All summer in one day
Ray Bradbury
- Are you ready?
- Yes!
- Already?
- Soon!
- Do scientists know right? Will this really happen today?
- Look, look, you can see for yourself!
Crowding together like flowers and weeds in a garden, all mixed up, children
tried to look outside - where was the sun hidden there? It was pouring rain. He poured
without ceasing for seven years in a row; thousands and thousands of days, from morning to night, without
for a break, the rain poured, made noise, drummed, rang with crystal splashes,
poured down in continuous streams, so that waves went around, flooding
sushi islands. Thousands of forests were felled by showers, and thousands of times they grew
fell again and again under the weight of the waters. This is how it has always been here, on
Venus, and the class was full of children whose fathers and mothers had arrived
to build and inhabit this wild rainy planet.
- Stops! Stops!
- Yes, yes!
Margot stood apart from them, from all these guys who were just
They knew that it was always raining, raining, raining. They were all nine years old, and if
there was a day seven years ago when the sun finally came out,
it seemed to the astonished world for an hour, they did not remember this. Sometimes at night
Margo heard them tossing and turning, remembering, and knew: in their dreams they see and
they remember gold, a bright yellow pencil, a coin so big that
you can buy the whole world. She knew they seemed to remember the warmth,
when the face and the whole body flashes - arms, legs, trembling fingers. And then
they wake up - and the rain is drumming again, ringing sounds are falling endlessly
transparent beads on the roof, on the path, on the garden and forest, and dreams fly away like
smoke.
The day before they spent the whole day reading in class about the sun. How yellow is it?
just like lemon, and so hot. And they wrote little stories about him and
poetry.
It seems to me that the sun is a flower,
It blooms for only one hour.
Margot composed these poems and read them quietly to the silent
class. And outside the windows it was raining.
- Well, you didn’t make it up yourself! - one boy shouted.
“No, by myself,” said Margot, “by myself.”
- William! - the teacher stopped the boy.
But that was yesterday. And now the rain had subsided, and the children were crowding around the big
windows with thick glass.
- Where is the teacher?
- He'll come now.
- Hurry up, otherwise we will miss everything!
They were spinning in one place, like a colorful, restless carousel.
Margot stood alone at a distance. She was weak, and it seemed like once upon a time
she got lost and wandered for a long, long time in the rain, and the rain washed everything off her
the colors: blue eyes, pink lips, red hair - everything has faded. She was
like an old faded photograph taken from a forgotten album, and
she was still silent, and if she happened to speak, her voice barely rustled
audible. Now she stood alone on the sidelines and looked at the rain, at
a noisy wet world behind thick glass.
-What are you looking at? - said William. Margot was silent.
- Answer when asked!
William pushed her. But she didn't move; swayed - and that’s all.
Everyone avoids her, doesn’t even look at her. And now they left her alone.
Because she doesn't want to play with them in the echoing tunnels of that
basement cities. If someone insults her and starts running, she will only
he will look after you in bewilderment, but will not catch up. And when they all
the class sings songs about how good it is to live in the world and how fun it is to play
different games, she barely moves her lips. Only when they sing about the sun, about
summer, she also quietly sings along, looking out the tear-stained windows.
Well, her biggest crime, of course, is that she flew
here from Earth only five years ago, and she remembers the sun, remembers what
it, the sun, and the sky she saw in Ohio when she was four years old. A
they - they live on Venus all their lives; when was the last time it shined here?
the sun, they were only two years old, and they had long since forgotten what it was like, and
what color, and how hot it warms. But Margot remembers.
“It’s as big as a copper,” she said one day and closed her eyes.
- It's not true! - the guys shouted.
“It’s like fire in the hearth,” said Margot.
- You're lying, you're lying, you don't remember! - they shouted to her.
But she remembered and, quietly stepping aside, began to look out the window,
to which streams of rain ran down. And once, a month ago, when everyone was taken to
shower, she never wanted to get under the shower and, covering the top of her head,
clutching her ears with her palms, she shouted - don’t let the water pour on your head! And after
Moreover, she had a strange, vague feeling: she was not like everyone else. AND
the other children felt it too and avoided her.
They said that next year her father and mother would take her back to Earth
- it will cost them many thousands of dollars, but otherwise she, apparently,
will wither away. And for all these sins, big and small, she was disliked in the class.
This Margot is disgusting, it’s disgusting that she’s so pale and sick and so
thin, and always silent and waiting for something, and will probably fly to Earth...
- Get out! - William pushed her again. -What are you still waiting for?
Then for the first time she turned around and looked at him. And it was in the eyes
you can see what she's waiting for. The boy became enraged.
- There’s no point in you hanging around here! - he shouted. - You won’t wait, nothing
will! Margo moved her lips silently.
- Nothing will happen! - William shouted. - It's just for fun, we'll
played. He turned to the others. - After all, nothing will happen today,
right?
Everyone looked at him in bewilderment, and then they understood, and laughed, and
They shook their heads: that’s right, nothing will happen!
- But... - Margo looked helplessly. - After all, today is the same
day,” she whispered. - Scientists predicted, they say, they are
know... The sun...
- They played it, they played it! - William said and suddenly grabbed her.
- Hey, guys, let's lock her in the closet while the teacher is away!
“Don’t,” Margot said and backed away.
Everyone rushed to her, grabbed her and dragged her - she fought back, then
asked, then began to cry, but they dragged her along the tunnel to the far room,
They pushed me into the closet and bolted the door. The door was shaking: Margot was banging
punched her with her fists and threw her whole body at her. Screams were muffled.
The guys stood, listened, and then smiled and walked away - and just
just in time: the teacher appeared at the end of the tunnel.
- Are you ready, children? - She looked at her watch.
- Yes! - the guys responded.
- Is everyone here?
- Yes!
The rain was subsiding. They crowded around a huge massive door. Rain
stopped. As if in the middle of a movie about avalanches, hurricanes, tornadoes,
volcanic eruptions, something happened to the sound, the device deteriorated - noise
became duller, and then stopped completely, the blows, roars, and rumbles fell silent
thunder... And then someone pulled out the film and replaced it with a calm
slide - a peaceful tropical picture. Everything is frozen - he won’t breathe, he won’t
will move. There was such a huge, incredible silence, as if you
plugged your ears or you went completely deaf. The children raised their hands to the
ears. The crowd broke up, everyone stood on their own. The door moved aside and
they smelled of the freshness of a world frozen in anticipation.
And the sun appeared. It glowed, bright as bronze, and it was very
big. And the sky around sparkled like bright blue tiles. And the jungle
so they glowed in the sun's rays, and the children, waking up, ran out screaming into
spring
- Just don't run too far! - the teacher shouted after him. -
Remember, you only have two hours. Otherwise you won’t have time to take cover!
But they no longer heard, they ran and threw back their heads, and the sun
stroked their cheeks like a warm iron; they took off their jackets and the sun
it burned their bare hands.
- This is better than our artificial suns, right?
- Clear, better!
They no longer ran, but stood in the middle of the jungle, which completely covered
Venus and grew, grew rapidly, incessantly, right before our eyes. The jungle was
like a flock of octopuses, giant tentacles stretched towards the sky in bunches
fleshy branches, swayed, instantly covered with flowers - after all, it’s spring
It's so short here. They were gray, like ash, like rubber, these thickets,
because they had not seen the sun for many years. They were the color of stones, and
the color of cheese, and the color of ink, and there were plants the color of the moon.
The guys laughed and rushed at the continuous growth, as if at a living elastic
the mattress, which sighed under them, creaked and sprang. They rushed between
trees, slipped and fell, pushed, played hide and seek and tag, but
the main thing is to look at the sun again and again, squinting, until they start to flow
tears, and stretched their hands to the golden radiance and to the unprecedented blue, and inhaled
this amazing freshness, and listened, listened to the silence that embraced them
like the sea, blissfully calm, soundless and motionless. They are for everything
watched and enjoyed everything. And then, like animals escaping from
deep holes, they again ran frantically around, running and screaming. A whole hour
They were running around and couldn’t calm down. And suddenly... In the middle of the merry running
one girl screamed loudly and pitifully. Everyone stopped. Girl
extended her hand, palm up.
“Look,” she said and shuddered. - Oh, look!
Everyone slowly came closer. On an open palm, right in the middle,
There was a large round raindrop lying. The girl looked at her and
started crying. The children silently looked at the sky.
- Oh...
Rare cold drops fell on the nose, on the cheeks, on the lips. The sun has darkened
foggy haze. A cold wind blew. The guys turned and went to their
house-basement, their hands hung limply, they no longer smiled.
Thunder rumbled, and the children, in fright, pushing each other, began to run,
like leaves driven by a hurricane. Lightning flashed - ten miles away,
then five, a mile, half a mile. And the sky turned black, as if it had come all at once
impenetrable night. They stood for a minute on the threshold of the deep shelter, and
then the rain started pouring down. Then the door was closed, and everyone stood and listened as
tons are falling from the sky with a deafening noise, streams of water - without clearance,
without end.
- And it will be like this again for seven whole years?
- Yes. Seven years. And suddenly someone screamed:
- And Margot?
- What?
- We locked her, she’s still sitting in the closet.
- Margo...
They froze, as if their feet were frozen to the floor. We looked at each other and
looked away. We looked outside the window - it was raining there, pouring stubbornly, tirelessly.
They didn't dare look into each other's eyes. Everyone's faces became serious,
pale. Everyone looked down, some looked at their hands, some stared at the floor.
- Margo...
Finally one girl said:
- Well, what are we?...
Nobody moved.
“Let’s go...” the girl whispered.
They walked slowly down the corridor to the cold sound of rain. Under the roar of the storm
and the peals of thunder crossed the threshold and entered that far room, furious
blue lightning illuminated their faces. They slowly approached the closet and stood at
doors.
It was quiet outside the door. Slowly, slowly they pulled back the bolt and
Margot was released.
========================================
Ray Bradbury. All summer in one day.
© Copyright Ray Bradbury. All Summer in a Day.
© Copyright Nora Gal, translation