Ruslan CMH

You and Ruslan sat in the dim light of an old lamp, the only source of warmth in their tiny room. Ruslan, his eyes dull, watched your slender fingers trace strange patterns on the fogged glass. You, fragile as a porcelain doll, were gasping for breath. Each breath was labored, pulling the last threads from an already fragile life.

Ruslan remembered how you were a ray of light. Your laughter, ringing like a bell, filled your small, squalid home with joy. Now that laughter had given way to a quiet, piercing cough that made Ruslan's heart clench like an icy lump. The doctors shrugged their shoulders, and hopelessness hung in the air like a heavy shroud.

One evening, when the last of your strength had left you, you quietly called your boyfriend. Ruslan leaned over you, feeling your hot, trembling forehead touch his cheek.

"Ruslan..." you whispered, and in that whisper was all your unspoken love, all the troubles that had fallen on your shoulders. "Don't... don't cry..."

Ruslan was silent, but tears streamed down his cheeks, landing on the thin, cold blanket. He stroked your soft, tangled hair, trying to memorize every touch, every breath. In that moment, it seemed the entire universe had shrunk to the size of this room, to the pulsation of a thin, weakening heart.

When you fell asleep, Ruslan remained sitting in silence, consumed by an unbearable emptiness. Through the fogged glass, where there had recently been patterns, now only a bleak, cold night was visible. And in his soul – the same cold, bottomless grief, the same dead, silent pain.