1
LENA
“Get inside, Lena!”
I stare at my father in confusion. He is standing in front of the linen closet at the back of the apartment with the door open, his hand on the frame and his eyes looking like I have never seen before.
“What?” I look at the closet then back at him. “Papa, what are you?—”
“Don’t argue with me.” His voice raises a panicked octave and my heart lodges in my throat. “Get inside. Now.”
What’s going on?My heart beats rapidly now, the sound of it increasing with every beat, because I’ve never seen Papa look this way before.
He is scared and his fear is making me scared too.
What’s happening?
“Tell me what’s happening.” My voice comes out smaller than I want it to. “You’re scaring me. What is going on, why do you look like?—”
“I need you to trust me.” He presses a dark blue flash drive into my palm and closes my fingers around it with one firm hold, his hands shaking but firm, like he is handing me something sacred. “Keep this safe. Do not let it out of your hand no matter what. If something happens, you run. You don’t stop, you don’t look back, you run and you get this out of Moscow.”
“Papa!” My throat closes around his name. “You’re coming with me. Whatever this is, we go together, we can just leave right now, we don’t have to?—”
“Lena.” He calls my name that way he did when I was twelve and won’t stop asking questions about his work. Gentle. Final. A door closing. “Get inside, please.”
My heart sinks in that moment.
I look at him, and he looks back at me. Both palms come up to cup my jaw, and he holds my face for a moment that stretches too long.
There is something in his eyes that looks very much like tears.
Papa is not a man who touches faces. He pats shoulders, squeezes hands, ruffles hair when he is being extra playful. He does not hold faces.
Something is very wrong here.
“Lena.” I see a tick in my father’s jaw as he calls my name, looking directly into my eyes. “I need you to promise me that no matter what you will not leave this closet. No matter whathappens, no matter what you see, you will stay hidden. PleaseDochka, promise me.”
I don’t know why this is happening, I don’t know what is going on and that is driving me crazy.
But the way Papa is looking at me tugs at my heart so bad, I feel my eyes watering.
My head moves slowly as I try to contain the tears threatening to pour. “Of course, Papa. I promise. I promise.”
I say it twice to assure him.
A tiny very tiny smile graces his tired face and he leans forward and presses his lips to my forehead. “I love you.”
Without thinking, I reply, “I love you too,Papochka.”
The smile on his face grows bigger and I smile sadly.
I always knew Papa loves it when I call him that, but I’ve always teased him about it and never really used it.
And somehow I don’t know why, but I feel so broken.
Papa takes in a deep breath and his expression settles into the careful, composed look I have seen him wear in a hundred hallways outside a hundred rooms I was never allowed to enter—the expression that means his real feelings are somewhere I am not going to reach tonight.
Despite everything in me telling me to protest, to fight, I get inside.
