Page 109 of 10 Days to Surrender

It trots three steps left. Stops. Chews. Stares.

My bare feet get sucked into the hungry mud as I give chase. The goat dodges with infuriating ease, dancing a few yards out of reach to take another bite.

“Why won’t you just listen?!”

The words rip loose from somewhere deep inside me, raw and shrill. The goat freezes. For one glorious second, I think I’ve won.

Then it pisses on the chamomile.

A sound escapes me—half-laugh, half-sob. Of course. Of course! Why would the goat do what I want it to? Why would Sasha? Why wouldanyone?I feel like I’ve spent my whole life being shunted from one manipulator to the next. Baba, Sasha—now, I’ve got a fucking goat bossing me around, wrecking the last things left that I care about and pissing on the remains.

I sink to my knees, the hem of my nightgown soaking up the dirty water from last night’s rain, and let the tears come. I cry like I haven’t since I was a little girl. It’s not about the garden, not really. It’s about Sasha leaving without warning, about the blood on his gun that I have to lie to myself and pretend I didn’t see, about the two fresh graves somewhere in this very soil that I’m kneeling in.

The goat chomps away, unconcerned with my breakdown. Through my tears, I watch it demolish the last of my mint.

“I hate you,” I tell it wetly. “I hate you so fucking much.”

It just bleats again, mouth full of my hard work, my careful planning, my desperate attempt at creating something permanent in a world that keeps shifting under my feet.

Mud squelches from behind. Sasha’s shadow falls across the wreckage of the herbs, long and lethal. I don’t look back, but in front of me, the goat glances up, bleats softly, then turns and scampers away into the hills.

“Ari—”

“Don’t.” I shove aside the hand offering to help me up. Instead, I get up on my own, even though it’s harder than ever these days. My knees peel from the mud with a sound like tearing skin.

That doesn’t stop him from trying to touch me again. This time, when I smack his hand away, I do it with a purpose. “I saiddon’t,Sasha.”

His eyes are sad and patient. “Just wait and?—”

“Wait for what? The next disaster? The next time you vanish to play mobster while I?—”

“This is why I’m going.” His scar glows white with tension. “Toendthe disasters. To keep you safe.”

“Safe?” A hysterical laugh escapes. I gesture at the garden. “You can’t even protect basil!”

He steps into my space, mint and cedar and misery all flowing together. “You think I want this? To leave you pregnant with my children in some?—”

“Ourchildren.” My voice cracks. “And yes, I do think that. Because you’re good at leaving. It’s what you do best.”

Something flickers in his eyes—a wound, swiftly buried. Good. Let him feel it.

He reaches for me. “Ptichka?—”

I slap his hand away for the third time. “Don’t. Don’t soothe. Don’t lie. You’ll march off to die nobly, and I’ll be here—” My palm taps my belly. “—alone with them, explaining why the dirt stays empty. Why nothing ever grows.”

His jaw knots. “We’ll replant.”

“It’s not about the plants, goddammit!” I say. “It’s about… about building something that lasts. Something the world can’t just eat.” I sweep my arm around to encompass the garden. “You want to know what this is really about? Look at this. Really look at it. Eight weeks of work destroyed in, what, twenty minutes? That’s our life right there. Everything we build gets trampled. Everything we plant gets fucking devoured. And now, you’re leaving, and I’m supposed to just sit here and twiddle my fucking thumbs while I hope you come back? While I hope you don’t end up buried in some unmarked grave while I’m changing diapers alone?”

A breeze riffles the remaining seedlings. He follows my gaze to the goat’s hoofprint sinking into soft soil.

“I’m coming back,” he says.

“You don’t know that.”

“I do.”

“Bullshit.” My laugh tastes like brine. “You’re rushing into war half-healed because you’d rather die a king than live as a man who?—”

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