We separated in autumn. Rita left me.
And I went. I wanted to swing. I was afraid to take revenge on her. And Diko wanted to drag her back into the night again. So much emotion in the head of a young fool.
30 years have passed. My God, thirty years. In front of me was Rita, the treasurer of Rita in the “Five”.
The fifth, the box. I put out my kefir with garlic and cigarettes.

The treasurer quickly greets, without looking at me, knocks, “That’s all?” He throws away the painted cloth. What a familiar gesture. But I would have gone if I hadn’t looked at the badge that everyone has a cashier on his chest. by Margarita Averina.

Rita is you?
She finally raises her eyes at me:
And what... God! by Loyola?
I didn’t expect to meet you like this.
Summer of 1988. My husband and I are going to Moscow on Sunday. She is in a black mini shirt, lean, with beaten and lacquered hair, in her ears huge plastic earrings, grimps. She talks about aerobics.

Rita has beautiful legs, a slightly loose walk and an eternal light smile. It’s like she’s running away from me, and I’m trying to catch her. Rita is wildly sexy, men turn around. And I am proud to have such a girl with me, and I am angry because she doesn’t even allow herself to embrace.

I tell her that I dream of becoming a journalist, Rita smiles:

I think it is boring. I will be a singer. It is certain.

We are 20 years old. Rita graduates from music school, piano. But now it is summer, there is no class, so she has long nails, with red lacquer. These hands and those nails also make me crazy.

Rita says strictly:

I want to eat! Out of coffee!

I only have a rubber in my pocket. I was going to live for him for a week, my mom left before leaving. And this cafe is worth the hell knows how much it seems to be cooperative, to collapse. But I make a careless face: of course, go! I think it would be enough for the red, but it would be enough.
In the cafe, Rita ordered pizza and champagne. We drank, and I didn’t care, just to take Rita home from here for the night. But there was the Mirage group.

Rita jumped up and started dancing under her alone, boldly and passionately. All the fat around stood up on Rita, forgetting about the vodka snack. And Rita still sang: “Music has bound, the mystery has become...” She felt like a star.
I almost had no money, but Rita carelessly threw the ruble on the table:
Okay we go for a walk! So what next?
And we went to me. It seemed to have been the longest and best night in my life. Excellent aerobics for two. “Music has connected us, the mystery has become ours” – it sounded in my happy chambered head.

Three months later, in the autumn, we split up. Rita left me:

“Listen, I met a guy, very nice, sorry. And he also said that he would introduce me to the right person at the recording studio. I want to record an album, I even came up with a title – “My Happiness.”

A silly name, I answered.

And went away. I wanted to swing. I was afraid to take revenge on her. And Diko wanted to drag her back into the night again. So much emotion in the head of a young fool.

Thirty years have passed. My God, thirty years. In front of me was Rita, the treasurer of Rita in the "Five".

Do you remember being a singer? I smiled.

Rita smiled nervously:

“We all wanted something... But I know you became a journalist. Sometimes I read you, you are good.

I left the store. I thought about Rick. Well, you can say, I’ve been revenged, let’s say thirty years later. I did not deliberately give up. As funny as it was, there were exactly ten rubles. The coin.

Only now they are not at all those ten rubles, not drinking in a cafe with Soviet champagne. Music stunned, Rita became fat, her life ends at the box office, accompanied by barcode. The grief.

A few days later, I went into the same “five”. I rarely go there, but I went there. With an unclear purpose.

She was there again. He saw me and was pleased:

You are smoking, right? Let us go! I’ll ask Nail to sit at the box.

Rita put on her jacket and we smoked. Rita said:

I was a fool then, sorry.

Rita, it doesn’t matter now. Thirty years passed. I have a third marriage and I have three children.

And Rita smiled – as then:

I suddenly understood. You are sorry for me, right? You think – here is an unfortunate aunt, dreamed of becoming a star, and now at the box, weighing potatoes.

Well, not that...

I see. You are regret. Remember, I wanted to name the album “My Happiness”? You know, it is not stupid. I would call it so now. Just our happiness is changing very much, our notions about it. For twenty-five years I have been married to a very good man, Dimka. Yes, he’s simple, he doesn’t have any music hearing at all, he snores at night. But he is a good car mechanic, he has put up the furnace in our country, he knows everything. We have an adult daughter, a beautiful woman. She is twenty-two, more than I was then. She is a lawyer, such a businessman, not like me at all. She is married, and we have a granddaughter, also Rita, she is one and a half years old. I am a very happy grandmother. I had a great life. The job of the cashier? I could not work, my husband has normal money. But why not work while your granddaughter is in the garden? I am sociable, you know. Okay, I have to run.

Rita, I finally said. You are right, fucking right. And I do not regret you at all. Run, I was glad to see you.

Already standing in the green door, she suddenly turned:

By the way, I became a singer. I sing to my granddaughter, she loves it. So I am a star. A real star for my granddaughter.