“Galina got a ride home.”
“How’d she manage that?” Alicia went to the window to look out. No sign of the street being plowed, though the snow at least had stopped. She wasn’t looking forward to hauling out the snowblower.
“Her ‘friend’ has a four-wheel drive.” Nikolai made air quotes. “Maybe he got so sick of her that he had to get her out of his house.”
Alicia feigned a disapproving look. “Maybe she wanted to get home, make sure you’re okay.”
He rolled his eyes. “Whatever. She’s over there now and wanted to know where I was. I didn’t tell her I’ve been here for the past two days.”
“Of course not.” Alicia took off the afghan and folded it over the back of the couch. “You should get home.”
“Yeah.” He stretched. Cracked his neck in the way that made her cringe and wince, then laughed when he saw her. “Sorry.”
There was more to be said in that moment, but she wasn’t about to start up that conversation now. She’d left it open for him to ask her to go with him, and he had not. She wasn’t going to pursue it. She walked him to the front door. They didn’t kiss there, suddenly awkward as though Galina could see them from all the way across the street, through a closed door.
“Thanks for putting up with me while we were snowed in,” Nikolai said.
She smiled a little. “You can pay me back by fixing my faucet.”
“Right. The faucet.” He made no move to leave. His phone buzzed again with a text.
“You should go.”
“This was fun,” Nikolai said.
Fun.
Nothing more than that. Fun. Casual. Fleeting. Not meant to last.
“It always is, isn’t it?”
He nodded. “Always.”
“How will you feel this time,” she said suddenly, no longer able to hold it back, “when you leave?”
Something in his eyes gave her hope, for the barest second. A faint spark. The barest twist of a smile. At the last second, everything went blank, and he cut his gaze from hers.
“I don’t know,” Nikolai said.
A thin and fruitless fury overtook her. “Can’t you even just once tell me how you feel? Can’t you even tell me you’ll miss me?”
“I will. I will miss you.”
She nodded stiffly, not satisfied, not with having to put the words in his mouth. Not surprised, after all this time and knowing him so well, but what had she expected? What was it, exactly, that she even wanted him to say or do that would make her happy? There was probably nothing, she thought as she searched his expression for something, anything at all that would give her reason not to close the door behind him and never open it for him again.
She stepped aside to let him pass and held the door open. She cleared her throat. In the absence of any further words from him, the sound of it was very loud. “Good.”
Nikolai paused to brush a kiss over her lips as he moved past her. The snow came up to his knees, and it took him a long time to push through it, across the yard and the street, marked by the path of the truck that had brought Galina home. Alicia watched, shivering in the chilly air, until he made it all the way to his house. He didn’t look back at her before he went inside his own front door, but then she supposed he didn’t need to do that, either.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Being snowbound hadn’t bothered Galina at all. Since getting home yesterday, she’d been baking. Piles of cookies. Bread. A pie. It hadn’t seemed to matter that the freezer, both in the kitchen and the ancient chest unit in the basement, were both still stuffed to overflowing with leftovers from the generosity of the neighbors after Babulya’s death. She’d covered all the kitchen countertops with pans and plates and platters.
“What are you going to do with all of this?” Niko set the toolbox on the table, which so far remained free of the burden of baked goods.
“Feed you with it.” She leaned against the countertop with one arm crossed over her belly to cup a hand beneath her elbow, the posture lacking only a cigarette that she clearly was missing.
Niko laughed as he sorted through the mishmash of tools in the box, looking for a wrench and some plumber’s tape. He’d been trying to sort the plethora of junk from the basement workbench, pulling out what he needed.
“I can’t possibly even make a dent in that.”
“Fine. You don’t want this? I’ll donate it to the home.”
He glanced up at the flat tone of her voice. “Do they let the residents eat stuff like that?”
“The nurses and the staff will eat it. They’ll appreciate it, if you won’t.” Galina waved her fingers in front of her face. “Where are you off to, Kolya, with all of those tools?”
“I’m going over to Alicia’s to fix her kitchen faucet.” He held up the wrench.
Galina snorted lightly. “How nice of you. Will she pay you?”
“Sure, the same rate I’ve been charging you.” He meant to tease her, but his mother didn’t smile.
“I’m your mother. I feed you. Give you a roof over your head. What I ask of you shouldn’t be anything to complain about, especially since it’s all going to benefit you in the end.”
Niko turned his attention back to the toolbox, feeling his shoulders hunch and forcing himself to straighten. Here it came. The sour comments. Maybe the rage, if he couldn’t defuse it.
“Not complaining, Mom. I’m happy to help out around the house.”
She muttered a reply that he didn’t catch, then said, louder, “Where is your brother?”
“He’s in Jamaica.” Niko shut the lid of the toolbox with a click. “Remember? He’ll be back at the end of the week. He’s leading a dive trip.”
Galina frowned. “I like it when you boys are home, where I can keep an eye on you. So I don’t have to worry about you.”
“You don’t have to worry about us. We’re grown men.”
She hacked out one of her standard harsh cackles. “You think that means I don’t have to worry about you? Mothers never stop worrying. Where you are, what you’re doing, if you’re happy, if you’re going to ever be happy . . .”
With an inward sigh, Niko went to her and took her by the shoulders. “I’m just going across the street to fix a faucet. Ilya will be back in a few days, after his trip. We’re okay, Mom.”
Galina frowned. “You and your brother are not very okay, I don’t think. What did I do wrong, Kolya? Was I really so bad of a mother?”
The words, barbed, hooked him in a tender spot and stung. He knew there’d be no sufficient answer for her. Nothing he could say would be good enough.
“Of course not,” he said.
She looked at him with narrowed eyes, head tilted. In the past, Galina had often played the martyr. There was something different in her expression this time. A kind of blankness that unsettled him.
“We all make mistakes. If you ever had children, you’d know. It’s not too late.”
Niko shook his head. “I already told you that I don’t plan on having kids, Mom.”