FROM THE HISTORY OF THE BAND 'OBLACHNY KRAY'. CHAPTER 17: EXILE FROM PARADISE. THE MAYAKOVSKY TRIBUTE

A month passed. My wife got bored and asked to come visit me with our daughter. I reached out to Andrey. Having secured financial support, I found a room right in the city center, on Gorokhovaya Street, near the "Sennaya Ploshchad" metro station. It was a very lucky moment to rent a room in the center for three thousand rubles a month. Natasha arrived with Masha, and that was happiness. I worked with others when paid shifts came up, and in the evenings I returned "home" to my family. We went swimming in Lake Ladoga, walked the entirety of the Hermitage and the Russian Museum back and forth. That happy month flew by like a single hour, like a single moment. When they left, I was overcome with such emptiness! It had been so good, and then suddenly—bags packed, train station, the end. It felt like I was the only one left in the whole world. Alone on the entire planet, in the entire Universe.I arrived at the studio; no one was there. It seemed like the perfect time—go on, create! But I couldn't. I had grown so used to Masha constantly toddling around, Natasha assisting, and if they weren't there, they were waiting for me at home, half an hour's drive away. But now... well, whatever. There was nothing else to do; I needed to adapt. It was late, and there was a 24-hour convenience store nearby. At the checkpoint, they asked: "What's up, Seryoga, going for vodka?" They hit the nail on the head. In the store, my gaze swept past the port wine for twenty-seven rubles and landed on the vodka. I felt awful! Nothing else would hook me now—neither wine nor beer. I needed a stronger impulse to drive away this pain. I grabbed two 0.7-liter bottles, some sprats in tomato sauce, and some black bread, and carried it all in my hands through the checkpoint. The guys from the private security police laughed: