The Before Short Story Series. Part 1. Иван Перепелятник
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phone, and went to the exit. Everyone else—not a word spoken—left too. Silence ensued. Only a slight sound of the air conditioning system went on actively filling in the void with an image of office life.
‘Morons! Idiots! Damn it!’ Jordan picked up the broken keyboard and threw it into the wall. Then he came up to the scattered keys and crouched, holding his hands to his head.
A couple of minutes later Jordan got his phone from a pocket of his loose jeans and dialled Beg Shauncan: ‘Hey Beg. That’s me. I got fired up a little here.’
‘Oh wow! who would have thought!’
‘Not funny. I have to face these dumbass morons day after day, all day long. We could have already started the project, were it not because of them! you see?!’
‘Jo, your getting fired up costs us millions… but that’s not all yet! the worst is that the best coders we hire for you refuse to work with you! what shall I do about this, Jo?’
‘But they are just dumb idiots! you do get it! they don’t work—they do nothing but get in the way! that’s all that happens in this damn office! they only slow the thing down! they do nothing to make it quicker!’
‘Well, it’s fine, Jo. I see. We’ll make it work. Don’t overthink it. Let’s make a deal: get some rest. At least today. Please. You are tired. You get so worked up about nothing. Go home. Have a walk. Watch a film. Should I arrange for some girls to visit?’
Jordan sniffed into the microphone, ‘Fine, Beg. I will. I will go home. Sorry. No girls, please. I have a dog.’
The two shared a laugh.
‘Great then. Deal. Have some rest, please, Jo. See you tomorrow.’
‘Bye, Beg.’
Jordan stopped in a parking lot in front of a row of cars. Each parking space was marked with yellow JB letters.
‘The weather is great today. No rain forecast. The clearance of this car is low. It holds well to the road. The acceleration is acceptable. I shall air my head,’ reasoned Jordan while sitting down into a roadster. The Porsche reacted to a Start button pressing: the control panel lit up. He pressed some more buttons: and there was music, and the tin roof folded into the boot. The main screen read, ‘Please indicate the point of destination.’ Jordan pressed Manual control and kicked the accelerator pedal into the floor.
Driving to his house’s gate, Jordan turned the music off and took a deep breath. ‘Looks like I calmed down a little. Beg’s right. I do need to have some rest once in a while.’ Having chosen the Parking option, Jordan took out his phone and made a note, ‘Think what to do with dumb employees—might need an intermediary’. The car slowly passed by the main entrance and stopped in front of the garage gate, waiting for the lifting door to open. Jordan opened the car door and got out. The autopilot system started making sounds of unrest, and Please specify further actions appeared on the screen. Jordan, on his way to the front door, chose the Parking option in the Porsche app.
‘Good afternoon, Jordan! I didn’t expect you so early here.’
‘Good afternoon, Sarah. I didn’t expect myself here either—apparently I will have some kind of a holiday today. I hope I won’t disturb you too much.’
‘I am very glad you came home earlier today—it’s been a while that you have needed some rest,’ Sarah said with a kind smile.
A dog’s barking followed. As soon as she heard Jordan, Ozzie ran to see him through the whole house. Beating her sides with her tail, she rushed into her master’s hands.
‘Ozzie! you my good girl! good! good dog!’ Jordan sat stroking and patting his bull terrier, happily wriggling in his feet. ‘You my cutie! time to get you on a diet, Ozzie. Look how tight your sides have got.’
For a moment Jordan thought of asking Sarah if she was following the indicated diet for Ozzie, but then he realized that this question would have compromised him: how could he imagine the very possibility of the indicated course of actions in his house not being followed.
‘Sarah, today I will have my lunch outside.’
‘I will get it ready in a moment. I need some fifteen minutes.’
‘Very well, thank you.’
Jordan went through the living room to the terrace windows. Ozzie followed him at his foot, wagging her tail in a pleased way and glancing at him every few seconds—making sure that he was still there by her side. ‘The weather’s quite rough today,’ observing the waves, Jordan doubted the feasibility of his idea to have a lunch outside. He looked at the windmills, located as far as possible from the house, so that not to spoil the ocean view from the living room and the terrace. ‘The rotation speed is higher than usual. The wind is too strong and it looks like it can still rain in a while.’Approaching the end of the living-room glass wall, he pressed a button—and immediately a breeze hit his face, as though it carried all the energy stored in the deep ocean. Running out to the open area of the terrace, Ozzie began to bark. ‘Well, five minutes or so and we are frozen here for sure.’
‘Ozzie, come here! come here, my girl!’
By the glass barriers and still barking loudly, Ozzie was looking at her master. ‘Well, let’s see what is so interesting that you saw there.’ Jordan came up to the dog and looked around. A strong wind was hitting his face with cold blasts. It seemed that the splashes of breaking waves down below the cliff were reaching him.
‘Let’s go home, Ozzie. Let’s go.’ Jordan patted his leg and went back to the living room. The dog, waddling slightly awkwardly, followed him there.
‘Sarah, I am afraid the idea of a terrace lunch is not working out. Please bring everything to my first-floor study.’
‘I sure will, Jordan’, the assistant’s voice came out of the watch on his wrist. He appreciated a lot Sarah’s approach to her job, and he did trust her. As much, sure, as Jordan could trust anyone at all. Even so, the fact that he was ready to leave Ozzie with Sarah for a week when going away on a business trip spoke volumes about their relationship. Earlier he would take the dog with him on all trips, which naturally caused a lot of issues and slowed the work process considerably. It was necessary to observe all kinds of quarantines and to comply with all the varied requirements for animal transportation that applied in different countries. He entrusted all house keeping to Sarah. She was the one in charge of organizing and overseeing house repairs, maintaining a fleet of cars, and even of buying his underwear. Jordan set up a separate account for housekeeping, the money in which was totally under Sarah’s control—she would also hire various contractors to maintain all the environment where Jordan led his life. He appreciated—no, he greatly appreciated Ms Estrada’s work and he paid generously for it. Six years after she got the job, she brought over her whole family from Mexico to the States.
Ozzie lay on a leather couch by the window while Jordan sat down at his desk and turned the TV on, choosing a news channel—just to make the room less empty.
‘Did you get cold out there? Ozzie?’ The dog was trying to get her nose under the nearby plaid. Jordan walked up to her and covered her. Sitting down next to the dog, he started petting her muzzle. The black spot around her black eye was suggesting an uncommon coloration: on one side, the left side, she was completely white—and the other side she had it all covered with black spots, just as well as her right paws in black socks. ‘An interesting mutation,’ noted Jordan to the breeder upon seeing the energetic active puppy for the very first time.
‘Oh Ozzie, how quickly flies the time! we’ve been living in this house for eight years already. Soon our big project will be done, my girl. Who knows, what we shall be doing afterwards.’
Ozzie was happily snoring, her muzzle next to her master.
Tōkyō
‘Ayaka, we’re leaving in five minutes! are you ready? everything you need too?’ shouted Hiromi from her bedroom.
‘Yes, Mummy, I am ready.’
‘Ayaka, what’s that?! why are you