When I Wasn’t Breathing

I didn't wake up this time. Ever since, I’ve been wandering around inside my nightmares, that seem to destroy my soul more and more every time. Every day is a test. Losses are becoming a part of my life. My girlfriend will never be late for a meeting with me again. She was killed by a Russian missile. My bubbly and cheerful friend Asya is not with me anymore. My world is decaying, like my abandoned town that smells of ashes. It was also destroyed by the war. I’ll never go to the dacha, that used to be my second home, anymore, and I won’t eat cherries from the dacha’s garden. All that is gone. Russia destroyed my dreams, peace and happiness.

I remember my 16th birthday in the pine forest. I remember my sneakers, worn from dancing and games. Now that whole area is laid with landmines. What used to be my escape from heavy thoughts has turned into a graveyard of my happy moments. That forest was a shelter for my soul; I felt free and protected there, among the trees. And now, with that carefree teenage soul of mine, full of misunderstanding, sadness and despair, I wander among the ruins and the smoke that rises above the town.

The horror began on February 24. My boyfriend and I lived in a rented apartment. It was the first home that I could furnish myself, to create home comfort, to my liking. We’d lived there just for a few months, but I already felt like the lady of the house. For me, that apartment is the smell of apple pie, which my boyfriend made for me for the first time. It’s a feeling of peace, and a life full of dreams. All that doesn’t exist anymore.

It's six in the morning. Mom called. Crying and shouting on the phone, “Baby, Kulbakine was shelled!” I’d known something terrible was going to happen a few weeks before when dad was deployed to Mariupol (he is a military service member). Breathing heavily, I walked up to the window and saw a black haze over the town of Chornobayivka. For a moment I felt that I wouldn’t be able to breathe anymore. I heard a shot, then—the second one, I felt like I was going to pass out.

Surprisingly, my boyfriend was quite calm. And I panicked. My boyfriend’s calmness began to annoy me, and I started screaming.

“Vania, we’ve got to pack fast!”, I shouted at him. “What are we going to do, what is happening?”

“You pack our identification documents, put my green jacket and black warm pants in a bag, and I will go and collect my pay cheque.”

“What pay cheque?!”, I shouted again in a hoarse voice. “I'm going to die of fear right now Vania, stop messing with me! And don't go anywhere!”

I was tired and scared, terribly afraid to stay in the apartment alone, so I begged him not to leave. Roughly, from that moment on, my memory erased itself, and my recollections became confusing. I remember the road, the girl at the entrance to an apartment building who held her teddy bear and showed him where the fire was. The traffic jam stretched from Kherson to the Mykolaiv traffic circle. All the vehicles from the city and the region seemed to have gathered on the highway. Vania was terribly annoyed, the traffic barely moved forward, he turned the steering wheel sharply and drove into the oncoming lane. Other cars followed us almost immediately. I saw only one vehicle that was driving towards Kherson. It was the police, in a white Toyota.

To be honest, I’ve always been ashamed of the town in which I was born. I always underestimated it. It almost never appeared anywhere, it wasn’t talked about, it wasn’t known. It seemed to me that only in a big city would I be completely happy and finally achieve that dream of success. However, fleeing from the war, I went to my native Bashtanka. Only after I arrived there, was I able to calm down. I no longer wanted any success, I felt that I was protected here, that no misfortune would ever befall my town, which so few people knew about.

But I was wrong that time too. On March 1, Vania's father received a phone call from his brother. He served in the Territorial Defence Forces (TDF) and knew the situation. It was he who informed us that a convoy of a hundred tanks was moving towards our town. He said that the TDF urgently needed jars and gasoline (to make Molotov cocktails); he added that they had very few weapons. I was filled with sheer terror. There was nowhere, nowhere I could hide. Was it all still going on?

I started to panic again, screaming and crying and rolling up and down the sleeves of my pyjamas. I have never been so scared in my life. Vania tried to be calm, but constantly walked from room to room and looked out the window. And I saw that he was scared too. We knew we had to act quickly. Vania, together with his father and brother, drained the gas from the car, and Vania's sister-in-law, his mom and myself sorted through the jars and shredded cloth. And then we heard some rumbling. I understood that it wasn’t the sound of a car. The tanks were here. With frightened eyes, the men grabbed Molotov cocktails and ran into the street. I felt that a little more of this and I would pass out from fear. I heard those tanks, their tracks. I heard them clanking on the road, reminiscent of the heavy step of menacing creatures. My heart was jumping out of my chest and pounding madly.

Fighting began outside the town. The streets were filled with smoke, dust and the cries of neighbours who didn’t have basements and asked to be let in. Children cried. I also cried together with the strangers’ children. Vania's mother and Alina, Vania's sister-in-law, reacted very quickly. We were supposed to have dinner, so hot cabbage rolls and butter-and-sprat sandwiches were already on the stove. Hastily, they put water and food in a bag. I couldn’t come to my senses and was standing by the door, with a glass into which they dripped some valerian for me. I should have run to the basement with everyone else, but I couldn't. I was overcome with fear and in a stupor. I thought about my family, who were not with me (they were on the other side of the town), and I was terribly worried about the men who left the yard a minute later. They thought out their plan of action in advance and began to act according to that plan.

By this time, I had recovered from the shock. When I did go down to the basement, I saw frightened little children there. They were shaking and crying. The neighbours, who didn’t have a basement, asked Vania's family for shelter and came here with their children. I saw little blue eyes first, and then the tiny girl herself. She looked like she was no more than six months old. I love children very much, so I immediately sat down next to her and started to entertain her. Everyone around was discussing the situation, but my attention was entirely on the little Nikusha. I grabbed the children’s rattles, keys that were lying on a small table that the men had set up for us, and tried to calm and distract the baby. Shots, explosions and people's screams could be heard from somewhere on the street. I still remember those frightened little eyes, I remember the two bottom teeth that had just erupted. I remember the smile that appeared on her face when we managed to cheer her up. And so two hours and forty eight minutes had passed since the beginning of that horror.

I burst into tears when I heard the familiar voices. Our men were back. I hardly ever felt such mixed emotions. I cried, I was happy that they were alive and ran to hug them. Then I was shaking with my whole body, but I still don't understand whether it was from fear or from joy. I wanted to know what was happening over there, and at the same time, I just wanted the peace that I’d always felt in the arms of my boyfriend.

And then Vania's dad shouted:

“Everyone, to the basement now, they are on our street!”

I stood motionless, while tears streamed down my cheeks. I wanted to run far away from that reality. The men took me down to the basement. They kissed us and left.

Until the morning I sat in a corner of the damp basement and cried. When I got completely exhausted, I managed to fall asleep, but from time to time I was awakened by gunshots and people's screams. And I cried again, and then fell asleep again, and so on in a circle until the morning. In the morning, I woke up from loud conversations, and saw our men again. I was happy more than ever to finally hug my boyfriend again. “Thank god, they are back!” was the only thought in my head.

Then finally we were all able to get out of the basement. I hoped that everything was over, although I understood that everything was just beginning.

“Girls, everything is very serious…”, Vania's father started the conversation.

We listened carefully and froze in anticipation.

“Part of the convoy was destroyed, the other part went to Snihurivka, and the rest are wandering around the city. People died, the downtown is gone...” He sat down on a chair, he looked down and wiped his sweaty forehead.

Vania and his brother, stone-faced, stood silently at the kitchen doorway.

I cast scary eyes over everyone present and then I heard my own voice:

“People died? Who…died?”

That's how I found out about everything that happened that night. Casualties, destruction, the town in fear. We decided to act. Vania, together with his brother and father, took on the task of blocking one of the streets to create an obstacle for unwanted guests. The women and I decided to organize the basement where neighbours and children could hide during an enemy attack. The feeling of fear remained, but we supported each other and it helped us stay calm.

I always had my phone in my hands. I was hoping to see a call from dad. He was in Mariupol. I managed to connect to the internet every now and then, I always had news open in the Telegram mobile app. The pain was tearing me apart. “Dad, what are you going through there?” We figured out the time when the shelling was the most intense, and whenever there was a several-hour break, Vania and I always tried to go and see my mom. She knew more about my dad and the situation in combat zones. The news was always disappointing, but dad always kept up a fighting spirit and positivity: “Family, everything will be fine, we will definitely win, we will kick out all the foes from our territory.” I never doubted his words, I believed him the most.

Time flew very quickly, and we began to lose track of the hours and days. The walls of the basement became our witnesses, we shared our memories, and tried to cheer each other up. The children who were with us surprised us with their endurance and courage. We tried to find entertainment for them, while a sense of powerlessness, uncertainty and fear for the future grew inside of us.

As time passed, we started to stay in the basement overnight less often, there was a feeling that everything was coming to an end. Even inside the house, we never took off our warm clothes. It was unbearable. I dreamed of taking it all off, taking off those clothes that were soaked with pain, tears and worries, and that made my whole body itchy. Vania wouldn't let me. But one night I took off all the clothes. And fell asleep like a baby. How little it took to make me happy!

Early in the morning, I woke up hearing Vania's screaming: “It’s coming!” And then I was thrown from the bed by a shock wave. It was a Russian aircraft, dropping aerial bombs that killed people, destroyed people's destinies and remained in the memory of Bashtanka residents forever. Covering my face with my hands, I lay in a stupor for a few more seconds, until Vania ran up and picked me up, handed me clothes on his way... the same clothes that I dared to take off, and that I kept on for a very long time after that morning. Panic began. “Mom, how is my mom… and my sister, dad… are they all right?” I was very worried about my family at that moment, because I imagined the consequences of the bombing but didn’t know where it hit.

Grabbing all the clothes we could, we threw them down to the basement, and got fully dressed in there. Each of us was restless, each was shocked, each was silent and immersed in their thoughts. We didn't know what to do next. The windows were blown out by the shock wave, and it was freezing outside. There was no water, electricity or gas, because everything was destroyed by the “Russian world”. They had reached people's homes now. The homes that Ukrainians built with their own hands all their lives, the homes in which whole generations were born, the homes in which we put our hearts and souls.

A shot... the third... the fifth. It was Grad artillery systems shelling us from occupied Snihurivka. We had become very good at ascertaining such things after two weeks of living in those conditions.

Everyone got down to the floor and covered their heads with their hands, Vania covered me with his body. It was terrible, I heard how the shells flew right over our heads. I heard the houses collapsing, heard the alarm that went off in Vania's car. It was at that moment that I said goodbye to life, holding Vania tightly. Closing my eyes, I saw the faces of my mom, my sister and my dad. My heart was beating so fast that it seemed it was going break into small pieces.

Each explosion pierced me from within, it hurt badly.

Seconds seemed long, like hours, eight minutes of non-stop explosions and… finally silence. However, I could still hear the shots and explosions in my head, there was no silence there.

The men immediately went upstairs. The summer outdoor shower was destroyed, the windows were shattered by the shock wave, and there was a pile of debris at the gate. Ten houses away from us, a town district was completely destroyed, houses, apartments, a park—destroyed. People were screaming in the streets, children were crying, elderly people fell on their knees and held their heads in despair and grief. It was from that moment that I felt anger towards the whole “Russian world”. I started to hate everyone, I cursed everyone, I didn’t wish the worst for them, because there is nothing more terrible than genocide. The terrible days dragged on for eternity, when there were multiple explosions in a row. We were no longer human, we became shadows of our former selves, our lives were ruled by fear.

Morning. Explosions. The damp basement again, a glass of valerian on the table again. That morning, I heard the most terrifying words of the entire period of the full-scale invasion from Vania:

“Pack your things quickly, everything you need, and go with Alina to Poland, I will drive you to the border.”

I was speechless. My heart sank.

“Are you kidding me? I'm not going, I'd rather die, but I won't go anywhere from here by myself. Do you understand that I have a mother and a sister here? And how am I going to communicate with dad? How will he call me in Poland?”

“It can't go on like this, Katya, you shouldn't live like this, you shouldn't suffer through this.”

I cry even harder. Vania runs into the house and starts packing my things. I take them out. He scolds me and puts them back into the travel bag. I start getting hysterical, I accept the fact that I have to go, but I can’t think about anything but my family, I think about how my mother will react, I think about my sister. Will I see them again? Vania understands that I can’t calm down, he takes my hand in his warm palm and says: “We will see each other again, you will return home, don't worry. Everything will be fine, I promise.” Everything happened very quickly, there was no time for anything, I begged Vania to stop by where my mom lived, I couldn’t just leave town and not say goodbye to my family.

            Driving up to my gate, I saw my mom on the doorstep, she rushed to hug me. I hugged her so tightly, as if I knew it would be the last time. She cried so hard she began to choke on her tears.

“Mom, I'm going to Poland.”

A minute later I was completely broken, and after ten minutes, the person leaving the town was no longer me. It was a devastated person who lived but didn’t breathe, or breathed but didn’t live. I felt that I was supposed to be there, be a part of the beating heart of this place, and at the same time, it was impossible to stay. I had always dreamed of traveling abroad, and Poland was already waiting for me. The dream that once seemed so vibrant and realistic had now lost its colour and its power.

Leaving the shelled town, I felt broken, not free, and life seemed empty, like a palette devoid of bright colours. Crossing the border, I felt my heart shrink, as I was losing the last connections with the past. On the other side of the border lay uncertainty, and my heart was clutched in the arms of pain.