She

The younger girl glanced at her mother, sitting opposite her at a beautifully carved wooden table with flower and vine motifs. She was sipping coffee from a round, low cup. Her mother looked at the girl, and they both smiled warmly.

"And you mean, Mom, we still have plenty of time? They're always rushing us somewhere—to school, to church, to some other boring place... They simply take up all our free time." The sixteen-year-old, petite woman, spoke with obvious irritation, but with a barely visible smile, clearly not taking her mother's words seriously.

"Yes." You know... when you start working, you'll have much less time..." The older girl smiled, as if knowing what would happen next, and took a long sip from her cup of golden tea. "...it'll take you much longer than school..." Both girls stopped listening to their mother, and after waiting a moment for the woman to interrupt her monologue, they said their goodbyes politely, and even though it wasn't their mother, they said, "Bye, Mommy. We'll come back sometime!!!" And ran out into the street.

Only the woman remained in the small second-hand bookstore, her face scarred by time, giving the impression of wisdom, but not entirely old. As usual, she sat in her rocking chair, reading a book by the light of a nearly burnt-out fluorescent bulb, so different from the sunlight reflecting off the yellowed covers of the books in the window. She put on large, unfashionable, yet oh-so-suitable glasses, and immersed herself in her reading. By now, she had read almost every volume, every book, every storybook, every sagas, every collection of short stories she owned. A bell hanging by the door announced a rather loud chime each time the door opened, so she didn't have to worry about whether a customer would call her when she entered.

Sales were minimal, but sufficient that in the shop she rented on the outskirts of the city, she could secure a small room with a bathroom and a kitchen, where, surrounded by faded cookbooks, she cooked a variety of Indian brinjals made with cream and zucchini, or Kastoori Gajar Matars made with carrots and peas.

By the time she finished another volume, dusk was almost falling. The door, slightly ajar, let in the cool autumn air, and the cuckoo clock had just begun to strike eight. She closed the door, turned the sign to "closed," and shuffled with her calm, tired, and well-worn gait to the back room. She sat down on the bed and looked at the Moon, but the Moon didn't look at her, as he used to. He simply ignored her and drifted across the dark sky toward the clouds, which seemed to be trying to match him in silver. After a few minutes, the Moon disappeared behind their thick blanket, enveloping the last street in darkness. There stood an old, antique streetlamp, unlit for many, many years.

The girls chatted rapidly on their way to school—as only their lips could draw together in a silent "p" and stretch out in a charming alto "a"—exchanging information about the latest fashion trends, about seventeen-year-old Kasia being approached by handsome Tomek, and about sixteen-year-old Monika recently having a fight with her "boyfriend." Only when they reached an intersection did they separate. Waving goodbye to each other, they shouted over the growing din of the break, waiting for hours to end. Boring as always, classes were always boring.

That day, they finished together. Kasia sat on a green bench in front of the school, wearing a brown coat, wrapping herself in a long scarf that, constantly blowing in the wind, ruffled her long, straight, unbound auburn hair. Monika approached her in a dark green coat that reached her knees, a black backpack slung over her shoulder, and a woolen hat, from beneath which her black hair flowed in a stormy wave in the wind.

"Hi, Monika!" Kasia began, but received no response. When she finished writing in her small notebook, she looked at her sister, who was staring at the billowing gray clouds with blue eyes glazed—whether by the wind or by sadness. Her cheeks flushed pink from either the cold wind or the tears streaming down them, she held the small book close to her. Hugging it, her black-gloved hand carefully concealing its edges in the folds of her coat.

"Is something wrong?" The question, which could only hurt, was, however, a reflex that young Kasia hadn't quite mastered. A tear rolled down her sister's delicate cheek, a tear that spoke volumes. Kasia hugged Monika to her, covering them both with a layer of love that seemed to warm the sisters with a hot gust that stopped the wind and the cold of gray reality.

"Now... everything will be alright..." Kasia wiped her sister's tear with a gentle, motherly gesture.

"He dumped me... he left me..." Monika, her voice breaking, began to tell her sister—and at that moment, both her confessor and her only friend—what had happened, why, and why he hadn't wanted to go to the halftime ball with her, and why... and why... And in the rush of questions, all the tears flowing straight from the heart of sixteen-year-old adulthood were drowned. On the way to the orphanage, they stopped at old Mother's shop.

"Oh! Hello everyone. So, how was school? Tell us..." But when she looked into Katarzyna's gray eyes, she understood everything... "Perhaps you'd like some warm tea? It's always better to talk when a wounded heart is warmed by love and warm tea." Monika raised her head, unable to understand how Mother had guessed what she was thinking. A moment later, Mother returned with three cups of tea on a wooden tray, placed them on the table, and began sipping from the cup, carefully observing the younger ones.

"I've raised seven children already, and I know what it's like. Life doesn't change, my dears," the old woman said, answering the girls' silent question and picking up the last volume of stories left on the bookshelf, which she hadn't read yet. She was halfway through.

"Why didn't you start working as a nurse? You could have done what you learned, what you loved, after all, such a profession pays better than what Mom is doing now..." Kasia tried to change the subject, knowing it was wrong to make her sister cry a second time after she had opened up to her and spilled the beans.

"I could... but if I can sacrifice my life for others, no amount of money will make up for it... and do you think I stopped being a nurse? No... I simply became a nurse-cardiologist." The old woman smiled warmly, and the girls smiled back. "But soon my heart will stop beating. I miss my Andrzej. Yes. Mine. I can say that." He died seven years ago, and that's when I started my second-hand bookstore. Now my story is ending. The pages have already been written halfway through the last chapter...

"But why do you say that? There's still us. You still have us. Me and Kasia. Why do you talk about leaving when there's still something, someone to live for?

" "Oh... life's too short to take it seriously... you won't get out of it alive anyway..." Another smile, this time met the intrigued faces of Monika and Kasia.

"But how can you be sure, Mom, that you'll be gone soon?" Kasia asked in an uncertain voice, fearing the answer. Pink, wrinkled lips parted slightly, eyelids closed, and after a moment of complete silence, Mother replied:

"Because when you get used to death, you can feel it coming." To live, you must renounce yourself for the sake of your other half, you must live at your core, so that the daggers of human words flowing from the storm of evil and anger don't reach you, and so that the warmth of love from beneath warms your heart and your entire being as strongly as possible. And to die, you simply have to accept what is happening, something you have no control over anyway.

Half an hour later, the girls left for their "home," even though their home—where their hearts rested—was left behind. The woman finished the book that evening. She looked at the moon. Now, against the bright dots of the night sky, the moon smiled at her. She was happy that she could help someone again. And the moon was proud of her.

The next day, on their way to school, the girls only glanced into the room where they had sat and talked with Mother the day before. She sat there, idle, staring at the clouds floating across the sky, wrinkled like the old woman's hands holding an open book on the last page. Monika approached Mother hesitantly, touched her cold hands, but before tears could well up in her eyes, she read the sentence. The last sentence in the Old Woman's story.

"...because whoever has known love will fear nothing, not even Death will touch him, he will live in the memory of others forever..."

Kasia approached and gently closed the book, placing it on the shelf...

"I think I dozed off... but it's cold here... we'll have to fix that door eventually... but why are you crying, Monisia?"

And the answer vanished in the inexpressible joy that, flowing from the hearts of the young women, gave Mother life that would never fade away..."