Andrey

I Alice The image depicts an anime character with a gentle, friendly appearance. Here are the main details of his appearance:

Hair: Medium-length, slightly tousled, with a smooth transition of shades—dark brown roots and light blond ends. The strands softly frame the face, with a few curls falling across the forehead. Face: Oval, with soft features. Fair skin, with a slight blush on the cheeks, which gives the image a lively and tender look. Eyes: Large, expressive, with a warm brown tint. The gaze is slightly narrowed, friendly and relaxed. Smile: light, barely noticeable, creates a feeling of sincerity and calm. Pose: The character rests his cheek on his hand, which adds a relaxed and cozy feel to the image. Clothing: He's wearing a warm beige sweater over a light blue collared shirt. The color combination looks harmonious and cozy. Additional details: small decorative elements are drawn around the character—golden stars and a cute drawing of an animal's face (resembling a teddy bear), which emphasizes the light, playful atmosphere of the image. Overall, the image gives the impression of being friendly,

and he'll be able to get out. Andrey, without any interest, agreed that this was reasonable. As I left, he didn't make a sound, just lay there and stared straight into my eyes. I crawled back by touch, holding the flashlight, and kept watching his retreating face until it disappeared around the bend in the tunnel.

consciousness.

Opening my eyes, I saw the sky darkening above me. We'd missed dinner. My whole body ached. And then I realized I simply couldn't. There was no way I could tell Grandmother (I must have imagined I saw her up there, of course) what we'd done and what had happened. Yes, I was a coward, a terrible coward. But the mere thought of confessing made me sick. I already said I was terrified of her. Now you understand how much. Good God, I was just a scared child!

Although, of course, these are all just cheap excuses. Washing myself alone under the pump, I swore to myself that tomorrow I would save my brother myself. Choice.

I dug the earth this way and that, ran for a long hoe, and dragged him by the legs, accompanied by terrible cries of pain. I crawled through the other side, through the opening by the stream, and when we were face to face, he spat at me. I dug under his chest, told him to exhale, and pulled. I brought him candles and matches so that there would be light in his cave (yes, I already thought of this place as "his cave")—after all, I was carrying a flashlight with me. I brought my brother water and a couple of apples, then stole food from Grandma's kitchen. But I still couldn't get him out. Not that day, nor the following ones.

It was much more difficult. The passage was no wider than a child's shoulders, and in this dark, claustrophobic space, it was extremely difficult to even breathe deeply, much less use a shovel. Several times, one of us got stuck in this hole, and it filled us with fear. But each time, fidgeting and pushing with outstretched arms (lowering our arms along our sides was impossible, and there was nothing to grab onto), we managed to back up, after which the excavation and widening of the tunnel continued. Difficulties did not deter us. We carefully mapped the path we had taken on a double-page notebook, and at night, whispered about plans for the next day. Overall, the cave curved to the right, as if trying to return to the ravine and then downward. We encountered one branch, but it ended in a dead end (a cave-in) just a couple of meters from the main shaft.

The caving explorations continued until one day, my brother, snoring louder than usual behind me, said in a muffled voice, "Wait... I'm stuck." Perhaps it was my fault. I was leading the way that day, and we were about eighteen meters from the cave entrance. I was so eager to move past a difficult section with protruding rocks that I didn't take the time to widen the tunnel properly and instead pushed ahead. My brother... he was bigger than me. He was stuck in a tight spot and couldn't do anything, anything at all. We didn't start to panic right away. But when, an hour later, Andrey couldn't move a centimeter forward or back, despite trying everything we'd tried, a hysterical note crept into his voice, and I tried to sniffle more quietly. Three hours later (it was well past midday at the top), we were both desperate, sobbing uncontrollably and screaming for help at the top of our lungs – completely pointless at such depth. I begged Andrey to try grabbing my leg again so I could pull him forward, but he screamed that it hurt, that he was suffocating. He wanted me to help him. I tried to shine the light on him, but I couldn't even

Grandma categorically forbade us from making a swing by throwing a rope over a ceiling beam. Being in the same house with her was almost physically difficult. So, as soon as the clouds parted, we broke free, screaming. We were scolded for our screaming and sent "to hell," since the wet garden didn't need watering. Taking a circuitous route, constantly wary of being followed, we reached a wide ravine overgrown with stinging nettles, over which a tree had fallen long ago. The tree itself, and the danger of being "speared" by falling from it, provided an understandable reason for amusement. The entire village stood on a high (really very high) hill, dropping steeply to the river. The ravine sloped gently in the same direction, and in some places was at least ten meters deep. At the bottom, coolness, shade, a babbling brook, and the inevitable scratches and nettle stings awaited you, not to mention swarms of mosquitoes. One side of the ravine was notable for its swallow nests—that's where we headed, first along a tree trunk slippery after the rain, and then, with no less risk of breaking our necks, under the sandy edge of the cliff, dotted with nest-like burrows. For a while, we tried to make out something in the nests (we found the skeleton of a chick), and then the squawking swallows suddenly attacked us, swooping down in a flock, their wings brushing against our hair and faces. Not expecting such agility from the stupid birds, I made a false move and tumbled down with a scream. When Andrey carefully descended toward me, clinging to the bushes and grass, I was already examining my discovery, oblivious to a dozen fresh scratches and a torn T-shirt. Part of the clay slope (I'd rolled roughly halfway down) seemed to have slid down under its own weight, revealing a narrow horizontal crevice just half a meter wide. The crevice was dark and drafty. Perhaps the crevice had been there before, but more likely, the two-day downpour had triggered the landslide. A stroke of luck for young explorers. We dug in the earth until dinner and widened the crevice enough for me to crawl through.

There are no normal people who, as they navigate life's path, don't drag along a pile of bitter regrets about what they've done (or not done). This is considered normal, and I'm not going to argue. If you meet someone who doesn't regret a single thing they've done, my advice to you is to run away from them as fast as you can.

My burden of regret, as you will soon discover, is extremely heavy. I will tell you about something I did as a child. It still weighs heavily on me. I will probably achieve nothing by presenting it to you for judgment. But I hope it will make someone feel a little better when they understand how much more terrible mistakes others are capable of. You see, I don't have a brother. However, in August 1991, I still had a brother.

Every summer, our parents would send us kids off to the remote village to live with our maternal grandmother for at least a month. They justified this by citing the need for us to enjoy the gifts of nature and fresh air. In reality, of course, it was more prosaic: our parents wanted to get away from us and relax themselves.

These trips left a mixed impression on me. Of course, there were many good and interesting things. Children have plenty to do in the countryside, as you know very well. However, our peaceful summer was greatly spoiled by Grandma. I capitalize this word for a reason. Our Grandma was the furthest thing from the image of a kind, fairytale grandmother who would bake donuts and tell you a bedtime story. Frankly speaking—and years later I understand this even more clearly—Grandma was a disgusting, half-crazy, evil shrew who drove her quiet and docile husband to his grave. I barely remember our grandfather. My brother was three years older than me and remembered him much better, always speaking of him with warmth. Perhaps this was the reason why, while Grandma was relatively tolerant of me, she openly hated my brother. It is even more difficult for me to understand the selfish position of our parents, who year after year entrust us to the care of this old and sick woman.