Luka’s voice cuts through the gunfire somewhere behind me, but I don’t stop, I can’t stop. I’m scrambling across the fractured ice toward the hole where Roman disappeared, and the surface is cracking under my knees, and I don’t care, I because he’s under there, he’s drowning, he pushed himself away from me to save my life, and now he’s dying in black water, and I won’t let him, I won’t—
I hit the edge of the hole, and the cold air rising off the water smells like death. Somewhere in that darkness is the man I love.
I jump.
The cold is violence.
It hits my body and every nerve fires at once, and my lungs seize, and I’m gasping underwater, sucking in frozen riverinstead of air. For one terrible second, I think I’m going to die right here, going to sink into the black and never come up. But then my arms are moving, and my legs are kicking, and I’m swimming down into water so cold it burns. I can already feel my fingers going numb, the fine motor control leaving my hands because that’s what happens in cold shock, that’s what the MSF trainers warned us about, you have maybe two minutes before your body stops cooperating.
I can’t see anything.
The darkness is complete and absolute, and I’m reaching blindly, grabbing at water that feels thick and wrong. The current is pulling me sideways, and I’m already running out of air because I didn’t take a proper breath before I jumped. I just went, I just fucking went because he was drowning and I couldn’t stand there and watch.
My fingers close on nothing.
I kick deeper.
My lungs are screaming, and my chest is crushing, and my eyes are open but useless in the black. I’m going to die down here, I’m going to drown three feet from him because I can’t find him in the dark, and he’s going to die alone and cold and thinking I let him go—
My hand touches fabric.
Wet wool. Heavy. His coat.
I grab it with both fists, and I don’t let go.
The current fights me, and I fight back, kicking toward where I think the surface is, but Roman is dead weight in my grip, ninety kilos of muscle and waterlogged wool. He’s dragging me down instead of coming up with me. I kick harder, my vision going grey at the edges. I can get his head toward the surface, but I can’t lift him; I physically cannot lift him; he’s too heavy, and I’m too small, and the cold has stolen half my strength already.
Light.
I can see someone with flashlights, and I kick with everything I have left, dragging Roman’s face toward the air. My head breaks the surface, and I gasp, choking on air that feels like knives in my throat. I’m trying to hold him up, but my arms are shaking, and I’m losing my grip on the ice edge, and we’re both going to slip back down into the black—
“LUKA!” The scream tears my throat raw. “HELP ME!”
My fingers slide on the ice. I can’t hold on. I can’t hold him. I’m going under again—
Hands grab my jacket. Luka’s.
He’s flat on his stomach on the ice, reaching into the hole with both arms, and his face is right there, grim and desperate, and I’ve never been so grateful to see anyone in my entire life.
“Take him!” I shove Roman’s collar toward Luka with fingers that have gone numb and clumsy. “Pull him out, I can’t—I can’t hold him—”
Luka grabs Roman’s belt and collar and heaves with a grunt of effort that tells me exactly how heavy my husband is. I’m shoving from below, using the last of my strength to push Roman’s body upward, and he slides onto the ice, grey and limp and not moving.
Luka reaches back into the hole and drags me out next.
I collapse the second my body hits the ice. My legs don’t work. I try to stand, and my knees buckle, and I go down hard, palms slapping against frozen surface. I can’t feel my feet anymore.
Roman’s not breathing.
Luka dragged him to the riverbank. His chest is completely still, his lips blue and his face grey, and his eyes closed. I’m crawling toward him on hands and knees because I can’t stand, can’t walk, can’t do anything except drag myself across the ice toward the man I love.
“No.” The word comes out slurred, my mouth not working right. “No, no, no—”
I shove myself up onto my knees beside him, and I put my hands on his chest, and I push.
My arms are shaking so badly that I can barely maintain compression. My fingers won’t close properly. I’m doing CPR with frozen useless hands, and it’s not enough, it’s not fucking enough, but I keep pushing anyway.
“Come on.” Push. “Come on, you bastard.” Push. “You don’t get to die.” Push. The words are slurring together, my jaw chattering so hard I can barely speak. “You hear me?” Push. “You took bullets for me, and now you owe me.” Push. “You owe me a fucking lifetime.” Push. “You don’t get to leave.”
