Page 110

[Alexandr Korol]

Good question, since we are sort of going through the beginning of the first volume of “Alternative History,” there was such a moment... So, in the winter of 2009, I had already met Alexander “the Big.” Then came 2010, and that summer, Valentina told me that there was... She calls me on the phone, I answer, I clearly remember it, I was in the apartment at the time. And she says:

– Alex, there’s this one woman — (I don’t remember exactly how she put it) — she said, “She’s waiting for a boy from Petersburg. She is the keeper of the keys and is waiting for a boy from Petersburg, some chosen one who must be born or appear in Petersburg, to whom she must pass the keys to paradise.

And I’m listening to all of this. Naturally, it immediately... I mean, I was still a young guy. Of course, my first instinct was to think: this is probably about me, it’s me. But I stay calm and say:

– Alright, Valentina, you’re telling me all this — why?
– What if it turns out you’re interested? — and she laughs.

And so she said that this woman, Tamara, lives somewhere in the Pskov region or near the Pskov region, in some village or something like that. And then what? It all just happens. It was simply that kind of conversation. I didn’t have any questions like where this woman is, or that I want to go to her, or “tell her it’s me.” No, I had no such thoughts at all. Valentina just told me this, the conversation ended, and after that I felt every day this crazy faith that some unique miracles were happening, that none of this was my imagination, that more and more it was all unraveling toward the idea that I really was someone unique. First, Valentina confirmed it to me when I first met her. Then Big Alexander confirmed it, which made me believe even more. And now again Valentina called and planted even more faith in me by saying that there’s some woman who is waiting — or rather expecting — some chosen boy whom she has to give the keys to paradise. I didn’t even think at the time to Google it and look up what “keys to paradise” even meant. I just took it as something, like there is something unique in the world — like me — and something unique must happen, and everything seems to be leading up to that,