Planet Earth

It was so hot in New York that even the cloud hanging on the skyscraper was tired. It came down, this heat from the sky, when the city's inhabitants, young, old, stubborn, pliable, kind, evil, cheerful, gloomy people had long since given up on their lives and began to pray to everyone. An old woman walked past dirty tables, and seeing flies covering the sausages, began to bow to them, and whispered: "God save you, my dears. Eat, eat, my dears." The girls, seeing the river of the memory, the Panama Canal memory, gushing from the top of the skyscraper, crossed themselves and began to pray to the fish falling out of this river and bang their heads against the tanks with sewage. People gathered and talked about the canal, about a distant and mythical place between oceans. The city streets turned into rivers of thoughts about canal. The fragile skeletons of skyscrapers stood still, barely scraping and clawing the sky.

It was in this overwhelming silence that he, Don, appeared, but everyone called him "The King of the Canals", because he had an unusual gait, because of which it seemed that he was walking not on the ground, but on top of it, looking around, whispering the spell of canals.

That year the heat in Panama was constant, all-pervasive, and unceremonious. It haunted everyone, everywhere and always, so that the bodies of the people working in the jungle turned into dried tomatoes, their perspiration and saliva mixed with dust, mosquitoes, flies, and butterflies. When they spat out one insect, hundreds immediately filled their mouths. At dinner, everyone whispered about death, like a shadow that had no form, but was always present.

Ferdinand Marie Comte de Lesseps was the first to dream of a passage between the oceans. He did not want to connect the Atlantic with her sister Pacific, but on the contrary - to separate the continents.

In 1881, he came with the amazed look of a man who believed that the continents were just different kinds of unknown. His French company, Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interocéanique, put its efforts into his dream, but Panama had other plans.

Insects and animals sticking out of the worker's mouths caused malaria and yellow fever: insects devoured thousands, bacteria bred in the water and food, in people's bodies; and devoured people from the inside. To fight bacteria, Ferdinand spent all his arsenal, including guns, knives, shovels, and even the shin bones of the deceased. But in vain. He left in disgrace, his vision shattered like a fragile glass, and the jungle blinked an eye at the builders who fled in disgrace.

For years, Panama stood motionless, as if it had exhaled something unpleasant.

In New York, where the sun, first strung itself on skyscrapers, and then fell behind them, there lived a magnificent lady, Melania. She had the gift of not losing her freshness. People said that she was born seventy-seven years ago, but her skin rustled like that of an infant ancient Egyptian pharaoh, and her eyes were so bright that people in the neighbouring house could not sleep. Melania lived in a skyscraper that pierced a cloud. The same cloud that accidentally ended up there when Melania was born. The cloud stopped in the sky looking at the infant, and then the skyscraper pierced her. So, this cloud hangs there to this day. Relatives and friends did not visit Melania, because of that strange hanging cloud. After all, every night, when the moon rose above the horizon, she, the moon, had to think about how to go around this cloud. When Melania was a child, the moon got stuck in this cloud. She, the moon, would have remained there to this day if firefighters from all over the country had not removed her. They took the moon off, but the firemen themselves remained there forever.

In New York, the minutes suddenly began to show the days and the hours were puzzled and did not show anything. And then came an event that arrived only once every four years. It was an old event, covered with rust and lichen. Its arrival was a fleeting echo from the recent past. It appeared suddenly, at midnight, on the clock’s hands that no one remembered, no one had ever wound, for it was too windy to wind.

The townspeople spoke of the event as a ghost, something, that came and went without any real purpose. Without any real purpose, but always with noise, a roar for the world to hear, and somehow with regularity.

Donald, who had spent his life in a skyscraper, tending a small apricot tree that had never seen a harvest, heard a hum one day.

Donald sat by the window, sucking on a huge popsicle, his hands and eyelids shaking. The wind, filled with the smell of burnt forest, howled through the empty streets. It was a memory of the time when a skyscraper elevator had taken someone he loved, Melania, to whom he had not had time to express all his simple thoughts.

When he was young, he asked her where the express elevator went. Melania had smiled and looked out the dark window mysteriously. "It doesn't matter where it goes… it matters where it comes from...” she said without turning to him, “or vice versa."

But she had gone into the depths of the great dark tunnel of the skyscraper and never returned. People said that the elevator took them to places where no one could go, places where the sun never rose, and where popsicles were as hard as steel bars. But Donald never asked again because some truths were too painful to bear.

That evening, as the distant screech of the elevator echoed throughout the skyscraper, Donald heard the firm stomp of heels down the endless corridor. His heart sank. A shadow passed under the moon, too soft to be real. He stood up, his legs shaking, and walked to the door.

Near the window stood a shadow—a shadow by itself, without a body. He felt the pull of an invisible thread pulling him toward the window, and with slow, measured steps, he walked toward it, toward the shadow.

He reached the window, his heart beating like a motorcycle. There, in the darkness, stood a past, or rather a shadow of the past.

"Are you ready?" the shadow asked in a whisper, so quiet that he could not understand the sound.

Donald hesitated, and a shadow entered the room through the wall as if the wall was gaseous. He sat down and closed his eyes. He heard that the express elevator soundlessly stopped and somebody came out.

He heard JD shouting and swearing at somebody. Elon’s voice swore in response.

Donald felt he was inside of the invisible trap.

Donald had a cat, Dolores. No, Dolores had a man, Donald. He, Donald, likes such mysterious names, and mysterious characters. She, Dolores, could change colour at will. One day, Dolores turned green and began to meow in an ancient Hill Billy dialect, which Donald could not understand.

Donald asked the cat to translate the dialect, holding her by the tail. The cat screamed like a siren and crawled under the bed, having broken free. There, she ate all the sausages. Melanie always hid the sausages under the bed. Dolores turned into a sausage ball and rolled out the door. Donald chased her, but the ball grew legs and rolled faster.

After an exhausting chase, Dolores climbed into the Trump Tower, and turned into a wounded, halfdead cat, limping on all her legs, and shining with sad eyes. Donald slammed into the door with all his might. Dolores began to look around the room with one half-open eye. When she found the sausage in Keith's bag, Donald was already lying by the door, tied hand and foot.

"What are we going to do now?" Keith asked.

"Call Vance," Dolores advised, gobbling up the sausages.

In the evening, in the park, everyone looked at the man in the expensive suit, who walked with unblinking eyes and pressed the tied man tightly under his arms.

YOU

When Spring awakens the youthful rivers, brimming with vitality, when it adorns the hills with vibrant meadows, combs the forest, serenading in delicate tones, hangs the stars across the heavens, scatters flowers across the fields, and fills the buds upon the trees - when you creep forth, behold the sun, inhale the air, and trace the flight of birds, so begins your life.

When Summer warms the land, teeming with ants, worms, and beetles, when it hurls the flies into the fields, sprinkles the flowers, swells the fruits, and nurtures the willows - when you run, eager to take flight, leave your nest, and caress the sky.

When Autumn drives the winds, and the gales bend the trees; when the forest scatters its seeds, and the river forges new paths; when the sky is veiled in clouds - then you stretch your arms, feel your strength, build your nest, and raise your progeny.

When Winter freezes the lakes and drapes the land in a blanket of snow, when the bare creatures sniff the frozen grass, when Winter swings the moon - then you stand upon a road with neither beginning nor end, a gust of wind trembling through your limbs. You forget your way, forget why you are here, why you were placed upon this earth, why your mother... mother... mother…

GOD

Rainy October days in 2015 drove Londoners into gloomy old houses. The sky was overcast, the streets were dull and grey, and the air was thick and smelled of wet earth. The bustling Londoners and visitors seemed to carry an almost tangible sense of the approaching darkness and cold. The clatter of footsteps echoed sharply off the cobblestones, and leaves wandered through the narrow alleys and clung to the legs of passers-by as if seeking refuge. A cat lay on the windowsill, watching fluffy sparrows gather under the roofs. With a pulled-up jacket revealing the dazzling white of his freshly washed shirt and a Boris-like hairstyle, Boris entered the office at City Hall.

He had just returned from a long but exciting trip to Japan.

A long-legged journalist in a black suit slept on the office couch, while Petronella Wyatt, a Spectator columnist, sprawled in the armchairs. From the office next door, there was the sound of "zzh-zzh-zhzh!"

Boris looked questioningly at Baron Greenhalgh.

"Your wife, Wheeler is vacuuming," he whispered. “Yesterday, she ordered the latest Dyson vacuum and had it brought to the office."

Boris nodded empathetically and entered the working office.

"Boris!" exclaimed Richard Barnes, a deputy, joyfully, "Pfeffer! Finally! How was the trip? Have you enjoyed in the south-east? How are things on the international front?"

"Well, you know, Japan is a bit tight," Boris replied with a smirk, "I told you not to let journalists into the office!"

Melanie was making mints for an upcoming fair when she dropped the jar, sending tiny candies scattered across the kitchen floor. She sat down so hard that the neighbours thought a tornado had started and ran for the shelter.

Donald looked up from his newspaper in surprise. He looked at Melanie sitting there, remembered his childhood, and cried - his mother would fall to the floor just like that, and the fire department would come to the roar and water the house, putting out an imaginary fire.

Melanie's eyes widened with curiosity. She had never seen a presidential candidate cry. She pulled an old clay pot from under the bed and placed it beside Donald. As the pot filled with tears, a smoky fishy smell wafted out.

Soon a crowd gathered outside the house, attracted by the delightful smell. They brought out cutlery, creating an impromptu barbeque party in front of her house. Melanie opened the door and saw the neighbours lined up beautifully. They were chanting, "We want Melanie! We want Melanie!"

"Who are these, what are we going to do with them?" Melanie asked.

Donald stopped crying, looking into the pot. "I have no idea," he said and licked his lips.

"What are we going to do with these people? One of them has a fish gun, he's going to shoot."

"So be it. My mother told me, when I was a child, that the best defender against a fish gun is a fish pan," said Donald, “no, fish gun… fish dun. A fish ban, tooty ban… Taliban. Melanie, is it Taliban or baby pan?”

Donald loved Melanie very much. He loved her big magic eyes. The black colour of the eyes shimmered with a bluish tint and looked like a horseshoe crab with the pincers sticking out. On the 26th of April evening, Donald was polishing pincers and broke the propodus.

Donald was amazed. He never expected he could break such a delicate matter. He put the polishing device aside, put the pillow on the windowsill, put the propodus on the pillow, and went to bed. Melanie went too, holding her eye with one palm. In the morning, Donald came to the window, the propodus was gone.

Donald looked out the window and saw a parade of horseshoe crabs: Mexican, Venezuelan, Colombian even Taiwanese horseshoes. They were marching like medieval knights.

Donald watched them go by, wondering if the Vance pincers had gone too. Vance had the most beautiful horseshoe pincers in the country, he brought them from Hill Billy. Hill Billy's pincers were huge with a portrait of Boris Pfeffer on the propodus. "Why does Vance want Boris’s portrait?” Donald thought and sighed heavily, “And what is the propodus? Prop… propindus... props, what is it?”

Melanie was rattling pots from the corner of the room, and the smell of delicious steak wafted in. "Well, to hell with this Vance," he thought, pulling a knife and fork out of his pocket.

One day Donald decided to go for a morning jog. And he accidentally found a handkerchief in the middle of the street. It was a beautiful handkerchief, the size of a parachute. While he was looking at it, people passed by and winked. For some reason, one woman named Melania tripped over the handkerchief and fell. She stood up, shook herself off, transferred a roast turkey leg from one pocket to another, and continued walking as if nothing had happened.

Donald decided to wrap himself in the handkerchief and take it home. He got to his house. His house was small, with one bedroom, and ten toilets. When he began to take off the handkerchief, a man tumbled out.

"Who are you?" Donald asked.

"Vance."

"Which Vance?"

"J.D."

"Which J.D."

"V.P."

"Which V.P."

"Vice."

"Vice of what?"

"The President."

"Which President?"

"Donald."

"Which Donald?" Donald asked.

"Here," said Vance, and pointed his pinky finger at Donald. Donald looked at the mirror and saw Donald there.

"That's true. This is Donald. Strange," he said, "let me give you some tea."

"There are too many calories," said Vance.

"I'll give you a cold one," Donald said.

“That is better,” said Vance, and they went off for tea. That's how they became friends.