Ninety-One

November 30. Outside the staff room window, the first real snow falls — fat flakes drifting slowly, as if hesitant to land on the dirty asphalt. A Zhiguli with a broken muffler sputters to a stop in the yard, and the radio on the windowsill crackles: “…Gorbachev announces…” Someone furiously twists the tuning knob, switching to “Europa Plus.” Maria Genrikhovna signs her name beneath a report dated November 30, 1990. The ink pen scrapes the yellowed paper a little harder than necessary. “In light of economic inefficiency and the lack of proper educational content, I propose that the theater club under the supervision of Sirina T. V. be discontinued.” The headmaster, Andrey Mikhaylovich, sighs heavily, staring at the sheet with glassy eyes. He looks as if he might crumble into pieces — just like the USSR itself. “Maria Genrikhovna, for heaven’s sake, how long is this going to go on? You know parents love it. And the kids… these past few years have been so hard. At least this gives them some joy.” Maria feels something tighten beneath her ribs. “Joy? They parody the classics, scream like they’re at a bazaar, and Sirina encourages this chaos!” “You should see them quoting The Government Inspector from memory afterward…” “That’s not pedagogically sound.” The headmaster rubs his temples wearily, then freezes for a few seconds, rolling a small medallion with Lenin’s portrait between his fingers — a medallion he hasn’t worn on his chest in ages, as if weighing some private thought. “Alright. Let’s try this instead. You personally oversee their next performance. Review the script, attend all rehearsals. If there’s truly no educational value—then we’ll shut it down.” Maria freezes, her eyes wide with disbelief. “I’m supposed to work with her?” “Well, who else? You’re the vice-principal.” She understood at once: she’d set the trap herself, and now she’d have to clean up the mess. December 1. A new calendar hangs in the hallway — Soviet, featuring Moscow landmarks, already as useless as everything else in this strange year when no one knows who’ll be in power tomorrow. The radio flips between Gorbachev and Yeltsin; daily arguments about the future rage in the staff room, which Maria avoids; sugar disappears from the cafeteria — now handed out only with ration coupons. That morning, Maria wakes up raw — like an exposed nerve—sharp, as if ready for battle. On her way to the first rehearsal, she walks hunched over, ignoring greetings from colleagues and students alike. Her eyes hold the resigned despair of someone forced to drink vinegar. And so begins the “bureaucratic hell.” Tanya sits on the edge of the stage, swinging her legs, scribbling something in her red notebook. When she sees Maria, she deliberately flashes a wide grin. “Oh, the censor’s arrived!” The kids giggle. Maria doesn’t blink. “The script. Give it to me for approval first.” Tanya carelessly tosses her a stack of pages covered in messy handwriting. “Here you go, Your Majesty. Just so you know — we improvise.” Maria Genrikhovna reads slowly, squinting and shaking her head in disapproval. Passive-aggressive sighs escape her with every page turn. “What is this… *The Seagull* in punk-rock style?” “And why not?” “This is Chekhov, Tatyana Viktorovna—not your…” — she searches for the right word — “underground rock club!” Tanya jumps to her feet. “To me, Chekhov’s exactly about how the young suffocate from old folks’ boredom!” A tomb-like silence falls. The kids freeze. Maria feels her ears burn, irritation coursing through every inch of her body. “Rewrite it. I want the classical text. No more of your… experiments.” Tanya crosses her arms. Her eyes flash — not with fear, but with defiance. “And if I don’t?” “Then the club gets shut down.” “Fine. We’ll play by your rules,” she says, lips pressed tight, already bracing for “battle with the enemy.” Now they’re forced to meet three times a week. In Maria’s office, the drama teacher deliberately perches on the edge of the desk — even though a chair sits empty. In the auditorium, the vice-principal makes pointed remarks about discipline, though the kids are quieter here than in her own classes. In the hallway, they pass each other like strangers — no glance, no word. Maria crosses out entire scenes in red ink. Tanya ignores half the corrections but concedes on small things — removes guitar riffs, for example, but lets Nina Zarechnaya keep her leather jacket. They argue more and more often in empty classrooms after lessons, their voices echoing as if the school has long been deserted — just the two of them, snow falling outside, and a strange coldness that has nothing to do with December weather. Maria grips the folder so tightly the cardboard crumples. Her lips tremble — she hasn’t cooled down from their latest clash. Why does that… that brat make me boil like this? Tanya’s smirk flashes in her mind — her fingers drumming on the desk, her voice cracking on high notes, then dropping low, almost to a whisper. I hate the way she looks at me. As if she knows that I… The thought cuts off. Maria stands abruptly, brushing off her skirt — as if shaking off something sticky. She’s just an upstart. A troublemaker. She belongs not in a school, but in some basement with her punk friends. But when Tanya deliberately brushes her shoulder on her way out, Maria feels goosebumps race down her spine. She hates it. Hates herself for not being able to simply throw her out of the school. Hates that she catches herself thinking: What if she’s right about everything? After the unresolved confrontation, Tanya steps into the corridor. The door shuts behind her with a dull thud. She leans against the wall, suddenly realizing her hands are shaking. In her pocket — a crumpled pack of Belomor, the last cigarette. “Damn it. Got worked up again.” From around the corner, Sergey peeks out — the incorrigible tenth grader. “Tanya, what’s wrong?” “Go away, colleague,” she waves him off, but her voice cracks. He doesn’t leave. He stares at her as if seeing her for the first time. “You… really care this much about her?” Tanya straightens abruptly and lights a cigarette right there in the hallway. She exhales the smoke toward the ceiling. “Me? Care? That’s hilarious. It’s just…” — she flicks ash onto the parquet floor — “it’s just exhausting that someone else gets to decide what’s allowed and what isn’t.” Sergey says nothing. He’s not stupid — he sees how her fingers tremble. “Alright, fine,” Tanya suddenly claps him on the shoulder, too cheerfully. “Let’s go rehearse. Or else our ‘Seagull’ will stay a chicken forever.” But after he walks ahead, she lingers another second, staring at the classroom door. Damn you, Maria Genrikhovna… For some reason, she suddenly remembers how Maria adjusted her glasses yesterday — slowly, with two fingers. And how, for a split second, their eyes met… Tanya crushes the cigarette butt fiercely against the wall. Should’ve become a lawyer, like Mom wanted. Shouldn’t have crawled into this hole. Shouldn’t have fallen for… The thought cuts off. She won’t even finish it in her own mind. A week later, during yet another script review, Maria notices a new line: “Treplev shouts: ‘I’M NOT A SEAGULL! I’M A HUMAN BEING—AND I’M TERRIFIED OF BECOMING LIKE YOU!’” Beside it, in pencil, Tanya’s note: “M.G., you’re definitely not going to like this. But it’s the truth.” Maria tears the page to shreds in anger. Then she tapes it back together. The sticky tape clings to her fingers just like the banknotes Arayik used to drop on the table — like payment for her silence. But then she tears it up again. On the last day before winter break, Maria is finishing her report when Tanya walks into the office without knocking. “It’s eight already. Time to lock up.” “What are you doing here?” the older woman asks slowly, raising an eyebrow. Tanya glances at her watch — cheap, plastic, with a worn strap. Maria notices it’s showing the wrong time. “Waited until you finished.” She tosses the keys onto the desk. “Here. From the auditorium. You always like everything locked up.” Maria doesn’t understand why it sounds like mockery — but it doesn’t anger her. Tanya drops a new version of the script onto the vice-principal’s desk. “Approve it. Now it’s nothing but dull, soul-crushing classicism.” Maria picks up the pages. On the last one, she spots a handwritten addition: “But if you cross this out too, it just means you enjoy arguing with me.” She looks up. Tanya is already leaving — but pauses at the doorway. “Happy New Year, Maria Genrikhovna.” And for some reason, it didn’t sound like a joke. It sounded more like “thank you.”