Mission 777 Possible. Marina Sprouz
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Название: Mission 777 Possible
Автор: Marina Sprouz
Издательство: Издательские решения
isbn: 9785006433045
isbn:
What will snow and frost do to them,
Ice of the blue…”
Then we danced awkwardly: Borjka took me by the waist and swayed like a teddy bear, and I had to turn in time with the music, as it was a slow dance.
When we walked along the town’s path, Borjka took my hand, and we found ourselves bathed in a stream of shining divine light, and he said: “We’ll live together!”
It sounded like a verdict. And within a week, we moved our things into one apartment.
Someone is Praying for You
Donetsk. Church near the maternity ward. Marianna, in a warm autumn coat, visibly pregnant, enters a small chapel. A stranger appeared unexpectedly and took Marianna by the hand as she was lighting a candle:
– Someone doesn’t want him to be born. But someone is praying for you. A woman. She is praying for your son.
Marianna widened her eyes, processing the information. The woman, head bowed, stepped away from Marianna. Everything will be fine, Marianna assured herself; previous pregnancies were difficult, but this time everything will be fine. I’m already in the maternity ward, arrived and settled in early. Today the doctors will say everything, but for now, I’ll take a little walk in the frosty air. Early October… And how cold it is…
Donetsk Land
Donetsk. October. Regional maternity hospital.
– Here is a pregnancy of 33 weeks, the heartbeat is hardly audible, immediate delivery is necessary, – a young doctor said to an elderly professor, – obstetric history is burdened, miscarriages, bleeding.
Marianna lies on the couch after an ultrasound.
– Have you eaten anything? – the doctor asks.
– I managed to eat some soup when I entered the ward.
– Bring her to the operating room!
Marianna woke up in the intensive care unit after a cesarean section.
– How is he, my son? – she asked a passing nurse.
Everything is fine, he’s in the neonatal intensive care unit, connected to a mechanical ventilator. Unfortunately, he’s not breathing on his own, but he’s a strong boy, weighing three kilograms six hundred grams.
The young doctor murmured near Marianna: – Now we’ll try to express at least a drop of colostrum.
– I have no milk at all, – Marianna said, pulling out her small breast.
– It’s okay, even a milliliter in a syringe will be enough for him. Marianna winced in pain. After finishing milking Marianna, the young doctor said:
– You understand, he has a chance, a small chance. He was born at thirty-three weeks, his lungs are still immature, they’re completely white on the X-ray, and it’s unknown when he’ll breathe on his own, currently on the ventilator. The doctor left with a syringe of colostrum in hand.
Marianna went to the neonatal department.
She approached the head of the department:
– Will he be able to breathe on his own?
– Oxygenation is dropping, we can’t disconnect him from the ventilator. Thanks to the new equipment for artificial lung ventilation we received last year, we have the opportunity to care for such children, otherwise he wouldn’t have been saved.
Good thing we have this equipment this year (thought Marianna).
First Meeting with Son
I’m going to see him now. Excitement overwhelms me. I step into the neonatal intensive care unit. The sound of the ventilator machine grows louder. I look at the little one. He looks at me. He’s quite dark-skinned, with thick black hair on his head; there’s a tube for artificial lung ventilation in his mouth. The child is struggling; the tube is clearly bothering him.
Marianna and her son lock eyes.
“Mom, I’m your son,” his voice transmits telepathically into Marianna’s head, in waves resembling Morse code; the words come from the area of the child’s forehead and reach Marianna’s forehead.
“My son! You’re my son!” Marianna responds through the airwaves with waves of tender, overwhelming love.
This is my son, and we will call him Albert.
Grandmother from Azerbaijan
Albert’s grandmother came from Azerbaijan to see her son, that is, Borjka’s father, and she briefly visited us upon learning from Borjka’s father that Albert was born.
Why was this meeting necessary… Marianna wondered later, it was necessary for some reason. Albert’s grandmother had dark hair, tied up at the back; her eyes were large and brown. She wasn’t as dark-skinned as Albert. Marianna kept trying to understand: does she resemble a gypsy or not, she wonders: what are Azerbaijani women like? The meeting was brief. The grandmother took Albert in her arms and examined him, but it was obvious she did not feel any kinship towards him, especially since Albert was still an uncircumcised infant and may not be Muslim. Then, as a sign of politeness, the grandmother drank wine from a crystal glass, refused to eat, and left. She said one thing: “He will be the same,” and nodded towards Borjka. Indeed, he is as dark-skinned as Borjka, but to say he is the same… that’s too much, since Borjka is quite plump.
The Boy Grows Up
At 4 months old, Albert still lies there, watching and not smiling.
The nurse sits beside little Albert, massaging his legs. The nurse will come again tomorrow, and the day after…
Albert presses his head hard against Marianna’s hand as she holds him, crying incessantly until he’s hoarse, and nothing helps.
Albert has laryngitis: he has a fever and a barking cough. We manage to get to the nearest hospital in Semivetrinsk.
They call for an air ambulance from Donetsk as Albert struggles to breathe, his wheezing audible. Two guys from the air ambulance bring Albert to me and say, “Say goodbye to your son!”
I manage to say, “Albert! My son…” as the men take him away in the car to the ICU in Donetsk.
He survived, and they discharged him.
At 9 months old, Albert can sit a little, but he still topples over like a doll.
At 1.5 years old, at a pediatric professor’s appointment:
“You’ve accomplished a feat!” praised the professor. “Considering how he was born, you’ve done something incredible. The boy is walking now, СКАЧАТЬ