Kadik's a very kindhearted guy. He knows Eddie-baby doesn't have any money, so he treats him. Usually they chip in on a bottle, the same way all the other kids do. But since Eddie treated Kadik and Tolik Karpov only yesterday, it's Kadik's turn to treat him today.
As usual on holidays, there's a particularly big crowd next to Grocery Store No.7. Always present, of course, are the "moochers," people who hang around the store on workdays from opening till closing time in hopes of getting drunk at somebody else's expense – people who "play for the grocery store all-stars," as they say in the district, and are well known to the salesgirls. On holidays, however, the sidewalk in front of the grocery store seethes with all kinds of human slosh – the usual customers having now been joined by fancily dressed workers who have managed to sneak away from the parade, many of them wearing ties and brown or green velour hats, and some with white scarves draped around their necks in local Kharkov fashion. You can tell at once that the workers aren't used to either hats or ties – their hats don't sit right and their ties cut into their necks – and as soon as they're flushed with drink, one by one they take off their ties and stick them in their coat pockets.
Scurrying here and there among the different groups are the workers' children, also very dressed up and with the obligatory balloons in tow. No self-respecting Saltovka child could get through the holiday without at least three balloons. The wives try to separate their already pretty loaded family heads from their comrades, and little arguments ensue as a result, but in general the atmosphere is a festive one, and the workers laugh in a friendly way if a wife goes too far in trying to pull her spouse away from his circle of neighbors or comrades from work. "My sleeve! My sleeve! Watch out, you'll tear it off!" they laugh.
Only a few of the workers have been drinking vodka here in front of the grocery store since morning. Since they have a whole day and night of drinking ahead of them, the others are saving themselves, and if they do drink, then they buy a bottle not for three, say, but for five. For the most part, however, they drink a local Ukrainian wine whose slang name is biomitsin – from bele mitsne, the Ukrainian for "fortified white wine." The workers' slang for vodka is "mug twister," obviously because a grimace can't help appearing on the face of anybody who might swallow that liquid.
Holding out their glasses, the moochers walk among the groups of animated, festive workers, and a few of them, the more enterprising ones, even have something like snacks with them – a huge pickle or some processed cheese wrapped in foil. In exchange for their snacks, these "businessmen," as Kadik jokingly calls them, obtain the right to the empty bottles. This exchange makes sense, since the empties can be turned in immediately for cash. An empty half-liter bottle is worth 1 ruble and 20 kopecks (remember, this is before the 1960 currency revaluation), and a large 0.8-liter vodka bottle, 1 ruble and 80 kopecks, while a half-liter bottle of biomitsin (full, obviously) costs 10 rubles and 20 kopecks. It follows that the moochers are never sober.
There is an unimaginable hubbub in front of Grocery Store No.7.
"The proletariat is on a spree," Kadik observes ironically as he squeezes through the doorway of the store. Eddie-baby follows him inside.
The two salesgirls don't have time today to give personal service to the wine-craving Saltovka population. Clusters of bottles hurtle across the counter, since nobody wants to wait in line and the workers are trying to stock up on as many bottles as they can.
"The dudes have arrived!" shouts an already drunk customer, a cocky little twerp wearing a white cap pulled down to his ears.
Kadik and Eddie naturally look a bit strange in their bright yellow jackets, something like tropical birds in this crowd of big black or dark brown coats with padded shoulders and choice short gray winter jackets with quilted linings and fur – or rather, artificial fur – collars in the proletarian fashion. Kadik calls the short jackets "half-farters," but the proletarians themselves call them "Muscovites." Just a year ago the proletarians wore their half-farters with jackboots. Now that fashion has almost completely disappeared, and only a few of those in line are still wearing boots.
The dudes may in fact be dudes, but they're Saltovka's own. They're well known to the grocery store all-stars and to the salesgirl Marusya and the other salesgirl, Auntie Shura. Seeing Kadik in line, Auntie Shura calls out to him without taking her eyes off the money and the bottles.
"How's your mother, Kolka? I hear she's not feeling well?"
"Oh no, Auntie Shura. She has a little cold, but she still goes to work," Kadik shyly answers her.
The fact is, only Eddie-baby knows that Kadik is ashamed of his postal worker mother. Kadik has never seen his father, and the only time he even mentioned him was to tell Eddie-baby that he was a famous scientist, although Eddie-baby hardly believed that. Would a famous scientist be interested in Kadik's insignificant and wrinkled little postal worker of a mother? Even if you took into account the fact that fifteen years ago she would have been much younger and more attractive? Actually, Eddie-baby doesn't care what kind of mother Kadik has. It's Kadik he likes.
Kadik takes two bottles of biomitsin, and they force their way back outside, shaking dozens of hands as they go. The faces of two of Eddie-baby's schoolmates flash by, Vitka Golovashov and Lyonka Korovin, who have just taken their places at the end of the line. Although Vitka and Lyonka aren't dudes, they are interesting kids who go everywhere together. It was Vitka who took Eddie-baby to the wrestling club for the first time. Vitka has been doing freestyle wrestling for a year now, whereas Eddie-baby has only just started. Vitka and Lyonka are up-to-date guys, unlike the majority of the Saltov kids, who are mostly either punks or proletarians. Parents like Eddie-baby's or Vitka's (whose father is a construction boss), or like Vika Kozyrev's (whose mother and father are both doctors), are a rarity in Saltovka or Tyurenka or Ivanovka. Most of the people who live here are workers. There are at least three big factories in the area: the Hammer and Sickle, the Turbine, and the Piston. It's a half-hour trolley ride from Saltovka to the largest factory in Kharkov, the Tractor Factory, where more than a hundred thousand workers are employed, most of whom live around the factory itself in the Tractor district.
After pushing their way out of the store, Kadik and Eddie-baby find an unoccupied area a little off to the side from the rest of the crowd. The unoccupied area is located between one of the walls of the three-story apartment building whose ground floor is completely taken up by Grocery Store No.7, and a small wooden stall where you can usually buy candy, sugar, cookies, and gingersnaps. Because of the holiday, the little wooden structure is covered with huge padlocks; the stall is closed.