This story is based on real events that took place in the 1980s.

—... And finally, comrades, we cannot help but focus on the mighty face of Neplyuev's merchandise!

Comrade Neplyuev raised his head. More precisely, she herself rose when someone called her by her last name.

—... I will not disclose, uh, the podgobnosti this, tkszzt, istogii, known, vpocheem, all of you no worse than your, uh, pokomnomu servant ... but ...

"Seven troubles - one pedsovet", said in the smoking room. Neplyuev closed his eyes and presented Nadino's face, pale, with a blue shadow of tears, although she did not cry with him.

They have not spoken for several weeks. Only glances, long glances in the classroom and in the corridors, so strong that others ran across them like invisible ropes. And - yes, they said, when Neplyuev asked her a task - in a diligently even tone, like an announcer, - and Nadia quietly, but also exactly answered, and Neplyuev thought that the hidden ring in her voice was scratching everyone, just like him.

They spoke in class, but it was not they who actually said it, but the Teacher and Disciple. The facelessness of the roles that Neplyuev did not know how to overcome, tormented him even then, a month ago, when he stomped with his 10-B along the paths of Kashtak, on the approaches to the Pillars. He was obliged to go on this campaign, even though he did not understand why, because there is a gym teacher Gopkalo, a lanky barbel in eternal tights. The leader of the campaign, who attempted to shout to him, Neplyuev, in command. 10-B did not fall behind:

- Tired, Ivan Valeryich, eh? Bear you? ..

- Do not bother Chistoplyuev, he remembers the road ...

- Will lead us when Gopnik runs away ahead and we get lost ...

Gopkalo set such a pace that he had to wait, go back and walk in circles. He was a whale to call names, not using a single forbidden word. Very soon, the entire 10-B was "clunks", "decrepit snails" and "ninety year olds", and Neplyuev turned out to be "healthy, it seems, I apologize, a peasant who weaves like a grandfather."

“And you, Platon Vasilich — a stupid, it seems, apologize, a man who chatters like a woman,” answered Neplyuev. He had long been with him on knives, as well as with almost the whole team, and he recognized the Poles only in solitude, when no one around was making a mess.

Appearing here two years ago, he still didn’t sing with his superiors, nor with his colleagues, or with the children. The latter, however, were difficult to call it that, and in general it was difficult to call them somehow censored - at least, many of them. In the classroom, these children subtly mocked the teachers, and during the breaks they discussed who was by whom, how many times and who was longer.

There were only a few exceptions, and among them was Nadia. She was a typical student of the old spill. This type had no chance of success, and the Mermaid Nadia, who was also one year younger than the others, was not honored by a woman. “Idiots, shkety”, thought Neplyuev about boys, “that’s where the real beauty is. Siberian, strong as Yenisei. Doesn’t anyone see? ”He was hurt for Nadia, even though he understood that he would otherwise get rid of jealousy. When Nadia was combing her mane up to her hips, fluffy, coffee-red with honey tint, it was impossible to bear. Neplyuev howled to himself and, to hide, found fault with Nadia, like a kid pulling his beloved girl by a braid, - and then in a dream saw her face, deadly right and gentle, lips and blue eyes, sadly strict, like taiga animals in the zoo.

He nicknamed her to himself Mermaid, and before going to sleep, he imagined Nadia naked, wet-haired and in droplets. It was something wet, spontaneous, although Nadya was always packed in a faceless form; it was sitting somewhere deep inside, and it seemed to Neplyuev that no one except him saw it. Nadia, the mermaid, did not dress up, did not twist her tail, and therefore was as if invisible to the boys.Of course, Neplyuev was afraid and to think about something more than the adoration strangled in himself, and in order to strangle him more strongly, found fault with Nadia on trifles.

And when they climbed up the yielding path, he told her:

- Rukavishnikova, your braid will fit us. Throwing you on Grandfather *, and you, like Rapunzel, hang a braid and drag people away ... Though you know who Rapunzel is?

The mermaid looked gloomily in front of her.

- I know.

- Such a famous stolbist **, yes?

She did not answer, but ran to the side, to the edge, gaping behind the trees.

___________________

* The name of the rock. - approx. auth.

** Stolbisty - Krasnoyarsk climbers. - approx. auth.

“I got her. Ha! ”- Neplyuev crooked, but could not stop. Nearby were the pillars and the mermaid. What he pinned to this city - and what he found in it. "The genius of pure beauty, your mother in the mouth," he thought. “I've had enough of what I saw of her. He lived, he lived - and he saw. Others look and cannot see, but I saw. ” Everything important was near, and Neplyuev was angry, he was terribly angry at the noisy 10-B, dirtying the Poles and the Mermaid with his gam, and with anger sneered like a jester, and pestered Nadia, who was running from him like a psycho ...

- So, there is no climbing, all clear? Lazuny! Come back! Quickly! - Basil Gopkalo. Nearby was a cliff, connected to the ridge with loose scree. On the spur stood a hut built of plywood with unnamed stolbistymi. She looked amazing, and the most inveterate already tried to crawl to her, rustling stones.

- Back! Heroes! Chapaevy! Everyone is here? Romanenko! ... Gorshkov! ... Ivanizde! ..

Fizruk shouted names, he was answered by a lazy "I-ah-a." Neplyuev was sitting on a stone, lost in his thoughts, but suddenly raised his head.

—... Rukavishnikova! Rukavishnikova! ... - Fizruk raised his voice. - Who saw Rukavishnikov?

Neplyueva chilled cold. He jumped up and shook his head, hoping to see her somewhere in the bushes.

—... He said: keep up, do not climb where the hell are you! What kind of people! Rukavishnikova-ah! ... Nadia-ah! ..

Echo repeated the cry. Somewhere stones fell. Silence.

Suddenly Neplyuev twitched. He was almost certain, and even without any “almost” - he was sure that he was right. Cursing, he crawled to the hut.

- Eeee! Ivan Valeryich! Kamikaze! And this is crazy! - Gopkalo shouted something offensive to him, but Neplyuev did not listen to him. He crawled here three times: the first time he nearly broke, and the other two crawled, like an insect, from pebble to pebble. The crumbling was buzzing beneath him, and he thought it was better to leave Nadya alone or to check whether he could sustain two. For some reason he had no doubt that the Mermaid was in the hut, as well as that she had run away from him there ...

—... and-no-about-waaaa! ... - came from behind.

- Rukavishnikovaaa! - Neplyuev shouted, crawling up to the rock.

That was his mistake. Besides, shouting, he stumbled and pushed down a large boulder, propping up the rest. Scree crunching, and Neplyuev rushed on four, like a mad crab, on the slope leaving it. The cold inside almost turned it off, but then he saw that he was still climbing up, winning the height of creeping stones, and now there would be a rock into which one could cling like an old friend without fear of a trick. Uffff.

Having reached the cliff, though one and a half meters lower than usual, Neplyuev pressed himself into a heated stone and looked like a stone tsunami went down into a hundred-meter-wide abyss, whining and exploding at the bottom of a brown firework. There was no horror, there was only gratitude to the rock for being with her, and she with him.

Catching his breath, he spat the dust, licked his peeled fingers, and climbed up. And only then he remembered Nadia.

She stood on the edge, looking down in horror.

“Hi,” Neplyuev told her, like an idiot, climbing out to the edge.

- How do we get back? - asked Nadia.

“Good question,” answered Neplyuev.

Truth be told, it was a crappy question. It was just crap, not a question, because there was no answer to it. There was no way down, except for the dead scree, from this rock.

- Come on. They'll take us away, he said. - They will return to the city, and by helicopter ...

Nadya was silent. Then she asked:

- What for?

- What why?

- Why did you climb here?

- And you ...