He promised to return, and Masha believed him, even though everyone laughed at her. As a farewell, he gave her earrings – two golden doves, and she wore them without taking them off.
“You’re so naive, Masha,” sighed her friend Tanya. “Why would he want you now? You saw how he is, they even showed him on TV.”
And indeed, they had shown Lev on TV – he had won some international competition and was the best student in his faculty, a real star. Several universities sent him invitations, all wanting him in their ranks, and of course, he went – such an opportunity only comes once in a lifetime.
Masha had never been good at studying. They became friends in ninth grade when the teacher asked Lev to help Masha with math, fearing that she would fail the exam, as she couldn’t solve a single equation on her own. Initially, the teacher had asked the excellent student Yulia, but she refused, bluntly stating that Masha was dumb. She did this in front of the entire class, and Masha was terribly ashamed.
She felt ashamed about everything: her patched-up tights, her suddenly grown breasts, her limp… At five, she had had encephalitis – maybe it would have been fine, but her mother was against any medical intervention after her son died during childbirth, and she couldn’t stand doctors. Masha’s mother never took her to the hospital when she had a temperature of nearly forty-two degrees. Eventually, her grandfather forcibly took her and took her to the district center, and that’s when they saved her. But now she limped and wasn’t particularly bright, what could be done.
Lev took the teacher’s words seriously – he tutored Masha three times a week, explaining the entire math curriculum to her from fifth grade. And strangely enough, Masha understood everything, not immediately, of course, but she passed the exam well. But it didn’t bring her much joy, because it meant that there would be no more meetings with Lev, and by then, of course, she was head over heels in love with him.
He wasn’t handsome – short, hunched, with glasses. But for Masha, he was better than the popular basketball players, Edik Smirnov and Sergey Luganov, because, first of all, Lev was very smart, smarter than all the teachers put together. Everyone knew that – he won all the olympiads, even once winning a national one.
Secondly, Lev was very delicate and attentive: not once in six months did he call her stupid, he never got annoyed when Masha had to ask him to repeat everything three times before she understood, and if she was in a bad mood – he always found the right words to support her.
And her mood was often bad – her grandfather was very ill, and she loved him like she loved no one else, not even her mother. He was her light in the window, her storyteller and savior. Masha herself gave him injections twice a day, secretly from her mother, but it didn’t help – her grandfather was quietly fading away. And her mother was becoming stranger and stranger with every year, constantly scolding Masha, sometimes even hitting her with a switch or a cord. Life wasn’t easy for her, and that’s why she fell in love with Lev, so different from her previous life.
When Lev appeared at the gate two days after the exams, Masha thought he had forgotten his textbook or something else. But he invited her to go for a walk, and that was the happiest day of her life.
That summer, Masha didn’t go to the vocational school, as she had originally planned, but entered the tenth grade, despite the headmistress’s timid suggestion that she would be better off becoming a cook or a seamstress. She boldly replied: “If anything, Lev will help me.”
And he did help. For two years, they did homework together, so although her grades were average, she passed all the final exams. Lev, of course, passed everything with top marks. And it was no surprise that after graduation, they became close – they knew they would part soon, so they decided to make everything clear.
“I’ll finish my studies and take you with me,” he promised.
“In five years?” Masha sobbed.
“Earlier. I’ll make money and take you.”
Masha’s mother wouldn’t let her go to school – she had to take care of her grandfather, who couldn’t get out of bed, and her mother, who wasn’t cut out for managing the household. And they had to live off something. Masha got a job as a cleaner at the school, replacing the late Zina, and began living a new life, without Lev. But the earrings he had given her were a reminder – he would take her, and everything would be fine.
He came to visit her during the winter session, and Masha had no reason to doubt his love. But then he was shown on TV, and everyone told her that he would find a rich and beautiful girl in Moscow, so why would he want a village girl like Masha?
“You’ll see, now he’ll say he has some math tournament or a camp and won’t come in the summer,” Tanya said.
On that May day when he called and said he wouldn’t be able to come in the summer, Masha already knew something bad was going to happen – she discovered that one of the earrings Lev had given her was missing. Masha searched the whole house, but it was nowhere to be found. How bitterly she cried! And right after that, the phone call came. And then Lev disappeared altogether.
But Masha still waited for him. All summer, she jumped at every phone call, every creak of the gate, but it was all in vain – Lev never came. And everyone talked about it, and the neighbor Timur, five years older than her, started touching her whenever they met and inviting her over for tea, so Masha began looking around to see if he was nearby before going to the well for water.
In August, another misfortune happened – her grandfather died. Strangely, Masha couldn’t cry – maybe she had cried all her tears over the summer. After the funeral, she went to the pond, sat on the sandy shore, and watched the water for a long time until her eyes started to hurt. After that, she took off the second dove earring, which had hung alone in her ear all summer, and threw it into the water. She didn’t think about Lev anymore. And she didn’t wait for him.
In the second week of September, Masha was digging potatoes alone – her mother couldn’t handle it, and the neighbor Timur offered help, but for a barter, and it was clear what for. The weather was dry and warm, so she was lucky – the potatoes came out easily from the loose soil, and the bucket filled quickly. And then, while digging one of the holes, Masha thought she saw something shiny. She began sifting the gray soil, and in her palm lay a tiny golden dove…
Her heart raced so fast that Masha thought it would jump right into the potato bucket! Dropping the unfinished row, she ran to heat the bathhouse, where she scrubbed her rough hands with a loofah and washed her long chestnut hair three times.
“Why are you heating the bathhouse on a Wednesday?” Tanya asked, seeing the smoke from her porch. She had come to ask for a wash too, having dug potatoes as well.
“Lev is coming today,” Masha replied calmly and told her everything about the earring.
Tanya laughed so hard!
“He’s forgotten all about you! What a fool you are!”
But Masha didn’t believe her – she was watching for the evening bus, and when it appeared, she sat and counted the minutes until Lev should have arrived at her house.
The minutes passed, the pot of his favorite pickle soup bubbled, and Lev still wasn’t there. When the sun reached its zenith, Masha took off her fancy dress, put the soup in the fridge, and went to sleep.
She was carrying an empty bucket from the cow shed, having fed the cow Zoryka in the morning, in her old, stained robe, with her hair hastily braided, when she suddenly saw him. Lev had grown a little taller, his face had rounded, but his smile and helpless look from behind his glasses were the same.
“Masha!” he ran towards her, hugged her so tightly that her bones creaked.
Everything came after that – her tears mixed with hurried kisses, his excuses, his story about how he went to China for work but was deceived there, and how he couldn’t even send news, let alone return home… And now, there were only his strong arms, her salty lips, and the beating of two hearts in unison.
Later, in the evening, they went to the pond, to the place where she first belonged to him, walking hand in hand along the cool sand. Lev said he would transfer to evening classes and get a job, and she – she was going with him, right now.
In the light of the setting sun, Masha noticed something shining in the sand. She bent down and picked up a tiny object.
“What’s that?” Lev asked.
Masha smiled and replied:
“Nothing. I just dropped an earring.