Page 146 of Cashmere Cruelty

But the night’s making me bolder. For some reason, right now, I can’t find my fears anywhere.

“Sometimes, it was my parents,” I confess. “Throwing me out, sending me away. Or, God forbid, getting married to each other again.”

“Sounds like a nightmare alright,” Matvey scoffs.

I snort.Can’t disagree with that.“Other times, it was just… me. Alone, somewhere I couldn’t recognize. I’d scream myself hoarse for someone—anyone—to come get me. But no one would.”

It’s strange. For the past few days, all I’ve wanted was for Matvey to look at me.

But now, I’m the one who can’t bring myself to look at him.

“What would you do?” I hear his deep voice ask. “When that happened?”

“Burst out crying,” I tell him frankly. “The one who actually knew what to do was my grandmother. She’d give me a tall glass of water, just like this—” I shake my glass for emphasis, “—and make me drink it all. ‘Water purifies,’ she used to say. ‘Water heals.’ And then…” I smile. “Then she’d sing to me.”

“Sing?”

“Yeah. Sometimes in French, sometimes in Creole. They were the lullabies she grew up with in Haiti.” A sudden memory makes me laugh. “There was one about a crab. If you didn’t sleep, it would eat you.”

“How comforting,” he drawls sarcastically. “Must’ve put you out like a light.”

“Eh.” I shrug and grin. “It’s like German fairytales: it’s the thought that counts. Besides, the crab didn’t actually eat you in the end.” I try to remember how that song went. “‘Dodo ti pitit manman,’” I sing quietly under my breath. “‘Dodo ti pitit papa…’”

Suddenly, I realize Matvey’s staring. “What?” I laugh, embarrassed.

“Nothing,” he replies a little too quickly. “You are…” He clears his throat. “Your grandmother must’ve been quite a person.”

I smile. “She was definitely that. Her life alone… You could’ve written a book about it. She was my grandfather’s second wife. When it happened, remarriages weren’t all that common, and mixed marriages even less. She had a rough go of it, especially with my dad.”

“Your father didn’t like her?” Matvey ventures.

“Not one bit.” It’s still painful to think about—how rejected she must’ve felt. By society, by her husband’s own son, by everyone. “But she didn’t mind me. She took me in and raised me as her own, in her home. For that, I’m forever grateful.”

I don’t mention what happened to that home. It feels dirty, somehow—the thought of bringing money into this. Under the cover of darkness, everything feels more honest. Sacred. Raw.

Suddenly, I realize I can’t take it.

“Well then.” I clap to put a bookend on that morbid detour in the conversation as I rise to my feet. “Drink it all. Keep those bandages dry.”

“Or the crab will eat me?” Matvey teases.

It’s too much. The night, the lights,us. The way Matvey’s looking at me—finally looking at me—with an intensity I can’t bear.

“Or the crab will swallow you whole, yes.”

Matvey rises with me. Then, surprisingly, he takes my hand.

He doesn’t kiss it, but his thumb comes up to stroke my knuckles. Somehow, it feels even more intimate like this. More raw.

“Goodnight, April.”

Twenty-three steps between our rooms. I know, because I counted them. Soon, there will be twenty-three steps between us. A distance so short—and yet, it feels like an ocean.

“Goodnight, Matvey,” I whisper, and cross back to my side of the dark, churning waters.

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