August 23, 1993
Monday
Nothing going on. While Zhorik and Lev Moiseyevich, whom I’d never once laid eyes on, were off touring Khryakino, I got worried about my studies, September first was coming up soon.
I dressed up like I was going to a restaurant, rode with Fedotych to the bus stop, got out. Headed to the institute like an ordinary student.
Nobody appreciated the blue splendor of my blazer. A couple of first-year girls glanced back, and that was it.
I checked the schedule at the dean’s office, stopped by the library, picked up my textbooks, and ran into Yurik on the way out:
– Romka, save me! The office got a shipment of Japanese VCRs. Staff can buy at cost. A hundred and twenty bucks. Got fifty to lend me? I’ll pay you back from my paycheck in a week!
– Sure, – I reached into my pocket and swore.
Why the hell had I changed clothes? My wallet was still in my denim jacket.
Had to explain I didn’t have the cash on me. Yurik glanced at his watch.
– I’m tearing off to the office, locking in the VCR. Can you swing by with the fifty before six? I owe you one!
– No problem.
Going home would take too long, so I drove to the office and asked Zhorik to advance me fifty dollars against my salary. Didn’t bother hiding the details. Told him I was helping a buddy get his hands on a marvel of scientific and technical progress called a «Japanese VCR.»
Zhorik smirked and suggested we go together. Said he wanted to check out the discount, better yet, feel the thing with his own hands, maybe it was plastic or cardboard. Real VCRs cost at least two hundred.
An hour later we were parking on Ostozhenka, in a side street across from the office.
Hadn’t been there in a while, not since my previous life — pantless, hopeless. Circumstances had changed since then. I pulled up in a foreign car, all decked out and full of myself.
Yurik and I settled in with beers in the office courtyard, waiting for the delivery. Zhorik took off, promising to be back in an hour.
We got the multicolored box right before closing, hauled it up to the second floor. Nobody paid us any mind. A couple of people nodded my way: «hey» and that was it.
At a quarter past six only Yurik and I were left in the office. Nothing prevented us from running the machine. We unpacked the box, bright as a fire in the jungle, marked «video recorder Funai», hooked it up to the television in the director’s office and put in a cassette I had brought.
Yurik marveled: «Japan!» I confirmed with authority: fine machine, no junk, holds its color. The cassette was a special test one – a fifth-generation copy of «Lethal Weapon». I had meant to trade it in, forgot in the rush, and it lay in the drawer of my desk. Today it came in handy for testing. Only top-quality VCRs let you make out where Mel Gibson was lying in ambush and where Danny Glover was.
All in all, I pronounced with authority, a «Made in Japan» machine was serious business. As an experienced film buff, I shared my wisdom: you’d get sick of it in a couple months, watch everything you could get your hands on, and shelve it. Promised to share the cassettes I’d stockpiled, two dozen of them, nowhere left to put them.
Zhorik came back.
He listened with half an ear to our talk about Japanese electronics, stood around thinking, sat here and there, and eventually ended up at Vladislav Arkadyevich’s desk. An awkward spot, but Zhorik paid it no mind. Dug through the papers on the desk, in the cabinet, everywhere within reach. Then asked where the safe key was kept.
I warned him right away there was nothing in the safe except a bottle of whiskey and an air pistol management liked to play with, shooting crows out the window. Showed him the secret spot where the key hid.
Every guard in the office had gone through the ritual of night crow-shooting. One rule — keep the pellets stocked so no one got caught short a bullet come morning. Zhorik didn’t so much as glance at the pistol, buried himself in the papers from the safe.
Yurik and I knocked back another bottle and said our goodbyes. The freshly minted VCR owner stayed behind to keep watch, and Zhorik and I drove to the apartment.
Zhorik drove, beaming:
– Ah, Romka. Finally! Goddamn it all to hell!! A three-finger whistle for it!!! Something big’s come up. And that Vadik of yours – an idiot. A gold mine right under his feet, and he’s dawdling with middlemen. We’re not splitting seven kopecks four ways!
On the way Zhorik sketched out the business of the company «Vlad Trading». The company bought consumer goods in Europe by the truckload on CIF Moscow terms. Using Pashka’s connections, it cleared a truck through customs at half price and sold the load on the spot. The truck went off to the buyer, who had paid the advance right after the border crossing. Vlad didn’t even have a warehouse. Why would he?
A great business, one everyone envied. Everyone except Zhorik.
Rifling through the papers, he jotted down the middlemen’s contact info and the fax number of the Polish sender the company got its invoices from. Dropping me off at my building, Zhorik asked: «You speak any Polish?»
