Shot Throught the Heart

Part 4

After we left the cemetery, Kuzma looked a bit lighter. He pulled Morgan and I all over town and showed us different places he remembered going with his parents and friends. Apart from the part of town that took the shelling that night, the rest of Mykolaiv was the same as Kuzma remembered it to be. We had lunch at one of his favorite restaurants and after we finished up our late lunch we started to make our way back to Cosima's farm. As we got to the hill, I pulled Kuzma down in the same-ish spot we stopped at that night. He leaned into my chest and relaxed as we turned to watch the sun starting to set behind the buildings. Morgan took a second to join us but once she did, Kuzma reach his hand over to her and she took it.

            Together the three of us watched the sun slowly set behind the horizon. Once the sun was gone, I knew it was time for us to finish our walk back to the farm. Slowly, we all got up and started our way up the hill. It was getting pretty dark by the time we reached the backdoor of the house. Cosima was waiting for us when we got inside and was quick to hand out mugs of hot chocolate to help warm us up from our adventures outside today. Anya wanted to start cooking us dinner but we were all pretty full from lunch so we just hung out in the living room with Cosima for the rest of the night.

            The three of us turned in early that night as we were all pretty wiped from the day and all of the emotions running through us. As Morgan and I were laying in bed about to get ready to go to sleep, my phone rang. When I looked over at it, I saw it was Mom. I picked it up and put it on speaker phone as I didn't want to get out of bed and thought it would be rude not to have Morgan listen in since she was half laying on me already.

            I kept the call brief, just an update to let her know we are doing okay and a little bit of a plan for our next couple of days here before we start our trip back home. Once I hung up Morgan and I fell asleep pretty quick, worn out from the long day.

            One major difference since we got to Ukraine, that night was the first either of us were able to actually sleep in and get good rest. When we both crawled out of bed and downstairs in search of food, it was already pushing noon. Kuzma was outside playing soccer with Cosima and someone else neither of recognized. But that didn't matter at the moment. Morgan and I both moved around the kitchen for something to eat for breakfast and coffee. We settled on a few pieces of toast and took a seat at the kitchen table.

            The day was pretty relaxed. Both of us just walked around the farm a bit with Petro catching up while Kuzma went into town with Cosima wanting to get a few things. This time when we went into the barn, we were surprised to see animals in the stalls and not cots and weaponry laying around. A few chickens, goats and pigs were cornered off on one side of the barn while three horses were in the stalls. Both Morgan and I were drawn to the horses right away. Two were a chestnut color while the other was a white spotted black. After walking around the farm for a while, we both went back into the barn and sat with the horses. There calm and gentle nature pulled us both right in and we enjoyed just being in there presence.

            That night Anya was back to cooking up a feast for us which after we ate, Morgan and I cleaned up from. Anya was not happy about us kicking her out of her own kitchen to clean up but finally started to relent a bit and sat on the couch with Kuzma to watch some kind soap opera.

            The next day Morgan and I went into town again to meet up with Svitlana for coffee. Kuzma was happy to stay behind on the farm with Cosima as she was going to teach him how to ride a horse. Petro actually offered to drop us off at the café as he knew where it was and it made me happy not to have to walk up that hill again.

            When we got to the café, Svitlana was already waiting for us. Morgan took a seat at the table while I went to go order us all some drinks and a few pastries to munch on. Svitlana told us that Yelena was with an Uncle for the day so she didn't have to rush out. We told her a bit more about what we walked into that night and about Kuzma. For Morgan and I, it was hard for us to talk about everything. But we knew it could bring her some closure as to what happened to Marta, so that's why we didn't really spare much detail.