Mystical stories about the cemetery night of the dead. Real Moscow stories about graves and curses are worse than tales

Bored life, what to do?

Observing the purity of morals, the shtetl authorities decided so: to remove the benches near the entrances and the domino tables that joined them in the yards! Too much has found a free home for them.

The whole thirsty city roams the yards in search of a saving shelter. Public utilities zealously carried out the order of the authorities.

The centuries-old era of shops that had made friends with the entire population of the city quarter was cut off unceremoniously, with revolutionary haste.

The benefit of experience is not to borrow. We will build a new world! Instead of inquisitive and omniscient old women-experts, peacefully knitting warm socks for their grandchildren for the harsh winter, decapitated stumps bashfully stood up in the yards.

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Vitka Selivanov has lived in the third entrance for the last twenty years. For pensioners, everyone under sixty is Vitka, Lenka and Svetka. But in fact the man was in his fifties

Klavdia Semyonovna, the same age, is just as lonely yearning in a small kitchen, painting a meager pension on duty morning porridge and frozen sprats for Murzik. In the evenings, lonely stumps stuck around youth beer parties. So the passengers of the sinking Titanic hurried to the rare saving ice floes.

Habit, as you know, is second nature. Young people were in no hurry to change the drinking place. In numerous eateries, drinking takes place on an everyday basis, without due courage, and near the native "patch", which was once a favorite bench, you can frolic to your heart's content.

Again, they will inform you to the house if you dare to slightly exceed the dose. Comfortable. If the dose increases significantly, they will take it to another place, to the churchyard. Again, their own, with a "patch".

Degraded deputies of the yard Khural hurried past the grandchildren, who were hungry on the stumps. There is no old lady quorum at all. The entire parliament in full force is on indefinite vacation in their own small-sized.

Grandmothers are languishing from doing nothing and, for the umpteenth time, they begin to count a new coffin stash. Should be enough for a modest funeral and a three-course memorial dinner for fifty mourners.

A respectful conversation with Murzik resulted in a sad monologue. There are no listeners. There is only one way - to the window, from which the surviving benches at the fence of the first entrance are visible.

Senile farsightedness, not disturbed by cataracts, immediately highlighted her friends in misfortune, peacefully located on the far bench. There are at least two vacancies on the bench. We must hurry. Applicants for a free place are completely bored at the windows.

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After the death of his wife, Selivanov took to drink. From a normal intelligent man, he turned into a typical homeless man within six months

The happy owners of the surviving bench and rightfully sit in places free from visitors, popularly explaining to visitors the essence of the newly introduced communal reforms.

The rest of the leisure is devoted to the vile behavior of Marinka from the fifteenth, who paraded past the astonished old women with a new imported gentleman of a curly brunette suit. The newly-minted admirer has no advantages.

The car is beautiful and the upholstery in it is rich, plush. And so the tipchik is completely useless, he is not at all remarkable, even - he is pimply. Such impudent behavior of the dissolute Marinka required additional investigation and long logical calculations.

In pre-reform times, before the communal terror, a discussion about changing a Russian boyfriend to an Ethiopian would have dragged on for two full talkative days.

The grandmother's former roommate was treated with respect. Although not a written handsome man, he treated the old women with respect, always bowed and inquired about health by name.

You can’t throw a won bench in any way. You can, of course, go to the city park with the whole court, but the long arms of the municipality have already reached there. Benches are abolished around the perimeter. Therefore, grannies do not go to the park, continuing the conversation.

From the dissolute Marinka, the conversation turned into the spheres of mysticism. It was then that I happened to be nearby and overheard this story.

Death on two legs

Vitka Selivanov has lived in the third entrance for the last twenty years. For pensioners, everyone under sixty is Vitka, Lenka and Svetka. But in fact the man was in his fifties.

He lived with his wife, they had no children and apparently no relatives either. They lived closed, did not have a great friendship with their neighbors. They were always seen together. We went to the store together, walked together in the evenings along Cosmonauts Avenue, which is two hundred meters from the house.

A year ago, his wife died. Fast, in one day. Heart. They buried her in a new cemetery, which was far from the city and grew at an incredible speed. In a million-plus city, death is a frequent visitor.

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They buried him in the same cemetery where his other half found peace. A few neighbors claimed that his grave was far from the grave of his wife, because in a year and a half the cemetery had grown both in breadth and distance

Life is unfair

After the death of his wife, Selivanov took to drink. From a normal intelligent man, he turned into a typical bum within six months.

He quit his job, did not pay the rent, and was warned more than once about eviction. Where he took money for food, no one knew, just as he did not know if he ate at all.

Vitka lost weight terribly, and it was completely clear to everyone who saw him that this one would not last long.

Compassionate men who drink in the evenings and weekends in the courtyard always poured Selivanov, for which he invariably politely thanked them. But he did not impose, did not expect that they would pour more and modestly retired. By evening he was always drunk.

On weekdays, weekends, holidays in the evening, he returned from his mysterious voyage around the city, barely able to stand on his feet. Sometimes he fell, near the entrance, and then the neighbors helped him get to the apartment. Victor Stepanovich Selivanov survived his wife for a year and a half.

Him in the same cemetery where his other half found peace. The few neighbors who went to the cemetery later claimed that his grave was far from the grave of his wife, because in a year and a half the cemetery had grown both in breadth and distance.

Terrible incidents at the cemetery

In the spring, as soon as the snow melted, Polina Sergeevna went to the cemetery from the sixth apartment. There her mother rested, and it was necessary to put the grave in order after the winter. After cleaning up the rubbish and sticking a bunch of artificial asters into the ground near the modest obelisk, she headed home.

The path lay past the grave of her neighbor Selivanova. Polina Sergeevna decided to go there. Imagine her amazement when, next to the grave of Irina Nikolaevna Selivanova, she saw the grave of Viktor Stepanovich Selivanov. On the very monument that she remembered when Vitka was buried, there was the same portrait of him, name, surname and dates of life.

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There was no grave there, moreover, it was clear that the earth there was dense and the shovels of the undertakers did not touch it. The churchyard workers stood for a long time in bewilderment, then politely asked Polina Sergeevna not to tell anyone about this strange incident.

At first, the neighbor thought that relatives were in a hurry, but then she remembered that there were no relatives at the funeral. Then she decided that the cunning employees of the cemetery administration sold his grave, and he was reburied next to his wife.

But this option also seemed to her somehow unnatural. The place was not the best, especially in the lowland, where water accumulated in the spring, and hardly anyone would want to covet it.

Deciding to find out what was the matter, the woman went straight to the administration. It must be said that thieving officials are afraid of pensioners-fighters for justice.

There is nothing for pensioners to do, so they can easily devote all their time to finding the truth. Moreover, there were many stories about the sale of places in the cemetery, everyone knew about them, and several leaders of local churchyards went to the camps to correct their mistakes.

But this time, as Polina Sergeevna says, the cemetery administration was surprised no less than she was. Immediately, a small delegation of representatives of the cemetery authorities and servants went with her. They checked the documents, then went to Viktor Stepanovich.

To everyone's amazement, there was no grave there, moreover, it was clear that the earth there was dense and the shovels of the undertakers did not touch it. The churchyard workers stood for a long time in bewilderment, then politely asked Polina Sergeevna not to tell anyone about this strange incident.

Of course, the interlocutors on the bench perfectly understood that the request was supported by material assistance to an elderly woman. Of course, the fact that the woman could keep this news in herself for no more than a week.

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By some unspoken agreement, this news was stopped discussing. The story turned out to be too incomprehensible, implausible and creepy

When she came to the cemetery for the second time, they showed her all the necessary documents for Selivanov’s grave and said that she was mistaken, and that Viktor Stepanovich was buried here from the very beginning, and if she doubts, then let her buy pills for sclerosis. They are, of course, expensive, so here's the money for a year's supply of pills.

After her story, the entire yard community of pensioners visited the cemetery. Everyone approached the graves of two people who loved during their lifetime, stood, looked, then went home silent and thoughtful.

By some unspoken agreement, this news was stopped discussing. The story turned out to be too incomprehensible, implausible and creepy.

Moreover, new themes were not long in coming. Marinka from the fifteenth brought a new roommate.

History from life.

I moved to another city, got a job. The job was the most "fun" - a night watchman at the cemetery. You won't believe how many freaks come at night, dig up graves and take away everything of any value. I resolutely stopped such encroachments and I did not care where the bullet from the rifle hit - in the arm, leg, heart or head. I buried the dead robbers under a cliff on the eastern edge of the cemetery - it was always cold, gloomy, scary and creepy there.

But I will not continue to describe to you the delights of the life of a cemetery watchman, but will tell you about the events that happened on the night of July 11-12. Then the weather was calm, the wind was noisy, and in the sky, illuminating the surroundings with a silver light, the full moon shone. I was sitting in the gatehouse, watching Seventeen Moments of Spring and quietly sipping cheap red wine, when a strange sound came from the street. On the alert, I removed the rifle from the brackets, jerked the bolt and, quietly opening the door, went outside.

As I expected, over a lonely grave, located a little further from everyone, three people fussed. Two dexterously brandished shovels, the third shone a flashlight at them. I was overcome with such anger that I was afraid myself.

Why the hell are you desecrating a grave, you bastards?!

A rifle shot broke the silence. However, none of the diggers even stirred. It turned out that at the moment of the shot one of them managed to turn the shovel upside down with the bayonet and the bullet hit him, ricocheting into the tree. Three turned in my direction with such mugs that I understood without a word - they would kill.

There was no time to reload the rifle. I tossed it aside and pulled out an army knife from the top of my boot. “Maybe I won’t kill,” I thought, “but I’ll definitely cut it badly.”
The two with shovels rushed towards me. I dodged a sharply sharpened bayonet and slashed the attacker in the chest, but immediately received a blow flat on the head with a shovel. My eyes darkened, I sank to the ground. One digger grabbed my hair and threw back his head, the second, rubbing his chest - blood remained on his palm - picked up my knife and grinned.

Now you, bitch, will suffer, and then you will die like a lousy dog. - the blade rested on my trachea. And this is where I noticed it...

The three scum didn't even know who killed them. A black shadow darted, one of the trio squealed like a pig in a slaughterhouse - he did not have both arms to the elbow - and immediately shut up, irrigating the ground with blood from the stumps and a cut on his throat. The second one threw a knife on the ground and ran away, but he did not run far: at the very gates, a shadow overtook him and the villain fell to the ground next to his head, which fell off a second earlier. The third, releasing me, was spinning around, panic horror seethed in his eyes, and when the creature appeared in front of him, there was a desperate terrible cry of a man who did not want to die. Slowly turning around, I saw a dismembered corpse… and the one who was standing over it…

Black medium length hair, pale skin, dark brown eyes, black trousers, black boots, black blouse, black leather coat - I did not like the man right away. A strange-looking dagger was clamped in his hand - there was no handle, the blade seemed to grow out of his hand. And then, looking closer, I realized with a shudder that I was not mistaken - the blade really looked out of his palm.

The stranger turned to me and his thin lips twisted into a smile:

I never ran so fast in my life and stopped only near the station, taking a breath. After weighing everything and thinking it over, I decided to return home, but a surprise awaited me near the apartment: the words “STILL DATE” were carved on the front door.

My mother and I live with my grandmother, but we are building a house on the other side of the city. I am 12 and have been living with my grandmother since birth. Her house is very close to the cemetery and the school. When I bring classmates to visit, they are horrified when they realize that our house is opposite the cemetery. But I answer them with a smile. Like, what's so terrible? I spent my whole life here and nothing happened... Looking at the cemetery, I have no feeling of fear. I do not look at the cemetery with the conclusion that the ground there is saturated with corpses. For me, this is just a place with crosses .. But for a long time, my grandmother told me that when passing by the cemetery you need to greet * spirits * Like, they look at you and wait for you to greet them? But I completely forgot about it ..
One fine day .. My best friend Tanya and I agreed to go to the cinema in the evening, to the cartoon *Shrek 2* We are Shrek fans and did not refuse this) Then it was winter .. The days are short and already at 8 pm it was getting dark terribly. It's like 12 o'clock at night. The movie ended, as we feared at 8. We lived nearby. But on different streets. There was not a big forest near the school. And behind this forest was the street * Lesnaya * where my friend lived.
When we got to school, we split up. *we were separated by a damn forest* She is home, and I am home… On my own. I walked quickly. The lantern standing on our street strangely did not turn on. But I didn't attach any importance to it.
There were 70-80 meters left before the house, as I heard slow steps behind me. I quickened my pace, almost running. Soon I heard the voice of an elderly grandmother. The voice was trembling, but in some places and angry. Grandma said she couldn't find her mother's grave. Buried in this very cemetery. I have already seen the burning light of the chandelier in the windows of my house. But my grandmother abruptly grabbed my hand and dragged me to the cemetery. I wanted to scream, but my voice seemed to have disappeared ... Grandmother was weak, so at the gates of the cemetery I grabbed the fence and did not let go. Grandma is gone...
I wiped the sweat of fear from my forehead and went home. Having reached very close to my house, I saw the silhouette of my grandmother at the gate. And she waved her cane at the gate. Knocked. I got scared. I called my mother and said that she would kick this grandmother out. Grandmother either heard what I said and immediately disappeared.
Mom came out, there was no one, only I stood frightened at the gate. Mom asked what happened. Out of fear, not understanding what I was saying, I said that there was a grandmother here ... Mom answered me that it seemed to me and did not believe me.
In the morning, it turned out that a grandmother came to everyone on our street, asking if they would help her find her mother's grave. And when he heard the answer, she disappeared, one might say evaporated in the air.
A month later we moved to a new house. At the end of the city. A year later, they began to bury people there and made another cemetery. Right in front of our house. It's embarrassing and gross. Now I am afraid of cemeteries, I do not advise you to walk around the cemetery at night. Is there a little…

.................................................................................................................................................

This story was told by Sofia Kazhdan. I present it here in the form in which it was told.

That evening I saw off the mother of my friend, who had lived in our small town for more than fifty years. I came home late at night and couldn't sleep.

Evgenia became a widow for five years and lived literally ten minutes walk from my house. Her daughter, Yulia, my childhood friend, begged her mother to move to live with her in another city.
Mom, I want you to be by my side. I don’t want to wake up every morning with only one thought that you are alone there, a hundred kilometers from me and my grandchildren.

As luck would have it, my eyes literally stuck together, but there was no sleep. Several times during the night I turned on the TV, picked up a book.
Then I decided to get over myself. I turned off the TV, put down the book, turned off the light and started counting.
"One... two... three... ten... eighty... one hundred and thirty... two hundred and fifty..."

And then ... Then the action unfolded according to the scenario of a science fiction film. Lying in bed, already almost asleep, I heard a soft knock on the window through my sleep. Lazily getting up, she went to the window and, opening the curtain, was horrified.

On the road outside my house was a funeral home bus with a black stripe down the middle. From it, my acquaintances looked at me through the windows, who left this world and moved to the “OTHER”.

I felt my hands and toes get cold, sweat on my forehead and nose, my legs become cottony, and my tongue sticks to my palate. Goosebumps began to run through my body.

Near my window stood the father of my childhood friend Yulka and the husband of Evgenia, who had to leave our town early in the morning, Uncle Lenya.
"Sonka, why are you looking at me so frightened?" - he asked and, smiling at me, continued, - I won't do anything bad to you. Get dressed and go outside ... You need to talk ...
I continued to stand and looked in horror at the street through the window pane.

People started getting off the bus. I personally saw many of them in the coffin. They were wearing the same things in which they were seen by acquaintances and friends, seeing them off on their last journey.

Uncle Lena was approached by Tamara, a former colleague of my sister who died of cancer, leaving a two-year-old son.
Why don't you come to us? Tamara asked, “Don’t be afraid of us… We won’t do anything bad to you… You need to be afraid of the living, not the dead…”
- What are you doing here? - I asked frightened, thinking that DEATH came for me, - I don't want to die! Don't want! It's bad, it's scary and it's dark there...
“Look at me,” Uncle Lenya said and smiled again, “Look at me carefully… Do I look bad?”

And in fact ... Uncle Lenya was very often sick for the last ten years of his life and was very overweight. In addition to asthma, he also had a bunch of other side diseases. Now in front of me stood a fit, lively man with clear eyes.

- I live in a beautiful place, - he said, - in a pine forest ... This place is ideal for my health.
- What are you doing here? - I asked in a slurred tongue, - You are all dead.
“They came to visit you, earthlings,” a good friend of mine, who died in a car accident, intervened in the conversation.

I don't remember what happened next ... and how many minutes or seconds I stood with my mouth open. Then ... Then I asked them:
— What is there? On the other side of life? Is it scary there? Badly?
“No,” said Uncle Lenya, “the DEVIL is not as terrible as you draw it ... There is a different life ... Other concepts about life ...

“Do you want to go back… to us… to Earth?”
“We want peace… We want the Earthlings not to touch us, not offend us, and remember that we are always there for you, we follow your life…”
— Follow? I asked scared.
“Here, I came to see how my wife will leave our house ... It’s hard for her to do this ... It’s hard ... So I came to help her, support her ...

- Uncle Lenya, - after a short silence, I asked, - Do you want to join us? In our life?
“My mission on Earth is over… I have done everything I could… Now I am at home.
- At home? - I asked in bewilderment, - How is it at home? I am at home... But you are not at home... You are in a coffin...
“Ha-ha-ha,” the dead laughed merrily.

“Sonechka,” Tamara said, “It’s you who is the guest… An earthly guest… And the coffin… This is how we leave your world…”
“Just don’t try to tell me that it’s good there ... That there is an afterlife kingdom there, and everyone lives happily ever after, like in a fairy tale.”
- Why does everyone live happily ever after, like in a fairy tale ?! No... Life there is not heavenly either... One must also work and live there... There is eternity... And here is the stop...

I no longer remember what I asked, what they told me, I only remember one thing, that I asked a few questions that to this day make me think about a lot.
— How often do you visit us, and how often do you want to see us?
“Practically none of us is drawn to Earth… But there are exceptions… Grandparents who have little grandchildren want to see the kids… They come to them at night when they are fast asleep,” Uncle Lenya said.
“I want to see my son… Hold him close… I left him so small, so helpless… I left him when he needed me so much… I don’t visit him very often… I don’t have time for that,” with annoyance in his voice said Tamara.

“We have our own life, and don’t bother us over trifles… Don’t come to the grave when you feel like it… Don’t disturb us… Don’t torment us and don’t torment our souls… There is a church for this… Go there… Pray for the repose of our souls,” Uncle Lenya said.
- Why?
“You are invading another world… A world incomprehensible to you… The time will come when you yourself will understand everything…”

— Who feels bad there, in this OTHER world?
- Who is sick? To the one who passed sentence on himself and took his own LIFE?... It's scary... It's very scary... WE, our world, do not accept these people, and in yours they are already dead... They are trying to settle down with the dead, but this is impossible... God gave man life and only God can take it away from us.
- Uncle Lenya, don't scare me. Are you trying to say that a murderer... A person who took the life of another lives better in your world than the one who decides his own fate?
“Probably, yes… These people are slaves… They accept new arrivals… They work with them… They go through adaptation with them… They teach them to live according to our laws…”

The alarm went off in the room...

I stood in the middle of the room in clothes and was shaking with fear ... To this day I still can’t understand what it was: a DREAM OR ...

And if OR...

Stuttering, I began to talk about the night aliens.
After the story was told, there was silence in the accounting department. An older woman interrupted her.
“This is a miracle,” she said, “Formerly, those people who took their own lives were buried outside the gates of the cemetery and they were not buried in the church ...

A year later, my friend comes to me and says:
- I had such a life situation ... I didn’t see a way out ... My mother died, my husband went to another ... I didn’t want to live at all ... I decided to cut my veins ... I filled the bath with water, took a knife and ... At that moment I remembered your story about night guests… I was scared… I was scared that in that world I didn’t understand, I would suffer even more. Two days later, I met Sasha ... Now we are waiting for our son ... There are simply no hopeless situations ... If you can’t fight, then you just need to wait out this unsuccessful period.

I WANT TO BELIEVE THAT WE DO NOT DIE FOR ALL...
WHAT THE SOUL WILL LIVE AFTER OUR DEATH... BUT THAT WORLD is unknown to us... And no one gave us the right to invade it. If it exists, THAT WORLD, then people live there according to their own laws...

It was a long time ago, twenty years ago.
Now I am a serious lady at the age, and then there was a young pretty busty blonde, free, unmarried.
She worked as a researcher in a medical laboratory developing new blood substitutes. She even began to write her dissertation on the topic of acute fatal blood loss. We modeled all this on dogs: we pumped blood out of them, and then poured in artificial blood. So I was not afraid of blood at all, quite the contrary.
***
And then I had a close friend M., a young handsome brunette, also a researcher, only in the field of theoretical physics, and he worked at the Academy of Sciences.
From the side, everyone thought that we were having an affair - we spend almost every evening together.
However, everything was somewhat different. We communicated with him not so much on the basis of love, but on the basis of friendship, and not simple, but based on common interests - namely, addiction to everything infernal.
During the day we promoted Soviet science, and in the evening we fell into mystical obscurantism (Now there is a certain analogue of this hobby - the Goths, but then, in the nineties, this movement did not exist yet).
Our favorite pastime was walking through the ancient cemeteries of the city. Almost every day after work we met and hurried to the churchyard at a friendly trot. And along the way, we often looked into the store and overstocked with a bottle of champagne for greater inspiration. Well, how without it on the graves, then?
For example, I told my friend M. the historical fact that George Sand and his beau Alfred Musset also liked to drink champagne at the cemetery at night, and from a skull. Well, we, of course, did not reach this point (due to the lack of a skull), but we also tried to show originality. They wandered, like Sand and Musset, at dusk, through the old Military Cemetery or Calvaria, reciting necrophilic verses or retelling the mystical stories of the most infernal authors - Edgar Allan Poe, Howard Philips Lovecraft, Ambrose Bierce ... In short, they tickled their nerves with afterlife romance
***
So on that fateful summer evening, M. and I, grabbing a bottle of brut champagne, hurried to the old Military Cemetery. The weather whispered, it was a full moon.
The full moon flooded the ancient cemetery with its dead light.
We sat on one bench, drank to the health of the dead, sat on another, remembered Charles Baudelaire, re-read a lot of epitaphs, commented on them. It was a wonderful evening.
... Finally brought us to the farthest, most abandoned corner of the cemetery, where we (oddly enough) have never been (although, it would seem, we have gone around everything for a long time). It should have been noted. I spread the newspaper on the edge of the dilapidated tombstone (so as not to stain my black dress) and sat down. M too.
Well, they drank, of course (although not from a skull, but from glasses taken from home).
…And so…
***
... The moon shone brightly, sharp shadows of branches fell on crosses and tombstones,
some cicadas crackled loudly in the dry grasses, and the soul asked for infernality.
Philosophical thoughts involuntarily wafted ...
Like - we are sitting here, young, beautiful, talented, and below us, literally nearby, under the ground are those who have long been gone among us, but once upon a time they were! Loved, jealous, hated - in a word, lived ...
Sitting on the tombstone, I recited with feeling:
“I must not love another, no, I must not!
I am betrothed to a dead man with a holy word!”
My friend M., phlegmatically listening to high poetry, kissed the neck of the bottle with feeling, and, trying to lean it against the side of the forgotten grave, noticed something shiny in the withered grass.
"Look, the ring!" - he exclaimed and already stretched out his hand, intending to raise it, but then I got ahead of him (and with this, I’ll say, looking ahead, I saved it!) And grabbed the ring first.
***
..The ring turned out to be a cheap fake with a blue glass. But the point, of course, was not its value, but the fact that it was found in such an unusual setting.
Having entered the role, and even being warmed up by champagne, I stood up, defiantly put a ring on the ring finger of my left hand and proclaimed: “With this ring I am engaged to the dead of this cemetery!”
M. applauded my courage and artistry, and I continued to quote, this time Byron:
"Don't wander around at night,
though the soul is full of love
and still rays
the moon silvers the expanse ... "
And to that we drank.
***
... Byron Byron, however, it was already midnight, and tomorrow both M. and I had to go to work, and we slowly moved towards the exit, very pleased with the romantic evening spent.
***
... We were already approaching the gates of the cemetery, where a small water pump stood by the ancient gatehouse - a black rusted post with a hook for hanging a bucket. Looks like it's been there for ages.
... And then a terrible thing happened ...
Passing by the pump, I stepped on an iron grate for draining water. To my misfortune, the grating turned out to be loose, it turned over and, having lost my balance, I fell with a swing with my chest on a sharp hook, just like Matrosov on an embrasure ... There was a crack of the torn fabric of a synthetic black dress.
Rising, I exclaimed indignantly: “Damn, I tore my dress!”, I pressed my left hand to my chest, took it away and ... I saw with horror my bloodied palm (blood was not visible on the black dress) ...
It wasn't just the dress that was torn. The left breast was cut almost in half by the tip of the hook!
(Surprisingly, I really did not feel pain at all - as I later found out, there are very few nerve endings in this part of the breast),
The dead man encroached not only on my hand with the ring, but also on my heart. A bust of the third size saved me - the hook pierced just at the level of the heart ...
***
I covered the wound with my left hand (which was wearing the ring), took a deep breath, and voiced the situation.
M. sobered up with horror, but lost the power of speech. I had to pull myself together - it was not for nothing that I worked with blood loss! It’s good that I’m not afraid of blood, otherwise I would have collapsed into a faint.
"Ambulance!" I screamed, but then I realized that it was unrealistic.
"Looking for a taxi!" I threw it in a businesslike manner, and, grabbing the crazed theoretical physicist by the arm, rushed from the cemetery.
As we ran along the dark street in search of a taxi, it began to dawn on me that the accident had something to do with the cemetery find.
Here... got engaged to the dead man on her own head!!!.. flashed through my mind.
As we ran along the avenue, I finally came to the conclusion that the ring was involved in my accident, and decided to throw it away.
Almost on the run, I tore the bloody ring from my hand and threw it away from me. A second later, I suddenly realized that, by a strange coincidence, I threw the ill-fated ring at the door of the entrance where my friend L. lived, (a doctor) with whom I abruptly broke off relations shortly before, and she was very worried about this.
At that moment, I didn’t even think about it, I remembered later (when I found out that a couple of days later L. opened her veins and tried to commit suicide, fortunately, they managed to save her). (!!!)
***
… As a physician, I have always been terribly afraid of germs.
And when I imagined the consequences of the contact of my chic bust with a rusty ninety-year-old hook, which had been standing all this time on the graveyard (and hardly ever disinfected) ... What if it ends in gangrene?! ... amputation of the chest ... My fantasy was played out not a joke. And I'm young, pretty, my whole life is ahead ... Horror ... We ran to the clinic.
***
In the emergency department, the old fat doctor on duty disinfected the wound and said that he could stitch them, but they had run out of painkillers. So if I agree without anesthesia ... I agreed. The doctor was delighted with my courage and put in 8 stitches, and I just laughed. Still, our experimental dogs didn’t get that.
***
Arriving home, I suddenly noticed a bottle of pills (an American terribly cool scarce antibiotic) that we, as doctors, had been given out at work the day before as humanitarian aid (I had already forgotten about this). I immediately grabbed the bottle and competently took the loading dose.
***
HAPPY END
In the morning I went to work as if nothing had happened, no one noticed anything. The antibiotic was taken for another five days. Then a week later I went to the clinic to remove the stitches. Everything healed surprisingly quickly, without any complications.
In a word, I'm still lucky. But it could have been different...
***
Many years have passed, but still a small scar on my left breast reminds me of this terrible incident.
***
I want to warn all readers - never take anything from the cemetery!!!