The woman in front of Ulya turned facing her. “You see? What did I tell you!”
Ulya sighed, looking into the woman’s disappointed face and headed away from the upset not-to-be viewers who began to disperse.
“I have an extra ticket.”
She turned at the sound of the voice to face a young man dressed in a fine gray suit and holding a cap of the matching color in his hand. With one quick look at him, she knew he was not only attractive with his intense gray eyes and powerful body, but the way he carried himself revealed his self-confidence. She paid him and watched him stride away to a phone booth. Most likely his date did not show up. Ulya silently thanked the girl.
The screen exploded with News, reporting successes of production, new schools and kindergartens and plants put into operation, followed by endless Kolkhoz fields with haystacks, tractors ploughing the land for winter crops, happy faces of workers and collective farmers. Then a sudden change to lots of people shouting, their fists thrust over their heads: “No mercy to the enemies of the Soviet people, German spies! They dream of the downfall of the Soviet Union!”
An annoyed whisper diverted Ulya’s attention from the screen. The young man who had sold her the ticket was threading his way in her direction, disturbing the other cinemagoers. “My place.” He pushed his ticket into the face of the teenager who sat to the right of Ulya.
A short, muted squabble erupted. “No, it’s mine. See my ticket.”
“Right, the seventh row, this one is the sixth.”
The teenager vacated the seat and, evoking discontent from the audience, made away.
Volga-Volga was a new comedy film full of tricks and dances and songs and a mild mockery of a bureaucrat. The young man beside Ulya roared. Time and again, his thigh nudged hers, so she had to lean away toward a fat woman, feeling her soft tummy every time they both burst out laughing.
End on the screen prompted the viewers to take to their feet and barge their way to the exit, pushing and elbowing each other. “What a great movie,” Ulya’s neighbor said from behind her back. With a half turn, she gave him a quick nod, enough to politely acknowledge his comment.
“You liked it too, did you?” he went on, following her to the street and, not taking the trouble to wait for her reaction, continued, “What direction do you go?”
She resisted the impulse to give him a curt response. “To the left.”
“What luck, I need to go there too.” He stretched his hand for a shake. “I’m Konstantin. You?”
“Ulya.”
“Ulyana, that is?”
Why should she indulge in a long explanation? “Ulya,” she repeated with quiet emphasis.
“What do you do, Ulya?”
Why was he clinging to her? she wondered. “I’m a student at the University.”
“Studying what?”
“Law. What about you?”
“I study at the Volsk Technical Aviation Military School.”
“To be a pilot?”
“An aircraft flight mechanic.”
She wanted to inquire about his future profession, but something in his look and his bearing made her hesitate to probe too much. He switched to the last films, which were hits at that time: If War Breaks Out Tomorrow, The Man With a Rifle, and Alexander Nevsky.
Still a half block from home, she slowed her steps. “That two-story red brick house is where I live. It was nice to meet you.”
He took a step as if to follow her then stopped. “Can I accompany you home?”
“Thank you, there is no need.”
With an adventurous toss of his head, and smiling as though he was sure she wouldn’t reject his idea, he said, “Maybe we can meet again?” His look subtly betrayed something else, some unspoken message, which alerted Ulya. What could this good-looking young man have to do with her, so simple and unattractive? Dried herring. That was what other girls called her behind her back. She fixed her gaze on him, which he withstood without batting an eyelid.
“Next week, on Saturday, maybe? I’ll have a day’s leave.” He looked at her expectantly.
She gave a nod of consent.
“At the entrance to the Lipki park then? What time?”
“At four-thirty in the evening.”
There is something rigid about him, something wrong, she thought, watching him stride away with his military posture. But how could she know? Her childhood friends aside, she had never had anything to do with a guy before.
Never interested in examining herself in the mirror, today, Ulya stopped in front of the wardrobe and, what she seldom bothered doing, looked at her reflection. The strong shoulders, too broad compared to her narrow waist and hips, the long strong legs, the hardly discernable breasts. Even at school, most of her classmates wore brassieres unlike her, who had never considered having one.
She tried to recall if she was aware of her disadvantage to the other girls. Not till recently. Her thoughts wheeled back in time to that summer day two months ago when during a beach volleyball game at the Volga she bumped into a girl. Now, Ulya remembered feeling self-conscious when she came in contact with her breasts, which were big and dense, and how all of a sudden, she perceived why the young men paid such interest to that bombshell, while ignoring Ulya.
The wall clock displayed four in the afternoon. The nearby promtorg would close at six. She took what money she had spared from her lunches and hurried outside into the street descending into twilight.
The little shop that mostly sold foodstuff had a small department with garments. She approached a full-bodied saleswoman behind the counter. “I need a bra.” The pumpkin—that was what Ulya dubbed fat women—pulled a bunch of brasseries from a hidden drawer then looked her up and down. “Are you sure you need one? I have none in the size zero.”
Ignoring the woman’s mocking tone, she said, “Show me what you
