"Viktor Pelevin. Generation P (fragment, англ.)" - читать интересную книгу автора

drive Tatarsky was ready to believe that he lived half of his life in the
apartment with Azadovsky and his relatives. Though, Tatarsky wasn't less
nervous than Lena.
The customer (his name remained a mystery), strikingly resembled the
image that formed in Tatarsky's mind after yesterday's talk. It was a
short and sturdy man with a cunning face and a hangover grimace that have
just started to disappear - obviously, he had his first glass today not
long before the meeting.
After the short courtesy talk (Lena was the main talker, Sergey was
sitting in the armchair in the corner crosslegged and smoked), Tatarsky
was introduced as a scriptwriter. He sat at the table opposite to the
customer, dropped the Rolex on it heavily and opened the notebook. It
became immediately clear that the customer doesn't have much to say. It
was quite hard to be impressed with the details of his business without
some kind of strong hallucinogen - he mostly talked about some obscure
pans with fluoride nonsticky coating. Listening and slightly turning his
face from him, Tatarsky was nodding and jotting senseless figures in the
notebook. With a corner of his eye he also studied the room - there was
nothing interesting in it, except the blue deer-skin hat, obviously very
expensive one that was lying on the upper shelf of the empty closet with
glass doors.
As promised, the pager started beeping on his waist after several
minutes. Tatarsky detached the small black plastic box. The message in the
window was: "Welcome to the Route 666". "Joker, huh?" - thought Tatarsky.
- Isn't it from "Video International"? - asked Sergey from his corner.
- No, - replied Tatarsky getting the serving. - Thank God, these assholes
don't call me anymore. It's Slava Zaitsev "famous Russian clothes
designer", everything is cancelled for today.
- Why? - asked Sergey arching his eyebrow. - If he thinks that we need it
more than he does...
- Let's talk later, - said Tatarsky.
In the meantime, the customer looked at his deer-skin hat in the closet
thoughtfully and gloomily. Tatarsky looked at his hands: they were locked
together and big fingers were rotating around each other quickly as if
spooling an invisible thread. That was the moment of truth.
- Don't you fear that everything might end suddenly? - asked Tatarsky.
You know what times we're living in... What if everything crashes?
The customer winced and looked at Tatarsky first, then at his companions
in surprise. His fingers stopped.
- I do, - he said raising his eyes. - Who doesn't? Strange questions
you're asking...
- I'm sorry, - said Tatarsky. - Never mind.
In around five minutes the meeting was over. Sergey took a stationery
sample from the customer - the logo was a stylized pie inside the oval,
with letters LKK beneath it. They set the next meeting in a week; Sergey
promised that the script will be ready by that time, as well as some
"frameset" and "balance".
- Are you crazy or what? - asked Sergey when they were outside, - You
must be, asking such questions.
- Don't worry, - said Tatarsky. - At least now I know what he wants.