Страшные истории на ночь-Контроль

Summary

A 17-year-old looks back on the night he killed his three friends—and the choices that led to it.

After drinking with Zhenya, Artyom, and Lisa, he gives in to their urging and secretly takes his father’s SUV. He is inexperienced, slightly drunk, and driving on wet, foggy roads. At first, he keeps his speed low, but when his friends mock him and push him to go faster, he accelerates, grows anxious, and makes a dangerous lane change. The car skids and crashes. He survives because he was wearing a seat belt; his three friends do not.

The aftermath is devastating. He is sentenced to prison, his father is beaten by the victims’ relatives and later dies of a heart attack, and his mother rejects him. When he returns to the village, people still regard him as a murderer.

At the cemetery, he angrily blames his friends—especially Lisa, whose approval he had wanted—and says they took advantage of his weak character. But he also admits the central truth: he was the one driving, and he should have refused them rather than risk lives to seem cool. The story’s grim idea of “control” is both literal and personal: he lost control of the car after first surrendering control of his own decisions.

Characters

• The narrator
• His friends: Zhenya, Artyom, and Lisa
• His father and mother
• The victims’ relatives
• The police