A high-explosive shell flew over a turret and blew the roof off a house. A recently acquired IS-6 tank painted in camouflage fired off one shell after another.

Andrei excitedly slammed the mouse on the table.

“And again!” he shouted, fixing his headphones and adjusting the microphone. Tykhon and the cat were scampering around him.

“Suck on that! Ever since the last two patches, this tank has been all but impenetrable. Shame we can’t patch the junk we send to the front. The best three tanks we have are used to protect the president. The latest models are made with rubberised weld seams. You get less of a bell effect, and it cuts down resonance from impact.” He pressed the earpiece closer to his head. “No, no, no, a projectile hitting the lower frontal area of a tank is less likely to produce concussion in real life than in the game. Ha-ha-ha! Yeah, this tank is on level nine. I’ll jack it up to level ten and flog it.”

A yell came out of the headphone: “THE ARMOUR IS NOT PIERCED!”

Dust swept up into the air by a broom gleamed in the bright Saturday sun and tickled his nose. Maria sneezed angrily. She was irritated by this perplexing allergy. A day off in September should have run according to the usual weekly routine: after breakfast, the washing, the cleaning and a walk; in the evening, a film, restaurant and sex. Everything to keep things from falling apart at the seams. But Maria was in a mood, which sent Andrei and Tykhon scurrying to their haven in the bedroom to play World of Tanks. And then there was the party.

Maria left the room and sneezed again. It would be better if they went out for a walk. She had never come down with an allergy before, for God’s sake. She washed the dishes left over from breakfast, wiped down the cabinets, table, sink, and microwave. When she’d run out of dirt in the kitchen, Maria hunted for something else to scrub or put away, but everything was, unfortunately, just right. There was only the old meat grinder that still smelled of oranges—Tykhon had tried to repurpose it as a juicer. Maria had no wish to start that project.

Empty. Anxious. Maria took the bed sheets out of the washing machine and neatly hung them out to dry on the balcony. That didn’t help either.

She stood in the kitchen and watched a sunbeam falling to the floor. The refrigerator whirred, the clock ticked. What she wanted from moving in with Andrei was family warmth. She painted the walls, arranged the furniture and the books to her taste, she picked out a coffee machine, potted cactuses, candles, she put up pictures.

She even pushed their bed up to the window to watch the moon sailing past. It should have worked. But it didn’t. There was the noise of childish screams and thuds outside. The boys in the yard were playing football. It felt to Maria that if she knocked something off the shelf, it would take a minute before hitting the floor; that’s how slowly time was moving.