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struggling with his hormones that seemed to live autonomously and manage his brain, and not vice-versa. Nothing was coming into his mind. Somewhere, Grandpa Freud was celebrating.
    Above her upper lip, droplets of sweat had formed. He got up, and with the tip of his tongue cleaned them off. She did not stir at all. She did not draw him closer and she did not push him away. Serge clasped her lips and gently began to inhale them into himself, and to release them slowly.
    “You kiss well, only your moustache is a little prickly,” she whispered as she raised his head. “Let’s go and drink something. Thirst tortures me.”
    They drank beer, warm and sour. A small little man with a bearded face went around and sold dried up salty anchovies. From him dripped rotten ooze and yesterday's vodka, and nobody wanted to buy his fish. Out of pity, Serge bought a big paper scoop full, but they had to throw out almost all the fish as they were covered in solid salt.
    They went along the park, sat on a bench, ate ice cream, kissed because of Serge’s permanent desire, and talked a little bit about themselves. Serge said that he was an Odessan. More precisely he was born in Odessa, but, unfortunately, did not live in this city. He lived in Moscow, but more correctly, near Moscow. He had a sister. Two, really—one in Odessa, who was actually his cousin, and the other, his true sister, living in Moscow, who would soon arrive with his parents …
    “I only have my mom,” Janna replied. “My dad passed when I was nine and a half. She is by herself now in Kishinev and I need to go to her soon.” Her sad voice immediately became more cheerful. “But I have a lot of friends and acquaintances. Guys and girls. They are like brothers and sisters to me.”
    Near the exit to the park stood a scale, and behind it sat a lean, black as tar, old geezer who took two kopecks from interested people to measure their weight. Serge appeared to weigh 73 kilograms, and noted that he had lost 3 kilograms since the beginning of summer. Janna was a whole 10 kilograms lighter, but to Serge it seemed that she should weigh the same.
    They had dinner in a small green cafe fenced in by a slanting lattice with ivy twisted around it. It was the custom to share tables at Russian restaurants, and a middle-aged couple was brought over to sit at their table. The man appeared reserved. The woman chattered about everything, but basically about herself. She was thirty-five years old and was still never married. And here, at last, she met the person to whom she will belong to from now on, and this person will belong to her too. The man vaguely assented, but was engaged more in a piece of tough meat, as if it was cut out of a heel. The woman became excited and started to foretell happiness for Serge and Janna. She envied their age, and told them about what unbelievable opportunities were coming for them, and poking her beloved in the side, kept on repeating, “Well, why aren’t we at least twenty-five?”
    Janna was rather bothered, and in a fairly loud voice, she directed Serge’s attention to how the woman chomped noisily and made smacking sounds with her lips and how this provincial holds a fork and that she had no concept about the purpose of a table knife. Eventually, Janna began to scoff frankly at the ignorance of their neighbors, and the man thought that it was necessary to say goodbye and go home.
    Janna and Serge laughed at them for a long time, copying and mocking them. “I’m already thirty-five, and I still haven’t put out! And it would be so desirable to have children? Yes, swell me up with kids, but my man is only interested in gorging on meat …”
    “But maybe he is not capable?” Janna whispered conspiratorially, with her lips attached to Serge’s ear. Serge did not miss a moment of even her slightest approach, and kissed her. “How did you guess, tell me secretly.”
    “You won’t be able to understand. It is a complex combination of