Into the Ether - Complete

The Winter of Our Discontent: Part 7

It's funny how four days could make such a difference to one's life. When we'd checked into the motel just before daybreak Friday morning, I'd been counting firsts. The first time we fell asleep together. The first time we'd made love. The first shower together. Yet here we were ninety-six hours later at the beginning of day five, and already I was counting lasts. I didn't know how to reconcile the fact that the best five days of my life might need to be enough to last me a lifetime. A lifetime without Dimitri.

It was still early on Tuesday, around 7.30 am, and we were lying in bed together. Neither of us had slept well. I'd woken in the small hours to find Dimitri missing from the bed. Even though it had only been a few days, I was already accustomed to his presence with me as I slept, noticing it when he was absent. I'd looked up to see him sitting at the table, head in his hands, writing on the small sheets of motel stationery.

"Good timing – I'd just finished," he'd said softly, tucking a few sheets into an envelope. Turning to face me I could see he'd been crying.

"What were you writing?" I'd asked apprehensively, wondering whether I really wanted to know.

"Just letters to my nephew and niece. Paul's nine, and I haven't seen him since he was around six, although he'll remember me from skype. Zoya's only a baby, and I've never met her, but I thought it would be nice to let her know her dyadya still cared."

He'd stripped off and come back to bed, lying on his side and resting his head on my breasts. Usually, I was the one to sleep with my head against him, but this time he was the one needing comfort. I'd pulled him close, kissing and stroking his hair, and he'd played with mine. And knowing he didn't want me to acknowledge it, I'd pretended not to feel his tears trickling across my chest, just as he pretended not to hear my whimpers as I also wept.

We'd eventually fallen back to sleep, and when I woke, we were lying facing one another, his arm draped around my waist. I knew he was awake by the way his breathing was so steady.

"Good morning, Comrade," I said, trying to keep my voice light.

"Morning Roza," he said softly. "How are you feeling?"

I shrugged. There was no way to answer that question cheerfully, so instead, I nuzzled in against him, tangling my legs with his and wrapping myself in his warm embrace.

"Dimitri? We've covered how things are going to play out if you don't come back. What's going to happen if you do?"

We'd been so focused on the fact that we wouldn't get a chance for a future together, we'd not talked about how things would go if the impossible happened; if he returned to me. "Would we be together? Openly?"

Dimitri smiled. "If I come back I'm going to shout my love for you from the rooftops. And I promise you, we'll find a way to make it work. I never want to be without you milaya, so for as long as you want me, I'll be yours."

"There's never going to be a day when I don't want you," I promised, thinking about if he came back and also if he didn't. "So you're going to be stuck with me."

"There's a happy thought for a man," he teased, pulling me closer to him and bringing his lips to mine. And for a few more minutes, I was able to push thoughts of him leaving away.

His lips were so soft as he laid feather-light kisses across my cheekbones and eyes, trailing along the side of my face before kissing lightly behind my ear. Using his huge hands, he spun me around, so my back was against his chest, pulling me firmly against him with his toned muscular arms. He was kissing my nape as I wriggled my backside against his naked crotch, giving him my wordless cue that I needed his loving.