Sometimes people ask me, “Do you still remember the worst attack?”
And I always say yes.
Because how could you forget something like that?
How could you forget the sound of death flying right above your roof.
The moment you truly thought your life was over?
It wasn’t yesterday. It wasn’t even last week.
But I remember it as if it just happened a minute ago.
Because memories like that don’t fade - they live inside you, like broken glass under the skin.
That night, shaheds came again.
At first, it was the usual sound in the distance - that slow, ugly buzzing that always makes your stomach twist.
You try to tell yourself it’s far away,
that it won’t come here.
But it keeps getting louder.
And then it’s right above you -screaming, vibrating, tearing the air apart.
I will never forget how low it was flying.
I could feel it - the vibration in my chest, in the walls, in my bones.
And in that second, I thought: It’s going to fall on me.
No time to run. No time to breathe.
Just that one thought - that this is the end.
People always think that in moments like this, they would pray, cry, scream.
But the truth is - you don’t do anything.
You just freeze.
You listen to the sound that might kill you,
and every second feels endless.
You can’t control your body.
You can only wait.
When it passed, I didn’t even notice I was crying.
I just lay there, staring at the ceiling, hearing my heartbeat louder than the silence.
Then, minutes later, came the ballistic.
The explosion felt like the sky ripped open.
Not a sound - a force.
You don’t hear it; you feel it - under your ribs, behind your eyes, inside your head like someone hit your soul.
The windows rattled, the cat hid under the bed,
and I remember thinking, maybe this is what dying sounds like - not one single explosion, but a whole night of them.
One after another.
Until the morning comes,
and you realize you survived.
Again.
But that night, many didn’t.
In Kyiv, shaheds and missiles hit high-rise buildings while people were still sleeping.
Families were torn apart in seconds.
Children who went to bed hugging their toys never woke up.
More than thirty people were injured and many died - burned, crushed, suffocated under ruins that used to be home.
I can’t stop thinking about them.
Did they feel it coming?
Did they know it was their last night?
And were the rest of us lucky to survive at all or just given more time to live in fear, waiting for the next tragedy?
Because that’s what this war does -it makes survival feel like both a blessing and a curse.
You wake up thankful and terrified at the same time.
I went outside later.
The air smelled of smoke, dust, and something else - something that no one ever describes, but everyone here knows.
The smell of death.
Once you smell it, you never forget.
It’s not even about blood or fire
it’s the smell of what’s gone.
That’s why I can’t forget that night.
Because it lives in me.
Every time I hear a siren, every time I see a drone light in the sky,
my body remembers before my mind does.
I can’t forget because forgetting would mean betraying those who didn’t survive that night.
And I remember too much.
Now, when new attacks come, I already know what to expect.
But knowing doesn’t make it easier.
It just makes it heavier.
Because every time you hear the same sounds,
you feel the same fear again.
The body remembers what it’s like to wait for death.
And sometimes, when I wake up too early and the world outside is still dark and silent,
I think about that night.
I think about how close it was.
And how fragile everything still is.
Maybe that’s why I keep writing.
Because when you put the pain into words, it stops rotting inside you.
Because surviving isn’t just about living - it’s about remembering.
Even when it hurts.
Especially when it hurts.
That’s the night I thought it was my last one.
And maybe that’s why I keep holding on to every small light, every morning, every breath.
Because the world tried to take them from me,
and I’m still here.
P.S. This morning I boiled water on a gas burner again, made cofee, and watched the steam rise in the cold air.
It tasted simple.
It tasted like survival.