- mine, I know, and I have the power to make it work for myself. Because it loves me. I thought so until this day, when I was going along the corridor of the best metropolitan clinic to see a doctor. Here I underwent a short survey at the request of Petrovich after I lost my sight for a minute from a recent fight. This is from the nerves, with whom it does not happen, then I thought. Vision returned quickly, and I gave out autographs to the girls, staring at their slender legs, bare for me especially. Several of them shoved me with phone numbers, a common thing.

The mood of the doctor seemed to me somehow special. By his stern, pacified face, he looked like an angel sitting on the shoulder of a sinner before a terrible judgment. Having offered a chair, he took out my X-rays. My heart went first to the knockout when it scanned the doctor's speech before the diagnosis was announced.

- Unfortunately, I must voice you ... - I heard the angel's call to me.

What?...

A brain tumor ... In its inaccessible part for operability. Vision loss will become more frequent, then the eyes will go blind forever and at the same time not for long, because then everything will end ... A question of two or three months. The clinic will do a lot to extend this period to me, says the doctor. But the chances for a full recovery are not. The consequence of frequent blows to the head and undertreated head injuries. The consequence of the constant struggle for success. Pay for the goal to be the best ... The body, like the last time in the ring, split in two. One part penetrates, asks questions, catches chances, clinging to the straw of life, the second discards facts, not believing in anything, except that bad dreams quickly end. I make the two halves unite into one - I still need it. I refuse hospitalization, promising to go to the hospice in a couple of weeks, climb on cotton legs and leave the hospital in a world that rejects me ...

Scary ... I do not want to die ... I now do not seem to myself the center of the universe. I'm just starting to live, and I'm already afraid to close my eyes. I'm afraid I will open them, but I will not see the light. Everything can start faster than the doctor predicted, if I let go of my stress. My life reminded me of a referee with a countdown to "ten." And what should I have time before the figure reaches the “dozens”, and I, exhausted by illness, retire to my knockout?

Omit the next few days. The reaction of the coach, the reaction of the mother. People close to me, whom I am bringing with my illness, and their words, filled with comfort and hope, but with ill-concealed despair. I could not hide it from them, too little time left. Petrovich will need to prepare himself a new champion, and Mommy ... I always lived with her, and it hurts me now even to look at her fight for my own son. They are trying to contact foreign clinics with the coach, sending copies of my analyzes and images. Petrovich hooked up the Boxing Federation, but I don’t want to disturb them, as well as poorly believe in a successful outcome. The doctor who made the diagnosis is the best in the capital, and the first answers-consultations on the diagnosis to my relatives from foreign experts only confirm his medical class. I just have to take it along with my fate.

And now I am sitting with a former classmate Dimka in a cafe on the waterfront, and we drink - he is a beer, and I - my traditional drink - freshly squeezed carrot juice. I mentally laugh, remembering the words of my mother that carrot juice is “eternal health”. I drank it even before intimate dates with fans, and it is a pity that now it’s not up to them. I admit that none of the women except my mother really need me. I did not manage to fall in love with anyone, fluttering from girl to girl in the intervals between training cycles.

Or am I wrong?

“Tell me, Dim,” I ask.- And who then gave me those boxing gloves? On my birthday? Remember what I mean?

Dimka mentally flew 11 years ago, then replied:

- I do not know. In the class, then they made fun of some time, but they didn’t figure out any of the girls. No one saw how these gloves were put.

“I wait, with love. Your P. ". Maybe she is still waiting for me? After school, I didn’t see much of my classmates, or rather, I didn’t see them at all. I did not get to all kinds of graduate meetings due to my busy sports career. But that gift from one of the classmates in love with me changed my whole fate. I would not get into boxing, and not ... I didn’t want to go on.

- How to find her? - I say Dima thoughts aloud.

- tortured school memories? Are you a little fan or for fun? - fun, in his own way, he treats my curiosity. - Let's estimate. "P.". There were only two of these “Ps” in our class - Polinka Ershova and Lenk Pavlova. The first letter of either name or surname. And both girls are top class.

And then I thought about it, peering for a long time then at Polina, then at Lena, trying to hook on the clue, their sympathy for me and something more. But until the very end of the school, although they treated me well, they didn’t confirm the text of that postcard. But even then I realized that I should have been more decisive. To make a counter step - it already depends on the guy. My days are coming to an end, of which Dimka, of course, does not know. They are like drops of gone rain, drying out under the bright sun. You can not let evaporate the last drop.

“Dimka,” I said. - You communicate with everyone. Help me find the girls.

... I'm sitting in a car near the house of Polina. It's evening, and I hope I recognize her. I did not find the phone number, only her address, and now I look into the twilight, trying not to miss the familiar and unfamiliar female figure at the same time. Slender brunette in high heels with her hair still flowing confidently walks to the front door. I go out to her.

“Sasha,” at first, surprised, confused, but then with a satisfied, warm twinkle in her eyes, says Polina. He takes a large bouquet of roses and picks up their scent with his upturned nose, and at the same time looks at me, as if seeing for the first time. I have changed a lot, she notes.

- changed? - I wondered. - And how?

- Has grown up, - Polina laughs and kisses me on the cheek. She saw me on TV, but only now, according to her, noticed how mature I was. Became different. And she, like me, is very happy to see me.

“If you can only, let's have dinner together,” I offer. “Any day you can do it.”

“Just don’t delay” - I wanted to add, but delicately restrained myself. I knew she was married. Did Polina read my thoughts or was there some other unknown reason for me, but I heard what I expected only in my soul:

- Have dinner with you? - a classmate smiles slyly. - Yeah right now.

... When a girl grows up, she has other habits, and the child's confidence in the school beauty is replaced by self-sufficiency and style. But her eyes, her blue pearls remained the same, at least for me. That's what I thought when Polina and I sat in a restaurant for a light dinner, washed down with wine and carrot juice. She asks a lot about me and my way to success, she was surprised to learn that I have no permanent girl, and I still lead the lifestyle of a single cowboy.

- Probably, there is no end to the girls, - she says with a smile. - You became a handsome man, Sasha. And he was small and inconspicuous. But I noticed you, an intelligent and brave boy.

I remember the touch of Polina's fingers, when she wiped my lip with Stas’s broken handkerchief. She is beautiful with that formed beauty that is received as a reward by young girls, as a result of the attitude towards herself and her appearance. Polina revealed herself brightly as a woman, and her husband certainly appreciates her.

“Anything can happen,” Polina replied coldly to the question about her family well-being, her eyes suddenly became sad, and decided not to touch her personal life.