“Where did you come from?” asked Gulia, trying to shove his head into the bag with hers.
Athanasius resisted, partly from dignity, partly because the rain had stopped. “From the university!” he said.
“You study here?”
“No.”
“And rightly so!” approved Gulia. “Suspicious place! Here friends speak well of each other. It’s unnatural.”
In the middle of the road full of cars splashing water, it came into Gulia’s head to stop and, arms akimbo, pose the question, “Where did you disappear to then? I waited for your call!”
Knowing that he would not be believed nevertheless, Athanasius craftily lied with the truth. “Was injured. Lying in the clinic. Supovna cursed me ninety-two times. Fed me regularly as much as… That’s because I never finished eating. Dealt her a blow.”
“Everything is clear, reindeer!” said Gulia in the magnanimous voice of a person willing to be taken in.
A car swept past. A canopy of water appeared above it. Athanasius hurriedly shut his mouth and eyes. It was already useless to cover the rest.
“Jerk!” Gulia yelled, jumping like a sparrow. “A natural jerk! Look where you’re going! People are walking here!”
Athanasius carefully grabbed Gulia with both arms and moved her onto the grass. But even on the grass Gulia continued to jump and threaten the cars. Her howls were laughable and silly. Like that of a child who beats the table for hitting him with a corner.
She finally calmed down. “I thought about you,” said Gulia, not making an acknowledgement but simply informatively.
Athanasius began to feel uneasy. He was not used to someone thinking about him. “How is your bear doing? Is it still so green?” he asked in a hurry.
They agreed to meet the next day. This time without excuses.
“I’ll bring a friend. And you’ll also bring one of yours!” ordered Gulia. “I’ve now adapted myself to finding in supermarkets bottles with winning codes! Felt one yesterday, but a woman already had it in her cart.”
“And your friend is also…” Athanasius carefully asked.
“Also what?”
Athanasius hesitated. His tongue was not in a hurry to utter “incubator for elbes.” “Well, does she possess abilities?”
Gulia looked around suspiciously at the elderly man with a professorial beard, who squatted across the street and examined an apple floating in the puddle. “Nina can find any object,” she said.
“She finds treasures?”
“Well, if she sees the one who buried it. Also any lost inanimate object… She’s unhappy. Introduce her to someone!”
Athanasius hesitated. “In order to make two unhappy at once? Certainly!”
“And your friend has abilities?”
“Only one. He ties construction nails into little bows,” answered Athanasius. He imagined that he would bring Max with him.
Athanasius showed up quickly in HDive. There were terribly long lines for the buses to the outlying regions and it seemed to Athanasius a good reason for teleportation. After turning up on the concrete area outside the gates, Athanasius wanted to take a step but realized that, having missed the mark by a centimetre, his soles were stuck. There was no chance of removing the shoes and nothing else to do. He had to take them off and go barefoot into HDive, leaving the boots sticking out in front of the bumper of Kuzepych’s bus.
Athanasius approached Max in the evening, when that one was busy with an important practical matter: pick out from the tangled mess a pair of socks of more or less similar colour. There were six washers for the entire HDive. They were all in the room next to the shower and, since there were many people in HDive, things were always mixed up. What they had not tried. Basins signed with markers, labels on things, ribbons sewn on, and allowing only several people to wash at the same time – nothing helped.
Max stated at first that he did not care. He was not going anywhere. Then he said that, so be it, he would go for the company, although he knew ahead of time that the girl would turn out to be this woofer.
“Why is that?”
“Law of the j-jungle! Pretty g-girls always have dogs as friends. Is your G-Gulia pretty?” he asked.
Athanasius wisely kept quiet. He would not rush to call Gulia “his.” It seemed to him that love at first sight is a TV cliché. It was totally different with Yara. Virus love is outside of the rules. Moreover, he had already recovered.
Max pulled a sock onto his enormous foot and wriggled his toes. “Forbidden to meet with w-warlocks!” he said.
“Nothing in the HDive charter says so. I checked. Besides, they’re not warlocks!” Athanasius stood up for them. It was unpleasant for him that Gulia was called this.
“Then what?”
“Well… eh-eh… simply going astray a little.”
Max neighed. “And what will y-you give me, if I g-go?” he asked.
Athanasius punched him in the back and hurt his own fist. Max liked this. He adored it when they hurt themselves against him. But Max liked to pretend to be a dull bodybuilder more. Moreover, he pretended with such perseverance that increasingly he was actually becoming one.
“Okay, I’ll go for free. Only t-take this! I…I’ll not talk with your woofer. And if she tries to come near me, I’ll un… un…unscrew her head!”
“Of course, not a problem!” Athanasius hurriedly agreed.
Max’s subsequent behaviour surprised him. The giant, allegedly not attaching any special importance to the meeting, began nervously to choose a pair of jeans and fling out turtlenecks from the dresser.
“This will k-kill me! And this is s-small!” he swore and again declared that he was not going anywhere, because there was nothing for him to wear and could in no way go in the hdiver jacket. Athanasius wanted to propose his own sweater to Max but understood that for such a moose it would only be fit to be carried in the pocket as a talisman.
Max kicked the dresser and dejectedly sat down on the floor. “I hate S-Supovna! She fattened me so that now I can’t get into anything!”
“What’s the difference to you? You’re going for the company,” Athanasius consoled him.
“I don’t want them to th…think that I’m a d…dolt!” Max declared.
Finally, he succeeded in finding decent clothing and calmed down. True, not for long, because he was concerned about what to do with his hair. Max did not have hair lying on top. He did not want to comb straight back. One obstinate strand always fell down with a comb-over to the left, while one to the right would show an unfortunate pimple.
Athanasius wisely kept away. The best way to enrage someone is to start to calm him down. The words “Calm down!” have a clearly expressed psychopathic effect. However, it was useless to explain to Max that he would look seven times better if he would not stare or try to walk with tense muscles.
Ul was lying around on the hammock and watching Max blowing hot and cold. “Take an example from me! The last time I looked into the mirror was when I helped drag it along the stairs!” he bragged.
“It’s b…because you’re an i…invalid!”
“I’m not an invalid! I’m a user of my own appearance!” Ul objected.
“Then