Fall of Matilda. Evgeny Russ
everything,” said dumbfounded Matilda, and retreated. She wanted to cry. She stood for a while in the stairwell and looked at the railing, familiar to her tears, the staircase that she went down to school every day. Matilda wanted to see old lady Zina, and she called her door. The door was also different, it was metal and with a door peephole. Matilda just now paid attention to this. A minute later the door opened and a vulgar woman of about thirty appeared on the threshold.
“Hello! And where is the old lady Zina?” Matilda asked.
“There’s no Zina here. We bought them an apartment in new buildings and exchanged it with surcharge.”
“And can you tell me their new address?”
“I don’t remember the address,” the woman said and slammed the door.
Matilda had no choice but to leave the entrance and return to her dormitory. On the way, she went to the law firm. Having told the situation to the lawyer, Matilda showed her passport and registration on the address.
“Yes, indeed, the situation is complicated. So do you say the captain of the police privatized your apartment?” the lady lawyer asked.
“It turns out that yes. This is true.”
“As much as we can do for you, it’s a small compensation from the state. You will not get too expensive outlay. If you want to get an apartment back, I can give you an attorney’s address. He has connections in tribunal, and he will solve your question positively. This is an expensive lawyer and its services will be worth as much as your elite apartment. The court will not find the error of the guardianship authorities or the police, because they could consider you missing. It will be even harder to get compensation from them and pay for the lawyer’s work on the return of your apartment. In this case, this affair will take only a novice lawyer.”
“I understood. How much do I owe you?”
“Not at all. In fact, I did not render any services to you.”
“Thank you. It was nice to talk with you,” said Matilda, and said goodbye.
This year was a year of upheaval not only for Matilda, but for all the inhabitants of her vast country. There was a deliberate disintegration of the Soviet Union. Despite the fact that at the March referendum on the fate of the country, almost the entire population voted for the integrity of the USSR, the collapse could not be avoided. Was defeated and the Emergency Committee. From the hostel Matilda moved to a rented apartment in the same area and continued to go to work. These were hard working days. Not having an own apartment, Matilda often visited the city Tver and always bought a real estates. Literally from one salary she could buy a two-room apartment in Tver. The average price of an apartment was 5 thousand dollars. Already in the 93rd year the flow of customers to the “Business Center Lingua” has significantly decreased. For all this time Arthur Khananovich got necessary connections, good acquaintances and even friends. He was going to do some other business with his new partners. In August, Arthur Khananovich announced to employees about the company’s imminent closure. It was planned to close the company “Business Center Lingua’ by mid-December. Matilda during her time has gained a lot of experience with the owners of large and medium-sized businesses. She had many job offers. Matilda kept all the business cards of the nouveaux riches. She remembered everyone with whom she had to communicate and the topic of negotiations. Business cards were not only from her immense homeland, but also from many parts of the world. Matilda did not attach much importance to these acquaintances. Now she did not like being an employee. She wanted and could start her own business. Early next year, Matilda moved to Tver in one of her apartments. This, perhaps, was one of her best apartments. She was on the embankment of Stepan Razin. From the windows there was a view of the Volga River, and Tvertsa River, flowing into it, a view of the river station, to which large multi decked ships and pleasure boats with hydrofoils were approaching. The berth for private yachts was also located near the river station, but already at the mouth of river Tvertsa. Years of work in the company “Business Center Lingua’ did not pass for Matilda in vain. These were hard working days. In the New Year, Matilda began a new life.
New life
One of the old two-story buildings on the embankment of the river Volga and was the new home of Matilda. The whole second floor was occupied by her apartment. The cabinet was in the back of the apartment. There was a table, near the wall, on the table was a large monitor with a flat screen, the size of an average TV set, a writing set, a keyboard and a small table lamp. The computer was next on the dresser. There was a printer and a scanner. Above the chest of drawers on the wall, the old grandmother’s photographs in the Italian baguette had found their shelter. There were not many of them. With St. Petersburg Matilda did not have already anything connections, only memories of childhood and school. The house where her childhood passed was not the same as before. The stolen apartment of her childhood was now a stranger, the neighbors too, almost all were others. It was 1994, and today Matilda celebrated her birthday in her posh apartment with a view of the Volga River. Matilda was sitting in a comfortable beech chair, wrapped in a blanket. Outside the window blow a cold wind and broke rare snowflakes on the window. On a low table in front of Matilda was a bottle of dry wine, an empty glass and a pot of cactus. Cactus replaced flowers for Matilda, buy them at this time in Tver was problematic. Also on the table was a saucer with young cheese, green olives with seeds in a green cup and a saucer with onions cut into large pieces.
“The older the wine, the younger the cheese,” thought Matilda, sipped a little wine from the goblet, then broke off a piece of cheese with a fork and sent it into her mouth. She was alone, and she was not bored alone with her thoughts. “It would be nice to have a cat or a dog, or even better, a real man,” she thought, but then deflected those thoughts.
“I cannot take this responsibility now,” decided Matilda, “I need to think about my education and go to college. Probably, it is better for me to choose an economic faculty.” She reasoned, “It would be very interesting to work as a financier in an international company or in a bank. It is necessary to enter the institute in absentia, and try yourself as an entrepreneur. Starting tomorrow, I will register my activities. The realtor agency is what I need.” Matilda thought, “Especially since I have several apartments for sale and one office space, I will use it for my company office.”
Outside the window, on the thin ice of the river Volga the fishermen were already winding fishing rods. Matilda took the olive with her fingers and bit into it. After the olives, a slice of onions and a slice of black bread were sent on the taste buds and absorption.
“What a poor little soul I am! I’m drinking an expired wine,” thought Matilda with a smile, and added to the goblet a dry wine from the cellars of the 1982 Ijevan Wine Plant. Getting out from under the blanket, Matilda went to the cabinet and brought a fresh issue of the magazine “Around the World’. Then she also settled comfortably into an armchair and wrapped up in a blanket. The articles were interesting. Matilda read it slowly, enjoying the reading and illustrations.
Tver goats
It was 1999 year. There were few visitors. To attract visitors, at the entrance to the building Matilda placed a glowing in the evening billboard with huge letters “Real Estate Agency’. It was a small room of one hundred square meters on the first floor. The windows faced the courtyard of the building and the main square of the city – the Lenin square. Matilda did not seek proposals for the sale of apartments in newspapers and did not offer other people’s apartments for resale. This was distinguished by her real estate agency from everyone else in this city. For five years, she managed to sell only seven of their apartments and she had two more small apartments for sale. The office was also in her property. Simultaneously with the rise in prices and the dollar, Matilda was forced to raise the price of her apartments for sale. It would be more correct to say that there was a rapid devaluation of the ruble and a fall in its rate to the rest of the