Чернобыль. Страницы жизни и любви

“I love you, I’m going.”

It was difficult to leave him. I was afraid to go. Coming out of the ward, I looked through the window. He lay happily and calmly. Somewhere flashed the thought that I would never see him alive again, but I drove it out of my mind.

My Sergei could not die. We had survived the terrible night and now everything would be okay.

I had asked a friend of Sergei to come round: I was very tired and wanted to get driving. I thought that I would see to the business and then get some sleep. But I had so much to do, it was all a blur, and soon it was time to go to the hospital. I popped home to pick up a pillow for Sergei and some surgical spirit for the injections.

For some reason my heart was aching. I came home at twenty to four. I went up to the seventh floor. My mother, who was in tears, opened the door for me.

“Sergei is dead.”

“When?”

I rushed to the telephone, but the receiver was hanging off the cradle. The voice in the receiver was familiar, although I didn’t recognize who it was and only understood that it was a female voice.

I ran downstairs and I wasn’t crying – something inside me had broken. Downstairs, I simply howled and screamed. Sergei was dead!!!

Igor was waiting for me, and got into the car without a word and we rushed to the hospital. I was crying, howling and screaming. What he had gone through, the poor thing. He had had such a hard time. I was afraid that I would go crazy. Sergei had died without me and I would never forgive myself for abandoning him!

It was difficult to get anywhere. There was a traffic jam. But Igor was great. He did everything he could. Earlier in the day, when we had been driving somewhere on business, I had told him that when I saw Sergei, I would lie to him, telling him that he would have a flat in two weeks but I did not have the time, and I had been counting on it to bring him back to life. Everything had collapsed. I couldn’t bear it and my heart was breaking, my brain was melting. I jumped out of the car, ran to the hospital. I was running up to the fifth floor, stumbling. People were sitting in the corridor, and some guy wanted to stop me but I didn’t see anyone or anything. I was going to him, my darling, my only one. I was afraid that they would take him away without me.

I flew into the ward, pulled off the blanket and what I saw, slew me for good: he was laying there, happy and blessed. He was bringing peace, and I kneeled before him, kissed him and his hands and whispered words of love to him. I knew that he could hear me, that he was with me. He was lying motionlessly, with his eyes open and his mouth open.

I am kneeling before him, crying, kissing him, his hands, holding his hands in mine…The feeling which I was going through is impossible to describe with words: it is a wild pain, which transfixes and holds your soul and your consciousness in its grip. I was an animal, mortally wounded, which sees its mate, its other half, murdered and torn apart with its own eyes; it fights, howls and is exhausted with pain, but cannot do anything… Something similar was probably happening with me. I wanted to die. The pain was killing me. I was looking dully, as if it were someone else, and not me observing us from the outside.

My mind refused to believe in the fact that the most terrible thing had happened. I am talking to him and I know that he can hear me. His eyes see me, he is with me here, but I will never hear his voice again. His hand will squeeze mine for the last time. I will kiss him and listen to the last processes taking place in his system. He is going away from me. I remained here completely alone. Here, kneeling before him and holding his hand, palm upon palm, I understood that along with him, real female happiness was also leaving. The happiness of a woman, who was loved by her beloved. I was everything to him; no one and nothing could replace me in his life. He was proud of me and admired me. I was his ideal woman, his ideal mistress, wife, mother of his children, businesswoman, human being; all these things he loved in me, the whole of me with my positive attributes and my shortcomings. His faith in me was my guiding star.

At that minute I understood that, from being the happiest woman on earth, I had become a lonely, beaten woman with a broken destiny. Where could I find strength? How to rise up again? My joy, help me, don’t leave me in this nightmare. I cannot, I cannot stay here without your warmth. Life stopped at that moment. He had existed, and everything had existed, and then he was no longer, and all life vanished with him. I was orphaned. Kneeling in front of him, holding his hand, I realized my helplessness. I don’t know how to describe what one feels, but sorrow is a terrible, strong feeling, a kind of madness. I was lifted up by the shoulders and asked to leave; I took off Sergei’s crucifix, which the doctor and I had put on him, and I put it on myself. I kissed Sergei and could not leave him…

When I came back to his ward again, I was stopped. There was a doctor and nurses there. I stood in the corridor, as if mad, and sorrow was overflowing in me. I did not want to leave and I did not have any strength to bear it. Everything was destroyed. I am incapable without him, this is a prison sentence. The pain was hellish, I was burning in that pain.

I went with them, and he was wrapped in sheets and taken to the morgue on a trolley. I went with him to be next to him until the very end. I was following the trolley and going mad with the thought that I would be leaving him here, that I would remain alone without him and he would never be with me. Everything had turned upside down in my head. Misfortune. My legs barely carried me. Tears fogged my eyes.

The nurse opened the morgue and parked the trolley by the door. I held his hand while they bound them up. They gave me a few minutes to say goodbye to him. I kissed him, as if I were crazy, and said something to him, words which, it seemed to me, I hadn’t managed to tell him before now.

I just managed to walk out of there. I walked away from the morgue and sat down. I don’t remember very well, but the nurses lifted me, I was either howling or crying. They took me to the hospital. I went into his ward, lay on his bed. I wanted to catch a bit of his last smell. The warmth that remained. I didn’t know what to do, I had just died along with him. The only thing that remained of me was my flesh, but there was no me, just as there was no him.

I left the ward, and they said something to me. They told me how he had died. I listened. He died in his friend’s arms. He was waiting for me, looking at the clock all the time and saying: “Natasha will come at five.” I got back at ten past four, but it was too late. He had died at twenty to four. His friend had helped him get to the toilet. They had come back. Sergei had sat on the bed and his heart had stopped. The heart of this amazing person – an incomparable father, a beloved one, a darling one, the most precious person to me, just stopped. His soul achieved peace, the tormenting pain had gone. You are at peace, my joy. But this peace had killed me, torn me apart. I didn’t know how to survive it, or what had to happen so that I could breathe a little.

I was standing by the window in the corridor, and a doctor was standing nearby. I was looking at the snow, which was falling on the earth. Against the background of the yellow light from the streetlamp, the snow was somewhat heavy, rough and unpleasant. It was falling, and I was watching without a word. Silence.

“You know, it will be easier for me to live from now on, I had one guardian angel, and now there will be Sergei there with me. I will be very happy: now he will be near me and with me all the time.”

He left with such peace in his soul. There was something amazing in it. I also left the hospital very calm, I sat in the car.

I could not leave the car here; for some reason I could not. Something made me act this way. There was a good deal of snow and the car was weaving in the road. But while I was driving, the car didn’t spin out of control. I was crying as I drove. I had no idea how to go on living. All the most important things were in him. I had lived with him for his sake. I love him. The house is him, the children are him. He is in everything, the meaning of life. His illness was the only thing that had occupied me in the recent past.

And now I had seen him off. I had closed his eyes, but he had opened them again. He had probably wanted to look at me for the last time. Look, my darling, look at me, I so need your look and your love. My soul is tearing apart.

I got home in a bad way. There were people at home. I took the photograph, which Sergei himself chose to put in a frame, his watch, pressed them to my breast, lay on the bed and cried. Then I fell asleep, and slept a few hours. I don’t remember this evening well. There was dull pain, which twisted me up, tears constantly rolling, no desires whatever, nothing. Only the wild pain.

These guys, our friends, wonderful, amazing, real people – took on all the responsibility for the burial, solved all the problems themselves. They helped me, were beside me, they did everything: their moral and material help was sincere and human. Their grief was as heavy and great and their eyes overflowed with grief and pain. I love you all, my darlings, for your love and devotion to your friend, my beloved man. I did something and spoke but it was all mechanical. If our friends had not been there, I probably could not have done even this.

Sergei’s mother and relatives came on Tuesday, the day after, December 8. It was a difficult meeting. His aunt with her daughter got out of the train first. Sergei’s mother, father and sister were in a different carriage. Only his aunt knew that he had died the day before.

I saw his mother’s eyes. She was looking at me.

“How is Sergei?”

I was ready to fall down. I couldn’t lie, but how could I tell the truth, knowing this pain, how could I?

But there was no choice, it would be very painful for her. I have to say, “Mother dear, sorry, sorry for the pain that I bring you.” My mouth opened:

“Mother, Sergei died yesterday,” I said. Listening to my voice, I, too, wanted to die. There was another tear filled wave of tears.

Mother, I’m sorry, don’t cry. Her scream cut my heart like a razor. A mother’s pain is a terrible pain. We cried.

Our friends agreed to bury Sergei in a very good cemetery. I went with them and chose the place. They wanted me to do it. I chose a very beautiful, light place. There was a central path and a church nearby. The funeral was arranged for December 10. The cemetery was very close to our home – only 15 minutes by car. It is so good that we are close to him.

It was a frosty day. I got to the morgue, people were standing around the coffin; I could hardly see them as I was looking at him. He lay there so beautiful and calm and seemed that he was about to open his eyes, get up and say something. I went up to him and fell on my knees and kissed him. I talked to him, my tears flowing. In my head, everything spun and I couldn’t pull myself together. I was going mad because I was seeing him for the last time. I could touch him for the last time. No, no, everything was rioting in me, everything was bubbling. I didn’t know what to do, I just stayed and looked at him, I did not want believe all that. It seemed to me that it could not be true, it was some kind of nightmare. A bus came, people started walking into the morgue. I got up, met Sergei’s mother. I took her to the coffin. They said goodbye. Her pain made me even more insane. I wanted to do something, to help her somehow, but I couldn’t, I was experiencing such a wild pain myself. I didn’t have enough strength myself. I don’t remember what happened then very well. Everyone left and I stayed with him.

I was kneeling beside the coffin, kissed him, talked to him and prayed to God to bring him back. I could not just lose him like that. “I love you so much darling, don’t go away. I’m helpless without you.” My temples throbbed. I heard the hearse come, they had come to take the coffin. I don’t remember how I got out of there. Our friends said that I came out howling. I howled like an animal, fell, thrashing against the ground. They say that it was a terrible sight. I was not myself. Everyone was crying. Sergei was a wonderful friend, a wonderful man and a wonderful soul. A lot of friends came to see him, everyone came to say goodbye.

I didn’t order a wreath for Sergei, I brought him a basket of roses as I always had. Thirty‑four bright red and beautiful roses for the most amazing and darling man. Everything went on as if in a dream. Why, why? He was so young, so beautiful, so good and clever, that man lived so little, he left his life just as it was blossoming. How could it possibly happen, when he had a son and a daughter and me? We loved him madly, we were in such need of him. My God, why?

These questions whirled round, I asked them and did not get answers. They read the service for Sergei in the church in Volkovsky cemetery – it a small, comfortable chapel. We carried Sergei to the graves in a funeral carriage. His mother and I went beside each other. It was his last journey.

The priest blessed the ground. I opened the requiem. I thanked him for the happiness that he had given me. I thanked his mother for such a son. I thanked him for the son, which we have, for his love, for these two years of a woman’s happiness, for those friends, who were with me, and for showing me how to live honorably. He had conscientiously paid his dues. He had defended us all, there in Chernobyl. Everyone started to say goodbye, the people came up to the coffin. I looked at those beautiful people, who on that day had also lost a part of their soul. I looked them in the eyes. I understood how dear he was to them, because my Sergei was the best. I was happy that I was his wife. Such good, wonderful people came to see him off. My Sergei was loved.

I am grateful to everyone who had come. Those were various people, many of whom I saw for the first time in my life, but they all supported me so much, helped me so greatly. We buried that amazing man. Sergei united us. The grave turned out to be very beautiful, a sea of living flowers and wreaths, a small column and a photograph of Sergei. Young, smiling, light in his eyes, the light of life.

I remained alone and collapsed onto the grave, I cried, but I knew that he was in a better place now. He is the most beautiful and the best. I loved him so much. Even during the funeral I felt his love, as if he was showing it to everyone – this is my woman, my wife. He is forever with me. We are together.

I kissed the photograph and slowly wandered home. Tears were flowing, but I was calm. At first, I came to the grave every day. I came to the church, then to him. Only there, after I had spoken to him, did I achieve some kind of peace, but I still miss him a lot.

Now the pain doesn’t lessen, rather it gets stronger, while the emptiness kills. I come to him, fall to his grave and cry and scream and weep. I talk to him. Sometimes I am ready to dig up the earth. Without you I am incapable, I just go crazy, it is so hard for me, but I am very happy: we had those two years, and you were with me. I come to him, cry and talk, and he hears me, he waits for me, I know that. He is nearby and helps me.

It seemed to me that I wouldn’t outlive his death, but I am living, maybe not living, but existing, but here I am. I live with love for him. I look for strength. It’s so difficult, frightening and painful. Sometimes it’s unbearable. For a long, long time, there won’t be any respite for me. It is very difficult in such a condition, the sorrow that is in you is great, and it weighs you down. It is you who feels all that and undergoes everything. It is yours. But life goes on and everything changes. But I know that our love is heavenly, forever. Many events followed Sergei’s death. But I know for certain that his love will continue to warm me, it will help us all.

The song which Sergei sang on our wedding was his gift to me. I don’t know who wrote these words, but in Sergei’s performance, it was beautiful and unforgettable.

I want you to be my wife

I want you always to be with me

To share in all my hopes

Sorrows and joys without getting tired.

You’ll give me a son, and, maybe, a daughter.

She will look just like you,

Blue‑eyed, with light‑brown tresses,

And, just like her mother, with a small tilt to her nose.

And I also want people to love our house,

For friends to gather round the circular table,

For us to share everything with the friends

Our friendship with sorrows and songs.

If you can’t give me your answer right away,

Don’t rush, darling, I can wait,

I’ve been dreaming for more than a year

My darling, my kind, my proud one.

Фото взято из личного архива автора.