Tamara Ivanovna walked slowly along the shelves of the huge supermarket, examining the brightly packaged products. She came here every day, like going to work. She didn’t need many groceries to feed a large family — she didn’t have one. So, every evening, the elderly woman would escape her loneliness into the brightly lit shopping hall.
In warmer weather, it was easier for her — sitting on a bench with the neighbors helped. But winter offered no choice, and Tamara Ivanovna had grown fond of visits to the new supermarket.
There were many people here, the smell of coffee was delicious, and soft music played in the background. All those brightly packaged products, reminiscent of children’s toys, delighted the eye and made her smile.
The old woman turned a jar of strawberry yogurt in her hands, squinted, trying to read the label and the ingredients, and then returned it to the shelf. Such dairy products were too expensive for her, but looking was free.
As she examined the abundance of goods on the shelves, memories of the past surfaced.
Images of long queues at counters appeared in her mind, where the saleswomen, like tigresses, fought for scarce goods. She remembered thick gray paper bags into which the purchases were wrapped.
She smiled as she remembered how she raised her daughter. To make her happy, Tamara Ivanovna was ready to stand in any queue. Thoughts of her daughter made her heart beat faster. The woman stopped by the low freezer with frozen fish and leaned heavily on it with her hand.
Her daughter’s laughing face appeared in her memory, with a mass of curly red hair, huge gray eyes, freckles scattered on her nose, and the cheerful dimples on her cheeks.
«How beautiful she was,» the woman thought sadly.
Under the disapproving gaze of the saleswoman, she approached the bakery counter.
Irina had been her only joy in life. She grew into a smart girl. When she realized that work wouldn’t bring her happiness, she decided to become a surrogate mother. As Tamara Ivanovna had told her, that decision didn’t lead to anything good.
At twenty, who listens to their mothers? If her father were alive, everything would have been different. But how dared these scoundrels involve an inexperienced girl in this matter?
Irina only laughed and stroked her growing belly. And her mother shook her head sorrowfully. How could she give up the child when it was her own? She carried him under her heart for nine months.
But Irina just waved it off: «I already think this is not a child, but good money.»
Then came the difficult labor, and Irina couldn’t be saved. They didn’t try too hard. Three days after the baby was born, she died.
The baby girl was immediately handed over to her parents. Of course, Tamara Ivanovna was not paid a penny. They were dealing with her daughter, not her.
Tamara Ivanovna buried her daughter and was left alone. No relatives remained, and it felt like she had fallen into emptiness and didn’t want to come out. It was easier that way.
Now, she was heading to the bread section to buy something. She needed to show that she wasn’t just wandering around. She found some small coins in her pocket and headed for the cashier. Today’s entertainment was enough; she could go home. She had already counted out the necessary amount and handed it to the cashier, hiding the rest in her fist.
Tamara Ivanovna noticed a young beggar on the second day after the supermarket opened, almost a month ago. Back then, she was on her first tour, carefully looking around. What had caught the elderly woman’s attention about the beggar? Perhaps it was her youth, which was striking, or the tragic stillness of her pose. Or maybe how carefully and tightly she held the baby.
«How could anyone sink so low?» the old woman thought, approaching the familiar figure. She dropped her prepared change into a nearby jar and addressed the girl: «Darling, aren’t you ashamed? Your hands and legs are fine, why don’t you work? You’re a young woman, you can still work.»
The old woman grimaced as she saw a few passersby hurry by, not stopping to approach her because the old woman was blocking the way.
«Thank you for the coin, but go your way. I need to collect more, otherwise, it will be trouble,» the beggar said.
The elderly woman shook her head sadly and hurried away, not wanting to be intrusive or preach. She had decided to help and did so skillfully. No one cared about it — neither the police nor the welfare authorities. People were so used to beggars that no one paid attention to them.
All the way home, the old woman couldn’t stop thinking about the beggar with the child. Her gray eyes and young voice seemed strangely familiar, these intonations she had definitely heard somewhere before, but where? Tamara Ivanovna tried to remember, straining her memory.
She closed the entrance door behind her, took off her low warm boots, turned on the light, and went to the kitchen with the bread. Fifteen minutes later, she was drinking hot sweet tea from her favorite cup, nibbling on a slice of Borodinsky bread with a thin slice of sausage.
«How hungry she must be,» the elderly woman thought. «In this cold! What a life!»
She looked out the window, trying to spot the young woman, and froze in fear. Two men of unkempt appearance were roughly pushing the girl into a car.
The elderly woman was in a daze. She rushed to the phone to call the police but stopped, fearing she might make things worse.
She approached the window and saw that the area in front of the store was empty. Deciding to wait until morning, she returned to the room. She wouldn’t have been able to see the car’s number from that distance anyway.
Tamara Ivanovna spent a restless night thinking about the girl and the baby. In the morning, she had a strange dream. She saw her daughter Irina, who was standing by the door of the supermarket with the baby in her arms. The girl was all blue from the cold, and Tamara Ivanovna tightly pressed her to herself, trying to warm her. But Irina didn’t respond.
«I’m not cold, Mom,» she said.
Tamara Ivanovna took the baby from her daughter’s arms and pushed aside the corner of the warm blanket that covered the girl’s face. She saw a large pendant with a bear on it.
«With the familiar pendant around her neck,» the elderly woman repeated.
She gasped and woke up. Her gaze stopped on the wall clock hanging opposite.
«Why did I sleep so long?» she thought.
It was already nine o’clock. She quickly got up and went to the window.
The girl with the baby was still in the same place. Everything was fine to the right of the supermarket door.
«Thank God,» the old woman sighed and crossed herself.
It was New Year’s Eve, and there was a strong frost outside. The girl had been outside for more than an hour, and she could freeze until evening.
Tamara Ivanovna took out the bread, quickly made sandwiches with sausage, poured some sweet tea into a thermos, and went to get dressed.
Seeing the elderly woman hurrying toward her, the girl became nervous and covered the bruise on her temple with a warm scarf.
«Don’t worry, dear,» Tamara Ivanovna said, offering her the food. «I don’t want you to go hungry.»
The girl smiled with just her eyes and took the sandwiches. She sat on a bench nearby and began eating greedily. She shoved the bread into her mouth and swallowed almost without chewing, choking and coughing. She anxiously looked at the baby, who was crying in someone else’s arms, and quickly shoved the last bite into her mouth, washed it down with tea. Then she quickly brushed off the crumbs and hurried over to the elderly woman.
«Thank you, we’ll survive until seven, and then they’ll take us,» she said to the elderly woman.
The rest of the day, Tamara Ivanovna kept checking the thermometer outside the window. The frost was getting stronger.
By five o’clock in the evening, she poured borscht into a jar and went to the supermarket for groceries.
As she passed the young girl, she placed the jar with food next to her and shoved some coins into her pocket. Then she gave her a mysterious wink and hurried into the welcoming warmth of the store.
This time, she wasn’t planning to stay long. She needed to buy sausage and pickles for the traditional New Year’s Olivier. Of course, she couldn’t afford a lavish holiday table, but she wouldn’t go hungry. When Tamara Ivanovna left the store, she didn’t see the beggar in her usual spot. The jar with the borscht was also gone. «Probably eating somewhere,» the elderly woman thought and smiled. She hurried home.
Now, she would slice appetizers, put the carp in the oven, and start setting the table. Maybe one of the elderly neighbors would decide to visit her.
It was almost ten when Tamara Ivanovna looked out the window again. She wanted to make sure that the girl had been taken home to warmth.
She glanced at the cheerful lights shining in front of the shopping center. Under the bright streetlamp, the familiar figure sat on the bench. Judging by her trembling shoulders, the girl was crying bitterly.
Tamara Ivanovna rushed around the house. In two hours, the holiday would begin, but someone was freezing outside her window. She threw a warm scarf over her shoulders and, wearing her house slippers, ran down the stairs. She stopped by the beggar, catching her breath. She tried to calm her pounding heart and plopped down next to the girl.
«I have nowhere else to go,» she said sadly.
Hope in the girl’s eyes caught on the grandmother.
«Please take care of him,» she handed the elderly woman a bundle that she had been holding and slowly trudged toward the highway.
Tamara Ivanovna’s mind was foggy. The young woman’s intention became crystal clear. People don’t leave a happy life like this. She struggled to her feet and, with all her strength, rushed after the departing girl, caught up with her, and turned her toward herself.
«Wow! What are you planning? Come with me!» exclaimed Tamara Ivanovna, pointing to the nearby five-story building, grabbing the girl’s hand, and pulling her along.
In the warm room, Tamara Ivanovna took the baby and laid him down near the heater.
«What’s your name?» she asked but immediately stopped, noticing the pendant with a bear among the clothes.
The girl followed her gaze and said, «Don’t worry, it’s all I have left from my mother.»
The elderly woman looked around at the beggar in fear and sat on the chair. She would never mistake this pendant, she herself had given it to her late Irina. Back then, when Irina turned sixteen, Tamara Ivanovna was short on money, so she took a brooch with a beautiful pendant to the jeweler. He clicked his tongue for a long time, unwilling to melt the antique into scrap, and came up with the idea of making it into a pendant. For the brooch, he gave money, which was used to buy a gold chain, and there was still enough left for a small party for the daughter’s friends at a café.
The girl took off her outerwear and looked questioningly at the elderly woman.
«Can I take a shower?»
After receiving an affirmative answer, she left, and Tamara Ivanovna drank valerian.
«So, this beggar is her granddaughter, but that can’t be,» she thought.
Then she laid the fed baby on the couch and seated her guest at the table.
«Alyna!» she called almost casually.
«How do you know?»
Tamara Ivanovna waved her hand uncertainly.
«I probably heard you eat.»
She felt a cold sweat on her forehead. There was no doubt anymore — she had taken in her own granddaughter. After all, this was the name the clients had chosen for the unborn girl that Irina had carried.
The girl smiled gratefully and looked admiringly at the dishes on the table, then started eating.
Tamara Ivanovna watched her closely, trying to find familiar features.
«Well, tell me, Alyna, what happened to you?» she asked.
The girl, as if waiting for this question, quickly and incoherently began to speak, as though freeing her soul from accumulated pain.
According to her, until she was five, she lived with her parents, and everything was fine, even her own pony. Remembering this, Alyna dreamily closed her eyes.
But then her parents began to argue and soon divorced. The girl stayed with her mother, who, one day, simply took her to an orphanage and wrote a renunciation.
Why did this happen, Alyna didn’t understand. Her beautiful fairy tale was suddenly thrown out like something useless. She spent twelve years in an orphanage, and then they released her into adult life.
Alyna ended up in an apartment that they provided her as an orphan. But she was deceived, placed in a shack that was supposed to be demolished. That’s where she met Vasya, the plumber.
When he found out Alyna was pregnant, he simply disappeared. The shack was evacuated, and they let her stay in the dilapidated housing until she gave birth.
But it turned out that someone had already occupied her new apartment.
The girl didn’t know how to fight for what was hers. And she couldn’t with a child in her arms.
So, she began wandering the train stations, begging at the metro. That’s when Igor Sizy noticed her.
«A beautiful beggar with a baby must bring in a good amount of money,» he thought, and immediately offered housing in exchange for the collected alms.
That’s how she and her son ended up living in the big basement of a high-rise building, where there were many others like her, beggars. There were cripples and sick people. But there were many more theatrical beggars.
Theatrical beggars were those who painted bruises and wounds on themselves, wore fake hunchbacks and pregnant bellies. These excellent actors brought the owner a lot of money, unlike Alyna, who couldn’t beg.
Days turned into days. In the morning, the beggars were driven to their spots. In the evening, their earnings were collected. The conditions were tolerable, but recently, they had started to pressure her. They said she didn’t bring in enough money, and her child kept crying and disturbing the others.
And today, they didn’t come for her, leaving her to her fate. The girl sadly stared at her half-empty plate.
«Thank you, I don’t even know how we would have survived this night.»
She put down the fork and yawned.
«We’ll leave in the morning, don’t worry, I just need to sleep a little.»
Alyna leaned back in her chair and almost instantly fell asleep.
Tamara Ivanovna woke the girl up and led her to the bed, settling the baby next to her in a deep armchair.
The elderly woman sat at the New Year’s table and smiled while listening to the president’s speech. Of course, she wouldn’t let her granddaughter and little boy leave, not tomorrow, not the day after, never. Let them live with her. That would be the right thing to do. At the right time, she would definitely tell them who she really was. She would help the girl get back on her feet and raise her son. But for now, let her calm down and settle into normal conditions. She had suffered enough.
As the chimes of the clock rang, Tamara Ivanovna poured herself a small glass and sipped the sweet tincture.
She walked to the window and looked out at the street, illuminated by the streetlights. Admiring the falling snowflakes, she thought: «Thank you, Lord, for this unexpected happiness. Ah, goodbye, loneliness! I have a family again.»
