“Why are you frozen here again?” - and cotton on the shoulder with his hand, and the voice of Bob, partner of the department. - Come quickly, and then the chef will make noise again ...
“I smoke,” I lied. And he stumbled a cigarette butt, walked his eyes to Lenin, especially the part of the body from which this walk began
Boots do not burn, - Bob neighing. - Cigarette butt rubbish, the Neanderthals would have lit a fire long ago ...
- Yeah, - I squeezed out a neigh, just so that he wouldn’t
suspected. - Socks are already smoking ... Let's go.

ABOUT HER

Elena Pavlovna worked the floor above ... Above was the editors of the magazine. Millionaire. Monthly circulation is a little over a million copies. But those in the Union then lacked. Open subscription once gave more
two million subscribers (our newspaper is hardly given a hundred thousand copies). In short, I was nobody to her.
Moreover, I witnessed men buzzing around her, most often descending from the mountains, whose pockets (men, not mountains) were sticking out bills. But I have never once noticed that she at least once led to this buzz. It pleased.

Everything else, God still exists!
I was brought to the Lenkin department by the deputy. main of that magazine. Once a month he made a strip in our newspaper, and I proceeded from the subject matter, edited (tried to edit, not fucking understanding) its materials. Somehow so be friends.

“Here, Lena, meet me ...” he once brought me to her department. - A talented lobotryas. Maybe he will come in handy
Somehow he introduced me to the one to which I was breathing
did not dare.
I stood in front of her, like a first-grader in front of my first teacher, not knowing where to put my hands. And most importantly, eyes.
She looked at her mockingly while sitting at her desk, dotted with papers, magazines, newspaper clippings. Burning brunette, covered with a shock of thick curls. And in some kind of outfit, unusual for those years, maybe domestic, I did not understand and I do not understand this. But from what it was especially difficult to withdraw the eyes - chains, necklaces, some pendants wrapped around her neck and ran down into a divine hollow, intentionally opened with three buttons that were not buttoned. It was there that they sparkled especially brightly. Or did it just seem so to me?

Well, why am I not one of the links of those chains!
- He can write? - came a voice from the corner. Immediately did not see in
department was also her immediate boss.
“And why the hell does he know?” - in a friendly way, he identified my journalistic
opportunities zamglavred. - Try it, and then decide for yourself ... But, you know, I don’t bring anyone from the street ...
A month later, I went on a business trip by letter to this magazine, taking for this leave in the newspaper. Wrote something. Probably not entirely bad, because after three months (this was the production process in the magazine, I don’t know how it is today) the material came out. And surprisingly, with minimal editing.

But glad I was not this. After all, now on full, on that basis, I could come to the department ... To see and communicate with Elena Pavlovna.
Since those days, women have practically ceased to exist for me. All women, except one. With which I finally fell in love for real ... Only for the eighth time in my life ... or for the tenth? No, wait - in the sixth ... Yes, what I say - in the sixth ... In the ninth. Similarly, in the ninth! Finally and irrevocably!

The only woman at that time was exclusively Elena Pavlovna. Others did not exist.
Elena Pavlovna. The name "Helen" I pronounced

inside yourself. Aloud spoke only occasionally. Houses. In my room. When I was sure that no one would hear me. Including my parents.
But who am I for her? Some garbage, who can, however, correctly put the word to the word. And, of course, the diploma in a pocket has journalistic. Just what is the result? For the soul of a penny ...I remembered again the rumors that her husband brought money to the house almost in batches. In the eighties, it was money. So do not even think it should be - to flutter.
... Do you think that is exactly how Lenka thought about me? So I do not know.
Fuck him at all knows what she thought of me. If I thought at all. So I represented the situation in those days. And suffered from all these thoughts ...

Everything correspondent: forward, on a mission...

- So, so. Go to Kaluga. I ordered a number for you, - the chef looked at me carefully. - Only you are this, as if within yourself hold ...
I really wanted to salute him. But I suppressed in myself this desire.
- Today is Friday ... On Tuesday, I expect 100 lines from you on Wednesday ... Why are you grinning? Good lines! Upon arrival - a review ... Lada? And look, the main thing - do not forget!
“Yes, chief,” I finally burst out. - Well, I, like, went? Getting ready for a trip is necessary ...

The glances of two pairs of eyes, Bob and Sveta, enviously envied me in my leaving back. Colleagues in the department.
And I was not care. I retired seven days from the editorial routine. And therefore, having stepped over the threshold of my native editorial office in the opposite direction from her, I did what any non-fool journalist of a moderately statistical newspaper who was in my position would do. I zabuhal. I did it so competently that I still remember the two days with difficulty. But he stopped on time (he was young, adequate). I remembered in time that I had to give a hundred lines in the issue of All-Union competitions. I confess, not immediately, the truth - where exactly? from which city?

... Saved a piece of paper, lying on the floor. Crumpled. All in divorces from wine, ketchup, greasy stains from it is not clear what kind of food. In the corner, I also found clear lipstick bands ...
Traveling certificate is! F-Fu ... Everything else I will think later. Where to go? Destination - Kaluga. His mother hildren ...!
Guys! Never stay in the state in which I arrived at Kievsky railway station. That state can be expressed briefly and concisely: “I don't love anyone.” And only the received education, and along with it, the beginnings of intelligence, were holding back to speak out to the nearest police officer and cashier by ticket ... Although I still do not understand why?

... And here I am in Kaluga. In the hotel "Central"
- And we already wanted to remove your number from the reservation, - the administrator tells me. For me, she is not even a woman. She is in uniform.
“I ...” began, it was, I was inspired, exhaling while ...
The uniform frowned, turned away her face, and defiantly waved her hand in front of him.
- Fill out the form, - handed me a ticket
They say that there is an autopilot, in which men in “date” condition return home. I believed in him when I entered my passport data in the same condition, the address where I live with another 15 or 20 positions. Well, I did everything purely on the machine.
“Number 415,” she handed me the key, on a huge wooden pear, uniform. - Right, on the elevator ... By the way. On the second floor our buffet works. The elevator does not stop there. You can climb the same way up the stairs ...

While walking toward the “right,” I felt my back, that her eyes were literally burning through me: would I enter the elevator, or - up the stairs?
“Toad,” I said to myself ... “In the end, what will she be knocking on the office?”
In the buffet, I took a pair of "Zhiguli." And it was something! In Moscow, for a beer, then it was necessary to defend the queue, if you still find where it is for sale ... I took two, because it was free, without a queue. And it would have been enough for the bottle ... “Zhiguli” became for me sleeping and sedative.
... Unfortunately, they calmed me until the middle of the next day. I woke up with an inexplicable sense of shame and self-deprecation, not understanding at the same time, but what exactly is bad?

I didn’t feel the hangover syndromes in myself: so, slight discomfort ... But I understood, at the same time, that I had missed something brutally. I somehow failed. I tried to find, to understand, in what “nakosyachil”? At the same time determined in time and space.

- So, let's start from the stove, - I said to myself, without opening my eyes. - First of all,... Read more →