the most final
concluding work

I had already seen that Uzbek in the Canteen and remembered, for it was because of him that I came across the idea that you might get stoned even without any weed but by simply hitching your wagon to the wake wave of some other buddy’s drag… That time we went to the Canteen after the lights-out where the youngs doing their fatigues "on the floors" were already washing the hall.

We chose the table in the corner and landed there to be out of the way, they still had wide swaths to clear before reaching that area. The joint was circulating our chosen company in a reciprocally attentive manner and the drift took a ho-ho bent – we looked at each other's mugs and were wetting our pants with laughter.

And that Uzbek was dragging his soaked rag, to-and-fro, at about five-seven meters off us when he suddenly joined the crowd with his snicker… In short, witnessing our good-humored recreation, he got recharged and dragged the same way – in our wake, without any weed.

We called him to approach and offered the heel which he rejected. Well, it's clear too, the roughed young feared that the on-duty piece of shit from his company would drop in to see what's how around there…

And then I saw the same Uzbek again among the MCU squad-team of youngs, he was riding the same truck-back with me. And at times, when on the road, he sang songs in the mother tongue attuned to their Central Asian modal-tonal harmony. Not much of like the Italian opera stuff but, on the whole, listenable, sort of Jimmy Hendrix when without his guitar. The other Uzbeks got perked up and the road ended more quickly. Good fellow "aqyn", or maybe "ashoogh"? Well, in short – lahbooh…

Sergeant Misha Khmelnytsky couldn't pronounce his name in any way, and, in the end, he said, "Okay! You will be Vasya!" So, one time as we were riding home, Khmel commanded: "Vasya! Sing up!"

I marked that the Uzbek was in no mood, sad and reluctant, but Khmel did not shut up, "What? Can't get it, salabon? The command was ‘sing up!’"

Well, the lahbooh started a song… The rest of the Uzbeks looked at him like angry dogs and scolded in their dark language, muttering, “You bitch, are you a canary for this motherfucker?” Of course, I did not know their language, but certain utterances need no translation.

Now, the lahbooh gave out one verse and steered to coda, but Khmel demanded more, "Sing, Vasya, sing!" So the soldier started again on high notes. And I saw how cleared up the Uzbeks' faces, they even laughed at one point.

Well, also quite understandable, the singer on the fly adopted his number to the situation:

"Vai, Sergeant, vai, I have fucked your Mom!."

But Khmel didn't get it at all, "That's it! Well done! More!"

And he got what he was asking for:

"Vai, Sergeant, vai, I have fucked your fucking mouth!."

The Uzbeks were rocking with laughter and the Sergeant liked it too, "Very well, Vasya!"

Here, the truck pulled up at the traffic lights and I, without a superfluous goodbye to the nice company of music lovers, slipped over the tailgate and down the short ladder… That time I slipped away to see Quiet Mouse.

Actually, her name was Tanya and she did not know that, to myself, I was calling her "Quiet Mouse" because when I first approached her in a trolleybus she was answering so quietly. And could I possibly not approach? Several times I saw her on the trolleybus when going from the ring road to the MCU.

She told me later, "I noticed you still in February, at the very frosts, your pea-jacket collar was wide open with the whole your neck sticking out." So motherly attentive. She was 2 years older than me.

"… we always choose those very women,

who have already chosen us …"

In the morning, when she agreed to a date after the working day by that same ring road, I was not alone going to the MCU by a trolley. From our stop, we had to march yet along a lane, and there I said to that Moldovan, "Rahroo! Would you bet I doff now?" In general, there was snow all around, although it was March already, and I stripped to the waist strolling along in just high boots and the canvas pants with Rahroo carrying all other items of my outfit behind. Because I had got filled with so irresistible delight; but that was before her telling me about my bare neck…

Most likely, my topless folly walking resulted also from the meeting that god's fool… Back in February, I was for about a week hanging out at the 50-apartment block – that same that we had started with rebar-rod breakers, now it was already nearing its delivery.

So, buddies from a squad-team there told me about some old man walking barefoot in one of the nearby lanes. And I went there twice, on purpose, before I met him… It was a bearded old man, his beard was white and slightly yellowish, and apart from it, the man had also a hat and an overcoat on. His pants were rolled up leaving his legs bare down the knees; he swept a path in the snowdrifts with a besom. Though long and skinny, he hardly was a junkie because he had a drift of his own.

The snow was falling in big rare flakes, and he walked barefoot and swept an empty path in the empty street. I stood by for a while watching him, and he gave me a sidelong glance or 2 while busy with his business. We both kept silent, and then I left.

But at the construction battalion that spring I did not care a damn about any theology when awaiting Trolley 5 by the Ring Road stop… Several of that number passed by before she arrived.

We quietly walked along the sidewalk by the host of five-story blocks laid of white silicate brick in the Lipetsk masonry fashion. Then we entered one of the staircase-entrances in one of the five-story blocks.

We embraced warmly and quietly, standing by the heating battery on the first floor, at the bottom of the staircase. Still standing, we quietly copulated.

Then we went out again to the endless sidewalk and I saw her to another entrance in another five-story block…

And for a long time after, it was not possible to repeat the warmly quiet pleasure; the staircase-entrances, for some reason, became too crowded… A couple of times we went to the movies for daytime shows but there were too many kids around.

One time Captain Pissak spotted me leaving a cinema with her. He called me aside and demanded to immediately cut all sorts of relations with her, although he could not present any sound foundation for his insistence. And that was most annoying – okay, suppose, you're Captain Pissak, then go and command in your First Company, why meddling if I had Tughrik to report to?.