On the Wings of Hope: Prose (Recognized)

Spammer

Oleg was really unlucky that day. Of course, it would be the greatest mistake to say that he was, in principle, a carefree lucky man running through his life, but on this day Lady Luck did not just turn away from him, but one could even say that at first, she looked at him sarcastically, then categorically, as some emancipated persons can only do, loudly declared to him "oh, that's it!" and then slammed the door loudly in his face and strode away, albeit only for a while, in the direction only she knew. Not in the sense that she would leave him for good – after all, he was still quite a promising young man! – but she decided, with one of her inherent feminine cunning, to let him feel all the charms of her, albeit short-term, absence.

And this absence of hers began to manifest itself somewhere around seven o'clock in the morning, as soon as Oleg barely had time to rub his eyes after the last excessively sleepless night, yawn sweetly, order "Alice", who only partially replaced his wife, to brew him coffee in his excessively smart, though still requiring human attention coffee maker, and start getting dressed. "Alice", unlike Lady Luck, was quite an executive, obedient and, most importantly, non-capricious girl, and did not contradict him this Sunday morning. The heated water bubbled sweetly in the coffee maker, and Oleg's much-beloved aroma of fresh coffee beans began to slowly spread around the house. Yet he did not have time to taste this invigorating drink.

"Tilin-tilin! Tilin-tilin!" his smartphone piped its simple melody and joyfully highlighted a completely unknown incoming call number to Oleg. Here we need to note that Oleg was not a big fan of trusting all sorts of unknown combinations of numbers, but the peculiarities of his work did not allow him to abandon his potential, and sometimes even kinetic clients. For several seconds Oleg stared stupidly at his loud gadget, wondering who the hell wanted to call him at such an early hour, but shortly after he still pressed the call acceptance button.

"H-m-m-m!" a gruff male voice coughed on the phone. "Oleg Alexandrov?"

"Hypothetically speaking, yes. Practically – who the fuck knows. What did you want from me?" Oleg muttered, still sleepy.

"I am talking on a very important issue for you, dear Oleg Alexandrov!" the owner of the unfamiliar number assured him. "Tell me, please, you are a client of Sberbank, aren't you?"

Purely mechanically, Oleg wanted to say that it is extremely hard in our difficult times to find a person who is not a client of this ubiquitous institution, and he already opened his mouth to do it anyway, but an unknown voice from an unknown number didactically continued.

"It is the security service of Sberbank. The fact is that we have just recorded a suspicious transaction on your bank card and were forced to block it."

"A huge, overwhelming thanks! I shall never forget your timely intervention!" Oleg, who had already begun, even being half-asleep, to guess into what unknown distances his interlocutor was dragging him like Susanin, cordially confessed his feelings to the speaker.

"Unfortunately, it's still too early to calm down and thank us for our efforts, mister Oleg!" comrade incognito firmly assured him of the urgent need to continue their conversation. "Our banking system records that the scammers still managed to arrange a pre-approved loan in your name..."

"When? How much?" Oleg interrupted him.

"What do you mean?" the side on the other end of the phone didn't get it.

"What is the credit sum, I ask?"

"Ah, the sum..." the voice faded slightly. "One million rubles!"

"And that's all?! Is that all you think I'm worthy of? What an unfair act of bullying!" Oleg, who had finally woken up even with no help from his morning coffee, barked into the phone. "You have just ruined all my sweet dreams! Oh, my Caribs! Where are you, my Seychelles?!"