‘Why don’t you mind your own business?’ retorted Blondie, her voice gathering up notes of malice, ‘Besides, if you hadn’t been much flirting with him, it could’ve been easier for me to figure out his inclinations towards me.’
‘Beg your pardon?’ asked Fringe with an air of bewilderment turning around to face Blondie. Katya turned around to face her opponent in response.
‘Yes, you heard it. I said to mind your own business. You know I fancy Filip. And I know you don’t. So leave him alone. You just have this stupid habit of flirting around, basically with anyone who stares at your breasts, well, even with those who don’t. You just fucking marvel why a guy doesn’t stare at your ‘big blue eyes’, so you instinctively begin to flirt intensely,’ finished Blondie and turned to the mirror.
‘You’re just jealous!’ Fringe defended herself but was obliged to recollect her behavior with Mr. Curly Hair. Perhaps the latter was right a bit and Tanya had been behaving herself with a flirty air, but she couldn’t help it, she was a woman, how else was she supposed to be with men?
‘Mhm, maybe I was flirting a bit. But that’s me. I do flirt with men. I’ll try to hold myself back a little. Deal, Virgin?’ Tanya uttered in her slightly raucous voice willing to make up and stretched out a hand like a business man. With men she behaved like a flirting little birdie while with her like she was rather unpretentious and business-like.
Katya stared at Tanya’s hand and took it, ‘Deal, Boobie Witch!’
And Fringe instantly pulled Blondie into her embrace, ‘Witch yourself! Boobie? Boobster sounds better!’ They both burst out laughing, their hug dissolving the remaining hints of offense in their bodies.
‘Sounds like new food for your tongue-twisters inspiration,’ Red-haired commented on the hug scene and put out her ciggie adding, ‘Baby Boobie Boobster boosted boobs to become a blockbuster bosom.’
Katya and Tanya turned to Red-haired uttering simultaneously, ‘Not bad!’
The gang of Yulya, Tanya, Katya and Filip arrived to Neukölln district. At first, they had to pop into a supermarket to buy some wine. Done.
Here they were. Two-room apartment. Also vinyl records but not as many as Mr. Curly Hair had. Very hot outside. Windows wide-open. Bon appétit to everyone. Yummy-yummy. Wine bottles got empty pretty fast. Nice music on. Silly pics were taken. Music videos were watched. Already dark. Yulya and Katya got out to buy some chocolate. Brought it home. So hot outside that the chocolate was more like a Nutella paste. The girls asked for spoons. Anyone wanted some melted chocolate? No, thanks. What perversity it is to eat melted chocolate on a hot eve. Everyone was chilling.
Having munched the chocolate Katya went to another room to stare out of the window. She sat down on a sill. Mr. Curly Hair approached from behind observing a picture A Girl on a Windowsill.
‘Bored?’ he asked sitting near Katya.
‘Nope, just taking some fresh air…like smokers would have a smoke,’ chuckled Katya thoughtfully.
‘I see. How come you don’t smoke while your besties do?’ he wondered, even though he was not really interested.
‘Donno, why should I? I guess smoking didn’t have that positive effect on me…you know, like using smoking to make friends-smokers and have a chat outside over a drag, or have a break after some stress, or smoke instead of eating…never thought of it…I might smoke though for fun when drunk or something…but I don’t do it properly anyway and a ciggie’s always falling down through my soft drunk fingers half-way burnt,’ summarized Katya with a vague smile.
‘What do you do in Moscow?’ asked Fil all of a sudden.
‘Study English and German, why? What’s that sudden interrogation about?’ Katya asked smiling and frowning at the same time.
‘Yes, I know that. Anything else? Work? Hobby?’ insisted Filip ignoring her slight indignation.
‘No, not really. Whenever I think of earning some money my parents stop me saying that I will have enough time to work after the uni, so that I’ll get sick of it…Sounds weird, doesn’t it? Girls and I are going to be English teachers; German is just a second language we learn. But we all want to learn as many languages as we can. That’s why we try to pick a language from native speakers,’ Katya tried to make herself clear.
‘Do you really wanna be a teacher?’ he looked at her with suspicion.
‘Not really. It was my Mum’s idea. After school I didn’t know what to study. My Mum thought I was good at languages, so she suggested that I should apply to a foreign languages department,’ Blondie explained.
‘But what do you really wanna be?’ Filip kept on asking as if it was an interview.
‘An actress,’ Katya said calmly, ‘What did YOU want to be?’ she redrew the attention to him.
‘I wanted to be an actor as well… But I never applied… I just didn’t bring myself to… now I’m too old for that,’ Filip pronounced it with some bitter notes in his voice.
‘Ridiculous, the age of twenty eight is already too late to become an actor? Those stupid rules,’ Katya grumbled to herself. ‘How far can you spit?’ she slipped into the role of an interrogator.
‘What?’ he seemed surprised, as if he didn’t catch what she’d just said.
‘How far can you spit, I said…I can spit far enough,’ she confessed with a smile.
‘I think I can spit far enough too,’ he responded also with a smile.
‘Ok, one-two-three and we spit, alright?’ Blondie commanded.
‘Outside the window?’ he asked.
‘No, on the floor,’ Katya responded with a sarcastic smile, ‘Yes, out there, of course.’
‘Ok,’ he agreed.
One- two- three – they spat. A common thought crawled to their heads, ‘Is it déjà-vu or the movie Titanic?’ Oops, there were some people walking by, just as they spat. They kneeled down on the floor and started to giggle.
‘No more spitting from the window,’ he whispered.
‘Agreed,’ Katya whispered back with a nod.
Just then Tanya entered the room asking, ‘Are you looking for something, kids?’
‘Yes, we lost an elephant,’ Tanya heard Katya’s response as the latter couldn’t stop her sarcastic flow.
‘How funny,’ said Tanya with a responding sarcasm tune and went on normally, ‘Well, we’re going to play Truth or Dare, are you in?’ wondered Tanya opening her palm in order to get a reply.
‘Why not?’ replied Katya in agreement and glanced at Filip.
‘Sure, I wonder whose idea it was… I’ll just watch you play,’ answered he concerned.
‘Ha, foxy, you can’t watch others get embarrassed without embarrassing yourself!’ stated Tanya, ‘Come on.’
‘Alright, let the show begin,’ said Filip and headed to another room.
‘Good boy!’ commented Tanya and followed him smiling.
Everyone sat down on the floor in a circle. Tanya volunteered to be the first one. She chose dare and the rest of the crew made her drink half a cup of Jägermeister, the only booze they’d found in Sven’s kitchen. The next turn belonged to Yulya. Having chosen truth, she just had to answer if she had ever eaten boogers.
‘Of course, I’ve eaten boogers. Everyone eats their boogers as a kid!’ was Yulya’s answer with no hint of embarrassment. At the beginning of the answer everyone started giggling but at the end they sat remembering their childhood poking their noses.
Being