Charles martin when the crickets sing epub. Reviews of the book "When the Crickets Sing" by Charles Martin

When the crickets sing Charles Martin

(No ratings yet)

Title: When the Crickets Sing

About the book When the Crickets Sing by Charles Martin

Charles Martin is an American writer who won the hearts of many women with his romantic prose. Some of his works have received worldwide fame and many critical reviews.

Charles studied at the University of Florida, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree. He later moved to Virginia, where he received a Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy degree from a local university. The writer currently lives in Florida. He is married and has three sons.

The novel “Where the Crickets Sing” was written in 2014 and immediately received positive reviews. The manuscript has been translated into 17 languages.

The work tells about the fate of the talented cardiac surgeon Jonathan Mitchell, or Reese. His wife Emma had a heart condition, and the main character tried to do everything to save her. He was not only her loving husband, but also her attending physician. Sometimes Reese had to make difficult choices.

Despite all the doctors' efforts, Emma dies. Jonathan takes her death hard. He closes himself off from the whole world, quits his job and settles in a mansion on the shores of beautiful Lake Burton. Now he devotes all his free time to fishing, boating and rowing.

One day the main character meets a five-year-old girl who sells lemonade. The girl has a heart defect and needs expensive heart surgery. She dreams of collecting money for it. Reese becomes imbued with the baby’s fate and meets her aunt, who replaced Annie’s mother. He begins to help them in every possible way in the hope of saving the girl’s life.

Reese understands that Annie will be saved by an operation performed by a surgeon from God. This is exactly the kind of doctor he is. Before the death of his beloved wife, he saved hundreds of lives and performed many operations. But now the shadows of the past frighten him, and he is afraid to pick up a scalpel again.

“Where the Crickets Sing” is a touching and touching novel that will leave few people indifferent. In the book you will find many medical terms, descriptions of diseases and the lives of doctors. But all this is conveyed to the reader in simple and understandable language. The work is also filled with excellent landscape sketches. Reading about the beauty that surrounded the main characters, there is a great desire to visit there.

Charles Martin painted all the characters very vividly. They amaze with their humanity, hope and faith in the best. As you read the book, you begin to involuntarily sympathize with each of them.

On our website about books you can download for free or read online the book “When the Crickets Sing” by Charles Martin in epub, fb2, txt, rtf, pdf formats for iPad, iPhone, Android and Kindle. The book will give you a lot of pleasant moments and real pleasure from reading. You can buy the full version from our partner. Also, here you will find the latest news from the literary world, learn the biography of your favorite authors. For beginning writers, there is a separate section with useful tips and tricks, interesting articles, thanks to which you yourself can try your hand at literary crafts.

Quotes from When the Crickets Sing by Charles Martin

Probably, only in a restaurant can you trim the fat from a steak if you don’t eat it, but in life, sweet and bitter often go together.

At dusk, a shadow appears behind you, hiding your steps from possible pursuers.

Doctors can help a person improve his health, they can prolong his life, but they are not able to heal him, make him healthy and whole.

Mr. Porter likes his lemonade to have a little more sugar, but he doesn't like some of my customers. You understand? ..Some people just need to add more sugar because they are quite sour on their own.

After all, what is a lie? It's just a well-disguised truth.

The process of dying begins the moment we are born.

The randomly heard cry of a cardinal, which is heard outside your bedroom window or outside your door, is the voice of many who ask you for one of their own.

… If there is no heart or it has died, nothing else matters. You can find a woman who will be more beautiful than anyone in the world, you can have fabulous sex with her, but when the last volleys have died down, so to speak, you will certainly think about having a snack, smoking a cigarette... and also about what you want now do with your partner. And then it will become clear to you that the woman who is now lying in the same bed with you is no more important to you than the TV remote control. True love is not a tool or a means, and neither is a woman’s heart. You won't find them in any magazine.

From my observations, those who prefer twilight to bright light usually have something to hide.

Download free book “When the Crickets Sing” by Charles Martin

(Fragment)

In format fb2: Download
In format rtf: Download
In format epub: Download
In format txt:

When Crickets Cry

* * *

To Steve and Elaine

Prologue

I pushed the handle and the screen door creaked quietly open, startling two hummingbirds quarreling over the feeder. The rustle of their wings died away high in the dogwood branches, and almost at the same instant the first lemon-yellow rays of the morning sun slid across the sky. It seemed as if someone had painted the vault of heaven the night before in deep blue and purple tones, and then wiped away the dark paint with cotton swabs of clouds and filled the vacated space with gold crumbs. I bowed my head and looked up from under my brows. The sky looked a little like a giant granite countertop, facing the ground. Perhaps, I thought, right now, somewhere up there, high in the heavens, the Lord is also drinking his morning coffee. The whole difference between us was that He did not need to read the letter that I was clutching in my hand, since He already knew what? in him…

Directly ahead of me, the wide Tallala flowed into Lake Burton. The river, looking like transparent greenish glass, was motionless, but I knew that at exactly seven o’clock, with a deafening roar of engines, this serene water surface would be disrupted by jet skis and boats, and small restless waves produced by them would begin to roll onto the banks. Yes, a little more, and the sun will rise higher to move west, so that by noon the air will warm up, and the water will sparkle so that it will be painful to look at.

With the letter in hand, I walked down the back porch and stepped carefully in my bare feet onto the dock. Feeling the mist rising from the water touch my feet and face, I moved along the wall of the boathouse and climbed the stairs to its roof. There I sat down in a hammock stretched between the pillars of the canopy, exposed my face to the sun, stuck my finger in a small copper ring tied to a short cord, and, pulling it towards me, began to slowly swing.

If there really is a God up there and at that very moment he was drinking his morning coffee, He must have already finished his second cup, because the sky became completely lighter and sparkled with a bright morning blue, and only here and there were barely visible dark stripes lingering on it.

In the courtyards and driveways, which in these parts invariably slope towards the lake, which lies as if at the bottom of a giant salad bowl, people, regardless of age, will ride along the plastic paths irrigated with hoses, play horseshoes in the shade of the trees, sip a mint julep or a cocktail. from tequila with lemon juice or just sitting on the roofs of boat sheds, dangling your legs. By nine in the evening, almost all owners of coastal houses will take out fireworks prepared in advance, and a festive cannonade will sound over the lake, scarlet, blue, yellow and green lights will be reflected in the water, which will fall down in flickering rain. Parents will raise their heads and look at the sky, children will laugh and scream, dogs will bark and pull on their chains, leaving deep marks in the bark of the trees to which they are tied. Cats will rush to find shelter, veterans will plunge into memories, lovers will hold hands and slowly slip away into distant groves on the shore to swim naked in dark, warm water, where no one will see them. All this makes up the symphony of freedom that accompanies the main summer holiday - Independence Day.

Probably, in all of Clayton, Georgia, I had no fireworks, no sausages, and no desire to color the sky with flashes of chemical fire. My pier will remain dark and quiet, my grill will remain cold, full of old ash and dusty cobwebs. Freedom was something distant for me - like a faint, barely wafted aroma that seems very familiar, but you can’t remember where you know it from. If I could, I would sleep all day today like some modern Rip Van Winkle; I would only open my eyes tomorrow and cross off the Fourth of July on my calendar with peace of mind. Alas, sleep is almost as unattainable for me as freedom, and besides, it is never strong. For many years now I have been sleeping in fits and starts, two to three hours a day, no more.

So I lay in the hammock with coffee and yellowed memories. I placed the mug on my chest and clutched the crumpled, unopened envelope with my hands. The fog was still rising behind me; it twisted in tiny spirals that, bending and dancing, floated silently and leisurely through the overhanging branches of the dogwood and melted thirty feet above the ground.

The inscription on the envelope, written in her hand, told me exactly when I should read the letter. If I had listened, I would have read it two years ago. But I didn’t do it, I didn’t intend to open the envelope today. Maybe I just couldn't. The last goodbye seems doubly hard when you know for sure that it really is the last. And I knew it. Four anniversaries passed and became a thing of the past, and I was still stuck somewhere between times, and nothing had changed for me.

I pressed the envelope with my palm to my chest, spreading its corners like little paper wings. Pathetic replacement...

Locals love to swing on the swings and, while sipping a mint julep, discuss what time of day on the lake should be considered the best. In the morning, shadows lie on the ground right in front of you and seem to stretch towards the day. At noon, the shadow shrinks and ends up under your feet: you stand on it, stuck between the past and the future, between what was and what will be. At dusk, a shadow appears behind you, hiding your steps from possible pursuers. And this is not a metaphor. From my observations, those who prefer twilight to bright light usually have something to hide.

Chapter 1

She seemed a bit small for her age. She looked like a five-year-old, although she was already six or even seven, but in her fragile, like a porcelain doll, body hid the brave heart of a fighter. She was wearing a short yellow dress, yellow socks, white sandals with a strap, and the ends of a straw hat tied with a yellow ribbon went down almost to her waist. Thin and pale, she nevertheless moved like Eloise 1
The six-year-old heroine of a series of children's books by American writer Kay Thompson. (Hereinafter approx. Transl.)

Just like Tigger from the fairy tale about Winnie the Pooh. The girl stood on the corner of Main Street and Savannah Street, right in the middle of the town, and screamed at the top of her little lungs:

- Lemon-a-a-hell! Lemon-a-a-hell! Buy lemon-a-hell, fifty cents a serving!

Her lemonade “stand” looked quite sturdy and bore signs of a long life, although it was clearly put together in a hurry. The counter, made from a half-sheet of one-inch plywood, was supported by four-by-four posts; two higher, but thinner, pillars supported the second half-sheet, which served as a canopy. Between the posts was a homemade lemon-colored banner with the inscription in large block letters: “Lemonade, 1 glass – 50 cents. Subsequent portions are free!” But what caught my eye first was not this touching advertisement in its artlessness, not the counter, not the yellow Iglu cooler, and not even the girl herself. The real centerpiece of this simple arrangement was a five-gallon plastic drinking water bottle under the counter. It occurred to me that this was her – the girls’ – personal well or spring where anyone could throw a coin and make a wish. And it seems that the whole city, silently whispering something secret under their breath, poured large and small bills and change lying around in their pockets into the bottle.

Stopping on the corner, I watched as an elderly woman with a lace umbrella crossed Main Street and dropped two quarters into a Styrofoam cup on the counter.

“Thank you, Annie,” she whispered, taking a plastic glass of lemonade from the girl’s outstretched hands.

“You’re welcome, Miss Blakely.” You have a very beautiful umbrella! “A light breeze that swept along the sidewalk moved the yellow ribbons on the girl’s back and brought her clear, angelic voice to me.

Miss Blakely sucked in a breath and asked:

- How are you feeling, baby? Better?

The girl looked at her from under the brim of her hat.

- Yes, ma'am. Certainly.

Miss Blakely raised the glass to her lips and, throwing back her head, began to drink, and the girl turned and began to look along the sidewalk.

- Lemon-a-a-hell! Fifty cents a serving! “Her southern accent sounded very pleasant - soft, slightly hoarse. Only such a little girl could pronounce words like that, and therefore her voice involuntarily attracted attention, like fireworks on the Fourth of July.

Wow lemonade!

It looked like the girl was making money faster than the Treasury could print it. In the bottle I saw a whole mountain of banknotes of various denominations, but none of the buyers seemed to be worried that all this pile of cash might suddenly “grow legs”, and the least worried was the little saleswoman herself. What does this all mean, I asked myself. Apart from the advertising banner between the two posts on the kiosk, there were no signs or leaflets that would explain anything. Apparently there was simply no need for this. This often happens in small towns: everyone already knows everything, and no one needs additional explanations. That is, no one but me...

This morning - a little before I arrived in the town - my neighbor and friend Charlie and I (among other things, he is my brother-in-law and lives very close - on the opposite shore of a narrow bay that is easy to cross by swimming, which we often do ) we were sanding the mahogany body and steel of the 1947 Grivetta, when we suddenly ran out of fine sandpaper, and there was very little spar varnish left. We tossed a coin and I lost, so I was the one who had to drive into town while Charlie fished from the pier and whistled shrilly as the microbikini-clad girls zipped past on roaring jet skis. Actually, Charlie hardly travels anywhere, but he has a very strong competitive spirit - that’s why he insisted that we cast lots. As already stated, I lost.

My trip today was unusual - in terms of timing. I'm rarely in the city in the morning or afternoon when the streets are full of people going to or from work. Frankly speaking, I prefer not to go to the city at all. As a rule, I go around the administrative center of our district on the tenth road, preferring neighboring villages, and I try to change the stores where I buy food, tools and other necessary little things every couple of months. In the vicinity of Clayton there is not a single store, not a single shop where I would be considered a regular customer.

But if I do end up in a city, I try to do it about fifteen minutes before the shops start closing. I dress like most of the locals - in faded, washed-out jeans, an old cowboy shirt and a baseball cap with an advertisement for some large company that produces power tools or construction equipment. I usually park my car behind the store, pull the bill of my baseball cap down, turn up my collar, and try to look at my feet and not at those around me. Invisibly, I slip into the store, buy what I need and slip out again into the street, so that no one remembers me and hardly notices me. Charlie calls it "invisible shopping." I call it a lifestyle.

A retired Macon industrialist hired Charlie and me to spruce up his vintage 1947 Grivette for the 10th Anniversary Classic and Antique Boat Show that takes place on Lake Burton each year. There was still almost a month left before the show. Charlie and I had done this event twice before, and now we needed some sandpaper to beat the Blue Ridge boat shop guys. We had been working on the Grivetta for ten months and were almost finished, however, before driving the motorboat to the customer, we had to connect the transmission and cover the wooden parts with eight layers of spar varnish. Only after this would the Grivetta be able to go out on the water.

Feeling my mouth go dry with curiosity, I crossed the street and dropped fifty cents into the Styrofoam tray. The girl pressed the plunger of the faucet with force, causing her knuckles to turn white and her hand to tremble, but still poured me a full glass of fresh lemonade, in which pulp and not completely dissolved grains of sugar floated.

“Thank you,” I said politely.

“My name is Annie,” the girl answered and, putting her leg back, sat down in an awkward curtsy, looking up at me from under the brim of her hat, which immediately made her look like a sunflower. – Annie Stevens.

I took the glass in my other hand, clicked my heels and recited from Shakespeare, changing the words slightly:

- Thank you, I’m just cold, so what? heart longing...

– Did you come up with this yourself?

- No. – I shook my head. – A man named Shakespeare wrote this in his book “Hamlet.” You see, as a child, while most of my friends watched The Waltons and Hawaii Five-O, I preferred to read books. I still don’t have a TV, can you imagine?.. But hundreds of long-dead writers fill my head with their incessant whispers every hour...” I slightly raised my baseball cap and extended my hand. – Reese. My name is Reese.

The sun was shining at my back, and my shadow, stretched out in front of me, protected the girl’s eyes from the sun, which at eleven in the morning rose quite high and was climbing higher and higher.

Annie thought for a moment.

– Reese is a good name.

A man appeared on the sidewalk, carrying two shopping bags from the grocery store, and the girl, turning in his direction, screamed so loudly that she could probably be heard three blocks away:

– Lemon-a-a-hell!!!

The man nodded.

- Good morning, Annie. Wait a second, I'll be right there.

The girl turned to me again:

- This is Mr. Porter, he works on this street. Mr. Porter likes his lemonade to have a little more sugar, but he doesn't like some of my customers. Do you understand?.. Some people just need to add more sugar, because they themselves are quite sour. - And she laughed.

– Do you trade here every day? – I asked, sipping the lemonade in small sips. Back in my school days, tossing and turning in bed all night without sleep, I realized one thing: if you ask enough of the right questions - ones that only slightly touch on the things that interest you, but do not directly name them, you can eventually find out everything you need . To do this, however, you need to have a good idea of what? ask when and, most importantly, how exactly you should start a casual conversation on a topic that is important to you.

– Every day except Sundays, when Sissy sells fishing bait at Butch's store. The other six days she works over there...

And the girl pointed to a small department store, in the window of which I saw behind the cash register a young woman with blond hair of a shade that usually gives the impression of being artificial. She stood with her back to me, but her fingers quickly ran over the buttons, punching out a check for the next customer. The woman did not turn around, but I was sure that she could see us perfectly in the three-foot square mirror hanging on the wall opposite the cash register.

“Sissy?..” I asked.

The girl smiled and again waved her hand in the direction of the display case.

- Sissy is my aunt. She and my mother were sisters, but my mother could never bring herself to put her hand in a bucket of worms or bloodworms. - Noticing that my glass was empty, Annie poured me more lemonade and continued: - So, am I standing? here almost every day, from morning until lunch, and then I go upstairs, watch TV or sleep. And you?.. What do you do?

I had long ago prepared an answer to such questions - one that was both truthful and at the same time allowed me to reliably hide the truth. And while my lips were saying: “I am engaged in boats,” my head was pounding: “No, my dear, I am not what I seem...” 2
W. Shakespeare "Othello".

Squinting slightly, the girl raised her head and looked somewhere over my head. Her breathing was labored, there were moist wheezes in her throat, and she was clearly tormented by an obsessive cough, which she tried to hide. At some point, Annie stepped back and, feeling the sidewalk with her foot, sank into a folding office chair that stood a couple of steps behind her kiosk. She folded her arms across her chest and took several deep breaths.

I watched her chest rise and fall. A fresh - no more than a year - surgical scar, along which whitish traces of stitches stretched like a dotted line, rose above the neckline of her dress by almost an inch, slightly short of the medicine box hanging on her neck. I didn't need a hint to figure out which pills Annie was forced to carry with her.

I lightly tapped the five-gallon water bottle with the toe of my shoe.

-What is this for?

Instead of answering, Annie lightly patted her chest, causing the scar to protrude further from the collar of her dress. People were walking along the sidewalk, but the girl was clearly tired and was not in the mood to talk much, much less scream at the top of her lungs, even if it was necessary to advertise the product. A gray-haired gentleman in a formal suit walked out of the door of a real estate agency located four doors down the street. He approached us at a brisk trot, grabbed a glass from the counter and, pressing the valve on the thermos, nodded to the girl.

- Good morning, Annie.

He tossed a dollar into a Styrofoam cup and another down into a plastic bottle.

“Hello, Mister Oscar...” the girl responded in a voice slightly louder than a whisper. - Thank you very much. Come again.

- See you tomorrow, honey. “He patted her on the knee.

Looking at me, Annie followed with her gaze Mr. Oscar, who moved on with a cheerful gait.

“He calls everyone “darling.” Even men.

I had already put my fifty cents in the cup, and when Annie was momentarily distracted, I put a twenty-dollar bill in the bottle.

Over the past eighteen or even twenty years, I have always carried a few necessary small items in my pockets or on my belt: a brass Zippo lighter (even though I never smoked), two pocket knives with small but sharp blades, a case with a set of needles and threads, as well as a reliable hand-held flashlight. A few years ago I added one more item to the mix.

Now Annie nodded towards my lantern:

“The local sheriff, Mr. George, has a similar one.” I also saw the same one on the ambulance attendant. Are you sure you're not a doctor or a police officer?

I shook my head:

A few doors down from us, Dr. Sal Cohen emerged from his office. After pausing on the sidewalk, he turned and slowly moved towards us. It is impossible to imagine Clayton without Sal: in the city he serves as something of a local landmark - in any case, everyone here knows and loves him. Now he is well over seventy, and for the last half century he has been working as a local pediatrician. His small office, consisting of a tiny reception area and an office, was probably the place for all the local residents: before his eyes they grew up, turning from newborn babies into adult men and women, and he helped them through most childhood illnesses. And Sal looked like a typical country doctor, as they like to be portrayed in books and movies: a strict jacket made of thick tweed, the same vest, a tie bought about thirty years ago, bushy eyebrows, a bushy mustache, hair in the nose and ears, long sideburns , large ears and an eternal pipe in his teeth. In addition, Sal's pockets were always filled with candy and other sweets.

Shuffling his feet, Sal approached the kiosk, pushed his tweed hat back on his head and, transferring the pipe to his left hand, accepted the glass offered to him with his right. Winking at Annie, Sal nodded at me and drank the lemonade in small sips. Then he turned away, and the girl, trying not to giggle, put her hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out a mint candy. Holding the candy in both hands, Annie pressed it to her chest and smiled as if she had become the owner of some rare thing that no one else in the world had.

Sal adjusted his hat, put his pipe in his mouth, and walked toward his Cadillac parked at the curb. The old doctor looked at me before opening the driver's door.

-Shall we meet on Friday? - he asked.

I smiled at him and nodded.

“I can already feel the excellent taste of Transplant in my mouth,” Sal said and, licking his lips, shook his head.

- Me too. “And I actually felt my mouth fill with saliva.”

Sal clenched the receiver in his fist and pointed the pipe at me.

“Get me a seat if you get there first.”

When Crickets Cry

* * *

To Steve and Elaine

Prologue

I pushed the handle and the screen door creaked quietly open, startling two hummingbirds quarreling over the feeder. The rustle of their wings died away high in the dogwood branches, and almost at the same instant the first lemon-yellow rays of the morning sun slid across the sky. It seemed as if someone had painted the vault of heaven the night before in deep blue and purple tones, and then wiped away the dark paint with cotton swabs of clouds and covered the vacated space with gold crumbs. I bowed my head and looked up from under my brows. The sky looked a little like a giant granite countertop, facing the ground. Perhaps, I thought, right now, somewhere up there, high in the heavens, the Lord is also drinking his morning coffee. The whole difference between us was that He did not need to read the letter that I was clutching in my hand, since He already knew what was in it...

I listened to the silence for some time, knowing that it would not last long. Any hour - and the laughter of children riding on inner tubes will ring over the lake; teenagers on jet skis and pensioners on rubber boats will scare away the Canada geese, feasting on pieces of white bread that some bird lover who has risen with the sun has scattered for them and which sway slightly on the water, like a fairy-tale yellow brick road. Closer to lunch, grills and barbecues will be smoking on dozens of piers and piers, and the smell of hot dogs, hamburgers, smoked oysters and spicy sausages will waft over the water. In the courtyards and driveways, which in these parts invariably slope towards the lake, which lies as if at the bottom of a giant salad bowl, people, regardless of age, will ride along the plastic paths irrigated with hoses, play horseshoes in the shade of the trees, sip a mint julep or a cocktail. from tequila with lemon juice or just sitting on the roofs of boat sheds, dangling your legs. By nine in the evening, almost all owners of coastal houses will take out fireworks prepared in advance, and a festive cannonade will sound over the lake, scarlet, blue, yellow and green lights will be reflected in the water, which will fall down in flickering rain. Parents will raise their heads and look at the sky, children will laugh and scream, dogs will bark and pull on their chains, leaving deep marks in the bark of the trees to which they are tied. Cats will rush to find shelter, veterans will plunge into memories, lovers will hold hands and slowly slip away into distant groves on the shore to swim naked in dark, warm water, where no one will see them. All this makes up the symphony of freedom that accompanies the main summer holiday - Independence Day.

I pressed the envelope with my palm to my chest, spreading its corners like little paper wings. Pathetic replacement...

Chapter 1

She seemed a bit small for her age. She looked like a five-year-old, although she was already six or even seven, but in her fragile, like a porcelain doll, body hid the brave heart of a fighter. She was wearing a short yellow dress, yellow socks, white sandals with a strap, and the ends of a straw hat tied with a yellow ribbon went down almost to her waist. Thin and pale, she nevertheless moved either like Eloise or like Tigger from the fairy tale about Winnie the Pooh. The girl stood on the corner of Main Street and Savannah Street, right in the middle of the town, and screamed at the top of her little lungs:

- Lemon-a-a-hell! Lemon-a-a-hell! Buy lemon-a-hell, fifty cents a serving!

Her lemonade “stand” looked quite sturdy and bore signs of a long life, although it was clearly put together in a hurry. The counter, made from a half-sheet of one-inch plywood, was supported by four-by-four posts; two higher, but thinner, pillars supported the second half-sheet, which served as a canopy. Between the posts was a homemade lemon-colored banner with the inscription in large block letters: “Lemonade, 1 glass – 50 cents. Subsequent portions are free!” But what caught my eye first was not this touching advertisement in its artlessness, not the counter, not the yellow Igloo cooler, or even the girl herself. The real centerpiece of this simple arrangement was a five-gallon plastic drinking water bottle under the counter. It occurred to me that this was her – the girls’ – personal well or spring where everyone could throw a coin and make a wish. And it seems that the whole city, silently whispering something secret under their breath, poured large and small bills and change lying around in their pockets into the bottle.

Stopping on the corner, I watched as an elderly woman with a lace umbrella crossed Main Street and dropped two quarters into a Styrofoam cup on the counter.

“Thank you, Annie,” she whispered, taking a plastic glass of lemonade from the girl’s outstretched hands.

Miss Blakely sucked in a breath and asked:

- How are you feeling, baby? Better?

The girl looked at her from under the brim of her hat.

- Yes, ma'am. Certainly.

Miss Blakely raised the glass to her lips and, throwing back her head, began to drink, and the girl turned and began to look along the sidewalk.

Wow lemonade!

“Thank you,” I said politely.

I took the glass in my other hand, clicked my heels and recited from Shakespeare, changing the words slightly:

- Thank you, I’m just cold, and there’s sadness in my heart...

– Did you come up with this yourself?

Annie thought for a moment.

– Reese is a good name.

A man appeared on the sidewalk, carrying two shopping bags from the grocery store, and the girl, turning in his direction, screamed so loudly that she could probably be heard three blocks away:

– Lemon-a-a-hell!!!

The man nodded.

- Good morning, Annie. Wait a second, I'll be right there.

The girl turned to me again:

– Do you trade here every day? – I asked, sipping the lemonade in small sips. Back in my school days, tossing and turning in bed all night without sleep, I realized one thing: if you ask enough of the right questions - ones that only slightly touch on the things that interest you, but do not directly name them, you can eventually find out everything you need . To do this, however, you need to have a good idea of what to ask, when, and most importantly, how exactly you should start a casual conversation on a topic that is important to you.

– Every day except Sundays, when Sissy sells fishing bait at Butch's store. The other six days she works over there...

“Sissy?..” I asked.

The girl smiled and again waved her hand in the direction of the display case.

- Sissy is my aunt. She and my mother were sisters, but my mother could never bring herself to put her hand in a bucket of worms or bloodworms. - Noticing that my glass was empty, Annie poured me more lemonade and continued: - In general, I stand here almost every day, from morning until lunch, and then I go upstairs, watch TV or sleep. And you?.. What do you do?

I lightly tapped the five-gallon water bottle with the toe of my shoe.

-What is this for?

- Good morning, Annie.

He tossed a dollar into a Styrofoam cup and another down into a plastic bottle.

“Hello, Mister Oscar...” the girl responded in a voice slightly louder than a whisper. - Thank you very much. Come again.

- See you tomorrow, honey. “He patted her on the knee.

Looking at me, Annie followed with her gaze Mr. Oscar, who moved on with a cheerful gait.

“He calls everyone “darling.” Even men.

I had already put my fifty cents in the cup, and when Annie was momentarily distracted, I put a twenty-dollar bill in the bottle.

Now Annie nodded towards my lantern:

“The local sheriff, Mr. George, has a similar one.” I also saw the same one on the ambulance attendant. Are you sure you're not a doctor or a police officer?

I shook my head:

Sal adjusted his hat, put his pipe in his mouth, and walked toward his Cadillac parked at the curb. The old doctor looked at me before opening the driver's door.

-Shall we meet on Friday? - he asked.

I smiled at him and nodded.

“I can already feel the excellent taste of Transplant in my mouth,” Sal said and, licking his lips, shook his head.

- Me too. “And I actually felt my mouth fill with saliva.”

Sal clenched the receiver in his fist and pointed the pipe at me.

“Get me a seat if you get there first.”

- Agreed. “I nodded again, and Sal drove off. He drove the car like all old people - slowly and in the very middle of the road.

– Do you know Dr. Cohen? – Annie asked interestedly.

- Yes. “I thought for a moment, choosing my words carefully. “We... we both just love cheeseburgers!”

- A-ah!.. So, will you go to the “Well”? – she guessed.

I nodded yes.

“Every time I see him, he either talks about last Friday or says he’s looking forward to the next one.” Dr. Cohen loves cheeseburgers.

- He's not the only one.

– But the doctor won’t allow me to eat cheeseburgers. He says it's bad for me.

I didn’t agree with this, but I didn’t say anything. In any case, I did not dare to express my opinion in a sufficiently categorical form.

- In my opinion, it is a crime not to allow a child to enjoy cheeseburgers.

Annie smiled:

- That's what I told him.

While I finished my lemonade, Annie watched me closely, but there was no impatience or irritability in her gaze. There was already quite a lot of money in her bottle under the counter, which I knew she really needed, and yet I was confident that even if I hadn’t paid Annie a cent, she would have continued to pour me lemonade until then. until I turn yellow or until I get washed away. Alas, the problem - her problem - was that I had years at my disposal, and she... she had almost no time left. Money in a Bottle gave her some hope, but unless Annie was lucky enough to get a new heart transplant soon, she would likely die before she even entered her teens.

Annie looked me up and down again.

“You are very big,” she said finally.

– Do you mean weight or height? – I smiled.

She put her palm to her forehead with a visor.

“I’m only six feet tall.” There are people even higher.

- And how old are you?

– Human or canine?

She laughed.

- Dogs.

I thought a little.

– Two hundred and fifty-nine with a tail.

Annie looked me over again.

- How much do you weigh?

– In the English system or in the metric?

She rolled her eyes.

– In English, of course!

– Before breakfast or after dinner?

This question puzzled her. Annie rubbed the back of her head, looked around and nodded.

- Before breakfast.

“Before breakfast I weigh one hundred and seventy-four pounds.”

Annie looked at me interested.

– What is your shoe size?

– American or European?

Pursing her lips, she tried to hold back a smile, but she put her hands on her knees and burst out laughing:

- Yes, American!

- Eleventh.

Annie involuntarily glanced at my legs, as if asking herself whether I was telling the truth or deceiving. Finally, she pulled down the hem of her dress, stood up from the chair and straightened up, sucking in her stomach and sticking out her chest.

“I’m seven years old,” she recited. “I weigh forty-five pounds and wear size six shoes.” And I'm also three feet ten inches.

- And what? – I clarified.

– You are bigger than me.

I laughed.

- Agree. I'm a little bigger.

“But...” Annie raised her finger, as if trying to determine the direction of the wind. – My doctor says that if I have a new heart, I can grow a little more.

I nodded.

– Very, very possible.

– Do you know what I will do with him?

– With your new heart or with your new growth?

She thought for a moment.

- With both.

- What?

– I will become a missionary, like my mother and father.

The idea that a heart transplant survivor would be wandering through the hot African jungle, far from medications, diets and preventive health care centers, and far from any specialists capable of providing this assistance, seemed so incredible to me that for a second I I didn’t think about the reality of such a prospect. However, I said:

“Your parents must be very proud of your choice.”

Annie narrowed her eyes.

– Mom and Dad are already in heaven.

I stopped short, but quickly got over my confusion.

“I'm sure they miss you very much.”

Pressing the plunger of the thermos, Annie refilled my glass.

“I miss them too,” she admitted. – Although I know that in the end we will definitely see each other again. “Annie handed me the lemonade and raised her hands up, as if weighing something on an invisible scale.

I took a sip, mentally calculating the probability, or rather the improbability, of the date she named. I must have been thinking too long, because Annie raised her head again and stared at me curiously.

– What did you want to become when you were little? – she asked.

– Do you do this to all your customers? – I asked in turn, taking another sip from the glass.

- How so? “Annie put her hands behind her back and unconsciously clicked her heels, like Dorothy from the book about Oz. - How do I deal with them?

– You ask them a lot of questions.

- I... Well, yes... I guess.

I leaned down to look into her eyes.

– We are musicians, my dear, and we are dreamers...

- Did Mr. Shakespeare say that too?

- No, Willy Wonka said that.

Annie laughed happily.

“Well, thanks for the lemonade, Annie Stevens,” I said.

In response, Annie curtsied again.

- Goodbye, Mr. Reese. Come again.

- Definitely.

I crossed to the other side of the street and, taking a bunch of keys from my pocket, began to select the one I needed to open the door of my Suburban. Already holding the key in my hands, I noticed in the windshield the reflection of a tiny figure in a small yellow dress and involuntarily thought about dozens of people just like her. All of them were united by one thing - the fire of hope burning in their eyes, which no force could extinguish.

I also remembered that I used to be able to do something and that once there was love in my life, but then “...I was shed like water; all my bones crumbled; my heart became like wax; melted in the middle of my insides." And it was all over. Now everything was in the past.

A rather strong wind, rolling down from the mountains, swept along Savannah Street. He flew along the sidewalk, along the walls of old brick houses, kicking up dust and playing with old creaking weather vanes and modern “musical pendants” that emitted melodious chimes. Stumbling upon Annie's kiosk, the wind, as if angry, blew particularly hard and knocked over a Styrofoam cup, scattering almost ten dollars in change and small bills on the ground. He drove the paper money further, and Annie, jumping out of her chair, rushed in pursuit, not noticing that the wind was carrying them straight to the intersection.

I saw the danger too late. As for Annie, she didn’t have time to notice anything at all.

A huge bread wagon was driving down Main Street just from the direction where I was standing. The light was green at the intersection, and the driver increased the gas, causing the engine to fire loudly and release a cloud of smoke. I managed to hear the radio in the cab playing bluegrass, and saw the driver put a Twinkie cookie in his mouth. At the intersection, the truck turned, and the driver automatically covered his eyes with his palm to protect them from the sun. At the last moment, he must have noticed the yellow stain on the child's dress and slammed on the brakes. The locked rear wheels skidded, the van began to turn across the street, but the more it turned, the faster its massive rear part moved.

Turning towards the noise, Annie froze, paralyzed with fear. She dropped the money she had already collected again, and it scattered all over the street like large butterflies. Out of fright, the girl wet herself, but not a sound came out of her throat, which was clenched by a spasm.

“Oh my God, Annie!..” the driver yelled, turning the steering wheel with all his might, causing the back of the van to smash into the right front fender of a Honda Accord parked at the side of the road. The impact threw the truck away, and a moment later it hit Annie right in the chest with its side. There was a sound like a cannon shot. The whole point, of course, was that the tin body of the van resonated like a huge drum, but then it seemed to me that Annie was flattened into a flat cake.

It must have been some miracle that Annie still managed to instinctively cover herself with her hand. She was thrown far back and rolled across the asphalt like a yellow skittle ball. The hat flew off and the girl got stuck under the front end of a Ford pickup parked across the street. Even from where I stood, it was clearly visible that she had a fracture in her left arm. The last gust of wind lifted her skirt and covered her face with it, so that Annie seemed dead. She lay completely motionless, her head tilted, and blood stains appeared on her yellow dress.

I got to Annie first, followed by the woman cashier I had seen in the window. Her eyes were completely wild, and besides, she was shouting some nonsense. After another two or three seconds, a small crowd had already gathered around us.

Annie's eyes were closed, her body went limp, her skin became pale to the point of transparency. The tongue sunk deep into her throat, cutting off the air, so that her face turned blue. I didn’t know if the spine was injured, so, trying to keep the girl’s head still, I used a handkerchief to pull the sunken tongue forward, freeing the airways and allowing air to enter the lungs. Of course, the risk was great, because if the spine had been damaged, I could have injured it even more, but otherwise the girl could have simply suffocated. No air - no life, that's why I made this choice.

Surgical intervention
I got acquainted with the work of an American author, Charles Martin, who was new to me. They say it is popular in the USA, especially among female audiences. After reading his novel “When the Crickets Sing,” I understood why: he knows how to put pressure on the tear glands very well, knows how to trigger the mechanism of sympathy in the fragile female soul.
Judge for yourself: the main character is a heart surgeon who chose this profession in early childhood because he dreamed of curing a fragile girl. This alone awakens immense sympathy in the sensitive reader's soul. However, this was not enough for the author, and then, already an adult doctor, after a severe blow of fate, meets another young angel. The girl also has a heart condition. Perhaps she was sent to him to give him the opportunity to correct the mistakes he once made. This is where the story begins, which does not develop in chronological order. The narration is in the first person. The hero alternately talks about his sad past and not very joyful present. This is done so that the reader is fully immersed in the situation and will no longer part with the scarf while reading. Some authors know how to so calculatedly manipulate the sensitive heart of the reader. However, this was not enough for the respected Charles Martin, and then he decided to add tragedy by introducing the main character’s blind brother-in-law into the novel. Well, I decided to finish off the readers with the name of the novel - When crickets cry, that is, “When crickets cry.” However, a translator intervened, who apparently decided to hint to readers that everything is not so bad that their hearts would not break and, probably, therefore translated the title as follows: “When the crickets SING.”
The result is a story in the best American traditions: the situation seems hopeless, but then, as if by magic, the clouds clear and everything becomes fine, contrary to all logic. Who cares about common sense, the main thing is that everything ends well. Perhaps someone will appreciate such a novel, but personally, the writer’s prudence always disgusts me.
But I liked that the book is replete with medical details that relate to the work of doctors. In this case, cardiologists and cardiac surgeons. However, this is a subjective perception; at one time I wanted to become a doctor, but then I changed my mind. Now it is only thanks to books that I can plunge into this atmosphere, which could become a part of my life, but, apparently, not destiny.
In the novel, everything is described in such detail that I even suspected that Charles Martin was related to medicine, but I did not find confirmation of this.

To Steve and Elaine

I pushed the handle and the screen door creaked quietly open, startling two hummingbirds quarreling over the feeder. The rustle of their wings died away high in the dogwood branches, and almost at the same instant the first lemon-yellow rays of the morning sun slid across the sky. It seemed as if someone had painted the vault of heaven the night before in deep blue and purple tones, and then wiped away the dark paint with cotton swabs of clouds and covered the vacated space with gold crumbs. I bowed my head and looked up from under my brows. The sky looked a little like a giant granite countertop, facing the ground. Perhaps, I thought, right now, somewhere up there, high in the heavens, the Lord is also drinking his morning coffee. The whole difference between us was that He did not need to read the letter that I was clutching in my hand, since He already knew what was in it...