300 years

Far or far, three thousand kilometers from the capital, in the sun-flowered working village, there lived a little girl Valya and had her best friend Luba.

The girls were in second grade and all eight years as long as they remembered, they were strong friends.
But one day a trouble happened - the beloved father moved the train (drunken fell asleep on the rails)
The whole world was buried and here they realized that Lubba was left completely alone, her mother died during childbirth, so the girl lived with her father in a barracks.
Luckily, it was not time to send Lubu to the children's home, she found a aunt - a father's sister from Leningrad itself.
And while the girl was waiting for her aunt, she lived in the house of Valy’s friend.
A month later, my aunt went on vacation and came for a day and a half. She gathered her niece on a long road, stayed overnight, and in the morning, thanked Valy's parents, ticked out Leningrad's address, sat down with a snorkeling Люба on the trail and, as it turned out, took her forever to the distant Leningrad.

Walia was reluctant. She cried all day. How is her love alone in a strange stone Leningrad? It’s so crazy away – five days on the train.

In Valy, in the whole white world, there was only one real girlfriend - Masha, Masha was a huge, dull turtle, the size of a good bowl. She constantly, with knowledge of the matter, chewed the apples and, without blinking, stared at the girl, only - it helped little.
But the trouble does not come alone, on one beautiful, sunny morning, Valu got a new tragedy - Masha disappeared, and after all, she would never swallow her nose even in an open pot, she was not so stupid to crawl out on the street, and Alabai - Sharik, would not let go, would curl the run back.

The girl turned the whole house, but the turtle was nowhere, only a bowl of water was left.
For a week, the whole street heard as from morning to late evening, Valya walked on the sidewalk bushes and canyons and all cried: "Masha! The little girl! Go to me. Where are you! I have courage. Masha, Masha, go home!”
Valerie’s parents were terribly upset at this time. As it turned out many years later, this mother took Masha on the bus, to the other end of the village, kilometers in six, and there and released on the lawn. At first, my mom always disliked this healthy, dull turtle and called it a stone, and that morning, my mom stumbled on Masha in the dark, fell and barely broke her head - because of this and psychanula, and quietly got rid of Masha. Then, of course, I regretted it was too late. Even to that grass, I was looking, but where there...
Valya fell into complete despair, because in addition to the disappearance of her last girlfriend, with her disappeared the hope to contact Anyway.
The whole trouble is that Valya, like any little girl, unconditionally believed in good tales - this played a wicked joke with her: After breaking up with Any, Valya for several days dealt with the Leningrad address on paper and a hundred times a day, hid it and hid it, so as not to lose it, but suddenly looked at Maska and here the girl came to the head a simple and brilliant idea - but after all, the turtles live for three hundred years.
This is where 100% guarantee, reliability and stability! Without long thinking, Valya snorted a chemical pencil and for three centuries wrote an address on a turtle armor.
What are three centuries? A couple of days and neither the turtles you, nor the addresses, nor the paper somewhere stumbled for the unnecessary. Ahhhhhhhhhh...
This is where the poor Walia suffered. Who knows how it doesn’t happen in fairy tales?

The summer passed, the autumn came, and one morning, early in the morning, Valya jumped out with a wallet from home and out... almost came to the postman Maska.
Masha, as nothing happened, was sitting on the doorstep and chewing the apples that were dried on the newspapers, and next to him was the happy Sharik.

It is even difficult to imagine: a huge turtle, a whole summer, a piece of spring and a bit of autumn, went back home through the whole village. (Apparently turtles are called wise not only for the expression of the face) After all, she, the miserable, in addition to the compass, needed to have considerations that you can only walk at night, bypassing dogs, boys and trucks. Valya did not believe her eyes, she hugged and kissed Masha chewing apples, and her mother's heart fell away, on the joys she even began to allow to fold Masha on the table.
But here is the trouble, for the long and dangerous journey, with the machine armor, the rain, almost washed off the entire address of Lubin. The numbers were still more or less read, but the street, or "8th March", although it is unlikely, and maybe "Peace", but it is also unlike. I don’t understand, even cry, and you won’t ask the Woman, she doesn’t know the matter at all.
It was necessary to see how Valin's dad stood on the table, raised the Turtle to the lamp itself, turned it and so and so, through the glasses, studied the letters and sketched: "Mush, don't battle, calm down, and so the hell can't break it up, and you are still shaking!"
And Masha, as a cosmonaut, quietly talked in the air with her legs and absolutely did not feel like a flash with the most important information.
And a couple of days later, unexpectedly, at school, Valino's name received a letter: "Hello Valia, I was waiting for a letter from you, but you for some reason forgot me and I decided to write to our school, I remember where you live, but I don't know your address..."

P.S

After many years and a thousand letters, when Valya had grown up, she still came to Leningrad, found Maratha Street, and finally met with her childhood girlfriend.
Then Valya got married, gave birth to three children, one of which was me... although - it is already quite different...
I call my mom...