Page 62 of My Wedding Night Massacre

Denis’s voice comes through the walls again, another question, and Pavlina’s voice answering it, but I keep my eyes on the map and my hand on the pen as I think about my own father, and what I still owe him, and how close we are now to the end of this.

Close enough to finish it.

38

Pavlina

Denis has opinions about eggs.

“They’re touching,” he says, pointing at his plate with one finger, not accusatory exactly, more like he’s reporting a problem he expects someone else to fix.

Nadia looks at the plate. “The toast?”

“It’s touching.”

She moves the toast to the far edge of the plate. Denis inspects the new arrangement, his brow furrowed, the full weight of his attention on the revised geography of his breakfast.

“Okay,” he says, and picks up his fork.

I watch him from across the table, drinking my coffee. Two years old is an extraordinary thing to be. Every opinion urgent, every problem solvable, the whole world small enough to fit inside a breakfast plate.

He catches me watching and stares back, unimpressed, then returns to his eggs.

Nadia refills my cup without being asked, her eyes on Denis the whole time. She looks better this morning than she did yesterday, less hollowed out, some of the fear gone from around her eyes. She still moves carefully through the villa’s rooms, still takes stock of every entrance without appearing to, old habits from a house where careful was the baseline.

Slava appears in the kitchen doorway.

He’s dressed, his hair still damp, his eyes going first to me and then to Denis as if doing a quick double check to confirm we’re both still here. He leans his shoulder against the door frame and looks at Denis eating his eggs.

Denis looks up.

He looks at Slava for a full three seconds, which is a long time for a two-year-old, long enough that I can see him running whatever internal process he runs when confronted with new information. Then he looks at me.

“Denis,” I say, “this is Slava. He’s your tata.”

Plain but true words. He’s always deserved both.

Denis looks back at Slava. Then at me. Then at Slava again.

Then he picks up a piece of toast, takes a bite, and looks out the window.

Filed. Processed. Moving on.

Slava hasn’t moved from the doorway. I don’t look directly at him because if I do, I won’t be able to hold my face together. I take a sip of my coffee instead.

He crosses the kitchen, pulls out the chair across from Denis, and sits. Denis ignores him, eating his eggs.

“Where’s my blue car?” he asks me.

“It’s still at the other house,” I say.

Denis absorbs this. “I want it.”

“We’ll find you a new one.”

He stares at me for a moment, weighing whether this constitutes an acceptable resolution. His face says it doesn’t, but he also seems to know there’s nothing to be done about it right now. He picks up his fork.

Slava sits at the table, still being ignored.