Tales of Ghosts. Playing Another Reality. Edgar Allan Poe award. Alexandra Kryuchkova

stood up and ran out of the classroom in tears. When the lesson was over, I turned on her player, but instead of music I heard a pleasant female voice. I realized it was the girl’s mother. For some reason, she had to move to another country for a few years, and before leaving, she had prepared that audiobook with instructions for Christina.

      ***

      The academic year was over. Parents were taking their children home. I sat on the veranda of the summer building, reading a love story. The next day I was leaving for the sea, not yet knowing that I would no longer teach there, because I would get married and move to another country.

      Someone silently approached me from behind and gently touched my shoulder. I turned around and saw Christina. She held out to me a bouquet of flowers she had picked. I hesitated to take them.

      “Come on, Alice!” she said.

      “Again?”

      She didn’t answer and sat down next to me.

      “Do you miss your parents?” I asked, trying not to get angry. “Do they often go on business trips?”

      “That’s what they say…”

      “Anyway, business trips end sooner or later!”

      The girl silently shrugged her shoulders and sighed.

      Another car drove up, Christina’s father got out of it. The girl threw herself at his neck.

      When he came up to me and started thanking me for something, I couldn’t hear anything anymore. I remembered his daughter ugly behavior: she addressed me like a girl, hung up phone, listened to the player, and did whatever she wanted. I don’t remember what exactly I said to her father then, but he listened to me calmly.

      “I’m sorry… Don’t take offense, miss Flitch!” he said sadly, when I cooled down.

      He left us alone, inviting his daughter to ask my forgiveness.

      “Forgive me, Alice! Come on!” the girl said defiantly coldly, clearly feeling no remorse.

      I abruptly got up from the bench. Christina even asked for forgiveness, addressing me like that! I took a few steps and heard her voice.

      “You look like…”

      I didn’t even turn around. Along the way, I remembered that I had left on the bench the flowers, Christina’s gift to me.

      ***

      I got married and went back to college on the first day of the new academic year to pick up some papers. My kids had grown up, but had hardly changed much. Among them, I didn’t see Christina only. My friend, the teacher, said the girl was present on the pupils list.

      My friend and I went to the chief office. I didn’t really care about Christina. I needed the chief’s signature on my documents. However, my friend asked him why the girl was absent.

      “Her father is a school friend of mine,” said the chief. “When Cristina’s mother died last year…”

      “Oh, did her mother die?” I exclaimed in surprise.

      “Yes. The girl was told that her mother had gone on a business trip abroad. Christina’s grandmother, my friend’s mother, liked neither her daughter-in-law nor Christina. So I advised my friend to bring the girl here.”

      “And why didn’t she come this year?”

      “Christina and her father… disappeared…”

      “Disappeared?!” I was stunned.

      “They went to the sea and never came back. The police are still looking for them… By the way, Alice, she was in your class, wasn’t she?”

      Many years had passed since then, and I disappeared on Earth myself. However, burning various stories of my earthly life in the bonfire of memories, I still can’t let go of this one, because every time my fate gave me a sad lesson, I heard a voice, whispering, “Come on, Alice!”

July 2003

      12. On the banks of the Thames

      London had been a childhood dream of mine ever since we were told about its sights in English classes at school. I studied the same sights at the preparatory courses of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and then at the University. It seemed that even before visiting London, I already knew it better than any other city in the world. I had little chance of getting the UK visa, so I put off a trip to London to the last page of perhaps my last foreign passport. Nobody knows what turn of fate has already got the very brick that will suddenly fall on your head, or what else would happen to prevent your vacation abroad.

      Everywhere I traveled alone. Vitaly threw up his hands, as he always had some reasons not to join me. However, on Christmas Eve, he vowed that we would definitely go somewhere together within the coming year.

      I worked as the head of purchasing department, free of job for traveling three times a year: on May holidays, August and Christmas time; and there were just three pages left for visas in my passport.

      Vitaly traditionally spent May and Christmas holidays with his wife (whom, like many husbands, he vowed to leave, but would have never done so, because he felt “pity for her”, since “she won’t survive, and you are strong!”), therefore, for our joint trip only August remained.

      Knowing my cherished childhood dream, Vitaly told me to go first to London, for May holidays, and suggested having a rest with him in August somewhere on paradise islands. Well, it made sense, didn’t it?

      I really enjoyed London! I walked it up and down and returned home with a feeling of complete satisfaction. By the way, the British had released me a multi-entry visa for six months, but I didn’t see much point in going back with limited funds, it was much more pleasant to visit something yet unexplored!

      There were clearly more wonders on Earth than the seven encyclopedic ones, and I was already dreaming of where I would go for Christmas after August in Paradise with Vitaly, as the boss urgently demanded to get me a German visa for our business trip to Munich. So, my travel bag got one wonder of the world less! And more, I had already traveled all over Germany, including Munich, in vacation and not during a business trip. Anyhow, my negativity reached the ears of the Universe: as soon as the Germans granted me a single-entry visa for five days in July, the business trip was immediately canceled by the very same boss! However, since the stamp in the passport couldn’t be canceled, the penultimate page turned out to be irretrievably damaged and wasted for nothing! My inner indignation from my own helplessness went off scale, but in the end, it never came out, because… every day brought me closer to the cherished islands with Vitaly in August!

      I scoured the Internet, called all the travel agencies that dealt with islands to choose the best Paradise for us, and mentally I was already rather there than in my homeland. Having prepared a bunch of beautiful dresses and bought a couple of charming swimsuits, I signed an application for my vacation, which became more and more problematic every year, because the boss was mutating into a slave owner…

      And so, a couple of days before departure, Vitaly called for me, beaming with anticipation of Paradise, to discuss our plans in a restaurant. He listened carefully to all my dreams and wishes for the main course, and ‘for dessert’ he suddenly said,

      “Lara, I’m leaving… for London.”

      “What do you mean… London?!” I asked, still understanding nothing. “And when are you leaving?!”

      “It’s a business trip to London for the whole of August.”

      “Yesterday you said you had agreed your vacation! in August! with me! on the islands in Paradise!”

      “Yes,