Get married in 100 days - стр. 4
“Tolik graduated from school with a gold medal, yes…” she lightly touched her son’s hand with her fingers. – And an institute with honors. Teachers and lecturers couldn’t be happier with him. Do you know how many thanks they told me at graduation? So they persuaded him to go to graduate school, so they begged him… of course, in science now the cat is crying for young people, but why? Because they don't pay enough money. Do you know what the salary of an assistant professor is? The chickens laugh! You can’t live on this money – so I told Tolik, there’s no need to get involved in science. Go work as an engineer and you will roll like cheese in butter. You still have a family to support…
Unfortunately, Nadya could not boast of the same talents as her potential groom: she graduated from nine grades with half a B, and then went to a pedagogical school. According to the calling of the soul. She could, of course, finish high school and then enter a pedagogical institute, but she wanted to work specifically with small children – she would have gone to become a teacher, but her mother dissuaded her. Like, it’s too unprofitable a business.
Surprisingly, Tatyana Dmitrievna did not express the slightest condemnation of all these circumstances – on the contrary, she praised her potential daughter-in-law for her choice of profession:
– Why does a girl need a lucrative profession? Only to the detriment of the family. There he will build a career, instead of taking proper care of his husband and children. I have worked as an engineer all my life, but this is not at the behest of my heart, but because of my husband’s profession: he is always on his flights. If I lived at home, I would give birth to more children and take care of them, but it’s hard to be alone all the time.
It was clear from everything that Tatyana Dmitrievna really wouldn’t mind having a couple more, or even four more children. She constantly paid excessive attention to her son: she would either make a remark that he was slurping, snorting, blowing his nose loudly, and so on, then she would start wiping him with a napkin, then straightening his shirt, then smoothing his hair… Tolik was not left without her advances literally for a minute. Nadya even felt sorry for him, although he accepted all this maternal care with stoic patience, without showing that she was annoying him.
Tolik was silent almost all the time, leaving his parent to sing his praises. At some point, Nadya’s mother could not stand it and asked:
– Anatoly, please tell us about your work.
Tolik instantly turned poppy-colored and began to hum, cough and stutter:
– Uh… well… recently we completed a p-project for… ahem, a large residential complex. Hmm! And… well, uh, I, ahem, designed p-almost the entire sewer system in it…
His voice was quiet, uncertain, as if he was pronouncing a poorly memorized text. At the same time, Tolik constantly glanced at his mother, as if she were his prompter.
Tatyana Dmitrievna nodded approvingly, but this did not help her son become more confident. In the end, she took the initiative:
– Yes, yes, and the chief engineer in their company praised Tolik very much, he said that the sewer system was designed flawlessly, that he didn’t even have to fix anything.