In January, the frost around Novomikhaylovsk was so intense that the hoarfrost on the wires sparkled in the sun. Seven-year-old Kirill Timofeev would wake up earlier than his mother’s alarm clock on Fridays—only on that day of the week. The rest of the time, everything went as usual: kindergarten, school, work, stores. But for the boy, Friday was a special day: in the old gray basket that his grandmother had once carried, he carefully collected “gifts”: a loaf of bread, a couple of sausages, an apple, or whatever else he could grab from the kitchen table.
“Are you dragging food again?” grumbled his older brother, Maxim, while brushing his teeth.
“Uh-huh,” Kirill nodded, tightening his grip on the rope handle of the basket.
His mother, Natalia Petrovna, knew about his “excursions,” but didn’t interfere: her son’s nature was stubborn, and questioning him seemed useless. She only set one condition:
“Just don’t go out when it’s dark.”
Kirill would obediently agree, leave after school, and always return before dusk.
The wasteland started right behind the railroad tracks. There used to be a furniture board factory there, but now there were only broken concrete slabs, half-filled trenches, and a few solitary poplars. In winter, this place seemed especially desolate, as if the frost had drained all life from it. People avoided it, saying that sharp metal scraps were hidden under the slabs, and you could get hurt. Also, the pack of stray dogs that roamed there all the time scared away any passersby.
But Kirill would walk to the farthest corner of the wasteland. Behind the pile of slabs, there was a small pit where a board propped open a hatch. It looked like a shelter, resembling a tiny room.
The boy would place the basket down and take out the food.
“Hello, it’s me again,” he whispered, as if someone might hear him.
He would crumble the bread, carefully slice the sausages with an old pocket knife, and arrange everything on a folded newspaper.
At first, he would leave immediately, feeling scared. But after three weeks, he started to stay longer, sitting on a slab, scraping his boots in the snow. After five to ten minutes, a young, ginger dog would appear from the hatch, limping on its back leg. It had somehow survived among the strays. It wouldn’t let the boy come closer than two meters.
Kirill named him Casper.
“Eat, Cas, before others get it,” he whispered. The dog would grab the sausage, retreat to a distance, but its golden eyes no longer showed the same terror as before.
That’s how winter passed: school, letters, multiplication tables, and every Friday— the wasteland and Casper.
By the end of February, a cold snap hit—minus twenty-five. On Friday, a snowstorm began, but Kirill still persuaded his mother to let him go to his “robotics club.” He hid the basket under his jacket. He walked to the wasteland, covering his face with a scarf.
Casper wasn’t visible. The hatch was cold to the touch. Kirill crouched, placed the loaf of bread, and whistled, as his grandfather had taught him. Silence. Then, from deep within, came a faint whimper.
“Casper?”
The snow crept up his collar. The boy decided to call:
“Cas, come out!”
No one appeared. Darkness reigned under the board. Kirill raised his flashlight and directed the beam inside: he couldn’t see the stairs, but there was no snow either. The space was lower than the frozen ground. Evaluating the situation, Kirill gritted his teeth:
“Wait. I’ll be quick.”
He shifted the board, pushed it open with his hands, and, shivering, descended into the hole. There were no stairs, so he had to jump down onto the concrete floor. The flashlight’s beam revealed an old corridor of pipes, rusting from age… and the ginger dog, lying with its injured leg tucked under. The dog opened its eyes. Something was stirring nearby.
Kirill squinted and gasped: under Casper’s belly, two tiny puppies were wriggling! It was their whimpering that Kirill had heard.
“So, you’re a dad now?” the boy asked in surprise.
He placed the flashlight down and sat down. The dog quietly growled—not aggressively, but as a warning.
“Don’t be afraid. I’m feeding you. Now we’ll feed the little ones too.”
The puppies ate with difficulty. Casper grabbed a sausage, chewed it, spat out the mush, and nudged it toward the puppies. Kirill froze: could he do that?
The wind howled above the hatch. The cold pierced to the bone. The boy felt that the dog wouldn’t last much longer. He stood up and touched its paw: it was swollen.
“Wait. I’ll bring help.”
Casper looked at him as though asking, “Will you come back?”
Kirill crawled back out, replaced the board so no one would notice, and then ran toward the road, feeling his chest burn with every breath.
A bus from route 12 was at the stop. Kirill rushed inside and shouted:
“There are dogs, puppies! They’ll die!”
The driver turned around:
“What class are you from?”
“Fourth. Please help!”
A name flashed through his mind—Minin, the neighbor who fixes cars and always takes in stray animals. Kirill pulled out his phone and dialed.
“Uncle Sergey, help! There’s a dog and puppies under a hatch on the wasteland.”
Five minutes later, Minin’s Ford diesel roared down the snowy road.
They pried open the old hatch with a crowbar. Sergey Minin went down first, followed by Kirill. The dog growled, but when it recognized the boy, it nudged him with its nose.
“Dislocated joint,” said Minin, examining the paw. “I’m taking the puppies. The dog goes in the trunk, we’ll cover it up. You’ll help?”
They barely got everyone out. Casper yelped in pain, but endured it. Sergey placed him in a box and threw in an old coat.
“Hang in there.”
The wind only died down by night. Casper and the puppies took up a corner of the auto shop, near the heater. There was some vaccine and serum in the fridge, all thanks to an old friendship with the vet, Anna Leonidovna.
After the dog was treated and the puppies were fed warm milk, Kirill fidgeted and asked:
“Can I come visit?”
“Of course, come on the weekend,” Minin nodded. “But tell the truth at home.”
“Okay.”
At first, his mother was angry:
“How could you go into that hole! You could’ve frozen to death!”
Then she listened as her son talked about the puppies, wiping her tears quietly.
“Anna Leonidovna called. She said the puppies will be taken,” Natalia Petrovna said in the evening. “But they won’t put the dog back on the street: he’s old now. Maybe someone will take him…”
Maxim, the older brother, grumbled from behind the computer:
“Take him yourself. We’ve got a private yard. He’ll be your guard.”
His mother turned sharply:
“Are you serious?”
“Well, what? The dog’s not young anymore, the puppies will be easier to find homes for.”
Kirill couldn’t believe his ears:
“Really? He’s a good dog. He’s not dangerous.”
“Well, it’s settled then. One’s unnecessary at the parking lot, the other—will come in handy at home,” Maxim shrugged, as if it was obvious.
The spring snow melted unevenly. On Saturday, Minin himself brought Casper to the Timofeevs:
“The eye’s almost healed, the leg’s recovering. Here are the documents: deworming, vaccination.”
Kirill placed his hands on the dog’s rusty back:
“That’s it, now you’re ours. Got it?”
Casper licked the boy’s palm, and after walking a few circles in the yard, started sniffing around the new smells.
The puppies were taken by Kirill’s classmate Vadik and a librarian from the village. Now, Kirill went to school as if he were floating a few centimeters above the ground.
At the end of the school year, the teacher gave an assignment:
“Write an essay: ‘My Kindest Deed in Winter.’”
Kirill carefully wrote the crooked letters, thinking deeply:
“Sometimes, you need to go to the place where it’s scary to help someone weaker. True kindness isn’t just about sharing a piece of bread; it’s staying next to them until the cold turns into warmth.”
The teacher read his work and smiled:
“So, what happened next?”
“Next?” Kirill shrugged. “Now Friday isn’t the only day you can do something good.”
The neighbor, who ran the school radio, suggested:
“Maybe you could tell the whole class about it?”
Kirill petted Casper behind the ear and shook his head:
“There’s no need to announce it to the whole world. The important thing is that the dog’s alive, and he’s not starving anymore.”
Casper snorted, as if agreeing.
When summer came, Natalia Petrovna noticed one thing: Kirill, as usual, was gathering his Friday basket. But now, he carried it not to the wasteland but to the old age home at the end of the street. There, he introduced the elderly to Casper, and the dog patiently allowed himself to be petted.
“Why do you do this?” his mother asked.
“Some people need bread,” Kirill shrugged, “and some need just five minutes of conversation. Like winter: if there’s warmth, it should be shared.”
Natalia Petrovna watched her son leave with the basket and the dog, thinking about how sometimes miracles are born from a child’s persistence: seeing those whom adults have learned to ignore.
And on the wasteland behind the railroad tracks, the weeds pushed through the gravel. People began walking across it again, heading to the pond—there was no pack of dogs anymore. But if you listened closely, you could hear a faint echo in the rustling wind: the creaking of the board over the hatch and the distant voice of a child:
“Cas, I brought it. Eat, before others take it.