After the exams, Dinka decided to give herself a gift and went to the Volga.
How many years have passed, and this place has not changed! Everyone is also playing children on the shore, there are still steamships, and the remains of the inscription "Find me, Lenka" have been preserved on the stone in the cave under the cliff. After a little sitting on the cliff, the girl went down to the pier.
- Hello," she said, saying hello to some man on the shore. - You probably don't know me, we used to live here a long time ago. Have you been here for a long time?
- I've been here all my life," said the man, looking at a stranger. - Ever since I was a child.
- Maybe you remember the boy, he worked on a barge... - Dinka talked to him without hoping for anything. - We got lost... he sailed away...
- Macaque, are you? - Somehow the man didn't speak with much confidence. - Dinka?
- Yes," surprised the girl. - And who are you?
- Yes, I am, - the man smiled. - And I haven't seen Lenka for a long time. I thought I heard that he was at war.
- Is that all?
- Yes," Troshka shook his shoulders. - He, after he didn't have time to come to you. He still walked on the boat and asked about you every time. But we didn't know where you were going and we didn't ask anyone.
Dinka smiled sadly, like a tear.
- All right, I'll go," she said, nodding toward the steamer, "and the landing ends.
- Bye. - Troshka, or rather Trofim waved his hand to an old friend.
Dinka went up to the deck and looked around the shore for the last time. The steamer beeped from afar and took the girl away from the shore, which became her native in such a short time.
Three! - He heard the voice of his old childhood friend Minka. - Look who arrived!
The reed turned to the friend. There was a military man next to him.
- Do you recognize him? -Minka asked a friend about it. - Lenka.
- Lenka? - Troshka turned on the spot, seeing off the steamer, ignoring the old friend's outstretched hand. - You were late...
- What does "Late" mean? - Didn't understand the military
- What-what-what... Your girlfriend swims away
- Mac, uh... Dinka? Was she here? - Lenka was confused.
- Just now," Troshka confirmed.
Lenka noticed on the beach, not knowing what to do.
- The next steamer is in an hour," he heard.
It's been 20 years. During this time, Nadezhda Arsenieva failed to get married and give birth to her daughter Anna. Now the world is not calm. It is already a year since the Second World War.
Anyuta cleaned up the house when she found an old, sometimes rusty crest in the shelf and threw it in the trash can for a while.
- Why did you do it? - Dinka almost asked her daughter if she was crying. - Why? Why? Dinka was taking out the trash and only by a miracle did she find something among the junk.
- And why do we need this rusty iron? - sincerely puzzled the girl.
- It's not iron, but the most expensive gift! - Dinka probably for the first time raised his daughter's voice - And don't you dare touch it!
- From Daddy? -Anya asked for it in detail
- No," said Dinka. Without going into detail.
And here comes the Great Patriotic War. Nadezhda Arsenieva is a doctor in a field hospital. Anyuta became a radio operator.
- Nadezhda Aleksandrovna," said a nurse slightly older than her daughter. - There, in the third tent, he was seriously wounded. I doubt that he will make it to the morning. There are no documents.
- Not at all? - Nadezhda asked and explained - the documents?
- Only a photo," explained the nurse.
Arsenieva entered the above tent, where a recently operated middle-aged fighter was lying. His injuries were indeed not easy...
- That's all there is - a nurse lifted, lying next to the wounded photo and handed over to the doctor.
- Give it back, - the man wheezed, - This is mine.
- I will return it now, - promised the girl.
Nadezhda Aleksandrovna took an old worn-out picture in her hands. A little girl looked at her from him, about 9 years old - she herself.
- Le...ya," Dinka sobbed, sitting down next to her. Now she felt not like a middle-aged adult woman, a responsible doctor, but that girl from the photo. - Do you... remember me?
- Macaque... - A man held out a man with a slight smile - so we met...
- I tried to find you, Lazy. - A woman whispered, stroking his hair.
- And I whispered to you," the man whispered, "overwhelming pain.
- Lena, I'll save you. I'll do whatever it takes for you to live, Lena... Do you believe me?
- You've already saved me - a man grinned - if it weren't for you - I wouldn't have run away from my master. But you and I showed up... - he was quiet for a moment - I felt like a man...
- I saved him then, and now I am - whispering a woman holding an old friend's hand.
- Remember the cliff? - Lenka asked
- How are you gonna forget him? - Dinka smiled through her tears.
Despite the situation, it was a conversation between two absolutely happy people. Even though after so many years, and apparently not for long, to say goodbye, but they are back together again.
