” Alex shrugged his shoulders. ”I think any truth is better than uncertainty, isn’t it? Besides, you can do something with the time left… to prepare, to think about something.”
“Yes, I understand,” John whispered. “Thank you Alex.”
“I’m sorry, Johnny. Really, I am.”
Alex felt that he should tell something more proper the situation but unfortunately, he was not a psychologist at all. Besides, he wanted to finish talking as soon as possible. He was not heartless; he just didn’t want to see his partner sick and crying. He always hated his tears but before he could give the boy a good box on the ear to stop his hysterics. Definitely, he couldn’t do the same to a dying person. Moreover, the hospital staff might misunderstand him.
“Well, I should go now. It’s getting late, almost time to go to bed,” Alex said at last. “See you tomorrow. I hope so. By the way, I almost forgot,” he took from his pocket a crumpled piece of paper and gave it to John.” I printed out the last letter from your girlfriend, thought you would be interested.”
“I can’t read now Alex. What is she writing?”
“She is worrying, asking, where you’ve disappeared,” Alex told reluctantly. He was too lazy to retell the whole letter, besides, he didn’t even remember all of it after looking through. “She wrote that her ex came back and she forgave him. So now she is asking you to forgive her and so on.”
“If she only knew that it’s me who should beg her forgiveness,” Johnny was sobbing, crumpling convulsively the edge of the blanket with his hands that all of a sudden turned to be clumsy and needless. It was painful and shameful to cry in front of Alex but he couldn’t help it.
“You are not guilty,” Alex said quietly. “You are not guilty towards anybody.”
Maverick tried to rise in bed a little but he failed; his haggard out of recognition face distorted with pain.
“Alex, don’t start mocking at me, please, but I want to know. Do you love me, at least just a little bit?”
“Are you nuts?”
“Alex, I’m dying. Nobody ever loved me, never in my life. I didn’t even have a dog in my childhood to love me.”
His friend kept looking aside. Tell him about love? Whom, this little fag? A hustler? And if he survives?
“See you tomorrow, John,” he said after all, trying to sound as gentle as possible.
“It may happen that there will be no tomorrow for me,” Johnny answered, leaning back on the pillow helplessly.
Alex went out; the door slammed. His tread in the corridor faded away and Maverick stayed all alone. He was wailing under the blanket that he pulled over his head, howling out of pain, despair, pity for himself and shame for his life turned out to be so stupid, coming to the end so abruptly and absurdly. He didn’t notice when and how he fell into half unconsciousness, half sleep to come to himself later, as if by push or sudden noise. It was the dead of night – no rustle, no ticking of a clock, no stars behind the windows. There were only silence and emptiness around. Everything looked different, not the way it looked before. It seemed that contours of objects became clearer and corners sharper. The floor was shining in a strange way as if somebody spilled either water or blood over it. Even night lamp gave light in a different way; the elongated bulb was flickering, stretching out. It was getting thinner and thinner, growing up like some fragile fiery stem. To add to it, some vague yellow shadows were rushing around the walls, quivering and fluttering.
He found Kristina’s letter on the nightstand with his hand, without even looking at it, like a blind man. The letters were twitching and jumping, as they were living things, however he was able to make out the beginning.
“Dear Paul,
Last night I had a strange dream. We were on the opposite sides of some wide and lackluster river. It didn’t look like Oka, it was some other one. You were different also, not the way you look at your photo. You looked young, almost like a boy, helpless, as a child lost in the dark. I felt like giving you hand through all this darkness and emptiness, but the river…”
“She is right, it’s how it is” Johnny whispered, dropping the letter. “Thank you, Kristina”
Some dark wide flow took him and started carrying away. The room began spinning around, first slow, then faster, and faster. The night lamp gave a few blinking and died out as a burnt out match.
“Hold my hand tight. I’m scared. I’m straying in the darkness and cannot see the path that I’m taking. I’m dragging myself through fog and cold, through the world that is falling into pieces and turning into nothing. It was my little world, where I used to live, and where I am never to come back. I’m dragging myself to the river voice.”
Everything had disappeared and then some light arose mysteriously. It was  the grey, transparent shining that originated not from the dull sky, which looked like a piece of glass blackened with smoke, but from everywhere – from dark motionless trees, faintly silvery cobblestones of pavement, smooth waters looking like they were glazed with fish oil.
John found himself at the embankment of Blise. Everything looked familiar, only the bridge disappeared. It vanished in the fickle cold air, as it never existed. Maverick walked down the embankment and came very close to the water. Now, when death was stretching over him its soft wings, rustling like leaves falling down his feet, the thought of drowning in the river didn’t scare him as much as before. Moreover, the feeling of ease all over his body and strange, ringing exultation that suddenly begun to sound in his chest to the high triumphant pitch, made him realize that he wouldn’t drown. He might swim across the river to the other bank, distant, and hazy; the bank that he used to seek so desperately.
Here the diary of John Maverick ends and I finish my narration. Whether it is a true story or just looks like true, let bygones be bygones


(ïåðåâîä íà àíãëèéñêèé Ñòåëëû Ïåðàëåñ.
Îðèãèíàëüíûé òåêñò íà ðóññêîì: "ß, Øàõåðåçàäà" http://proza.ru/2009/01/06/491
è http://proza.ru/2009/01/06/495)