Page 91 of Vasily the Hammer

“Then trust me just right now. Trust me to touch you. Just long enough to prove it. It won’t be anything earth shattering, but... I hope it will help.”

Foolish girl that I am, I nod.

He moves one hand to my pelvis. I’m thinking he’s going to try to seduce me and just this one time, I’m going to stop him because I am too tired for anything except existing, but then he holds it there. “This tattoo, I put here. No one else has gotten it, no one ever will. I’ve never drawn it anywhere else. It’s the only place you’ll ever see the Baranov ram and thevefor Vasily. But it’s not a V. It’s not the Latin letter.”

“Oh, it’s the B?”

He smiles gently, tentatively, mindful that I might react violently. “I mean, it’s ave,but yeah, it looks like a Latin B. But you didn’t just immediately trust me to tattoo you, so I tattooed myself.”

He only has two tattoos that I’ve seen; his brother’s name and the bit of Russian on his thigh. I sit back just enough that I can nudge up his shorts enough to see it. “Three bezgorka. Threevezgorka,”I correct with this new knowledge.

“A lot of Cyrillic and Latin look the same but sound different. For example, the uppercasezeis similar to a three, and the E with the umlaut? That’s pronouncedyo.”

I nod, following along, putting together the puzzle. “So then it’sz... vuh-yo... zvyog—”My eyes snap to his.“Zvyozdochka?That’s what that says?”

He pushes carefully on my mons. “You’re mine.” Then he covers the hand I have on his thigh. “And I’m yours. I told youforever, and I told you the truth. I was...” He laughs, his face pinking up. “I was terrified. I thought for sure that we were going to get out here, and I was going to break down, and I wasn’t going to be able to protect you. I thought I’d be dead weight and you would realize I was too weak. But I couldn’t let you go. Then everything just fell apart, and I no longer saw a way out for me, but there was still a chance for you. There was everything we put into motion. Those videos and that tattoo and the position I was in, and all I could do was hope it was enough.”

“I don’t know if that’s good enough.” I want it to be, but I can’t say that it is.

“I removed a piercing every year. Because I told you they were just for you, and then I wasn’t faithful, and that was even shittier of me, but there it is. I could have taken them out all at once, but it hurt worse doing it on the anniversary.”

“That’s stupid.”

“Yeah, we already know I’m stupid. Damn good businessman, though. And I could have gotten this tattoo removed, but instead, every year when I removed the piercing, I refreshed the tattoo. I was supposed to the day Sasha called me to say he’d found you, but then it didn’t matter because I had you back. My heart was always yours, even when nothing else could be. I never stopped loving you.”

“You can’t apologize to me with a tattoo and a piercing, Vasily.”

His grin is much brighter this time. “I can, and I did. And not saying you hurt my feelings in the shower not noticing this, but look.” He fishes around in his pants and pulls his flaccid penis out.

It has a second piercing in it.

“Dammit, Vasya.”

“Ya tebya lyublyu, zvyozdochka.”

I’m exhausted. That’s what I tell myself when I tuck him back into his pants and then collapse onto his chest, mumbling, “I don’t hate you, Vasya.”

“That’s a—” He curses when he’s interrupted by a knock on the door, but it’s much softer than yesterday’s.

“Hey, sorry about breaking up the love fest,” Kseniya calls through the door. “But there’s been a minor complication in the plan. Tony’s decreed y’all are getting buried together.”

Vasily sighs. “Iwasgonna say that’s a good start, but maybe not.”

“You’re positive this is what you want to do?” Vasily asks as he parks the rental car behind the church, away from the other mourners. I’m wearing a tasteful veil and he’s donning a brimmed cap, nothing unusual at a funeral and enough of a disguise that no one would recognize us with just a casual glance through the window, but we’re certainly not sneaking in the front door this way.

“We have to.”

“Not really. I can get access to money, enough to keep us on our feet, at least. Camilla’s already here with Artom; I’m sure we can have him snuck out the back or arrange something at the cemetery. We can go back to that little house outside of Denver. We can be Bob and Betty and Billy Smith. The Smiths.”

My shoulders shake with my laugh. “Those are the most suspicious names imaginable. No one under the age of sixty goes by Bob or Betty.”

“Not true. I have a guy in Los Angeles who’s Bob. He’s a clean-up guy, does a great job with bodies. Can’t be any older thanyou. And there’s a drag queen Alex is buddies with. Real nice guy. Gal? They go by Betty. We could be Bob and Betty.”

“Bob the clean-up guy and Betty the drag queen.”

“I think women can be drag queens now. Kings?”

It’s ridiculous. It’s all ridiculous. Outside, the air is chilly, the sky overcast. Snow dances around our windows, caught in drafts and whisked back up, too light to simply fall. I’ve lived my entire life in Phoenix and Tampa. I saw the pictures of Dad and I at the ski slopes, and I know I went to culinary school in Michigan, but I wonder if I’ve always found snow to be this soothing.

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