Do Not Look Down on Seconds, Vasilich!

By Boris Bakhmetyev

Sometimes Cactus Vasilich, thanks to the chief executive’s secretary, got a chance to watch TV. Taking advantage of the boss’s unexplained prolonged absence due to some serious illness, Iskrina Romanovna would move from the reception area into his office and watch her favourite soap operas on the large television.

Usually, Cactus Vasilich — in whom the spirit of the comatose modest office worker Yevgeny Vasilyevich still lingered (he bore a striking resemblance to the top boss) — secretly grew bored while watching those series. Everything in them was with too many tears, not at all to his prickly bureaucratic taste. Besides, it constantly threw him off his creative work rhythm. When he needed to think about strategic reports and resolutions, about forward-looking plans superseding the previous ones, instead he had to endure "Simply Maria" and other "Santa Barbara"-like tv serials.

But a certain series, a Soviet one, touched Cactus Vasilich to the very root of his soul. Here’s how it happened. As she watched TV, Iskrina Romanovna simultaneously complained to Vasilich about her life — specifically about her husband, Zvezdoniy, who worked as a driver at the office. Lately, Zvezdoniy had become very nervous. The reason was that he had been reassigned to a new car — a Lada Vesta — which broke down far too often. It was all because of the hostile electronics that had to be replaced with Chinese parts. Sometimes he couldn’t even turn off the engine, because afterward the car wouldn’t start. He had to unscrew the steering wheel and the left rear wheel to unlock the onboard computer.

Because of his car troubles, Zvezdoniy started drinking more than usual. On days off from his driving shifts, he began skipping his side gig as a deliveryman, losing ground in that influential Moscow corporation that Cactus Vasilich, at Iskrina Romanovna’s prompting, was overseeing.

Iskrina, so upset about her husband, decided to down a glass of valerian tincture. To shake the drops out of the bottle, she first practised on Cactus Vasilich, tipping the bottle over his pot before finally dripping the medicine into her own glass…

Vasilich somehow missed this moment and fell into a trance. Suddenly, he saw on TV — was it the top boss, or perhaps Yevgeny Vasilyevich, i.e., himself?.. But then he clearly made out the intelligence Standartenfuhrer Stierlitz from the Soviet series "Seventeen Moments of Spring". Although spring was still a long way off — only the second ten-day period of December was drawing to a close… Moreover, Stierlitz unexpectedly said to Vasilich in Armenian: Barev zes («Good day!»). Then he lit a Cuban Cohiba cigar — strictly forbidden in office spaces in the Reich.

The next moment, Iskrina Romanovna knocked back her glass of valerian and cried out: «Stierlitz is walking down the corridor!»
«Which corridor?» Vasilich thought mechanically.
«Our corridor!» Iskrina Romanovna blurted out, guessing his thoughts.

«Don’t look down on seconds», Vasilich mused automatically. For a minute or two, he felt like the key member of a mysterious, tight-knit, yet very powerful structure. Then he abruptly blanked out… Like Stierlitz before the final stretch of highway to Berlin. Meanwhile, Iskrina threw open the window to air out the office — and to clear her own head…

December 18, 2025