Page 32 of Vas

He raised his head, smiling as he handed over his cell. “Take your pick.”

He watched her bent head as she scrolled. “This looks good.” She flipped the screen around, surprising him with an action flick. “It doesn’t start until eight, giving us plenty of time to get there.”

Vas pulled a hundred from his wallet and placed it in the leather check holder on the table then helped Anya from her chair.

It wasn’t until they were in the car and driving to the theater that he heard her say, “You’ve gone quiet. I’m sorry if I’ve upset you by asking about your family. That hadn’t been my intention.”

Shit. His somber mood was fuckingup their date. “No, it’s me who should apologize. You were just trying to get to know me better and had no idea it was a sore topic.” Though he was uncomfortable with opening up, he felt like he needed to elaborate or there’d be a rift in the rest of their evening. After taking a moment to gather his thoughts, he said, “I grew up poor. We were poor in Russia and even poorer when we moved to the States. When my mother became ill…” He stopped a moment to tamp down the sudden rush of anger he felt whenever he let himself dwell on the subject. “She hid it from my sister and I until it was too late for the doctors to do anything. I blame myself for not noticing and getting her the help she needed sooner.”

The feel of her hand on his forearm surprised him enough to pull his eyes from the road and glance at her. Her expression was hard to read in the dim lighting but there was a firmness to her tone when she said, “You can’t blame yourself for something that was out of your control. You were a child. And yes, from the sound of things, I get the feeling you grew up fast, but you were still your mother’s child and age and maturity has nothing to do with that. If she hadn’t wanted you to see something, I guarantee, there’s no way you would have known.”

Vas shook his head. “The signs were all there, but I just thought she was tired and overworked.”

She squeezed his forearm. “Because that’s what she wanted you to see. You and your sister were her children, no matter your age, and she didn’t want to lay that burden on you.”

But it was a burden he would have gladly taken, long before she had finally laid one at his feet.

The memory of that night was something he’d never forget. The weather had been unusually cold for October and no matter how high Vas had jacked up the wall heaters, they couldn’t compete with the drafty apartment, leaving a chill he couldn’t eradicate. He’d been sitting beside his mother’s bed, spoon feeding her chicken soup as she lay shivering even under the electric blanket he’d bought for her.

She’d gone downhill fast in the last two weeks since he’d rushed her to the hospital after she collapsed, to the point she’d barely had enough strength left to move.

They’d waited too long.

Vas would never be able to unhear those words as the doctor stood before him reciting them.

His mother’s eyes slowly opened, her milky, pain-filled gaze seeking him out.

Setting the bowl on the side table, he leaned in closer, taking her hand. Once capable and strong, the now frail, almost boney, appendage felt light as a feather tucked into his palm, blue veins creating a hodgepodge of tracks under the paper-thin skin.

“I’m here.” He kept his voice low, not wanting to wake Yana who lay sleeping on a futon a few feet away.

“Promise me.” More fragile than her hand, her voice was but a whisper and Vas had to strain to hear the words over the painful-sounding rattle in her chest.

Careful not to squeeze too hard, he tightened his hold on her hand. “Anything.”

“Your sister…” she struggled for another shaky breath. “Take care of her.”

“I will. I promise. I won’t let anything happen to her.”

Her shoulders eased into the mattress as she closed her eyes, seeming more at peace than she had for days. “Vas?”

He leaned closer, trying to catch her words. “I’m here."

“And take care of you. The road you’ve chosen is dangerous. Don’t let it bury you.”

His mother wasn’t stupid and with the money he’d been bringing home lately, Vas knew she’d had to have known he’d moved on from piddly shit like boosting stereos and selling drugs, but that had been the only time his mother had ever acknowledged the fact.

They had also been the last words she would ever speak.

Turning into the theater parking lot, Vas pulled into a spot and turned off the car, but he didn’t make a move to get out. Instead, he turned to Anya. She sat, twisted in her seat, facing him, and he took her hand from his arm, sandwiching it between his own. “Thank you. That helps.”

“I’m glad.”

Her smile was so bright, he didn’t have the heart to tell her that no amount of words—even falling from such sweet lips—would ever change the way he felt. His anger that fate had thrown opportunity into his lap too late for all his wealth to help his mother was not something that would ever subside.

But her kind words had helped him shake off his morose mood. Helping her from the car, he took her hand as they walked to the ticket booth.

“It’s been forever since I’ve seen a movie in a theater,” she said as they stood in line at the concession stand.

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