“Can you tell me the right words?”
“Round and round,” she says after a long moment.
She stares me down like she knows I’m doing it on purpose. She’s so perceptive. Still, she speaks. She does what I ask, and it’s ridiculous how proud I feel. A warmth blooms in my chest, and I sing the line again, this time the right way. She sings the words carefully under her breath.
We’ve been doing this every day for a week now, working on songs and nursery rhymes a little more each day. I pick anything predictable enough that she notices when I deliberately break it. She’s even started saying “that one” or “this one” when I ask what crayon she wants. It seems small on the surface, but it’s a huge accomplishment.
I sing “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” again, a song that’s definitely become her favorite. I stop mid-verse, letting the melody hang unfinished between us. Anya stares at me, blinking once, then again. Her lips part and she sings, “Up came the sun and dried up all the rain.”
The joy is so sharp it hurts.
I send Samuil a message immediately. I have to. He needs to know what just happened.
She sang the line I left out. She’s progressing so well!
You’re extraordinary. Don’t forget that you’re magic.
I read it several more times until the words seep into my bloodstream. He thinks I’m extraordinary.
By the time Davýd arrives to pick her up, Anya is humming whole stretches of the song while clutching my sleeve like she’s afraid I’ll vanish if she lets go. When he walks in, she’s practically glued to my side.
“Malyshka?” he says gently.
She lifts her head, watches him for a long moment, and then she sings the same phrase from “The Itsy Bitsy Spider.” He smiles and claps, pretending that he’s just a proud father, not that his world has shifted on its axis. It’s important to Anya that we don’t react too much to her progress or she shuts down.
To me, though, he says, “Thank you,” and his voice breaks on the word. His daughter is slowly coming back to him.
“She’s a great kid,” I say, reminding him gently that she’s the one doing all the work.
He nods, unable to speak, and scoops her into his arms. She lets him, laying her head on his shoulder, still humming softly, and something inside me melts all over again.
When the door closes behind them, I sit down slowly on the couch and let myself soak it all in. Being a parent is such a hard job. Maybe that’s why my own parents were so shitty, not to mention all the foster parents who saw me as a paycheck and not a child who needed love and nurturing.
I get up and go to the room we’re working on for the nursery. I stare up at the paint swatches we’ve chosen but haven’t narrowed down yet. We don’t know the sex, and we’ve decided we’ll do a gender-neutral room either way. I’m partial to a pastel mint for the walls, but Samuil is still stuck on a bright white. He’s ridiculous.
My phone buzzes and I see Kelly’s name on my screen. She’s just checking in, the way she has many times over the last few weeks. At first, I was so sad I didn’t have the capacity to give her much more than one-word responses.
Since I’ve been working with Anya, though, I feel more like myself. I decide to finally talk to her and let her know what’s going on. To a small extent, anyway.
With a deep breath, I call her.
“Molly?” she answers, voice sharp with worry. “Are you alive? Did you get kidnapped? Are you in a ditch somewhere?”
I let out a tired laugh. “I’m fine, Kel. Really. I just had to step away for some family things.”
“Oh, good,” she says on a long exhale. “Because I was ready to file a missing persons report.”
“I’m okay,” I reiterate, smiling despite myself. “Actually, I’ve been tutoring a little girl lately. She’s been through a lot, but she’s amazing. Today she sang a whole line of a song we’ve been practicing together.”
“Aww,” Kelly says, softening. “Of course she did. You’ve always been an amazing teacher. You work best with the most traumatized kids.”
I can’t help but smile at this. I feel so aligned with my purpose.
“So,” Kelly continues, voice brightening wickedly. “You told me a few weeks ago you’d met some ridiculously hot guy. Spill the tea.”
I groan. “I never said ridiculously hot,” I complain.
“You didn’t have to. It oozed from the text.” She lowers her voice. “So who is he?”
