you like.”
“You’re a kind girl, but you can’t make things right. Forget cleaning. Talk to me. Tell me about the snow. How I miss it. So hot here.”
Katya sat on the bed. “I like the snow too, the way it melts in your hand yet has the power to stop traffic and empty streets.”
A smile flittered across her aunt’s face.
Snow hid ugliness, but it could cover a drunk where he lay and maybe propel a car into a river. Beautiful and deadly.
“You’re thinking of them,” Irina whispered.
She nodded.
“Did they suffer? Did Galya?”
Pain seared her heart and it was all she could do not to cry out. “No.”
The day they found Galya, the phone had been answered by her father. His legs had suddenly gone from under him. Katya had rushed to his side, helped him sit, then taken the receiver and listened.
A man said Galya had been shot, a quick and painless death. Her mother had walked into the room, seen their stunned faces and known without them saying a word. Katya trembled remembering the terrible noise her mother had made. The sound of a heart shattering, a sound that had pulled them all into the vortex.
Papa had driven Katya to the mortuary and demanded to see the body, convinced they’d made a mistake. But the mistake was letting them see her. The image of her sister’s body was forever etched on Katya’s brain. She remembered feeling distress for what was once a person lying in front of them, her face viciously mangled, relief that it wasn’t Galya, then numbing horror because it was.
Their eyes fixed on the gory figure with unnaturally bulging ripped cheeks, she and her father had clutched each other, unable to speak or move. As Katya identified the flesh in the middle of her sister’s cheeks as nipples, she turned her face into her father’s chest and pushed him out. He’d collapsed in the corridor and people came running. The man who’d shown them the body protested they’d insisted. Another man called him a fool. If it was a mistake, no one would take responsibility, but later Katya decided she wasn’t sorry about what she’d seen. They’d been lied to because Galya hadn’t been shot, hadn’t died quickly and painlessly.
She helped her father to the car. On the way home, his grief transformed to fury and he raged at the monster who’d mutilated his daughter, at the FSB for lying, and at himself for letting his child do such a dangerous job. You couldn’t have stopped her, Papa. Katya drove in circles until he’d calmed. When she finally pulled up outside their building, he was quiet again and made her swear not to tell anyone what they’d seen.
Her mother was still sobbing, Babushka and Dedushka sat white-faced at her side. When neighbors and friends visited, her father disappeared. Katya held the day together, made cups of strong black tea sweetened with jam, comforted her mother and her grandparents while she ached inside for someone to hold her. She couldn’t imagine life without her older sister.
When everyone had finally gone, her father returned a changed man. Her mild-mannered, gentle Papa swore to her he would find and kill the person who’d tortured his child. Everything had to be kept from Mama and her elderly parents so he confided in Katya, told her every detail he uncovered, every conversation he had, weighed her down with horror until she felt she’d suffocate.
Her mother stayed in bed. Katya did the shopping, the cleaning and cooking. She’d been so overwhelmed by the needs of others she put her own pain on hold. She’d been unable to sleep, unable to practice the violin. Part of her felt if she’d died, they wouldn’t have missed her as much.
As her aunt slept, Katya stroked her hand. Another member of her family in pain. At least those dear to Katya had been together at the end and a part of her wished she’d been with them.
By the time Vasily returned Katya had made zharkoye , a traditional beef stew. After she’d put him in a good mood with food,
“You’re a kind girl, but you can’t make things right. Forget cleaning. Talk to me. Tell me about the snow. How I miss it. So hot here.”
Katya sat on the bed. “I like the snow too, the way it melts in your hand yet has the power to stop traffic and empty streets.”
A smile flittered across her aunt’s face.
Snow hid ugliness, but it could cover a drunk where he lay and maybe propel a car into a river. Beautiful and deadly.
“You’re thinking of them,” Irina whispered.
She nodded.
“Did they suffer? Did Galya?”
Pain seared her heart and it was all she could do not to cry out. “No.”
The day they found Galya, the phone had been answered by her father. His legs had suddenly gone from under him. Katya had rushed to his side, helped him sit, then taken the receiver and listened.
A man said Galya had been shot, a quick and painless death. Her mother had walked into the room, seen their stunned faces and known without them saying a word. Katya trembled remembering the terrible noise her mother had made. The sound of a heart shattering, a sound that had pulled them all into the vortex.
Papa had driven Katya to the mortuary and demanded to see the body, convinced they’d made a mistake. But the mistake was letting them see her. The image of her sister’s body was forever etched on Katya’s brain. She remembered feeling distress for what was once a person lying in front of them, her face viciously mangled, relief that it wasn’t Galya, then numbing horror because it was.
Their eyes fixed on the gory figure with unnaturally bulging ripped cheeks, she and her father had clutched each other, unable to speak or move. As Katya identified the flesh in the middle of her sister’s cheeks as nipples, she turned her face into her father’s chest and pushed him out. He’d collapsed in the corridor and people came running. The man who’d shown them the body protested they’d insisted. Another man called him a fool. If it was a mistake, no one would take responsibility, but later Katya decided she wasn’t sorry about what she’d seen. They’d been lied to because Galya hadn’t been shot, hadn’t died quickly and painlessly.
She helped her father to the car. On the way home, his grief transformed to fury and he raged at the monster who’d mutilated his daughter, at the FSB for lying, and at himself for letting his child do such a dangerous job. You couldn’t have stopped her, Papa. Katya drove in circles until he’d calmed. When she finally pulled up outside their building, he was quiet again and made her swear not to tell anyone what they’d seen.
Her mother was still sobbing, Babushka and Dedushka sat white-faced at her side. When neighbors and friends visited, her father disappeared. Katya held the day together, made cups of strong black tea sweetened with jam, comforted her mother and her grandparents while she ached inside for someone to hold her. She couldn’t imagine life without her older sister.
When everyone had finally gone, her father returned a changed man. Her mild-mannered, gentle Papa swore to her he would find and kill the person who’d tortured his child. Everything had to be kept from Mama and her elderly parents so he confided in Katya, told her every detail he uncovered, every conversation he had, weighed her down with horror until she felt she’d suffocate.
Her mother stayed in bed. Katya did the shopping, the cleaning and cooking. She’d been so overwhelmed by the needs of others she put her own pain on hold. She’d been unable to sleep, unable to practice the violin. Part of her felt if she’d died, they wouldn’t have missed her as much.
As her aunt slept, Katya stroked her hand. Another member of her family in pain. At least those dear to Katya had been together at the end and a part of her wished she’d been with them.
By the time Vasily returned Katya had made zharkoye , a traditional beef stew. After she’d put him in a good mood with food,