This ridiculous story never started. Initially, there was nothing here...
I was lying at the bottom of the ocean, crushed by a multitude of kilometers of icy water and smoking in silence. Or maybe I just thought I was smoking, but the smell of tobacco smoke to the palate and tongue was just as linden, and I even woke up with a ridiculous desire to take a sip of fragrant freshly brewed coffee.
Was it a human memory? Or just some ridiculous obsession?
...Disgusting cheap coffee in the morning, some bun jammed on the move, a rapid run down the stairs ... heavy smell and darkness in the entrance ...
I wonder how old was I then? Twenty years old? A shaggy green-eyed girl in a wrinkled T-shirt and old, torn jeans. The only friend who ever saw a bright red motorcycle. The only dream is to reach the very edge of the earth... Well, or even further... Or maybe higher... After all, there is nothing impossible in this world...
A huge sphinx mowed down on me a dark golden eye and smiled:
- Do you dream everything, Chari?
- Dreaming? - I have shaken my head and looked back, - I'm just trying to remember! All these lives, destinies, millions of other people's dreams and emotions! How to find yourself in them?!
I put my hands around pointing to mountains and piles of books dumped everywhere. Thick and thin, shabby and not so much... They all breathed, lived, whispered their innermost stories. Somewhere among them was mine. Carefully written on thin parchment, smelling of my kisses and lilacs. Yes, it was lilac...
I stared at the serene comrade and sighed and sat down next to him on the dusty stone floor at the entrance to the cave. She hung her legs down. In the abyss. Although, in that human life, I would hardly call it an abyss. Somewhere down there, in the very bottom of the unimaginably huge clouds, there was a shining darkness. It was the shining darkness. Pulling towards herself. I wanted to stretch out my arms and fall into it, caressing this world under the dome of shimmering golden sky...
- How long have I been here? - my voice sounded lifeless. In general, I knew the answer, but I was used to asking that question day in and day out.
- Three hundred wasn't too small," the Sphinx answered calmly, and I felt it move. Even the air seemed to live in this strange world.
- Three hundred...
I sighed. Ah, that obsessive, sticking smell of tobacco smoke to the palate and tongue. I also... I tried to catch this brand-new flavor, and I shuddered when a book in a brown-brown leather binding knelt on my lap. Lilac! It was the smell of lilac!
"Nasty cheap coffee this morning, some bun jammed on the go...
I flipped through the pages and cried out in disappointment. There was nothing there at the end. Only clean, untouched pages. I didn't have a story carefully written by someone else's invisible hand. Something squeezed inside, making me grimace bitterly.
- Died?
The Sphinx was not looking at me. He didn't even seem to hear it.
I slowly closed the book and sighed, looking at the darkness swirling downstairs. The com inside me was a little weaker. Well. So it was necessary. Or maybe there was nothing. Not a bright red motorcycle, not me, not pressing the ice-cold, soulless water... I smiled sadly:
- So this is the edge of the earth?
We were silent.
- So what happens next?
The Sphinx turned his head in my direction and looked carefully into my eyes:
- And there's nothing further out there, Chari, no... Yes, and it's all in your head...
He exhaled right in my face, and I backed out. I tripped over a stone and, ridiculously stretching my arms, began to fall. I still saw his huge dark golden eyes, heard an obscure whisper... I felt the breath filled with the smell of lilacs... And then I was swallowed up by the velvety darkness.
Hideous cheap coffee in the morning, some bun jammed on the move, a rapid run down the stairs ... heavy smell and darkness in the entrance ...
I jumped out of the entrance and suddenly hit someone big and deliciously smelling of chocolate.
- Girl, why are you running so fast and not looking around?
I pulled up my chin and looked at the dark brown, golden eyes. The young man smiled:
- I think now you just can't help but share the company with me for ice cream eating in the next park. Isn't that right?
I squeezed the keys to my faithful two-wheeled friend in a flash and nodded unexpectedly, smiling back. I think this time the edge of the earth can wait.
- And what's next?
- And there is nothing further there, Chari, no... Only blank sheets. And your hand that brings out the hieroglyphs of your life on them...