It was a summer like any other summer for Anna, but something extraordinary happened. She was ten years old. Grandma and Anna took their yearly trip to Ukraine. In the middle of the night they got off the train in Vinnytsia. Warm air was full of fireflies. Grandma counted the luggage. All of the bags smelled of citrus. Their relatives and friends loved the fruit from Leningrad. Grandma would have Anna stand with some of the luggage and would move some of it closer to the train station building. It was painted white and blue years ago. Some of the places on the walls had paint peeling off. You couldn't see it in the dark but Anna had been there before. They were going to spend the night at Mother and Child's Room. It was a place where parents could stay with their children, in case they had more traveling to do. There was a huge auditorium with lots of beds. They were arranged in rows. You could see the street lights form the giant window. And you could hear a gentle noise from the tracks coming from the slightly open vent. They walked up the stairs to the second floor and headed to the receptionist's desk. There was a lamp on the desk and the light from it illuminated the front of the room. Grandma showed her passport and Anna's certificate of birth. The lady walked them to their bed. " Let's sleep head to toe," grandma proposed. The sheets were freshly washed and pressed. Clean, crisp smell of laundry detergent and starch. Anna loved that scent. She buried her nose in the bedding and couldn't stop enjoying how fresh it was. Grandma was laying very still trying not to disturb Anna. But the girl was restless. It was quiet for a long while. Then someone started coughing and sneezing. Sometimes a baby would cry gently and her mom would start comforting her. Anna was inspecting grandma's feet.The light was coming from the window and was hitting grandma in the way that Anna could see her clearly. Grandma had thick toe nails. Yellowish . They even had a green hue when the light from the street was touching them. Very dry skin. She could have used some of mom's Nivea. But grandma was not into all that. She used to say that beauty was on the inside. Sure, but her feet could have used some moisturizing. Anna's thoughts were interrupted by an announcement that the next train was coming and would be here for three minutes. She inhaled. Warm southern air with hints of Acacia, Lily of the Valley, and some other flowers she didn't know was coming from the vent. She could hear the train approaching, stopping, and people getting off and on. Alla Pugacheva was singing " ..Kak vse , kak vse.." in the distance. Someone coughed again. Anna looked at grandma's face. Grandma was very set on having a good night sleep. Anna could see that grandma was not sleeping either but her eyes were shut. Anna knew that grandma thought that you were still getting a good night rest as long as you didn't open your eyes. Anna thought about how she would spend three months with her summer friends. How it would be hot every day! Unlike spending a cold summer in Leningrad. Where the sun shines but it's not warm enough and it's raining every day. How she would eat apricots. How they would be fuzzy on the outside and how they would be soft and warm on the inside! How their juice would run down her chin .How she would come home for dinner and grandma would say," Why is this child always dirty? It's a little devil, not a girl." No school and no homework for the entire summer! Just playing outside with her summer friends all day long! Meanwhile , another family arrived and started registering, settling down, and ,yes, coughing. She could not sleep like this. She was laying in bed and listening to all the noises. Watching the light coming from the registration desk and the window. All the noise coming from the tracks. Listening, watching, and feeling so happy. What she didn't know was that the following summer Aunt Clara would teach her how to measure someone's blood pressure. She would be mesmerized by hearing another person's heartbeat in her ears. 'Lub- dub, lub-dub.' She would measure Aunt Clara's blood pressure ten times a day. Until grandma would say, " you need to go play with your friends now", and " the apparatus is not a toy." She would tell grandma, " but Aunt Clara has hypertension and her measurements fluctuate!" Grandma would take the sphygmomanometer away from her and put it on the upper shelf of the cupboard with the " good candy' for the guests." Anna would pout and go play with her friends until dinner. She didn't know that one day they would be all playing cards and Tanya, her friend who she had known all her life would say that all the people from Leningrad are stuck up and stupid. She didn't know she would push Tanya and Tanya would shove her back hard. She would fall in some glass. Cut her finger. She didn't know she would end up with the scar for the rest of her life. She didn't know the next day she would come to play all fixed up and a neighbor would bring a huge plate with raspberries with a heap of sugar on top. Everyone would be eating the sugared raspberries.They would burst with fresh flavor in your mouth, the sugar hard on your teeth. Everyone would admire how big and bulky Anna's bandage was. And lastly, she didn't know that one of her friends would pretend to get a closer look at her finger and then all of the sudden he would plant a kiss on her raspberry sugared lips. Her very first kiss.