Carefully, the Gestalt doors are closing
Alla Krasnova

Illustrator Мария Гнедькова

© Alla Krasnova, 2025

© Мария Гнедькова, illustrations, 2025

ISBN 978-5-0067-1377-2

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

Chapter One

A friend told me: “Come here for a week, or you’ll be sitting there like a pet dog.” I wasn’t thrilled that she thought I was a pet bug, but I was. The last five years of my life had been very difficult, and now, at thirty-two, I was on the train to her country house, or rather, her family’s ancestral home, where she lived.

On the phone, she told me that it was a paradise. Sometimes she sent me photos from there, and I saw that there was a vast area almost on the seashore, and there was a forest nearby.

I didn’t really care what kind of house they had, I just wanted to get out of there and not think about anything. I would love to live in a wooden shed, too, if they promised me that they would cut off the dark roads from my forest for this time, where I was lost and lost hope of ever getting out to people.

Avena volunteered to meet me at the train station. She said she was coming to pick me up in her car. This was a good thing, because I had a vague idea how to get to their ancestral nest on my own. In order for me to go to her, I had to say exactly those words that she said: “I’ll come and pick you up at the train station.” So I quickly bought a one-way ticket, but I didn’t buy a return ticket, so that I could have the freedom to choose when to leave there. It may well be that I will be so uncomfortable and decide to leave earlier. Although I was uncomfortable everywhere primarily because I was uncomfortable with myself.

To be honest, the psychological state in which I lived left much to be desired. I was too depressed, and when I was offered to work remotely at work a year ago, I gladly accepted, and for the last few months I didn’t leave the house at all. So now I needed a change of scenery, and I was very happy to accept Avena’s invitation. To change the situation, to leave my seclusion altogether, was a way out for me, even if it was purely geographical. I had planned that a couple of weeks spent elsewhere would also take me away from the much bigger evil of the Internet, the virtual space I was stuck in. “Where are you? I’m online. That is, in nowhere.” I was too tired to be where I had never been, in this “nowhere”, and constantly, that is, online. I thought I’d rather lie on the beach or wander in a real forest. It’s much better to be in the forest than online, because it seems that a little more and you can find a way out, that is, reach out to your old self, who had something more than a nickname and an account.

***

Avena and I used to work together. Everyone was surprised that she came in a premium car and worked on a salary that would not have been enough for her to buy such a car herself in ten years of savings. Our employees called her rich and didn’t like her very much, but I didn’t care. I was too caught up in my career and personal life to gossip or be jealous, I just didn’t have the time. At that time, everything was going very well for me, and I had no doubt that it would continue to be just as wonderful. I always studied well, worked well, met my man, we began to live together, and all this for love. As they say, nothing foreshadowed…

I can’t say that Avena and I were very close friends, I treated her the same way as others. She made me stand out. We enjoyed chatting together during lunch. I never asked her anything personal, which was kind of inappropriate, considering that I was soon going to be the head of our customer relations department and she was going to be my subordinate. She was five years older than me, and our birthdays were almost exactly the same-my fifth of May, her third. We once agreed that we would celebrate them together one day, but it never came to that.

***

I was lucky on the train, I was alone in the compartment, so I could do whatever I wanted. But I didn’t want anything. I just lay on my back and stared at the ceiling, which was milky in color and divided into squares. I counted the squares on the ceiling that made up it. The light in the compartment flickered frequently, and then went out altogether, leaving me alone with my thoughts. They were taking me back to the past again. It was strange to think that only five years ago things were different.

I thought back to that moment when everything went downhill at an incredible speed. I didn’t try to find an excuse for my bad luck, but this fragment of my life was clearly visible in my mind’s eye when I thought about why I was stuck in despair.

That was five years ago. I think it was still March. It’s not snowing yet. I stayed late at work because I was always very efficient and wanted to do more. A workaholic? I don’t think so, I just always did what I liked, and I liked working. I enjoyed my work, and I wanted to enjoy it as much as possible. Other areas of my life were not displaced by work, on the contrary, I received positive emotions from work in order to fill my personal life with them. And my personal life inspired me to work. I kept up with everything and didn’t really think about how I was doing it, because it just happened naturally.

On that fateful evening, I opened the desk drawer that usually held stationery that I hadn’t yet unpacked. By the way, I loved fresh stationery: new stickers, pens, folders for papers and organizers. I have always been careful about their quality, because they, despite their simplicity, greatly increased the efficiency of work. I needed pens to write well, paper folders to be comfortable, stickers to come off well, and everything to look aesthetically pleasing. We had pens, stickers, and folders for papers with the logo and name of our company “Cleo”, and I organized it.

But when I opened my desk drawer, I didn’t see any office supplies. I opened my desk drawer and couldn’t believe my eyes, because there was a doll lying there. And not just a doll, but a voodoo doll riddled with many pins.

I froze, staring at her. I was frozen in space. I thought with horror. The doll was made of cloth. I took my eyes off the doll and looked around – there was no one there.

I thought this doll looked like me. I closed the drawer to consider this moment nonexistent, as if I didn’t want to let him into my world, so that I wouldn’t make any decisions or feel any emotions. I couldn’t accept the fact that someone here thought of me enough to make a voodoo doll in my image. I acted the way people often act in a state of shock: they reject what happened. But then it was easier for me to write everything off as a trick of my eyes than to take it as a fait accompli of my biography.

Closing my desk drawer, I went home, and all weekend this doll was in my mind’s eye. I couldn’t talk to anyone about it, because Jan, who I was living with, didn’t ask me anything about my condition, and I couldn’t say anything myself.

After the weekend, I didn’t dare open this drawer for a long time, and when I opened it, the doll was gone. Then I tried to forget about it and almost forgot, but there was a fear, as if something would happen. My uneasy premonition did not deceive me. I felt as if I had been climbing up a sheer cliff all the time, not afraid of heights, and then suddenly I looked down – and everything collapsed.

Perhaps I should have discussed it with my colleagues, but I couldn’t get a word out, because one of them was a traitor… And then, about three months later, everything went downhill, our construction company went bust, and my man left… He just left to “think”, and six months later he married someone else. I was told that this happens, and that I should not look for reasons in myself. However, I didn’t look for them, I kept seeing this voodoo doll, and I thought that I was jinxed.

Unnoticed, five years passed, which resembled a fall. “How far is it to the bottom? I kept asking myself, sinking lower and lower. “I think I’m far away,” I said to myself as I continued to fall lower and lower.

***

On the train, my unhappy thoughts kept me awake, and I haven’t had much sleep in recent years. I could hardly fall asleep, and I could hardly wake up. I also tried every day to start a new life, but again I realized that I was slipping down, despite my efforts. And here, at night on the train, I couldn’t sleep, so I went to the vestibule.

The vestibule was quiet. It was a wonderful night, full of stars, and on such a night you especially feel lonely, because everything encourages romance. I was just going to stand there and watch the scenery change through the transparent windows of the doors, but suddenly I looked at the door, and there was this damn doll imprinted, as if it had bumped into the glass on the back side. It was only for a moment. What was inside me suddenly flew to me from the outside, imprinted on the transparent glass. I ran away, hearing my heart pounding clearly. Indignation, anger, and resentment rose up inside.

I didn’t sleep, I just lay there and got up only from the insistent knock on the door of the guide, whose name was Galya. I saw her several times when she brought me bed linen and tea. She was a very sociable woman with heavily varnished and lifelessly dry dark hair. She looked to be in her mid-fifties.

“The train arrives at M-station in fifteen minutes,” said her husky, still half-awake voice. While I was driving at night, I heard her voice more than once, she talked to her colleague about the incident with bed linen and described in colors how one passenger took it out in a suitcase, that is, stole it.

Another guide was indignant in a loud voice, saying, why this woman, who looked very decent, their bespontovoe bed linen. “She’s not normal,” Galya told her. I actively listened to them. Their conversation distracted me from my thoughts and made me feel better. I imagined this woman who stole the bedclothes, then looked at her white bedclothes and wondered why she would need them. I noticed how quickly and with my head I go into other people’s realities, so as not to think about my own. Other people’s problems didn’t seem so hard to me. I would even have liked to join in the conversation of these lovely ladies and talk to a careless passenger to distract myself from my voodoo doll, which, as it turned out, I carried everywhere with me, it did not live on bird rights in my world.

“Yes, yes, I’m awake, I’m getting up,” I said. – I’ll check out the bed linen, “I said, and felt a wary pause outside the door. Probably, Galya did not understand that someone could hear their conversation and catch the intonation of their lively conversation, so that later she could insert her own word.

Getting off the train was exciting, because I had to get off in a different mood. As my mother used to tell me, “Now leave the room and come in in a different mood.” Despite the fact that this phrase annoyed me, I knew that now I needed to do just that.

The train stopped, my hand gripping the handle of a suitcase that was bright red in color. I once bought it for traveling with my lover. I wanted to go on a honeymoon trip with this suitcase, but ironically, this is the first time I went with this suitcase alone. It was of good quality and very different from the suitcases I’d seen. Design work, author’s work. I hoped that he would give me strength and my life would also be author’s, where the author is me, and not a voodoo doll.

***

– hello! I waved happily as I got off the train and saw Avena.

She had shoulder-length glossy blond hair. They also say about such hair: “dazzling blonde”. I’ve rarely seen someone with such a well-groomed blonde.

I stared at her, a blonde in an aquamarine dress that looked really good on her, but I wondered what I looked like in her eyes. I thought I didn’t look bad, the years of my painful existence didn’t have a significant impact on my figure and appearance, I was still slim, and, as it seemed to me, I hadn’t changed much.

Before the trip, I put myself in order, dyed my hair in the salon. The master who painted my hair a dark brown color said that I had gray hair. And this is despite the fact that my face remained almost the same as five years ago, there were no new wrinkles. Someone goes to the cosmetologist and fills the face with botox to hide the traces of facial life on it. I didn’t have to do that, I didn’t have life on my face. It wasn’t there at all, either inside or out. I guess it was my instinct for self-preservation that prompted me to look for this life in others, so I decided to go on this little journey.

Avena came to me with quick steps and hugged me, and I smiled again, feeling my right hand tighten on the handle of the suitcase, and my other hand hugged my friend back.

“I’m so glad to see you. She said, and I saw her amused narrowed eyes.

“Me too!” I replied, imitating her life-affirming intonation.

Chapter Two

We got into Avena’s Jeep, which was dark blue in color. I noticed that Avena used to have a different car, just as expensive. If there was anyone to be jealous of and put a voodoo doll on, it was definitely not me, because I didn’t have such a car. Avena’s parents had a family business-a chain of stores Solomina&Solomin, which sold inexpensive but high-quality furniture. It was their brand.

– Well, let’s go?! she said cheerfully to me. – It won’t take long to get here, you’ll see how great it is here!”

“I don’t doubt it,” I said quickly.

When I looked at myself in the front-view mirror and saw how pale my skin looked in daylight, I was a little upset. In a room or other enclosed space, I looked better, but now the rays of the sun seemed to deliberately highlight my shortcomings.

“The house is almost empty,” Avena said as the car pulled away. – My mother will be back soon, she is in Moscow on business, developing our family business. And my father is on vacation with friends. Savannah and I are alone.

“Savannah?” I asked.

“This is my sister. Didn’t I tell you about her?

“Oh, yes – “I said.

I really forgot that Avena told me about her sister who was born with a genetic syndrome. Back then, I was too wrapped up in my own business and career to listen to other people and remember the information. I didn’t want to delve into other people’s problems, feelings and emotions, because they took away my strength.

– How’s she doing?” I asked out of politeness.

– Great, close to the sea. She likes water, she likes everything, “Avena smiled. – And I’m getting married, “she added, and her smile deepened.

I was taken aback when she said she was getting married. It stung me, as if my story was repeating itself, but not with me.

– Yes? I said quickly, trying to hide my confusion.

For a moment, I thought I saw a voodoo doll glimpse somewhere between the trees we were driving past. I held my breath.

“Great, congratulations,” I added, keeping my voice calm as best I could.

– He’ll be here soon, and you’ll meet him!” Avena said. “His name is Sean. I told him on the phone today that we would have guests, “she smiled enigmatically, and a thought crept up on me: “What if she was the one who planted the voodoo doll on me, effectively taking my fate away from me and appropriating it for herself?”

But then I tried to brush the thought off like it was an annoying fly, since it was completely illogical. Avena couldn’t be jealous of me, because she had everything… Or could she? She didn’t have a man then, and now she has one, and I don’t… I didn’t know what to say next, so I veiled my confusion with a compliment to change the subject.

“You haven’t changed at all,” was all I could say at that moment.

“You too,” she nodded happily at me.

– How’s Ian doing?’ You haven’t been in touch anymore? – What is it? ‘she asked me, as if she were asking me something ordinary.

My heart gave out with resentment and pain, as if an old wound had been opened with a stick.

– no. I haven’t even thought about him in all that time, “I said defiantly.

“Out of sight – out of mind,” she said, taking it all at face value.

Soon we stopped at a huge white house with a marble staircase leading up to it.

“Is this a sanatorium?” I said with a grin. – Do you really live here?”

“Yes,” she smiled. – But this is all due to my father and mother, they worked hard. And my sister and I just happened to be in trouble, “she giggled.

“Cool,” I said, and my foot protruded out of the car, framed by a flowery, pointy-toed spring shoe.

I reminded myself of the girl in the ad who often played on my smartphone. First, her leg gets out of the expensive car, and then the rest of her body shows up. It was funny. I smiled, and Avena noticed my smile and gave me a cheery wink.

We headed for the house.

In addition to her Jeep, there were two other cars parked outside the house – a gray one and a red one.

“Almost there,” I said ironically.

The house was huge, white color dominated, combined with brick, and went to pink. The benches, gazebos, and fences were pink. There were many swings around the house. If the house wasn’t so huge, I’d say it was Barbie’s house, although its solidity and solidity suggested fountains and antique statues. However, they were, only of a modern type.

As we were walking into the house, I stopped at a statue that was made in the firm of a female outline, the inside of which was empty.

– This is the work of Francois Duanne, a famous sculptor, a good friend of my father. We’ve got a lot of his statues here, “she commented casually. Avena contemporary art. – Let’s go quickly, I’ll show you more! she tugged at my arm.

I followed her. She took me around the back of the house to show me the pond where the swans swam.

“Look – » she said, pointing to the pond, which was surrounded by a small white fence.

“Yeah, they’re cool,” I said softly, eyeing the two swans that swam there.

“They’re not real!” Avena said with a grin. “It’s my mother’s thing. She likes this kind of thing. Well, that’s when you look and you think they’re real, but on closer inspection they’re not,“she smiled. – They still have a remote control, it’s in the tree closest to the pond.

“Is the tree real?” I asked in surprise.

Avena laughed. Her light laugh fascinated me. Avena was genuinely surprised by my naivete.

“And the trees are real,” she said, smiling. “There’s a lot of real stuff here, and I’m still surprised,” she said ironically. “By the way, I’ll introduce you to my sister,” Avena said, looking at the watch she was wearing, a small, shiny watch that looked more like a bracelet. “No, Savannah’s having a nap right now. Avena waved her hand, and her watch bounced on her slender wrist.

I was always surprised that Avena wore a watch, because no one else at work wore one. Everyone was watching the time on their phone or other gadgets. But Avena always came with a watch on her arm. I understood that this habit of wearing watches had been with her since childhood, as if it had grown together with them, and I could no longer imagine her without a watch on her hand. But her watch made me uneasy, and I began to think about time, and I realized that the last five years of my life had gone down the drain as if they hadn’t happened.

***

Inside, the house was quiet, deserted, and echoing. It seemed that if I said a word, there would be an echo. The house is like a dream in which you wander, wander and nothing happens. But it was cool inside, I liked it, it was refreshing.

Avena showed me my room, which I immediately liked because there was nothing superfluous in it, and fortunately it was small, with cream tulle that shivered in the slightest breeze, because the windows were open. I was glad that the room was small, otherwise I would have had to put up a tent and live in it, so as not to lose the boundaries of the body. Then Avena gave me a surprise.

“Make yourself comfortable,” Avena said. The best rest after the train is to see the sea. Or you can go swimming. Do you want to go swimming?

I was a little confused. After my lull in life, when nothing happened at all, it was out of the blue. I hadn’t even gotten away from the train ride where I’d seen a voodoo doll in the window, then Avena had surprised me by telling me that she was getting married soon, and now we were going to the beach.

“I hope you brought your bathing suit with you.” she said cheerfully to me.

In fact, I took a hundred-year-old bathing suit with me at lunchtime. But there was too much going on in one day for me, so I decided to lie.

“No, – I said with a sly smile, just in case she divulged me.

But then she said:

– great! I have so many new swimsuits, some from the latest collections. I can’t bear it. You can choose any of them. Or do you want me to pick one for you?”

Apparently, she didn’t want to accept the rejection, and it was easier for me to accept.

I decided not to make up any more excuses, after all, being at one with the nature of the seashore could calm me down more than the tulle fluttering in the wind in this room. Besides, Avena said that there are few people on the beach right now and we will be almost alone. I didn’t want to choose a swimsuit myself, so I entrusted the choice to her.

Avena and I were about the same size, but she was slightly plumper at the hips, and the difference wasn’t significant.

Soon, she brought me a silver-and-white bathing suit with small white beads on top.

“These are pearls, they’re real,” she said with a smile, handing it to me.

– What if they go under?” I asked warily.

“So that’s where they belong, meeting their ancestors, going back to their roots,” she laughed, punctuating her joke with a silvery laugh that matched my bathing suit.

“Okay, I’ll put it on,” I said reluctantly – " but I’ll just sort things out a little first.”

“Come on,” she said, waving her hand. “So you’ll be buried in your rags for half a day.” I need to live now – " she said, as if by accident, but it stung me painfully, because it was targeted.

“I’m going to change,” I said stiffly.

Avena went out. I decided to change my clothes. I opened my dresser drawer to throw my trinkets in, and again I thought of that damn doll that was in my desk drawer. I slammed the drawer shut angrily, just as Avena came in again.

– By the way, I forgot to tell you, there’s a small cafe on the beach where you can enjoy seafood and drink refreshing cocktails. She glared at me as I hovered over the dresser.

“Yes, yes, I’ll be out soon,” I said with excitement in my voice.

Sometimes I didn’t think Avena had anyone to talk to, so she chose me as her friend. But now I was happy about it.

***

The waves were beautiful, the water lilac-frothy. The beach was almost deserted. I looked out into the distance and saw the sea merge with the sky, and the view mesmerized me, leaving all the problems behind somewhere. We had big straw hats, sunglasses, and a tent to hide from the sun. I thought we could make a movie here. I decided that I would take this landscape with me, with these soft cries of gulls, the rustle of waves. But before I could think about it, Avena sat down next to me.

– And now for a keepsake selfie, “she said, and took a picture of us on her phone, first pulling out her lips like a duck.

In principle, I didn’t mind. I was wearing a smoky pareo, the swimsuit fit me perfectly, showing off my figure favorably. Now I could take the sea with me not only in my memory, but also in the form of photos, it was even more pleasant.

Next to us, about a hundred meters away, there was a small wooden cafe with the romantic name “Dal”, similar to an open house where drinks and sea snacks were sold. There was a food delivery van parked next to the cafe. Avena was very happy when she saw her friend there. She waved at her and flew over to her.

Я слышала, как по пути она воскликнула: “Ольга, моя дорогая!” From a distance I could see them talking animatedly, but I was even glad that Avena had left, because I wanted to enjoy the view of the sea.

She returned about fifteen minutes later with two cocktails in her hands.

“I remember you like mojitos,” she said. Let’s remember the good old days – " she said, handing me one of the glasses.

“Great,” I said, taking the glass and straw from her hand.

“There’s still plenty of drinks and snacks,” she said, gesturing toward the cafe. “Will you go?” Avena suggested.

– I’m not hungry, “I said.

Avena lay down with me on the light beige bedspread to watch the sea. She took a sip from her glass and then talked about Sean, saying she missed him so much. Her voice mingled with the sound of the sea and dissolved into it, it enveloped and calmed me, as if rocking me in a sea cradle, but suddenly she said:

“Do you want me to show you a picture of him?”

I shivered, immediately moving from the sea dope to reality.

“No, – I said sharply, squeezing the handful of warm sand in my hand for some reason. “Let’s do it later,” I said, and quickly changed the subject.

I said I’d rubbed my toes with my tight shoes. It’s a good thing it was, but I only noticed it now, when I saw the redness on the little finger of my left foot. Avena said she had a Band-Aid for her. I was glad she’d taken the bait, because a Band-Aid can heal a finger, and a soul that has a wound can’t be covered with a Band-Aid. I didn’t want her to show me Sean’s pictures, because I didn’t have anyone to show her.

Chapter Three

I hoped that I would get a light tan, because I didn’t want to stand out too much from her tanned friends and feel like a black sheep in the truest sense of the word. Plus, my dark hair color only served to accentuate the pallor of my skin, which hadn’t seen the sun in so many years.

I didn’t say anything on the way home. Thankfully, Avena didn’t say anything either, having talked too much on the beach. She drove the car and smiled to herself. I didn’t touch her in that dreamy state, especially since I knew she was thinking about Sean. I was also thinking about my life, but not about Sean, and I was trying to watch my expression so that the corners of my mouth wouldn’t turn down and my face wouldn’t curl up in a sarcastic grin.

It was strange that every little thing I saw here brought my past back to me again. There seemed to be no getting away from him. It was here, everywhere, beside me, traveling with me. This is the sea… Jan and I haven’t been to the sea, but we wanted to go. I remembered what he’d said, how we’d lay together under the covers and dreamed of swimming together. I would pretend that I wasn’t very good at swimming, so that he would keep me afloat. At the thought of it, I finally gave up and sighed heavily.

“Why are you sighing, my friend?” Then I heard Avena’s voice.

“It’s hot,” I said, the first thing that came to mind. “But never mind, the house will cool me down now.

“Oh, did you notice that it’s chilly out there, too?” – What is it? “she asked with a smile. – And it’s not air-conditioned, it’s designed to be cool even on the hottest day.

“Cool,” I told Avena, looking out the windshield at the road that led us down the winding lane. – I’ll get some sleep when we get back, I’m too sleepy, “I said, just so that no one would touch me when we got there. I wanted to be alone with my thoughts so I could think about what to do next.

It was strange, but when I came here, I thought that I would finally find company and forget myself for a short time, and now I chose to be alone with myself and with my thoughts. Because I brought my “swamp” with me.

Soon we arrived at the house. By this time, Savannah was awake. When I got out of the car, I saw a girl in a white lace dress standing in the sunlit doorway, it was Savannah. I waved at her. It was obvious how happy she was to have a new person, because she didn’t have enough communication.

Savannah had a genetic condition that left its mark on the structure of her face. Avena and I didn’t talk much about it, I didn’t feel comfortable asking questions, and I didn’t want to find out anything.

“Hi, I’m Donna,” I said very politely as I approached her.

“And this is Savannah,” Avena said for her, coming up with me.

Savannah nodded and smiled. I didn’t know why Avena answered for her, but it was clear that she loved her sister very much. Savannah was still very young, about twenty or twenty-five years old, and she looked like her older sister.

Savannah’s hair was blond, slightly longer than Avena’s.

Savannah giggled merrily as we entered the house. It was obvious that she grew up in love and acceptance, so the syndrome that left its mark on her appearance did not affect the feeling of inner freedom.

In fact, I was afraid to see her face, but not because of her genetic disorder, but because I basically became afraid of new people, they reminded me of the “old” ones, the ones from my old life, the life that ended five years ago, but did not let go until now. Sometimes it seemed to me that reality was playing a cruel trick on me, because the new people were similar in appearance or in their habits, manner of communication to those who were with me then, it was as if I was being sucked back into the swamp of the past. Any resemblance of this world to the one I’d left behind made me shiver. I was glad that Savannah wasn’t like any of them. But I was glad early, because Avena suddenly exclaimed:

“Do you want to see what kind of dolls Savannah makes?”

– what? I flinched at the unexpected suggestion.

“Let’s go, let’s go!” Savannah said happily in a deep voice as she took my hand and pulled me along. That’s how I first heard her voice.

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