“I was planning to play tennis tonight,” Nina recalled irrelevantly.
Samsonov’s voice thundered in the receiver: “What’s your problem, Nina? You’re what – messing with me? To hell with your tennis! Now listen – you get prepared, and Kolya will come by to pick you up.”
“Oh, there is no need…”
“He’ll be with you at half past seven.”
Samsonov hung up.
Nina did not feel the floor beneath her feet. It seemed she only had to push off with her toes lightly to float up in the air like a real fairy. Her man had called her. Her! Himself! He had invited her! He was grateful! He was thinking of her!
Suddenly, the flight of the fairy named Nina stopped short, and she sank onto the floor beside the pool that had once been an egg. “What am I going to wear?” That eternal question, the curse of all women, had bothered Nina very rarely, but now it posed itself to her in the most threatening way.
Nina rushed to her wardrobe and drawers. Their contents flew onto the sofa and bed. An inspection of her clothes gave disheartening results, testifying eloquently that Nina had no life of her own. All those mouse-grey blouses and skirts were only suitable for sitting behind the computer or jostling in the underground.
True, there was a special case in the back of her wardrobe where chic, unworn things were kept that Nina had bought once following Aliska’s instructions. Nina retrieved them and laid them out. The things were beautiful – Nina felt intimidated by them. However, inexperienced in fashions as she was, Nina realized that some items were lacking if she meant to go out. For one, a purse. And the right costume jewelry. And good perfume. “And my hair? Oh, goodness!” Nina could not recall when she had last done her hair.
After some rummaging in her note-books, Nina found Aliska’s number.
Aliska took some time to recognize her. “Shuvalova? Who is Shuvalova? … Ah, hello.”
Nina asked her former university mate for some more instructions. Aliska started enlightening her, but then she cut herself short.
“Listen, I’m going downtown now – I need to do some shopping myself. Join in, if you like.”
They met in the shopping center of the city. Aliska was still the same – strikingly showy, cynical, and chain-smoking. Together, they made the round of a dozen fashionable boutiques. Aliska solved easily all of Nina’s problems, throwing in some precious advice in passing about the right time to put on this or that ‘rag’, and the time to take it off, the right way to wear a thing, and the right pose to assume to best display it.
“All right, spit it out – what beast are you hunting?” Aliska asked as they landed, with their bags, in a coffee-shop to have a cup of coffee.
“What are you talking about?” Nina wondered sincerely.
“Who is it you’re going after? Let me guess… Your boss?”
Nina flushed.
“No, I never…”
“Don’t be coy,” Aliska said, ignoring her protests. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of, you know. True, I didn’t expect that of you – you’ve always been a nerd.”
“I’m not such a total nerd,” Nina murmured.
“Uh-huh. Not any longer, to be sure,” Aliska laughed, patting the bags of purchases.
“How are you doing?” Nina asked to change the subject.
“Kicked out of the job again… Because of the boss, too. He’s the right kind, and we had some very good time together, but his frump of a wife got the wind, and – goodbye, dear Alisa…”
“Speaking of jobs, could you fix me with a job in a bank or something?” she asked suddenly. “Clearly, I’m not like you – work is not my hobby – but one has to draw salary somewhere.”
Nina pondered a moment. She was grateful to Aliska for her help.
“Yes, I think I could put in a word for you.”
She would never think of recommending the lazy, immoral Aliska to Gradbank, but she did not care much about the shady financial institution in which she had once committed a malfeasance.
“There is this growing bank. I worked there for some time and I know a vice-director. His name is Kirill.”
She pictured Aliska thrusting her claws into the soft body of her former chief and laughed.
“What’s this about?” asked Aliska.
“Nothing, sorry. Only, mind you, that guy Kirill adores his wife.”
“We’ll sort it out,” Aliska said resolutely.
At half past seven sharp Kolya called.
“Nina Yevgenievna, I’m here, down by the entrance.”
Nina was ready. She had spent the past hour developing the important quality of ease. That was one of the lessons she had received from her mentor. “The problem with new things is that they are new,” explained Aliska. “It shows, see? That should be avoided at all cost. The things on you and you in them must look natural —as if you just slipped on something at random from among your everyday rags. If it’s not natural, then it’s not chic, but a housemaid’s attempt to pass for a lady.”
Aliska’s remark struck home. Nina felt mortally awkward in all those stylish clothes.
“Can it be helped somehow?” asked Nina.
“Well, it helps if you wear the new things a couple of days before going out. When are you going to need all that?”
“Tonight,” sighed Nina.
“Tough luck. Still, put it on for an hour at least. Sit in it, walk about in it. Try to occupy yourself with something that can distract you. Not washing floors, of course, but something casual, you know…”
Having put on dutifully all her posh new clothes, Nina walked, and sat, and then walked again before the mirror. Everything fitted her ideally, but there was not a grain of ease; the mirror reflected a housemaid all figged up in her lady’s garments. “He’s going to notice that – he’ll know that I’ve dressed for him. He might even think that the clothes aren’t mine – that they’re off somebody else’s back. Terrible,” Nina fretted. “Ease, ease… How am I supposed to acquire it? Think, girl.”
Her eye fell on her music center. Nina had not turned it on for a long time – she had been too busy to listen to records. She loved music, although she was not a naturally musical person. It was her mother who had had an ear for music, as well as her father. When Nina was about ten, her mother signed her up for music classes, but Nina quit a month later, to the relief of her teachers.
Nina had always admired people who could sing. If she had had such a gift herself, she would have been singing old Russian romance songs which she believed she felt deeply. Her music center had a karaoke function, and at one time, Nina had made some attempts to imitate the current pop hits. But as for many other things, she had had no time for that, so karaoke had been put aside, although the methodical Nina had promised herself to pick it up some time in the future.
Now she turned on the center, plugged in the microphone, adjusted the karaoke, and, standing before the mirror with the microphone in her hand, announced: “My Grey-winged Dove, sung by Nina Shuvalova.” Music poured from the loudspeaker, and Nina began to sing. What sounded so natural and easy when performed by the famous pop diva turned out to be anything but easy. Nina started out of time, and either ran ahead of or lagged behind the music; she missed beats, found herself unable to utter the simplest words, and was totally off the tune. Nina was angry with herself; she was not used to being so bad at what she was doing. Once she finished mutilating the Grey-winged Dove, she did the same kind of carnage to the Pink Flamingo and the Artist Who Painted Rain. Little by little though, she was getting the knack of it. When she had done for the second time Call Me Your Little Girl, she had a breakthrough. Her shyness was gone, and she was no longer afraid of the microphone; she grasped the feel of the rhythm and gained control of her voice. In the mirror, an elegant young woman sang in a manner that was neither powerful nor artful, but with something very right and soulful to her singing.