Page 136 of Cruel Demands

“Well, that’s good because it’s hideous.”

“Now what if I really liked that?” he asks, lifting my hand up and inspecting it. “What was that American idiom you told me about? If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all?”

“Yes, well, what was yours? A foe will flatter you, but a true friend will tell hard truths?”

I smile and try to let it feel silly, but when he drops my hand and links our fingers, all I can think about is the weight on my left hand and how it would feel to have real metal there.

We continue through the market, and I make a point of not praising anything, but I slip up once or twice. By the time we return to the house, the guards are carrying four boxes of jewelry, two paintings I did not ask for, a record I mentioned my father used to put on when we cleaned, a brass candlestick Nikita might like, and a stack of books by an author I said is good.

It is absurd. I feel flushed with joy.

That night, I lie awake in Mikhail’s bed thinking about the afternoon. He’s still somewhere downstairs working, but his side of the bed is already turned down, his reading glasses folded on the nightstand beside a stack of reports.

I look down at my finger, at the fake gold ring turning my finger green. If I think hard enough, I can still conjure the buzzing in my hand I felt when he slid it onto me and linked his fingers with mine.

When I moved to Russia, I thought my favorite sights would be cathedrals and palaces and fountains, but Mikhail laughing has quietly slipped into the top spot.

It makes no sense that I could picture myself with a politician or with my boss or with a forty-three-year-old man or with a pakhan. Any one of those things would make no sense. Putting them together makes it insurmountable.

But somehow I just fit with him. I feel light. I feel seen. Protected. Chosen.

A few low notes drift through the hallway, faint enough that they could be the backdrop of my happy musings. Then the melody continues. Piano.

I sit up to make sure I’m really hearing it, but it’s still too distant to quite make out. I follow it down the corridor, past the staircase, turning toward a part of the house I vaguely remember from the time I was imprisoned here.

I don’t want to remember that time, but it’s seared into my memory. For all my fantasizing about Mikhail, I have to keep it at the forefront of my mind that that’s him too.

I find Mikhail sitting at a grand piano. I vaguely remember now. He was sitting there before at the bench with his mother. I hadn’t really computed that in my state.

His sleeves are rolled to his forearms, and his head is bowed slightly as his hands move across the keys. He’s still wearing the ridiculous ring on his finger too. I have never seen him like this. There is no calculation in his face. No sharpness or awareness of who might be watching.

I stop in the doorway to watch, and the floor creaks. Mikhail opens his eyes, looks at me, and stops. His hands go still on the keys, and I watch his unguarded expression close like a window shutting. He stands. “I woke you, I am sorry.”

“No, don’t stop.” I lean against the doorframe. “I was just starting to believe you had a soul.” He remains seated, unsmiling, but he does not play. I take another step into the room. “You’re very good,” I say quietly.

“I was better once.”

There are a thousand questions I could ask. What do you mean once? Who taught you? When did you start learning? Did you like it then? Do you have other hidden talents? What is your favorite piece? Why do you keep hiding every soft thing about yourself like someone might use it against you?

But I can already see him retreating back inside himself, so I ask an easier one. “Can I stay?”

Mikhail considers for a moment, then moves slightly to make room. I sit next to him, close enough that our legs nearly touch, and resist the urge to rest my head on his shoulder. Instead, I put my hand on his thigh and leave enough room for his arms to move freely.

“Keep playing.”

“That sounded like an order.”

“I’ve learned from the best.”

He looks at me for another moment. He places his hands back on the keys. Then he begins. The first notes are soft, but they build and layer. The music builds. The room seems to disappear around it.

I stop thinking about guards. About my apartment. About the warning sitting like a stone in my stomach. I stop thinking about the fact that I am living inside the house of a man I do not fully understand.

He begins another piece. This one is quieter.

“I forgot to tell you earlier that I love you too,” I say into the music and kiss his cheek.

In response, he drops his head so that his cheek touches the top of my crown.