Page 114 of You + Me – Against the World

“Well, for once, you’re not the one who gets to decide, Vadim. How many of my dreams have you made come true since we met? I don’t even have enough fingers left to count them. Now it’s your turn. This is your dream, and I won’t let you ruin it.”

“That’s it? It wouldn’t bother you at all?” He throws his palms up to the sky, helplessly.

“It breaks my heart,” I whisper, feeling the tears well up. “You haven’t even left, and I miss you already. I don’t even know how I’m going to survive here without you—”

“Okay, I’m not leaving,” Vadim cuts me off.

“Yes, you are,” I reply, pressing two fingers against his lips. “You’re going. And anyway, if you stay, I’ll leave you. We’ll be in the same city, but I won’t speak another word to you.”

“That will still be better than being thousands of miles apart.”

The thought of being so far away from each other makes me dizzy. My head is spinning, my legs are tingling, and my heart is growing weak. But I can’t show him how I’m feeling. I can’t try to hold him back.

To love him is to let him go.

“Vadim, if You + Me is what I think it is, we have our whole lives ahead of us. Three teensy months won’t tear us apart. Remember, everyone who tried and failed to break us up: Timothy, my brother, Felix, my father, Abrams, Cheyenne—all of them! Russia won’t manage to do it either. Maybe I can even come visit you there?”

I don’t believe a word of what I’ve just said, but I throw myself into his arms to hide the despair I can’t keep from showing on my face.

“I’ll be so proud of you when I see you over there!” I continue regardless.

“You’re going to be freezing!” he jokes, trying not to crack.

“You’d better come back, Arcadi!”

“I’d rather die than not come back, Lancaster.”

“So, are you ready to chase your dream? Are you game?”

“I’m game…” he says, his eyes shining.

Then he kisses me. I feel the ground slip away beneath my feet. My tears mingle with the kiss, and it’s as if I can’t breathe. Like a limb is being amputated. Like I’m suddenly split in two.

You + Me, Me + You. What do I have left without that? What am I, without the other half? What will become of me if I can’t draw strength from him? A small, incomplete, unstable, empty vessel. The Alma I was six months ago—shy, muted, fragile, letting life carry her along.

My mother told me never to depend on anyone, least of all a man. But I can’t stand on my own two feet without Vadim.

39

Vadim left a little while ago. I didn’t have the courage to go with him to the airport, but it’s probably better this way. Better for him. So he wouldn’t see me cry, show my regret, crumble... Throw myself into his arms and beg him to stay.

Why on earth did I push him to go?

Stupid question.

So he could follow his dreams.

And because I love him.

Saying our goodbyes in his apartment was heartbreaking. I can’t imagine going through the same scene in a crowded terminal. Who knows, maybe I would have tried to stuff myself into his suitcase or wriggle underneath his clothes, just to be able to board the plane with him. I might have set off the fire alarm just to have more time to say goodbye, to look into his eyes and kiss him one more time.

In the end, it was probably better that I stayed away, even if I feel like I’m being punished for it now, as I cry alone in my room. My pillow has seen it all by now. I can soak it with tears, bunch it up, turn it over, and start again: it absorbs everything, stoic and silent.

By now, Vadim must have already taken off. He’s en route to Russia, thousands of miles away from me. I start sobbing all over again.

“Alma, honey, can I come in?”

“Not now, Mom.”