Olga was eighteen years old when her parents unexpectedly divorced. The father left, leaving his ex-wife and daughter a two-room apartment in the South-West of St. Petersburg. Guests began to come here infrequently, Vera herself had few acquaintances, and her girlfriends only occasionally ran to her daughter. Only a large Siberian cat, nicknamed Marquis, brightened up the long boring evenings filled with the flickering of the blue TV screen. In the spring, Olga began to notice that her mother sometimes became nervous and agitated. Then Vera called somewhere, locked herself in her room, dressed up for a long time and …