was shown on TV. At that moment, Peter thought that if he could earn money, if his book was published and he would earn a lot of money from it, then he would certainly go on a trip too. I would go to some exotic country, to Egypt, or to China, or maybe I would go to Dubai. There were many places to go, but there was no money.
Having taken a sip of coffee, Peter stood up from the table and went to the stove. He removed the lid from the frying pan and, taking a wooden spatula, stirred the dumplings, after which he closed the frying pan with a lid.
– He might give up this whole writing thing. I don’t like to write. I have to admit to myself that it doesn’t give me any pleasure to write, especially when you have to write a lot, and you have no idea what to write about or how to fill the pages. – Peter thought, returning to the table.
He clamped his fingers around the coffee mug and stared into it. After taking a sip, he turned his gaze to the TV.
My sister came into the kitchen.
– Will the dumplings be ready soon?
– In about five minutes.
– Okay, I’ll be on the computer, bring them to me when they’re ready.
– Don’t you need to do your homework?
– It’s necessary, but I’ll do them later.
– Come on, don’t sit for long, I also need a computer.
– Okay, but most importantly, bring me the dumplings.
– Okay, okay. – Peter mumbled, taking another sip of coffee.
When the dumplings were ready, Peter turned off the gas under the frying pan, put the dumplings on a plate and, putting the fork there, took everything into the room. He placed the plate on the table in front of the keyboard.
– Bring some ketchup. – said Christina, taking a fork and pricking one dumpling on it.
Peter went back to the kitchen, took ketchup out of the refrigerator, and took it to his sister. She squeezed ketchup into the dumplings and returned it to Peter. He took it to the refrigerator.
There was nothing to do. All that was left was to watch TV. But it was uncomfortable to sit in the kitchen, my back quickly got tired, and the coffee had already left an unpleasant taste in my mouth.
Taking a mug of coffee, Peter poured the rest into the sink and, after rinsing it, put a tea bag there. The kettle was still hot, but not hot enough for the tea to brew. Peter turned on the electric kettle and stood next to it, waiting for the water to boil in it.
When the water in the kettle boiled, Peter took it and poured water into the mug in which the tea bag lay. The water turned dark brown. Taking a teaspoon, Peter crushed the tea bag, which made the water even darker. Having brewed tea, he took the bag out of the mug and threw it into the trash can. Then he put three spoons of sugar into the mug and mixed everything thoroughly.
After taking a sip of tea, he sat down at the table and stared at the TV, which was still showing a travel program. The program was interesting, it showed all the countries that were on the world map. Peter was surprised by how people lived in other countries, especially in countries like India, where they didn’t even remove garbage from the streets and where there was no sewage system. People were too spiritual, they did not value life or comfort. This seemed strange to Peter, but in India it was normal. As explained in the program, Hindus believe in castes, and that later they will be reborn in another caste and will live like kings.
– This is all strange. Is it so difficult to keep the streets clean? – thought Peter, taking another sip of tea. «I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t read or write books.» Where will writers and those who will read them come from in such a dump? Although you yourself are not that much of a writer. I decided to write a book, but I don’t even know what to write it about. You write some boring nonsense, where each chapter is nothing more than a copy of the first chapter. But on the other hand, if there are so few varied events in the life of a writer, what now? Inventing tall tales about him writing a book and fighting space aliens? Stupidity. A boring book about a boring person.
– I’m done, you can go to the computer. – said the sister, coming out into the kitchen with an empty plate. She took it to the sink and went to her room to do her homework.
– Great! – said Peter and, taking a mug of tea, went to the computer.
Returning to the computer, he opened his social network page. Sveta was offline. Then Peter decided to write the fourth chapter of the book. He opened the office program, scrolled to the bottom of the text, wrote a chapter subtitle, and began to describe another, boring day of the writer. There was nothing interesting to come up with, and it was impossible to come up with anything, because the book was just about a guy who writes a book, and nothing more. Any imagination could spoil the plot, nothing could be added, and for an entire chapter I had to write a boring day, during which the main character walks from the computer to the refrigerator, drinks coffee and tries to compose a text.
The hardest part was dragging out the moments when it was necessary to describe on two pages how the main character cooks scrambled eggs and pours coffee.
Without going into details, each day could be fit into two paragraphs, simply by briefly writing that the main character poured coffee, cooked scrambled eggs, had breakfast, and went to write a book. But the publishers wanted at least eight author sheets, and for this, it was necessary to write at least three thousand words in each chapter.
Peter was clearly tired of working on the book he had in mind, because it was incredibly boring, at least for him. He was used to watching films where the plot develops quickly and energetically, where the heroes constantly get into some kind of trouble and are forced to fight monsters, but what happened here? Computer, social network, kitchen, coffee. Four components from which it was necessary to assemble a whole book. The publisher simply had to recognize Peter as a genius. Well, who else can write a book of more than two hundred pages, where the main character constantly drinks coffee and sits on the computer? It was boring beyond belief. The main thing is that this boredom does not scare away readers, because Peter wrote not in order to write a book, but in order to earn money.
Peter sat over the fourth chapter until the evening.
Mother returned from work and was preparing dinner in the kitchen.
Christina entered the room, turning to Peter, who was just finishing the last paragraph of the chapter:
– You are very busy?
– Now yes, but what did you want?
– Go to the store with me.
– Why do you need it?
– I need to buy a notebook.
– Do you have to?
– Yes, I need a notebook.
– Okay, just come on a little later, I need to write a little here. Take mom’s money for now.
The sister left the room and went to the kitchen to ask her mother for money for a notebook.
Peter continued to write. There was very little left. One, two, maybe three sentences, and that’s it, the chapter is completed.
Having completed the last sentence, he looked at the number of words, it turned out to be exactly three thousand. This is exactly how much he needed so that in the end the book would turn out to be the right size. It would be unpleasant to write a book and then find out that it will not be published because it does not fit in size and only one author’s page is missing. This would be creepy, because there were not so many publishing houses in Russia, especially good publishing houses that could promote the book.
– Let’s get ready. – said the sister, entering the room.
– Okay, okay,