You will laugh, but I was born Odessa. I am silent for everything else, but I am often asked: “Are you a Jew?” “No,” I answer sadly, “unfortunately not. I am a strange mixture of Polish, German, Ukrainian and Russian. But I was born in Odessa, it will not suit you? "

I was born at the 16th station of the fountain, where the sea is still relatively clean. (Just don’t ask about what, I’m afraid you don’t like what you hear back) And there I learned what real Odessan is. “How is Zhvanetsky?” - you will say and you will be wrong. Mishanka, of course, was born in Odessa, but he got out of there because he was poorly fed. Where did you see a full-grown Odessite? I even somehow amused at you.

No, Uncle Misha and I rushed to where we were cared for, where there was more red riba and less smiles. And if they tell me that I am from Odessa, I honestly answer: “You didn’t understand me that way. I was just born there. But this, too, is worth something ... "

Like any abnormal, I was always with unstoppable force pulled to the places where I came from. And once I did go, leaving my wife (I was still married then), business, important meetings and everything that made me postpone my trip for another month. I got into the first train, spat on a Moscow platform slippery from the rain and drove off.

- Home? - the conductor asked me.

“Home,” I agreed easily.

And he remembered the joke:

“At the Odessa railway station, a fat aunt with suitcases pops out at the door of the arriving train and shouts:

"Nosilnik !!! Potovskun !!! Come here, you will have me first! ""

“True, this is a joke to you, but in Odessa it is life.

Almost for the first time in my life I went to NE. You did not go to SV? Then you don't understand me. Immediately stop reading. And, by the way, read once started.

My neighbor turned out to be a hoarse girl who scolded Moscow with its ticket offices in which tickets only to general and CB, Moscow prices, blatant # # $% new Caucasians and me. The girl, as I later found out, was called Masha and she went to the capital to sell nuts collected from her grandmother in the village near Razdelnaya. Now Masha, tired of waiting at the ticket office at least a reserved seat, was traveling to Odessa, spending half of her own money on a ticket earned at the cost of weekly hard labor.

- And you will not pester? She suddenly asked, slightly calmer.

- I'm not annoying!

- Look to me, without stupidity.

This “stupidity” made me something that I wanted to cry and laugh, I suddenly realized that I was madly in love with absolutely an uninteresting Masha just a minute ago, that I, perhaps, would have attached to her and that I was really going home.

- Masha, how do you see if I offer you to go to a restaurant? - I blurted out after a while.

- How do you see if I say that I have no money?

- Very positive, I treat.

- Come on! - Masha stated. - But in general, let's go. Go out into the hallway, I will change. Not in jeans, I go ...

- Come on. Well this is not a "National" - I smiled.

- Go out, and then go alone.

And I went out, I stood and looked out the window until I was touched by the shoulder. I turned around and froze in place. In front of me was a spectacular blonde in a tight black dress who had time to do her hair somewhere. Yes, with such it is possible that in the "National", that in the "Maxim":

“So are we going somewhere or was it a stupid joke?” - Masha asks.

- Guess three times.

And we go.

Well, what to say - I spent the whole evening climbing out of my skin to maintain the image of a social guy. But she, she changed so much in the couple of minutes in which she changed clothes. Her hoarse voice acquired insane charm, traits - inaccessibility, gestures - grandeur.

Night. We are in a dark compartment. I hold Masha by the hand and read her own verses and strangers alternately. I really want to kiss her slender fingers, but I do not dare. I am generally timid by nature. And here is something unearthly ...

“You really aren’t pretentious,” says Masha.

“Unfortunately,” I sigh.

“But I seem to be sticking to it,” she says.

I am shaken.I do not understand what is happening to me.

“You are trembling,” she says, and I see in the glare of the light falling from her window a smile.

- stupid, right?

“If you want, I will hug you and you will be warm,” she says so naturally, that in these words not a drop of falsehood and vulgarity can be heard.

“Very,” I say with my lips. So I can not hear at all, but she hears, or does not hear, but she still hugs me and everything plunges into a pink mist, into an unreal space without time. Where there is only she, only her lips, hands, skin ... I cease to exist, I die a sweet death whenever I touch her.

Morning comes. And again in front of me Masha in her slightly baggy jeans.

- We arrived already, about five minutes left ... Time to say goodbye ...

- Wait ... What say goodbye ... How to say goodbye? ...

“Yes,” she says, as if not hearing, “you don’t go right to the platform, please.” My husband will meet.

And the train stopped. I sat and looked at the closed door. I tried to convince myself that everything that happened was just a dream. I tried very hard to convince myself of this.

But I could not.