Page 6 of The Breath Before Forever

The man showed up for the day. He even wore the pale yellow vest and bowtie set that Vera picked out to match Hannah’s gown. Igor didn’t complain, wasn’t late, and never let his true mood be known to the rest of the people around them that day. He let the woman of the hour have her day to shine and be adored, and Vaslav truly appreciated that from Igor.

All things considered.

Setting the glass to the top of his desk, Vaslav pushed two fingers down through freezing ice cubes until the tips of his digits were able to touch the mouthful of liquid that remained at the very bottom. Pulling his fingers back out just as fast, he flicked the droplets of water that had gathered at the tips in Igor’s direction. The other man didn’t so much as flinch.

Vaslav snorted. “It’s water and ice. Not vodka, or anything else, yeah? Mira brought it to me. She knows I need to take my pills around this—”

“Since when do you keep a schedule for your Vicodin and sleeping pills?”

“It was more than just those,” Vaslav shot back hotly.

Not that it did him any favors to admit it.

Igor didn’t react except to say, “But that’s not really the point, is it?”

Dammit.

Instead of outright explaining the schedule of his current meds—and because he refused to feed Igor’s current need to provoke Vaslav’s aggression—he yanked open a drawer on the desk, and from it, pulled a pillbox made up of twenty-one steel boxes.

Three rows of seven.

Morning, noon, and night.

Each box had a top, engraved with the day of the week and designated time of day, that could be easily flipped open. At first glance, one might not see the engravings depending on the light. It didn’t look like the standard pillbox that came to his mind. That’s also what he liked the most about it.

Vaslav popped open the next evening’s designated box and dumped out the few pills waiting inside to the top of his desk. They scattered across the old gloss until every single one came to a stop in different places. All the while, Igor didn’t move a muscle.

Pointing at one house-shaped pill, Vaslav said, “That’s the only one in the bunch that matters, no? Apparently, the studies show it slows the dementia’s eventual progression when started early and taken long enough. But we’re talking what they’ve known for maybe thirty, forty years, so—”

What real effect it might have on him was still yet to be determined, and by the time it really mattered, would he even know the difference?

Vaslav shrugged, letting his statement cut off abruptly because frankly, he wanted to move on. He nodded at another pill on the desk. White and circular. “A migraine med that probably won’t help, but I had to indulge Bogdan to get the things I really wanted.” He pointed at a pale pink cylinder pill that had tumbled farther than the rest to the middle of the desk. “A sedative for the evening. Swears it’ll knock out a horse. At my worst, it makes me feel like a spineless slug.”

He didn’t bother with the rest of the pills. They were only meant to manage the worst symptoms that came from the other medications, or the mood stabilizer he took every morning that helped only slightly with his more neurotic behaviors and thoughts, but what difference did it make?

Vaslav scooped the pills up into his palm and dropped them back into their respective box. “The pillbox was a wedding gift from my wife—unironically, I want to enjoy these years with her. More than me, she deserves that, too. So yes,” Vaslav said, shrugging and he snapped the top closed. “She does know. Spasibo.”

Igor cleared his throat and shifted from foot to foot. The frank honesty made him uncomfortable, as it should. That was the point.

“Good to know you’ve been keeping up on all of that, then,” Igor finally settled on saying.

A good minute after the fact.

Vaslav didn’t feel a need to point out that his friend’s busy schedule—and his recent displeasure—kept him more distant than usual. Both were valid excuses. Vaslav blamed his friend for neither. Mere months ago, it would have been unheard of for Igor to miss out on Vaslav’s day-to-day activities.

“Demyan mentioned your plans for a dinner,” Vaslav hedged, opting to take their conversation in a new direction. “One where you would like my wife to make an appearance.”

Igor shrugged in the halo of light spilling in where he’d inched slightly closer to straddling the doorway’s threshold. This far at the end of the house, the music from the party was barely a murmur. “I think her presence, and rings, cement what it all means. I like to think it gives credence to the marriage and retirement rumors.”

“There are no rumors about my retirement.”

A sigh answered that indignant remark.

“Yet,” Igor replied.

Well ...

“I’m just not fond of the word,” Vaslav said. Such a thing didn’t exist in the true sense. Thieves had reversed their spiders for decades before him to say it was so, but he wasn’t foolish enough to believe that would be enough to protect him.