As I promised somewhere, this is a story from my life that happened when I was a "consulting watchman" at a stone processing organization. Stone processing refers to the creation of vases, bowls, simple sculptures, fences, tiles and, in addition to all of the above, tombstones. I went to work there shortly before graduation (I'm generally drawn to adventures in my life), because the place is quiet, in the private sector, not far from my house. There are tram tracks nearby, and behind them is a park with a parking lot. I was on duty there from 21:00 to 8:00, every other night. There wasn't much to protect the products—even if you lifted the stove, you couldn't run far with it. Equipment and tools were guarded, and drunks and teenagers were chased away once a year.
This office is called "Stone Flower", and, by the way, it still exists, it is a guardhouse, a doghouse, a trailer where artists work, and a courtyard in which blanks, simpler product samples and ready-made orders are placed, mainly tombstones. During the busiest months, which happened more often in summer than ever before, the courtyard looked like a cemetery: gravestones with and without portraits, vases of black granite and marble were placed in neat rows in front of the guard booth. The window of the gatehouse, illuminated only by a desk lamp and a video surveillance monitor, overlooked this idyll, and I soon got tired of contemplating it all night long. On the advice of my shift supervisor, I began to spend the night in the artists' trailer, where there was a lot of light and there was often someone to talk to.
Almost every night, one of the artists stayed working until morning. The fact is that people, as you know, tend to die without stopping, and our office was located 300 meters from one of the largest city morgues, and our business cards were in the reception desk there, so there was no shortage of work for artists. Sometimes, 3-4 tombstones were knocked out per night. In the evening, the movers will bring a polished slab, unload it, and the girls will work on it all night.
That night, I went on duty as usual. I called my superiors, identified myself, and said that I had accepted a shift. I watched the closed gate in the camera, made my rounds, fiddled with the shepherd Jim, my permanent colleague, and went to the trailer to the artists. It was 22:40 on the clock.
Oksana, a girl about 4 years older than me, was sitting in the trailer. She usually did not stay overnight, as she had a small child at home, whom she raised herself. After questioning her, I found out that my son went to the sea with his grandmother, so Oksana is trying to earn some extra money. We sat and chatted. She captures some kind of granny in granite, checking the photo from time to time, and I look out the window, listening to Jim. Oksana finished some big stage of her grandmother's portrait, and we sat down to drink tea and cookies. We talk about this and that, we tell jokes.
At midnight, as usual, I decided to go around the territory. The fact is that customers still happened before midnight: either crying relatives waited for the autopsy to end but stayed too late, or some guy in an expensive car on the way from work would look in. After midnight, as a rule, only drunks and hooligans from the park wandered in, so we always let Jim loose at that time. It was enough to cool the ardor of all sorts of midnight adventurers.
I lowered Jim down and returned to the trailer. Oksana continued to work on the portrait of her grandmother, and I sat on a chair by the open door of the trailer and began to watch the street, chatting with the artist and listening to the measured tapping of her hammer, sometimes interspersed with the buzzing of a doormat.
At first, Jim caught my attention. The dog just ran in circles around the yard, but I, who did not remember a time when I did not have a dog in my house, knew that healthy, and most importantly, calm dogs do not behave like that. Jim went round and round, and I called him over. The dog came up, ears flattened and tail wagging, and I heard our brave guard dog whining thinly.
I patted Jim, said something soothing to him, took out of my pocket a Duchess lollipop with a soft filling, which he loved very much, unwrapped the wrapper and handed it to him. Jim sniffed the candy, opened his mouth to take it, but suddenly, pricking up his ears, he looked towards the dark bulk of the park across the street. The dog whined even louder, and, flattening his ears again, hid in the booth.
Getting up from my chair and muttering to Oksana something like "I'm on my rounds," I went out into the courtyard, illuminated by a single lantern hanging on the wall of the gatehouse. Movement in the park caught my attention. A well-dressed guy came out of a dark alley, looked left and right, and jogged across the roadway. The young man was heading towards our gate, and I was standing in the middle of the courtyard as if rooted to the spot. It was only when he opened our gate and walked towards me with a friendly smile that I realized that both the baton and the pepper spray had been left in the artists' trailer.
— Hello, — the guy extended his hand to me. "They make stone products here, don't they?"
—With us,— was all I could say. I was taken aback and didn't shake his hand.
—Can I watch it for now?" — the night guest asked, and I noticed in his gaze some kind of subtle "glazing", which I immediately attributed to the alcohol he had drunk or the substances he had consumed.
"Look, please,— I replied. — Just don't touch it with your hands.
The young man raised his hands, palms facing me, in a protective, almost comical gesture. Jim never came out of the booth, and I didn't warn the guy that we had a dog in the yard. He was kind of weird, it seemed to me. And, as they say, "it turned out, it didn't seem."
I carefully walked into the trailer, trying not to lose sight of this guy. He walked between the rows of products, examining the stones, tombstones and vases. Once he even reached out to touch it, but pulled his hand back with a smile, as if he remembered that I had asked him not to touch anything. I took a baton and a pepper spray, hanging them from my belt. He took a heavy, powerful flashlight in his hand, which could both dazzle and "dim" if necessary. Oksana was passionate about her work, and I wanted to warn her to call the police if I didn't come back, but at the last moment I relied on my own strength and went out into the night.
The guy was squatting by two polished slabs of red and black granite. When he heard me, he turned around and, giving me a smile, asked:
— What do you personally think, which monument is better? Black or red?
The question caught me off guard. I didn't expect such a question from a young guy barely older than me.
"I've always liked black,— I finally replied. — And the portrait is more clearly visible on it, and the image will last longer. But black ones are more expensive.
At these words, the guy waved away:
"Oh, come on! I just want the quality. To be remembered. To look like a living face.
— It will be! "He said it wasn't me." It came out somehow unintelligibly.
The guy laughed, got up from his crouch, and, taking a business card and pen out of his breast pocket, asked him to write our phone number on it. I replied that I would bring him our business card now, but the guy, looking at his expensive watch, said that he didn't have much time, so he asked me to dictate. I dictated it, and he wrote it down and put the card back in his pocket. I managed to make out the name printed on the business card.: Paramonov V. V.
The young man said goodbye to me and turned around, taking another look at his watch. Jim barked, so loudly that I turned to his booth and shouted at the dog not to scare the customer. When I turned around again to say goodbye to the overnight guest, he was gone.
I returned to the trailer, boiled a kettle and poured boiling water into a cup, sending three tea bags to the same place.
— Who have you been chatting with for three hours? I already thought you'd left me here completely," Oksana's voice sounded deliberately offended. — The girl is sitting alone in the middle of the night, and there is no one around to talk to.
I once laughed it off, surprised that I had been away for so long. Oksana finished the portrait of granny a long time ago and has already filled in most of the image of some shaven-headed chubby man. So I've been away for a really long time. It was beginning to get light outside…
In the morning, the shift worker and I watched the surveillance camera footage. So I get out of the trailer and give Jim a piece of candy. The dog runs into the booth, and I turn my back to the camera and look towards the gate.
So I point at the products and go to the trailer.… From one in the morning until four in the morning, I walk around the courtyard alone with a lantern in my hand, pausing at two empty slabs of red and black granite. My lips are moving, as if I'm talking to someone, but no one is there.
I returned home in a depressed state and fell asleep. Then I took two days off and spent the whole week walking like a somnambulist. In the end, blaming everything on overwork, he returned to work and took over the shift.
The evening rounds went as usual. Dima, another of our artists, was working in the trailer. I didn't talk to him much, he was introverted, meticulous and uninteresting. All the topics boiled down to how badly he was living in the world. Anyway, I sat in the gatehouse until morning, and at 6:40, as usual, I looked into the trailer where Dimon was sitting and dozing. Having shaken Dmitry awake and exchanged a few words with him, I went out into the courtyard and ran my gaze over the finished slabs and suddenly was stunned: the same guy was looking at me from the tombstone, and under his smiling face an inscription was carved in smooth letters that read: "Paramonov Vyacheslav Viktorovich, / some date, I don't remember already / 1985 — 07/14/2009".
My legs gave out, and I barely made it to the gatehouse, staring blankly at the wall calendar. The night of July 13-14 came just when he came to our yard. I rolled my eyes and poured half a bottle of cold mineral water on my head.…
Later, sometime during the next shift, I found out that Paramonov was either a businessman or a candidate for deputy, and that night he died in a fight in the park across the street. The guy was stabbed in the neck, and before his death he managed to run 40 meters further down the alley. When his wife came to order the monument in tears, she asked our staff which one was better — red or black. Without waiting for an answer, she chose black. Just as he wanted.
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