Ловушка для Мыслеформы. A Trap for a Thought-Form. Премия им. М. Булгакова / M. Bulgakov Award (Билингва: Rus/Eng)

With a sinking heart, I pulled the Left Door towards me and took a step inside.

There were many people there, pacing back and forth without noticing me. No one asked my entrance ticket, although the entrance wasn’t free of charge.

I floated to the coffee shop and sat down at a table next to a sprawling giant black cat. The Cat scanned me carefully and greeted me, meanwhile people came and went away, paying no attention to us at all in the place where the Past and the Present – and the Future? – were merging together.

«Do I no longer exist among all these people?»

Suddenly, the man, who had invited me to come in, appeared next to me.

I stood up and touched his hand. He turned around. I silently looked into his eyes. Unlike other people, he noticed me (as, indeed, the Cat) and said hello. I held out my book. The man read the title and shuddered involuntarily.

«This is my gift for the Museum,» I explained. «And the book of poems, „The Moon Cat“, is for you.»

I was in a hurry to leave my mark before everyone, including that man, would stop noticing me.

He disappeared and reappeared with his book, handing it to me. I opened the book to a random page, and the title of the story caught my eye, «The GLOVES that fell from the Sky». I shuddered, too.

We sat at a table across from each other. In silence. He got my «Magic» and «The Moon Cat», and I got his «Gloves». He worked in the Mansion as Guardian of the Portal. Definitely, all these people around existed in some other dimension, where there were neither me nor the Guardian, who still reminded me of Roman and Ray.

I returned «the Gloves» to the author, asking him to sign it for me.

«Hmm… today is a magical date,» writing it under the dedication, the Guardian said either to me or to himself. Dates and numbers had some meaning to him.

«Has SHE come back?!» the Guardian’s mind raced.

«Show me the Mansion, please!» I asked him mentally.

The Guardian stood up from the table and held out his hand to me.

«To the right is the Theater, where our performances take place,» the Guardian looked at me with genuine interest, «but I prefer to show you something… unusual. You see, extremely strange stories constantly happen in this Mansion.