This summer has scorched me completely. A year ago, I stood on the "administrative border" with Crimea. My documentary character, the Crimean Tatar Rustem, was stepping closer and closer to the checkpoint. It was the final scene and it seems that the world would stop and explode in a second. A year after, I look at the mountain range, embraced by frozen clouds. The silence is so nervous that you want to turn up the volume. Inside my breast – silent explosions – the first, second, third. This is how Grad-missile works. You ask "Did you have lunch?", but I have explosions – from heart to stomach. I don't know how should I answer. A rocket flew into the school in Druzhkivka. I’ve been running nearby for dozens times. News in chats about our guys – wounded. Tomorrow is September 1 and children go to school. 261 school buildings throughout the country were completely destroyed. This is how Grad-missile works. – Are you also waiting for Alexey? Also to Donetsk? – And for how much? – 350 euros. – Hm, but I pay 400 euros. They said that it is possible to reach Donetsk in 12 hours through Zaporizhzhia. For 650 bucks." These sums sound crazy. Driver Alexey has wobbly gestures, an unfashionable shirt, a silver cross and a dreadful job. I wonder if he is praying or just wearing (carrying?) a cross. Usually there is a difference. Both women are disappearing inside the bus. One of them is accompanied by two kids and two other women. The little kid is running around the parking spot. The older boy starts to cry and he is comforted. "A son", – sharp and painful thought. I find myself again in the middle of someone's sorrow and someone's decisions. A son has a blue-yellow bracelet and such red eyes. I have the same eyes, from time to time. "one morning we will wake up and there will be no war". There are a lot of unknowns in this sentence. "One morning" (when?) "We" (will we even be together? no guarantees, honey). "Will wake up" (if we are alive). "There will be no war" (I text this and my eyes are getting red). Tomorrow is autumn, but February is not over yet. A portrait by @roman.matkov in Avdiivka on assignment for @spiegelmagazin with @thoreschroeder_