Maxim Mazhorin - The struggle between good and evil

Another friend, whose name was Victor, was set out to war in one of the flash points. He wrote that if he was killed, then let his letter be kept for his son, whom he did not pay attention to. When his son called him to play, Victor repelled him and found all sorts of different reasons to avoid spending time with his son and his wife. He gave his child a miss and irritated that he did not allow him to watch movies and interfered with other things, asking him to play with his son. He wrote that he could never forget the moment when he was digging the earth with a spade, and his son, coming from behind, began to pull father’s spade toward himself to help him to dig the earth. But Victor, turning around, pushed his son away, who then fell to the ground. Victor looked at his son lying on the ground and said: “What are you trying to do, do not bother!” Victor could not imagine that this would be seen from the window by his wife. When Victor and his son came home, he embraced his son and looked into his wife’s eyes and said: “We had a very great time together.” But at that moment his son became very sad.

Victor wrote a lot about the fact that love is much appreciated at war. Once a soldier said, wiping away his tears: “Everything turns out strangely, at home I was constantly offended and was angry with my family and other people, and now I’m crying and regretting it, I’m ready to hug them all day long and ask them for forgiveness for all resentment! I am ready to tell them every day that I love them!”

The soldiers ran for letters faster than to the chow hall. Many of them said that they are ready to sacrifice much to touch their loved ones and relatives, to their mothers, wives and children. In his letter Victor said that at first it was not customary and it was embarrassing to cry at war. But then, almost everyone cried there.

When the bullets whistled over Victor’s head and he saw his comrades-in-arms fall dead, and others writhing with unbearable pain, he remembered how he ignored his family and thought only about his son and wife at that moment, imagining how they were walking together and enjoy every precious second. Victor had never returned from the war, only memory remained from him, and the only things that remained after him were the letters that he sent to his relatives.

My other friends Vadik and Alyona were happy that they found each other. Every year they went to vacation by the seaside. They took a car, packed their bags and put off on a journey. They loved traveling; especially they liked to drive on night roads. Once, when they were traveling to the sea and had already driven half of their way, another car appeared on a contra-flow lane. There was a serious car accident. They both survived. Alyona got less serious injuries. She had broken both legs, her right hand, four ribs and she got a serious head injury. As for Vadik, he got a spinal fracture. He was forever chained to a wheelchair. When Alyona recovered, she left Vadik for another person. Her love was not true. But at the time of marriage, standing near her sweetheart, she promised to love her husband both in health and in illness. It is evident that for her it was just words. If she really loved her husband, she would never leave him. Because love has no timeframes and tolerates absolutely everything.

Another friend of mine, whose name is Angelina, married a very handsome and a very rich guy. This guy was glad that he got such a companion of life. But his mother could not say the same about her. She did not like the choice of her son. And she did not want to see this girl near her son. His mother had two girls in mind who would be perfect for her son as she thought, and who would not mind marrying him. And she would be happy to marry her son with one of them! His mother was a friend of those girls’ parents. His mother said: “Rich, handsome, intelligent, and married a simple girl from the village, I cannot believe it!”

One day it happened that his mother was very ill. She was diagnosed with cancer. As a result, she withstanded several surgeries, and she needed care. Her rich friends rarely called her and practically did not visit their seriously ill friend. They simply wrote her off in their minds, what could not have been said about Angelina. The sick woman did not like it when she came home and began to help her with household chores. She could not huff her out of the house, because she loved and respected her son and understood that she was his wife.

She simply did not have the strength to say something against it and show her dissatisfaction. But time passed. Angelina and her sick mother-in-law were getting closer and closer to each other. The lady found out that one of the girls she recommended to her son became a drug addict, and the other, having taken all her money from her husband, left him. When she found out about this, she walked on her weak legs to the kitchen where Angelina was cooking, and asked: “Angelina, do you really love my son?” Angelina answered: “I really love your son very much, as well as you!” The sick woman answered:" You know Angelina, we are very rich and respected people, but at the same time we are poor! We do not have what you have. We do not have love. We have everything except love. I am glad that you are the wife of my only son, and I ask God to give you a lot of children and let them please you and remember your grandmother who understood much thanks to their mother. Forgive me, please, Angelina, I cannot express in words my guilt towards you. Forgive me! If you cannot erase all my insults from memory, then at least tell me, please, that from this moment we will be best friends. And just say that you forgive me! Hearing this, I will feel much better.” Angelina, hearing this, happily replied: “I forgive you with pleasure, and now we are best friends.”

Tears began to drop down from the eyes of a sick rich woman’s, and she went, snapping along the corridor, to her room. A few months later she died. The last few months of her life this woman talked only with Angelina, who did not leave her even for a minute. The sick woman did not want to see anyone at home. When she said something to Angelina, she had never been in a pique with her weak spots. On the contrary, she received only healing for her inner world from Angelina. Before the lady died, she said to her son and Angelina: “Be happy and never offend each other. Forget the word ‘I’, now there’s only ‘YOU’! Love each other very much. Whatever happens, keep on loving!”

That’s how the lives of people with whom I communicated and made friends have come about. Last time I also thought about one person, namely about my classmate, who moved to another city, when we all studied in primary classes.

Once at school time I saw that the guys from our class goofed on one of our classmates. They shut him in a closet and did not release him for several minutes. The only boy who did not take part in that heartless madness was the same boy, whom I remembered a few days ago. He approached the boys from our class and said: “Why are you doing this? After all, he really feels unpleasant and he is very offended, so, you’d better be pitiful to him, because he has a mother who loves him and doesn’t want you to shut him in the closet and mock him.”

I then thought, is this wonderful, pure, merciful and true love really lives only in one boy from our class? This boy was different from the rest guys. He studied well, never offended anyone, had a good memory, always greeted everyone and righted the oppressed. He was the only of the kind. His gaze differed from the ones of the rest guys. His gaze combined: love, mercy, pity, compassion, romance, meditation, boldness, subtle psychology, sacrifice for the sake of society and a will to justice. I know nothing more about his fate, since after the third class he moved with his family to another city. At school, I’ve never made a pal of with him. But I do not know why. Perhaps, this is not possible to explain. I just remembered about this boy. Why did I remember him? I do not know! Maybe it’s love! Or maybe it’s naive and funny! I’ll try to find him in social networks. If he is not there, then I’ll try to find him some other way. I really want to find him. I can hardly stand his gaze if he is not married or has become a drug addicted or an evil psychopath, a drunkard, a homosexual or a criminal. Who knows, maybe I made was mistake with him. Maybe he transformed from a loving, sweet boy to an evil, irritable, proud, grinning and unhappy man. Because I know that people can change. Good people can transform into evil, and evil can become good. But what kind of person is he that does not have a constant good core in himself and can transform from good into evil? After all, every evil thought, deed and every word must be repelled and chased away, and you must not be allowed to multiply this evil in our life.