Chapter 3

After all, the desire to improve one’s financial situation is the strongest motivation a person can have! It was 8:02 in the morning, and our whole crew had already gathered in the spacious reception area of GBG-Project, milling around outside the management offices until the secretary—a woman of indeterminate age with a wild mass of curls—couldn’t take it anymore. She got up from behind her desk and lined us all up along the wall. Then she sternly shushed our rowdy bunch, surveying us like a broody hen: quiet down, in other words. Good grief, what a racket!

How were we supposed to keep quiet when our whole future was hanging by a thread? And the prospects around us were so dazzling you could look at them and see it: the future! A new TV, treats, vacations by the sea. While you stood at Zyuzyukino Station in stretched-out sweatpants, one foot on the pedal of an old bicycle, watching the brand-new Vienna–Paris Express fly past. Oh, man!

Zhanna Arnoldovna had explained earlier that the technical director himself wanted to talk to us. A couple of chief project engineers, the head of Human Resources, and the general director’s secretary were supposed to attend the interview. But in reality, there were twice as many people. First, we waited outside the reception area for almost two hours—I have no idea why they dragged us in at eight—and second, we learned that the technical director had an important meeting scheduled for ten o’clock. Strange people! So, in the middle of preparing for that meeting, they started calling us into the office one at a time.

I’d just ducked into the restroom, and when I came back, Zhanna Arnoldovna was gone. From our group’s whispers, I gathered that more people had joined the technical director in his office.

“Here we go, Mashka! They called in Devyatko! I wonder how long they’ll grill her—” Shlyapkin didn’t get to finish.

Our former lead engineer came out of the office as white as a wall, gave everyone a tragic look, and gestured for the next person to go in.

“Well? How’d it go?” Yurka and I descended on our former boss while our girls charged off into battle. “Did they hire you?”

“The hell if I know. I haven’t been this nervous in years. I need a cigarette!” Arnoldovna said, and that was all. She went over to the secretary’s desk, scooped up a handful of hard candies from the vase, and stomped off toward the stairs.

Obviously, the woman was stressed. Yurka and I grinned toothily at the stunned curly-haired secretary, exchanged a look, and sat down along the wall again. We tapped the toes of our boots against the floor—right-left, right-left—until the door opened again.

“Well? What happened? What did they say?” I asked Valya Galanina when she came out of the office, bright red and sweating, and leaned her perfectly respectable rear against the door.

“Whew!” She rolled her eyes. “They said they’d call.”

“That’s it?” I raised my eyebrows in disappointment.

“Uh-huh.” The girl smiled sheepishly. “I don’t think I impressed them.”

“You?!” Shlyapkin and I gaped at her.

Valya had worked at SNiPTechPromGaz for five years. She wasn’t considered much of an engineer, but she was sweet and pretty—and, most importantly, had such an impressive size-six bust that even I found myself staring at her blotchy, heaving cleavage.

Yurka swallowed hard.

That was it! I was toast, no question about it! Whatever trembling and worrying I’d been doing stopped right then. What did my one year of experience amount to against Galanina’s five? And as for her chest, I won’t even go there.

No, I had a chest of my own, too, and it was nothing to be ashamed of. But that was the whole point: Valya had put hers on display, and her interview had lasted three minutes. Never mind that I’d done the work of two people at the company, taken work home, and, according to Arnoldovna, possessed a rare kind of intuition—constructive intuition… You had to know how to face the truth. They didn’t need us here. That was all there was to it!

All that remained was for the technical director to read about my children on my résumé, and Berry would march straight out the door.

“Mashka, go already! We’re the last two,” Shlyapkin sighed and nudged me toward the door.

“Yur, maybe you should go instead? I’m suddenly not feeling it anymore.”

Yurka straightened up and muttered:

“Don’t chicken out! I’ll have your back, like a man!”

The man in question was scrawny and short, with a chicken’s Adam’s apple and a wispy little ponytail. But he clenched his jaw—oooh! A real matador! Give him a red cape and a sharp lance, and he’d be ready to face the technical director.

I pictured it and let out a nervous giggle. Oh, what the hell. What did I have to lose?

“Well, if you’re going to back me up like a man… Then in I go, Shlyapkin!” I looked at my old colleague, slapped Yurka on the shoulder, and added, “All right, break a leg!”

Wow! There really were a lot of people in the office. And the office itself was about the size of our entire company. Around twelve people sat behind a long work table. The technical director himself was presumably seated at the head—in plain English, the chief engineer for all of GBG-Project—a solid-looking man in his fifties with two chins and glasses. Then again, everyone here looked substantial, even the two women. I didn’t bother studying them.

“Hello! May I come in?” I hovered at the threshold for a second to be polite, then stepped inside and stopped right in the middle of the rug.

“Hello, miss. What’s your last name?” the important-looking man asked, flipping through a folder presumably full of résumés. “Did you come to us straight out of college?”

Damn it, I’ll kill Natasha—and Zhora, too! This was what happened when you didn’t have your hair and makeup done properly!

“Not exactly. I graduated from college two years ago and worked as an engineer at SNiPTechPromGaz for a year. My last name is Berry.”

“Berry, is it…” The man finally found my résumé and skimmed it. He raised one brow in surprise before looking up at me.

I knew it. He’d read about my Berries. I kept looking at the director, deciding I had nothing to be ashamed of. It wasn’t as if having children were a death sentence.

Yes! I had children! And, incidentally, they never got sick!

Well, practically never. Not counting colds, runny noses, and assorted viruses.

At that point, I decided not to jinx it and mentally spat three times. All three landed right on the technical director’s bald head. As if he’d felt it, he pulled out a handkerchief and wiped himself off. He gave me a mildly reproachful look, and I even blushed a little. Thinking of the kids, the treats and TV I’d promised them, I exhaled, confidently told them what my specialty was, and began listing my battle honors. I hadn’t come here just to smoke, after all.

“…I worked on developing and preparing operating documentation, and I also took part in the projects managed by our department.”

“What was the primary focus of your work over the past few months?”

I decided not to lie: