Confession of the kept woman

Translated from Russian by Alexandr Gibayev

© Ihar Navitski, 2020

ISBN 978-5-4498-4100-1

Created with Ridero smart publishing system

«My name is Svetlana. I am a kept woman. For someone this word will cause disgust, someone will be interested, and for someone it won’t matter. My confession is not about moral principles. Every human chooses his own path in life. While standing at the end of the line, he will answer to the Savior himself. It’s also happened to me: I am at the last line. No, I do not regret the life lived. It is not possible to fix anything… If I had the opportunity to go back, I would rewrite some moments, but life is not a manuscript, you can’t redo it. Why had I decided to take this step – to create my diaries? Probably, every person, when his days are close to end, wants to leave something behind to be remembered. I lived an exuberant life, but, frankly, empty. Maybe my confession will serve as a good lesson for those people who also burn their life.

My story began simply. I was born in one of the republics of the former USSR. The younger generation, oh how strange it already sounds for me, although I’m still 37 years old, does not know those times when it was necessary to stand behind a sausage in a long line, and in order to buy foreign-made boots, take turn in the evening and stand whole day. And these boots were the pinnacle of happiness for a young girl. And nearby was totally different life. People in expensive at that time cars drove around the city, throwing a look at the long «sausage» queue. Their companions, dressed in expensive mink coats, which we, ordinary girls, had only to dream of, with arrogance, left these expensive cars to buy the next expensive jewelry. And somewhere, just a hundred meters away, there were people who were no different from these, in expensive cars. Maybe only because they are just people who also want not to stand in line for their boots, not to spend time behind the shops, thinking about how and what to feed their families. They just wanted to live. It was a time when the old was dying, and the new was still unable to grow. Then one household motto was popular: «Be like everyone.» Beautiful motto, by the way, and very convenient for the elite in expensive cars. All in those days were cut with the same comb. The same clothes (simple things that created the grayness of the human mass), the same type of food… Even then, as a teenager, an internal rebellion against this way of life was arising in me. I could not understand why my mother, who gave so many years of her life to the factory, cannot afford to buy a more expensive and elegant dress? Why is the father, the foremost worker who «lives» at the factory, constantly repairing our old car to take us to the country during the weekend, where we have to work hard and long while growing vegetables – the only salvation, according to mom, in a hungry winter? I had many unanswered questions in those years.

My youth coincided with the times when a certain part of people tried to get out of the gray mainstream human mass. They were few. They were called co-operators. They worked differently, but most importantly, they thought differently. Most people did not accept them as a useful unit of society. And the reason for this was simple human envy. They had more expensive cars. Their wives did not stand in line at regular stores and did not think about how to feed the family. They had money, and therefore the problems of ordinary people were unknown to them.

Only after I learned that life from co-operators was not sweet. Behind the external well-being was a tense and dangerous life. But me, as a teenage girl, of course, did not know all this. I was internally drawn to some kind of life unknown to me. I did not want to be like everyone else. Like everyone, finish school, preferably with a medal. Like everyone else, go to college. Like everyone else, find a husband and wait for him from work, preparing him delicious borscht. For me, the phrase «like everyone else» was akin to red sheet for a bull. From an early age I made my choice: I will not be like everyone else!

My favorite season was summer. I could not think about the lessons all day long. I must say that I didn’t love studying, although I always had good grades and my parents were proud of me. The school helped me. It helped in developing in steadfastness and perseverance. And immunity. Immunity to everything that was imposed on us by the school of that time. No, I did not rebel in class and did not shout out slogans. I just lived the lives of millions of boys and girls of that time: I tried not to upset my parents, I studied and studied again. Outwardly, everything was as befits a Soviet student.

Internally, I already had a different life. My friends and I tried to make the dresses shorter. We started to like the guys from high school. The first time I painted my lips secretly from my mother… Oh, how was I punished then! Mother kept lipstick for special occasions, and I turned these occasions into everyday ones. I wanted to look beautiful in front of that older guy. I specifically lingered after class, just to see him. He passed by and sometimes glanced in my direction. I was in seventh heaven. But it was only the looks. Only later, when I became a little older, I realized that I was not interested in him.

Who was I? Little girl, instead of a breast I had two small peas. In those years, I already attracted the views of the male sex, but I was still an unformed ugly duckling. Of course, later I turned into a beautiful swan, and the men could give a lot for my opinion in their direction, but then it was still so far for me. In general, as is often the case with young teenage girls, my first love ended without starting. No, there were no tears in the pillow, no emotional conversations with my girlfriends about this. I just experienced this moment of my life, and that’s it.

Let’s return to summer, more precisely to one of the moments of one summer. At that time I already considered myself an adult. The following year I graduated from school. My parents had already made plans, how would I go to the local institute, how would I finish it, well, and so on, in short, they had already painted my life to me. I did not want to upset them.

I really matured. Instead of two peas, my body was decorated with elastic breasts. The legs were flat and looked very appetizing on high heels. I became a girl. Almost everything suited me in my appearance. But hair… I was a brunette. From the pages of fashion magazines, blond beauties looked at me, and I really wanted white hair color. Later, having repainted in a blonde, I began to look more spectacular, but in those years for me it was the ultimate dream. In the country, I rested and indulged in dreams of a future life. I reviewed magazines many times. I liked everything about glossy women. I didn’t understand why my mother looked at one magazine so sadly once. The answer came to me later. All this glossy world was very far and incomprehensible for her.

In the summer, my friends gathered at the cottage. We shared news and fresh girlish stories. Girls have already awakened in us, and we behaved differently than before. Now we began to pay attention to our yesterday friends from a different perspective. Yes, and our yesterday friends began to look at us differently. Very often we noticed that their views glide over our figures and, as it were, undress. But these were just looks. Touching the hand caused such a thrill that it was impossible to be next to the guy, so the girls were thrilled with excitement.

It was a time when something new and unknown came to me. I already wanted more than sighs and hand touches. Intimate topics were not discussed in an ordinary family. Many of the teenagers drew information on forbidden topics from conversations with more experienced peers or from other sources. Parents were embarrassed to talk with us on such topics. No, my mother told me about the rules of hygiene and how a girl should behave, but for some reason it seems to me that mother herself would gladly close her eyes to these principles of behavior. It seemed to me at that time.

That summer, a new military family appeared in our village. The head of the family repaid his homeland in one of the fraternal countries and went into reserve. The family had two sons. One is my age, the other is older. The family is sociable. The guys were smart, I especially liked the older one. His name was Vadim. I do not want to say that he was handsome, as in the pictures of fashion magazines, but he had the pageantry of that time. Firstly, his clothes. He didn’t dress as stereotyped as our guys. Everything was selected with taste. His demeanor sharply put him on a higher level among our local guys, for which they did not like him.

Several of my friends immediately began to run after Vadim. He chose me. Of course, these friends immediately ceased to be friends. I was worried about this for a long time and only then I realized that there were no friendship in love. I have been guided by this principle all my life. Happiness loves silence. If possible, do not boast much of happiness.

Vadim noticed my attitude towards him immediately. He was already an adult, as it seemed to me then, a guy, he was 23 years old. He was not embarrassed by my age. At first I doubted, because for me it was the first time to have a serious, as I thought, relationship at that time. But feelings prevailed, and I decided to get to know the guy better.

I did not even think about sex then. I knew about it, like most of my girlfriends, only from stories. I was a girl. For me, sex in those years was still so far away. It may sound strange somehow, but Vadim made sex close. I kept wondering how «this» would be for the first time? Represented various romantic paintings. But «it» was simple. Just on the grass. No, I did not regret it, everything was great. It was immediately felt that I was not Vadim’s first. But at that moment I really wanted to be the last. I snuggled up to him and silently enjoyed the night sky. Vadim was nice and patient. I remembered my first time for the rest of my life. Later, I very often recalled Vadim and the night sky in my memory. I did not have the best memories associated with our female things.

Probably every girl who became a woman has certain moments that will remain in her memory forever. I have this night sky and stars. I wanted to continue meetings with Vadim. They were, frankly, more and more uninteresting to me. Then I could not understand why. So I became an «adult.» With Vadim we did not maintain further relations. It was an initiative on my part. And frankly, I still don’t know what happened. Something pushed me inside him, and the spark died out. I continued to live as an exemplary and obedient girl… Sorry, already a woman.

So a few years passed. I graduated from school well, without a medal though, but they handed me the diploma. At a school evening, many of my peers, feeling like adults, took a certain dose of alcohol drinks. I was no exception. In a dance with one guy from a parallel class, I circled on the wings of happiness. Here, finally, the life. On the same wings of happiness, I gave the guy a manual test of many components of my body. Well, at least I was smart enough to not surrender to him under the influence of alcohol vapors!

After dancing, we scattered around our small groups, with the guys with whom we have been friends for all these long years at school. They swore, as usual, in an eternal friendship. Now, of course, I understand that there are eternal friendships among very few people. And then we were all young. But the country in which we were born, «lived out» its last years. Representatives of the elite party already weren’t «shouting» so loudly from the stands. They began to repaint more and more from red to other colors. But my path has only just begun.

The Institute welcomed me warmly. I enjoyed learning. Maybe not even studying, but communicating with new friends. Unlike the school, where every year were the same people, the institute was constantly filled with new. I was a freshman, everything was interesting to me. While the period of getting used to student life was on, the guys did not interest me. Then nature began to take its toll, and I gradually began to look at the opposite sex. There were very few guys in our group. The choice was small. But on the next stream, you could show yourself and surprise the guys. What the girls and I did. Fortunately, discos at the institute were held regularly.

I was still wearing pink glasses from college life. Gradually, these glasses began to turn into white, and then they had to be removed altogether. I was very struck by the contrast of the Soviet institute on the screen and in real life. No, I do not want to say that everything was bad with it. On the contrary, the teachers gave knowledge at a high level. But behind the scenes moral battles unfolded fierce. I never climbed forward to various positions, but the zeal with which my classmates went to their goal was wildly terrifying. Some individuals did not stop at nothing in order to be on top of the world and curry favor with their superiors and, of course, benefit from this. So my life began to turn into a real adult life. My personal life fell silent for a while. There were no suitable candidates.

Towards the end of the second year, the feminine in me began to gain the upper hand. I began to look closely at the guys. My special attention was paid to the fourth and fifth courses.

At this time, a girl transferred to our group from another faculty. She sat in the audience next to me, and we started talking to her. Olga, that was her name, really became my friend for many years. You could even say for life. And now, when my days are numbered, Olga does not leave me alone. She helps me not only financially, but also morally. Thanks to Skype and other new technologies. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves and think about sad things. At that time, the time of our youth, I did not want to think about anything bad. We girls did not understand why the abbreviation of our country suddenly changed, why people died under tanks, and why my father’s business were closed in one month. No, of course, in general, everything was clear, but the depth of the problems that people would face in those years was not clear to us. We have not yet felt the approach of the time when one after another the enterprises will fall apart, when in a very short time my father will grow old and goofy, his mother will turn gray with grief. All this was in the near future. We just wanted to live. And we lived. Met with the guys. We smoked a little, drank a little. There were parties, there were gatherings.

In this period of my life I was waiting for my prince. I wanted to be in his arms and see the stars again. I was kissing with the guys, hugging, but the last bastion did not give up. The guys did not have that highlight that I saw in Vadim. Although there was plenty to choose from. The guys at our institute were great. But, alas, I could not find Him yet. So Olga and I spent time meeting with one or the other. The two of us were having fun. We complemented each other. Then fate scattered us in different countries. Olga went to live in foreign countries.

Closer to autumn, when the leaves began to fall on the trees, I was «struck» by an electric shock. A guy came down the stairs at the institute – my type, and that’s all. «Hit» not only on the head, but in a causal place. At the sight of this guy, it started to whine so sweetly «there». Even with Vadim this was not. I took this feeling for love. And only then I realized that it was a real passion. But how I wanted him at that moment… I wanted it so that I ran away from his gaze. He, too, was not averse to making contact with me, but I did not make this contact, tried my best to avoid it. For me, this feeling was new, and I was very afraid of myself. In the classroom I flew in the clouds. Olga kept pushing me with my elbow at lectures.

The day to get acquainted with the subject of my desire came. His name was Alexey. Upon closer inspection, his figure was even better. How did our acquaintance happen? In the student cafeteria. He paid for my compote. I did not have enough money and, standing in line after me (of course, I arranged it so that he would be in line after me), Alexey, as a gallant guy, paid the missing amount. The first minutes after meeting were very stressful. He was a little worried, I was also worried. Because of this excitement, I did not notice how my dress rose a couple of centimeters above the limit. Alexey was already tense, and then my chiseled legs appeared before his eyes. How not to worry if you are a guy?! We exchanged template phrases and dispersed into audiences. For the rest of the school day, I reproached myself for acting like a fool. But in vain: Alexey waited for me on the porch and escorted me home. We walked around the park and everything was wonderful. I did not think about anything. I was fascinated by Alexey. When he looked at the bottom of his stomach, there was such a sweet feeling that I wanted to surrender to him right here in the park, on the yellow fallen leaves. This can not be described in words. This must be felt.

So time flew by, and evening came. Alexey lived on the other side of the city, but if he had called me to visit then, I would go without hesitation. However, he did not do this, for which I am grateful to him. I think that if he were to call me then, our relationship would be short-lived.

I fell in love… For me, the world turned upside down. Now I really want to return to this autumn park and correct a lot in my life. But, alas, it’s too late, my train is moving to the terminal station. And then I loved. Sex with a loved one is not even sex, but really making love. It seems to me that it is necessary to strictly distinguish between these concepts. Sex and love. I do not want to say that Alexey was a macho man in bed, but I felt very good with him. Those moments of intimacy that life gave us were the most desirable for me. He was courteous and did not ask unnecessary questions, such as where and when I lost my virginity. And for this, a special thanks to him. At that time I was so sorry that Alexey was not my first man.

A year flew. We met, confessed love to each other. We were happy. Father increasingly began to apply to the bottle. I did not notice the degradation of my dear person. I did not notice how my mother, still a young woman, turns into an old woman under the weight of problems. I loved Alexey. We wanted to get married. But then an obstacle arose in the form of a summons to the army. Olga persuaded me to wait with the wedding. In her own way she was right. Alexey was upset. His parents, who were behind our relationship with him, were also upset. For them, I was a good girl. Besides being very attractive, I’m not stupid either.

We decided to wait. Alexey went to repay his homeland. On the wires to the army, we again vowed to love each other until death, I changed several handkerchiefs that were wet from tears. And then went the waiting time. No, I really waited for Alexey.

So a month passed, then the second, third. A girl named Veronica joined our company. She was the opposite of Olga. They were both plus and minus, but Veronica turned my whole life upside down. She was a few years older. She had more life experience than we put together. This is what she bribed me with. Gradually, I began to move away from Olga. She started dating a guy, their business went to a wedding and a quiet family life.

Veronica awakened in me everything that had fallen before. Student gatherings have become uninteresting for me. I was more and more attracted by new fashion items and attracted colorful storefronts. No, I still answered Alexey’s letters. Waiting for him and did not pay attention to other men. But, frankly, inside of me the first feeling for Alexey was fading more and more. I do not know why this happened. Maybe because I gradually changed my life priorities.

Under the influence of the Veronikin charms, I increasingly wanted to have the same blouse as hers, or lipstick. How and when a change occurred in me, I did not notice. I turned into a completely different Svetlana. No, I remained responsive and kind, but more and more often I was drawn to leaving home. I so did not want to see the drunk father and listen to constant scandals that I ran. I just ran to where I seemed to understand. I ran to Veronica. Together we began to spend much more time.

Olga and I met only in the classroom. I can’t forget our last conversation with her before a long breakup. Olga got married. With her husband, they were going to leave that country, which had not yet been. It was at the beginning of spring. We phoned and agreed to meet at our place. Olga arrived, as usual, without delay. A couple of template phrases, piercing Holguin’s look and just one word: «Think it over». At that moment, I told her too much, like, you are leaving for a better life, you are leaving me and etc. So we parted for many years. After fate will bring us together in one of the hotels in Turkey. It was about a couple of years after our last conversation. At that time, Turkey was just opening its tourist routes, and among the CIS countries this direction was an indicator of prosperity and well-being. But after our last student conversation I was very offended by Olga. She was leaving for Germany. Any foreign country at that time was a paradise for us. Later, when another five years was added to my years, I realized that Olga wanted a better life for her family. And she got it. Her husband, a programmer with a capital letter, was able to provide a decent life to Olga and the children. She became a housewife and devoted herself entirely to the family. I began to provide myself with a decent life in a different way. No, do not stand on the panel, but, in principle, if you look, it’s not far from this and left.