homelovefamily | [no one falls in love under fluorescent lights]

[no one falls in love under fluorescent lights]

The party had been different.

It certainly had more in common with the occasional ball that she remembers from her childhood with their bright lights and beautiful dresses and so much champagne than the few other parties she’s been too. Memories keep slipping in more and more each day, leaving her a little unsettled. How does she fit that life, those memories with their ups and downs against the last ten years? It feels like she is two people.

Still she had gone to the party and marveled at it, feeling both at home and strangely disconnected. The cocktail she’s had has done nothing to help those feelings. Deciding to not stay too late was for the best.

Her coat isn’t buttoned, the bright red standing out against the paleness of her dress. The curls in her hair have loosened to waves and she’s certain that she’s leaving a trail of glitter in her way as she walks home. It’s late, but it doesn’t feel far and the cool air feels good after the warmth of the crowd.

Valentine’s Day is a foreign holiday to her, dedicated to a saint that she can name and speak to, but feels no connection to. It’s supposed to be all love and romance, a day to cherish those you love and pursue those that you want to love you.

She doesn’t know much of that kind of love. Anya’s felt that quickening of her heart, the warm pleasant feeling that comes from the mere sight of someone special, especially when their attention is fixed on her.

Her mind might be full of tumbled up thoughts of love and the past and how far she’s come from where she started, but the years have taught her to always be hyper aware when she’s alone at night. Darrow might be safer than some places she’s been, but it is still a city. Movement coming from a cut through walkway catches her attention and she freezes under the light of a street lamp, body tensing for a fight.

The figure moves and is caught by the light from another streetlamp. Realizing who it is, she relaxes a bit. Not fully, but more than she was thirty seconds ago.

“Good evening Gleb,” she greets, trying to sound calmer than the adrenaline in her veins says that she is.

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Gleb knows there's been a party tonight, of course, but he hasn't once considered going. The holiday itself is one he sees little appeal in, as is the case with the way people seem to want to celebrate it, all unnecessary capitalistic nonsense, intended only for the sales of various commodities. Even if that weren't so, he's sure he wouldn't have had any interest in attending. He's heard about these parties thrown in some mansion, the glamor and the excess involved. It reminds him too much of a time long past, one he's worked hard to move Russia forward from, back when everything seemed so much simpler. Were he to go, he knows he would get no enjoyment out of it, so he stays in instead, passing his night the way he does most nights and pointedly trying not to think about who else might be at the party. Nothing good would come of that. There's no reason for it to mean anything to him.

It's only because he's gone out for coffee, having run out in his apartment, that he winds up confronted with exactly what he's been trying to avoid. Anya looks like a vision in the soft glow of a streetlight, her hair loose and wavy, her dress catching the light and flattering in a way he shouldn't notice. "Anya," he replies, inclining his head slightly. "You look... nice." He would be self-conscious in comparison, but at least he's fully dressed this time, unlike that afternoon she showed up at his apartment door, his shirt a plain, warm, plaid flannel. "Were you at that party?"

It seems to speak for itself that she was, but it feels better to ask than to act on assumption.

Edited 2018-02-19 15:47 (UTC)

Anya’s heart is still racing, a fluttering in her ribcage. The now useless fear is part of the reason for it, as is the party that still echoes through her mind. There’s a third reason and this is a reason that she won’t let herself think too much about. Especially not nights like this one, fresh from celebrating a holiday that whose singular focus is on being in love in the most over the top way.

“Thank you,” she says ducking her chin a little as she accepts the complement. Her cheeks are tinted pink from the party and the cold. A lone, long curl has escaped the confines of hairpins and hairspray to tumble across her cheek.

“I was,” she nods taking in Gleb’s appearance as she answers. It is plain to see that he was not at the party, even if she didn’t already know he wasn’t. It didn’t seem like the sort of thing that he’d choose for himself. She hadn’t brought it up to spare him any discomfort. Back at the party, she’d spent a little time looking at the gathered crowd in various rooms keeping an eye out for him on the off-chance some other friend of his had brought him. There’s no use in thinking of the faint twinge of disappointment that she’d felt. Not with him in front of her now.

The first thing she notices is how comfortable he looks, with his plaid shirt and the start of a beard. It’s a very good look on him. She might have met him while he was in uniform and seen him in his suit, but this looks more like who Gleb truly is rather than either of those.

Anya offers him a small smile. “I see that you weren’t. I don’t think you missed much. It was over the top..” There’s a pause as she gives a little shrug. “What are you doing out so late?”

Hearing that it was over the top doesn't surprise him at all. Gleb smiles a little for it, small and wry, as he sticks his hands into the pockets of his jacket, mostly to avoid the temptation to reach out and brush aside that stray piece of hair of hers. He'd be overstepping, he's sure. For all he knows -- for all that it's any of his business -- she was just in the company of someone else, some man with whom it would be fitting for her to spend a holiday like this is apparently meant to be in the company of, and despite the tension he thinks he'd seen in her shoulders a moment ago, he's only just caught her after they parted ways. It's an oddly unsettling thought, and yet, if it makes her happy, he knows he could learn to live with it. Somehow her well-being and her happiness have come to be the things that matter to him the most. Certainly his own safety doesn't, and when it comes to her, he knows he doesn't have the right to anything more.

Maybe, had things been different, had someone else been sent to Paris in his stead or had he never met her at all, he would have found another woman someday. Even if that had been the case, though, he doubts he would ever have felt quite like this. It's overwhelming, damn near torturous; he couldn't get rid of it if he tried, and he would never try. He knows how that ends. The best thing to do instead is come to terms with loving her, and with the fact that she can never know that he does, if she hasn't guessed already.

He as good as told her what would have been waiting for him back in Russia, but he never told her why he did what he did. A part of him hopes he never has to. It's better that he carry that on his own.

"It didn't seem like something I would enjoy very much," he admits, though there's no judgment in his voice. That she went is something he sees no reason to be bothered by. She belongs in a world like that. The fall of her dress alone, the way she wears it so naturally, seems to prove as much. That was always going to be the case, long before he actually knew it would. "I came out to get coffee. I didn't know you would be here."

He regrets the words quickly, wondering if it sounds as if he wishes he hadn't run into her, not wanting to drive her off. Instead, he adds, "You must have had a good time to only be coming back now."

Thinking of the woman she would be now if the revolution had never happened isn't something that Anya really thinks of regularly. Scattered thoughts of that possibility drift in every now and then, based on memories and speculation. If Russia had stayed like it had been under Imperial rule, would she have felt perfectly at home at parties like the one she just left? Would she have become a frivolous girl, caught up in the glitter and the flirtations, caring little for anyone outside of her circle? Would the Russian people remain a distant hypothetical, little creatures meant to be prayed for and minded, but never known?

She'd like to hope that wouldn't be the case, but there is no knowing. Instead she will simply experience this life in full, placing it against all of her memories.

Taking a few steps closer, a twinkle of light reflecting off the glitter that follows after her catches her eye. "I'm like a little star," she laughs as she uselessly tries to brush some of it away from her dress. "No, I didn't think you would or I'd have asked you to come when I heard of it."

Holding her small purse — little more than a pocket of fabric — with both hands, Anya tilts her head as she looks up at him. "I think I simply lost track of the time." Her mouth curves up into a teasing smile. "Isn't it a little late for coffee? You'll never get to sleep."

She really is like a little star, Gleb thinks, the sparkles of her dress catching the dull, warm glow of the street lamp, making her look even brighter than she otherwise might. To him, though, it would have made little difference anyway. No one would draw his attention as easily, hold his eye so well. He never really even bothered to look — to see past his job, the party, the cause — until the day he met her by chance. Even now, all this time later, it's hard to believe that one instant could change so much. Had he been standing a few more meters away, had the truck not backfired, had someone else reached her first, nothing else might have happened the same way. He might, when the time came, have actually been able to follow his orders, since she wouldn't have been anything more to him than a previously believed dead daughter of the tsar. That isn't a line of thought worth entertaining, though, least of all at a time like this. It won't accomplish anything, and she's deeply embedded in his head now as it is, taking up too much space and time.

"You are," he says, a slight fondness in the slant of his smile. A quiet agreement doesn't seem like going too far, not when she's the one who said it in the first place. It buys him a moment's time, anyway, to try to process the rest of what she's said. She sounds like she means it, that she would have invited him to go, and he can't fathom why. They're friends, he thinks, or something like it, but she can also be impossible to read; every time he thinks he has a handle on her, on the situation, he loses it entirely. This statement is as surprising as anything else has been. Oh, it can't mean anything serious, of course, but it's unexpected all the same.

And yet, if she'd asked, he thinks he would have gone. He may not have liked it much, but he wouldn't have turned her down, no matter how awkward or impossible to make sense of it might have been. It would have been worth it.

"It might be a little late," he adds, shrugging with the concession. "But I think I'll manage." For just a moment, he looks at her, no less struck by how beautiful she looks and how conflicted he feels about it. Then he adds, nodding towards her, "I could walk you home, if you'd like. You shouldn't be out walking alone at this hour, not like this."

Crossing the pool of light, she closes the distance between them. He hardly looks like a deputy commissioner now, just as she barely resembles the streetsweeper who spent her nights under a bridge. This place has transported them forward in time and across a universe (or a world) to an almost American city, where no one expects anything grand from them. There is no party to serve, to people to serve and rule. She's hardly a grand duchess. It is just a title, a list of things she used to be along with dishwasher and assistant nurse. Her feet ache a little in the heels, unused as she is to such impractical footwear. The girl at the store said they'd be good for dancing, but she didn't really do much of that. Only a little and felt the rush of the movement, even if she wasn't dancing with anyone she cared about.

She laughs softly, amused by his repetition of her self-description. The way he says it, the gentleness of his smile suggests that he means it as a complement. It feels a little silly, but she likes it nonetheless. It reminds her of pet names she heard her father give her mother, gentle words for simpler times. Whether or not those times were actually simpler is of little consequence. The memories come tinged with feelings, pieces that fit in but still leave gaps. It is probably better that she doesn't remember all of the horrible details, even if she remembers the gunshots and the screams, the flashes of fire and blood, so much blood. Her family remains whole as they dance across her memories. Ducking her head almost shyly, she looks up at him through her eyelashes for a moment, still smiling up at him.

The moment lasts longer than it should, with her just looking at him, basking in the glow of the entire night. Perhaps sentiment is contagious and at the party she picked up a bug. Maybe it was already there.

Her heart is still fluttering slightly in her chest. She knows it isn't nerves, but won't name it.

"I think you will," she agrees breaking her own spell. The instinct to argue, to point out that she can and has handled herself wells up within her. That she healed from those bruises and scrapes, learned to fight and claw her way, has kept herself alive in worse places than quiet streets. She doesn't say any of that. Just like they don't bring up what likely was waiting for him when he returned to Russia, she doesn't need to bring up all the ways she nearly lost her life again that have nothing to do with him. "Thank you. I'd like that. I've kept myself safe alone with worse, but..." Pausing, she gestures to her shoes and then to him. "I don't have to. We can keep each other company tonight."

For several moments, all Gleb can do is stand there looking down at her, his heart feeling as if it's lodged in his throat, his hands restless at his sides. That loose strand of hair catches his eye again, and this time, it's all the more difficult not to reach up and tuck it back. Even that would be mild compared to the other things that fleetingly cross his mind. He just has to remind himself that anything he thinks he sees in the way she gazes up at him in turn is either the product of his imagination — wishful thinking — or a trick of the light or both. She really does look luminous like this, with the muted golden glow of the streetlight picking up all the glitter on her dress and glinting off her hair. Surely he couldn't be blamed for finding something captivating in that, or for the way time seems to stand still, leaving him lost in her orbit. She really is like a little star in that way, too, a fixed point and one that perpetually draws him in. When he thinks of her like that, маленькая звезда, it's all he can do to fight off the instinct to precede it with моя.

She isn't his, nor will she ever be, not in any regard. He knows that. He just needs to remember it at times like this, when the air seems heavy with a possibility that he knows can't be real. That simply isn't how things work, not even in a place like this, where their past selves don't seem to matter to anyone else.

When she speaks, though, agrees, it brings him back to himself somewhat. Gleb nods in response, smiling that same small smile at her. He fully believes that she could manage on her own if need be — she did survive for all of those years when she wasn't supposed to have, and he still doesn't know how she did so, nor does he think it's his place to ask — but she shouldn't have to. Dressed like this, out walking on her own so late, she could far too easily become a target for trouble. Maybe with someone else at her side, that won't have to be the case. Besides, it's a good excuse to be near her for a while, if she'll allow it, and if he's honest, he could probably use the company himself. He's used to a fairly solitary existence, his life back home dedicated to his job and the party and nothing more, but being around her, it's hard not to want to stay there. "Hopefully better than walking all that way alone," he says, a lightly self-deprecating joke. Briefly, he considers offering her an arm or his hand, then thinks better of it, not wanting to overstep or give her the wrong idea. Instead, he nods down the block. "You were going this way?"

It isn't the coldest night she's ever walked through, not by a longshot. Anya has trekked across forests and open fields, stomped over snow and wished for warmer clothes. She's stolen warmer clothes only to regret having to carry them months later. The nurses helped her to prepare, warned her to be careful when she finally left them. A destination hadn't been in mind, not as clear as it was when she met Dmitry and Vlad. By then the dream of Paris had had years to form, fed by hope and cold, hungry nights, given a name in faded posters of an outside world. The party was meant to give her purpose, give her a job and food to eat. Anything that it gave her it was only just. She didn't have a name, didn't have parents, didn't have a home. Just the persistent fear that attracting too much notice was not going to end well for her. It was best to just hide in plain sight.

So she had. Keeping out of the gaze of those in charge until that fateful day when the car backfired and she heard a rumor on the streets. Gleb had smiled at her then, oddly nervous as he offered to buy her tea. She hadn't understood it then and still didn't now. What did he have to be nervous about? At the time she was nothing but a frightened street sweeper, feeling like she might throw up with her nerve shaking from the sound. She had appreciated his offer, liked his nerves better and his haphazard smile, like he was a human under the uniform. It had never occurred to her to say yes. Her employers would have fired her instantly, with another person eagerly waiting for her job.

Nodding she takes a step towards where she was going, waiting just a moment for him to fall in line with her.

"It's better to walk in the spring or summer, when the air has cooled off and the quiet has set in," she remarks fondly, holding her purse in front of her, trying to not be disappointed that he didn't offer an arm or a hand. It would have been the gentlemanly thing to do. "But it is better to walk with someone else regardless of the weather. At least it isn't sleeting."

"Small mercies," Gleb agrees, the same trace of humor in his voice. He suspects that they're both accustomed to being out in nights far colder than this one, or than most of the people here in Darrow are used to; this is chilly but mild, not such a terrible night to be out in at all. Still, there's a part of him that wishes he could draw her close, wrap an arm around her shoulders to keep her warm. If an arm or a hand seems to have the potential to be overstepping, though, he's sure that would be, and then there would be no taking it back. Better to stay close at her side as they walk, getting a glimpse of her profile as he glances over towards her, then gesturing down towards her feet. "I can't imagine those would be very fun to walk in if the roads were covered in ice. Skating may be one thing, but that..."

He'd call her a cab if it came to it, but then he wouldn't have the excuse of keeping her company for a little while. Selfishly, no matter how awkward it might feel, no matter the nearly overwhelming uncertainty when he's around her, he's grateful for this. Besides, however capable she may be, he wouldn't have wanted her to be out walking alone dressed like this, the risk of drawing the wrong sort of attention too high. He doesn't really have the right to feel protective towards her and he knows it, but there are a lot of things he could say the same about, and none of them have made a difference so far. Loving her, for example, is something to which he isn't entitled in the least, but all of his attempts to stop that in its tracks have been utterly useless. There's really no sense in trying any further, which he's already resigned himself to, as much a fact — as much a part of him — as his name or where he was born.

"Besides," he adds, emboldened just slightly, perpetually trying to balance on some careful line between going too far and overstepping unclear boundaries or holding her at too much of a distance, "then I might not have gone out, and then I wouldn't have run into you."

Edited 2018-02-21 21:48 (UTC)

Perhaps it is a little bit too on the nose, the stereotypes of two Russians walking on a winter evening. It isn't so terrible, hinting at a spring that is not far off. The weather is by no means warm, but Russian winters last far too long. Knowing that Anya still misses them, misses the tinge of autumns and the glories of summer. She'd left a Parisian spring for a late Darrow autumn and missed most of the year. Even thinking of simple things like that makes her heart ache for a Russia that will never be hers to know again. Glancing down at her shoes at his gesture, she lets out a small laugh as she nods. "No, they really aren't practical for walking on ice. Or for walking in general. They look pretty and weren't that terrible to dance in, but..." Pausing she shakes her head again. "That would not be very fun at all."

For now they aren't so bad. If they had truly bothered her, Anya would have relented and called herself a cab as she was leaving the party. But she had wanted the coolness and the fresh air after so much noise and glitter. Walking herself home had been a temptation she couldn't resist. Her reasoning had been that if it was too much then she could always hail a cab and finish the journey that way. Now that she has encountered Gleb, she feels even less inclined to give up on her walk now. There is something nice about being out where with him, without the pressures of being in a flat or the eyes of other people. Most other people do not care what either of them do, it would likely make no difference either way, but she feels better about this kind of open quiet.

"With good reason. If it had been sleeting, why would you risk walking out? It would've been an entirely different night for both of us, each of us on our own. But now, we are together." That seems to be the better way to end the night of a holiday that is so focused on love. It isn't meant to be celebrated or ignored in solitude, at least not in the way the people here demand it. Looking up at the sky, she smiles as she looks back down at him, at the lighter expression on his face. The early beard tugs at something in her heart, a warm feeling growing in her abdomen. "How lucky for us."

Of all things, it reminds him of New Year's, of those few, fleeting moments before everything went wrong when he wanted to kiss her and thought she was looking up at him like she might have wanted the same. There's no way that could possibly have been the case, of course. Gleb knows that now, just as she knows that Anya can't possibly mean that this is lucky for both of them. At least, he can't fathom why that would be the case. She has every right to want nothing to do with him, and yet she's constantly proving him wrong on that front. Now is one more example. Of course, even if she does mean it, then he has the sense not to read anything into it. Maybe she just didn't want to be out walking alone, or a party full of strangers has made her want something a little more familiar. Whatever her reason, he won't argue it. It's more than he deserves, and he knows damn well that he is lucky, grateful as ever for any moment of her time she'll give him. Probably it's pathetic, to be so caught up in one woman, but there's been no one else for him since he laid eyes on her. He can live with it, especially if it means getting moments like this, the two of them in the quiet of a brisk evening, hardly anyone else around, Anya looking as beautiful as he's ever seen her. Though he may not know what to say or do around her, though he knows damn well that he shouldn't feel for her the way he does or spend what time he can around her instead of keeping her at a distance, he's long past thinking there's anything that could be done about it. To drive her away, he'd have to be a fool.

"Very lucky," he agrees instead, his voice quiet and his smile small and warm when he glances down at her, surprised to find her looking up at him in turn. Were they any two other people, maybe this would mean something. As it is, he can savor that smile, even if he doesn't understand it. There are, he's sure, any number of men at the party tonight who would gladly have walked her home, but he's the one who's here with her now, and she seems to want it that way. That, as far as he's concerned, is fortunate indeed. "I'd have waited to go out until morning and wouldn't have seen you at all."

And she really is beautiful, however conflicted he may feel at the sight of her dressed up like this, sparkling under the light of every street lamp they pass through. He wouldn't have wanted to miss this. "I prefer this."

For her part Anya tries to not think of New Year's, of the possibilities that had been held, so many what ifs as she stood beside him in the crowd. If she really thought of that night, of how he looked at her and how he smiled, it would drive her a little crazy to know what she had missed. Turning into a werewolf had not been part of any plan or thought she'd had that night.

Now that's free from the party, she releases a breath that she hadn't fully realized she'd been holding. It's been over a month since the last party she went to and while this was not sponsored by this strange city, there had been magic to it. A small part of her had been afraid that something equally as unexpected would happen to her again.

"Do you?" she asks with a curious tilt of her head. "I prefer this as well."

The curl brushing against her cheek moves as they walk and her need to do something with her hands, a nervous energy that is part run-off from the party, part being here with Gleb, compels her to reach up and brush it back. Somewhere in the confines of her small purse she has a hairpin that she could use, but she doesn't want to stop to find it.

"The party was magical, though, even if it was a bit too much for my taste." She pauses, shaking her head thoughtfully. "It was like something long ago and nothing like it. I'm not used to it."

There's a part of Gleb that wants to ask just what she means by that. It's probably simple enough, though. She'd have been making her way back through ice alone, and now she isn't; there isn't much of a choice there. He finds something heartening about her words even so. Around Anya, he's never quite sure what to say or do, struggling to balance on the edge of something he's never dealt with before. It isn't quite the war it used to be — there's long since been a victor in that battle, and he neither could nor would take that back if given the chance — but it's still a complicated thing to say the least, and nearly impossible to get right. Every once in a while, he catches himself feeling like there might just be something there after all, like the moment on New Year's that he's convinced himself he must have imagined. Other times seem to prove that there's no way that could be the case, which perhaps is for the best. He's given in to that dream enough. He doesn't need the dangers of letting it go any further.

Right now, though, even with the disparity of her in her sparkling dress and him in something simple and sturdy, everything feels simple, peaceful, right. He can't shake that heavy uncertainty, but despite the chill in the air, he looks over at her, her words sinking in, and feels nothing but warmth. If this is all he ever gets — the friendship he once offered her that day in his office, a handful of quiet moment to savor — then he'll count himself lucky. This place has left him, at times, as conflicted as Anya does herself, knowing that he should have gone back to Russia to meet his fate, being here a chance he should never have gotten, even in a world he doesn't much care for. It is lucky, though, to be alive when he should be dead, and luckier still to be able to walk by her side, his eyes tracing the movement as she tucks that piece of hair back away from her face.

"I wouldn't have the first idea what to do at a party like that, I don't think," he admits, a little thoughtful, but still smiling gently down at her all the same. "That sort of thing, it is not for me." He won't add that there's a part of him that's comforted by the notion of it being too much for her, too. "I would guess that even what they have here that is most like what we remember is really nothing much like it at all. We've missed a lot of time."

Anya is relieved that Gleb doesn't ask her what she meant. If pressed, she could find an answer, knows the obvious one is that it is better to be walking with him than walking alone. However that isn't the only reason she prefers this, ending her night quietly and alone with him. It is a good reminder of how far she has come, of who she is and was and what she wants now. Despite the awkwardness of their first meetings, the division between deputy commissioner and street sweeper, she believes that they really are friends now.

That should be enough.

Somehow it doesn't quite feel like it is.

Laughing softly at his admission, she turns her head and looks up at him. Her pace isn't as rapid as it would be alone. They're walking almost leisurely despite the fact that it is winter. It isn't cold. Certainly not by Russian standards. "No, I wouldn't think that you would. I barely remember what to do that a party like that. I felt a bit lost," she shakes her heads before brushing it away with small gesture. "You are right. It's been over a hundred years since Imperia; Russia became just a memory. This was meant to be the 1940s, but it still felt like so long rather than just twenty years. It is very confusing."

Not for the first time, Gleb wonders what she would tell him if he asked about what and how much she recalls. At first, what feels like so long ago now, when he was sent after her, he'd considered that perhaps her claiming to be no one was just a story, a way of dodging suspicion. He remembers too well the way she'd reacted the day he arrived here, though, saying that she wasn't Anastasia, telling him that he was wrong for believing so. There's no reason for him to doubt the veracity of that. Something happened to her that night so long ago. He'll probably never know what; perhaps she doesn't know herself. Whatever it was, it must have made her believe she was someone else until the truth finally came to light.

Now that he knows, it's hard to see how anyone could have missed it, but he's glad they did. He may never have met her otherwise. Someone else might have made a different choice than he did.

Talking about the past, or at least that part of it, seems off-limits, though. If nothing else, he shouldn't be the one to bring it up. The last thing he wants is to ruin what's become a perfectly nice evening, Anya close beside him as they walk, that quiet laugh of hers so small and yet so worth savoring. "The 1940s in 2018," he says, shaking his head as he speaks. "A strange idea for a party, I'd think." He's never been much for nostalgia, though, looking forward rather than back. In theory, he'd think it must be nice, having something from long ago to celebrate, but mostly it reminds him of the Russians he saw in Paris, stubbornly clinging to a way of life that no longer existed. If tonight was anything like that, then it really is a good thing that he didn't go. "There's too much to catch up on, anyway. I don't know what happened in the 1940s."

Certain memories Anya longs for. The clear sound of her sisters' voices, tricks Alexei might have played, her mother's smile. She has parts of these things, useless moments scattered with more precious ones. The dark space in her mind where her last memories of them should be. She doesn't want to remember that night, doesn't want to fully know how she survived when they didn't. How unfair fate was in those final moments to spare her as it took those she loved most.

Perhaps one day she'll be ready to remember, but not tonight. Not on a night like this one where the air is warmer than it should be (just as that night was cooler). Not when Gleb is a reassuring presence, smiling at her the way he is, filling her mind with possibilities she shouldn't entertain.

"The people here like to play pretend with the past. To celebrate things like they were in the movies of the time." Anya does not know how she feels about such nostalgia. Things are rarely as neat as people remember them being. They want to remember the good things, not the plain black bread and watery tea of rations. There is a softness in memories. Things were never as good or bad as people think. She nods though at his remark. "There is. There was..." she pauses, uncertain how to bring it up. "There was a war then. Another great war. The Germans invaded Russia, or the Soviet Union I should say." There is a soft clucking of her tongue. "I'm almost sorry I looked it up."

Gleb's smile fades some then, his head shaking as he lets that sink in. Perhaps the worst part is that it isn't particularly surprising, merely disappointing. The home he left behind was one barely healing, one war having given way to another; he barely remembers a time without one conflict or another. Knowing that was the case only drives home what he'd thought of the party in the first place. Celebrating a time with a world at war, as her phrasing leads him to believe was the case, while simultaneously ignoring that that was the case is nothing he wants a hand in, any more than he could have supported the displaced Russians trying to relive their glory days at the Neva Club while ignoring what was happening to the rest of their countrymen and why there was such an overthrow in the first place.

"It feels sometimes as if we've always been at war," he admits, a touch of ruefulness in his expression. "I suppose that's one thing to appreciate about this place." It doesn't matter that he isn't quite sure what to do with himself in this strange future, after knowing with such certainty and for so long what his life would be. That changed before he arrived here anyway. He has to believe that there was a purpose to everything they did, for the sake of his own sanity if nothing else, but it's still a difficult thing to imagine all that rebuilding leading to a war-torn nation yet again.

There's still a softness to the way he looks at her and speaks, though, as if confessing something he wouldn't dare to another. Perhaps that's so. Whatever he may feel for her, if he sets that aside, then what's left is the fact that he's closer to her by far than he is to anyone else here, or really anyone at all in a long time. He trusts her. Besides, no one else here truly knows where he came from and the land he left behind.

"I can't say I'm sorry not to have seen it." He wouldn't have lived that long anyway, and they both know it. Now isn't the time to drive that point home, though, and shatter this calm, the quiet implication enough for now. Wherever this tenuous peace came from, and whatever else may be lingering in the air, he'll hold onto it while he can.

Anya's own expression has turned solemn, more serious than she's been in hours. The itch that had been lurking under her skin has finally been scratched, the discomfort that had quietly nagged at her made real. She had known that such a war hadn't lasted for forever, but seven years is a long time. By her math, she knows that had she not suddenly arrived here in this city then she would have certainly lived to see that war start. It would only be a little more than ten years later. That is almost too much to bear. Both she and Gleb and Russia have seen too much war, too much bloodshed. How much more can the world endure before it completely falls apart?

She hadn't manage to finish her research, picking up on all that she had missed. There are books in the library that she hasn't dared to crack the spines of. Perhaps in a few months she will be ready to, but not now. When that time comes it will be slowly, in drips and drabs.

"I think we have," she agrees with a soft nod of her own. War in so many forms. Between neighbors, between allies, within oneself. Her own memory wars against her. "There is certainly that. War hasn't touched this place. Or if it has, it is only in the people who come from somewhere else."

Some people she's met come from violent, messy places. Others seem to have lived idyllic lives. All of them are building and rebuilding lives. Her pace has slowed involuntarily as she turns her body slowly towards him, watching his face, taking in the softness that she finds there. There is a gentle way that he seems to handle her. Anya is certain it isn't purely because he was ordered to kill her and didn't. There is more to that and she longs to know it, but can't make herself ask why. Why does he look at her like she is something precious? Is she? Isn't she the enemy of the world he'd hoped to build simply for still living? His confession says otherwise. Her lips part is gentle surprise at the admission. "I'm certainly not sorry that I didn't see it as well," she agrees. "People aren't meant to fight for forever. Ceratinly not to die for someone else's cause."

Gleb isn't sure if her phrasing is deliberate or not, if she'll know just how deep those words cut or if it's a coincidence. Regardless, he feels them even so, drawing in a deep breath in response. He'd known, once, exactly where he stood and what his cause was. It wasn't even very long ago at all that he would have said that nothing could have stirred him from that. That was before Anya, though, and before he aimed a gun at her and realized that he couldn't pull the trigger, and what the cost of that would be. His life for hers. An easy choice to make, in the end, if not to grapple with the implications of. If only one of them could have survived, then of course he would want it to be her rather than having to carry on with her blood on his hands. He's had to cope with that now, though, for far longer than he ever expected he would, and he still doesn't always know what to do with that.

What he believes is the same as what it always has been, but he can't claim that side, that cause, as his own anymore. Neither would he pretend for a second to have any attachment to the other. Everything that was done was in Russia's best interest, and until hearing about yet another war coming to them, he'd been certain that the future ahead of them would eventually be a bright one, once the wounds of the past healed further. Either way he looks at it, then, the cause that he'd have been dying for wouldn't have been his own, except perhaps in the sense that he'd have been doing it for her. Looking at her now and the softness in her expression, nearly desperate to reach out and touch her, he still believes that the choice he made was the right one. He could never have ended her life, no matter the cost.

He loves her too much for that.

"I wouldn't have minded it," he says quietly, somehow managing to keep looking at her as he speaks, his own pace slowing so he can match hers. "Dying for someone else's cause." It's the first time he's ever outright addressed what would have happened to him, putting a name to it rather than talking around it. Under the circumstances, though, he doesn't see any way not to say it. Whether or not her words are an intentional reference to the fate that would have awaited him had he not shown up here, she must know the ways in which they'll ring true, and she deserves his honesty. After everything, it's the least he can do for her. "Just... We've seen more than enough war."

"I don't want to be someone else's cause."

It is a miracle that she is still managing to keep walking. Her feet already know the way back home even if her mind is racing, her thoughts a mess. A vice has clamped down around her heart, squeezing tightly. This is the first time that what they both knew about the likely endgame of his return to Russian has been spoken aloud. The Party would not stand for such a brazen betrayal. They would have made an example of him, just as they would have made one of her. Perhaps they would have secreted him off, worked him until he was broken beyond repair.

The end result remains the same — Gleb would not have lived. She would have stayed alive, remained a lost grand duchess found, but not him. Anya has a hard time imagining that life. She spent months practicing, rehearsing and memorizing, playing at something that is actually the truth. But the memories she has of her childhood as scrambled, filled with light and warmth, but also coldness and fear. One thing is certain: the Anastasia whom the world imagines from those postcards died in Yekaterinburg, if she ever really existed at all. In an odd way with each piece she recalls, the more that Anya feels that she is both Anastasia and something new, something more than just Anya the streetsweeper/dishwasher/nursing assistant. She just does not know quite what that is.

Staring at Gleb, her eyes are fixed on his. Her hand lets go of her purse and she reaches out for him, touching his arm. "I am glad that you lived," she says almost urgently. "No more bloodshed for either of us."

It isn't until she's spoken that Gleb realizes how his own words might have come across. He frowns slightly for it, unsure how to explain that that's not how he sees her at all, and certainly not why he was unable to kill her. Had some other woman been Anastasia, the lost grand duchess, it wouldn't have mattered, and he wouldn't have needed to think twice. For the good of the country, for the fight that's been his since he was old enough to take it on for himself, he would have followed his orders with a clear conscience. That much, of course, it's better to left unsaid, implied but not stated outright. To do otherwise would be cruel, and this subject, now that they've — or, rather, he's — broached it, is a fraught enough one as it is.

His beliefs haven't changed, though, just for love of her. He almost wishes it were that simple, knowing he would be far less conflicted, but he doesn't think such a thing is truly possible, and it certainly isn't the case now. For someone else — for many, perhaps, the reason her existence would have been so dangerous in the first place — she might well have been exactly that. To him, she's not her family's name or her title or what she would have represented. She never has been. That is, instead, simply something he's had to learn how to grapple with when it comes to his feelings for her.

"You're not a cause," he tells her, shaking his head gently. "Not to me. I..." Again, he doesn't quite know how to say what he wants to, but having been the one to bring this up, he might as well see it through. "I betrayed the cause I fought for," he says, the words coming slower now, each careful, deliberate. "And I don't regret doing it. I can't claim that cause as my own anymore. That's what I meant."

Glancing down at her hand on his arm, wishing he could take it, lace his fingers through hers or brush a kiss against her knuckles, he lets his expression grow a little bittersweet. "It isn't because of what you are that I couldn't do what I was sent to," he adds. "You're more than that." She is to him, anyway, and a part of him hopes she can hear those unspoken words. Before she was ever Anastasia, in truth or pretend, she was the street sweeper who was startled by a backfiring truck, whom he couldn't help but look for in the time that passed after that brief encounter. Everything else has built from there. He thinks she'll always be Anya to him, though. She's the woman he first fell for, and that's not so easily undone.

Relief rushes over her at his statement that she isn't a cause. Anya knows it. Knows that she is a real person, flesh and blood. But her family...the Romanovs were meant to be people from God, angels made flesh to work hard for the people of Russia. They were meant to be better than the rest of their homeland, for better or for worse. Blessed for bringing good, blamed for everything else. If it wasn't for the cause of ending the tsar's rule and the cause of wiping out his bloodline, then she would still have a family. She would still have her memories.

So many stills and what ifs.

If anyone of them had happened then she wouldn't be Anya. She doesn't know who that girl is. They just would wear the same face, own the same name (even if Anya would only half-turn her head at the sound of someone calling it after her).

"All right," she says softly her expression turning gentle as his turns bittersweet. Curiosity is there as well. If she is more than than a cause to him, then what is she? How much more? Does she make his heart beat faster? Does he think of her when she is not around? How far into the corners of his mind are thoughts of her kept? "How much —"

Her mind chases after those thoughts like a cat after a mouse for a moment longer than it should. None of those are questions that she will ask right now. She cuts herself off, kills the question right there as she takes her hand off his arm.

"All right. I don't know if it matters now, as we are both still alive." Pulling her gaze away from him, she looks up at the signs on the street corner, gesturing absently for the way they are headed next. "It isn't far now."

Despite being unfinished, the fragment of a question sends a spark of fear down Gleb's spine, a worry that he's said too much, shown his hand. At the same time, it's hard not to think of an answer: всё. Just as soon as it occurs to him, he knows that, even if he thought she might be the least bit receptive to the way he catches himself thinking about her too often, to the feelings he knows there's no sense in trying to ignore, she wouldn't want to be considered everything any more than she would want to be someone's cause. It's an exaggeration, probably. She has, though, become something of a focal point, turned his whole damn world upside down, left all that he'd once believed and fought for called into question. To him, it would be close enough.

Even if she had asked, though, he couldn't have answered. If there was a moment between them, some quietly exchanged tenderness, that moment has passed, the abruptness with which she looks away and removes her hand from his arm making that clear enough. He looks away in turn, taking a deep breath, silently hoping that he hasn't made too much too apparent or made her uncomfortable. It may be impossible to fully ignore or set aside how he feels about her, but for her sake, he can let it not matter, still there but lying dormant. Just this — whatever she'll give him — is enough.

"We are," he agrees, watching as they pass familiar buildings, most of them darkened by now. "Strange, but lucky." Gleb isn't sure he manages to seem quite as convinced as he should, but he doesn't want to explain to her why that might be the case, that a part of him still remains certain that he should have had to go home to face what would have awaited him there. It's the same reason he knows he would never have run, though it would have been easy enough to, already being so far from Russia. Another train to another country, distance between himself and Paris, and he could have disappeared. There's too much of a sense of duty in him for that, though. Perhaps his loyalty has been shaken, but that much remains unchanged. "That much, I think, will always matter."

The completion of her question, the answer he doesn't tell her, all of that possibility just hangs in the cool air between them. Would he have told her that she was more to him than just a notion, a thing worth dying for? Would he say that she's a woman, flesh and blood, and that doesn't have anything to do with ideals at all? Anya wonders if she's a fool for thinking that she is more than just a failure of duty to him. If she was a friend and that is why he stayed his hand. She wants to believe that they are friends now, that she hasn't been fooling herself. That her heart isn't leading her astray. It hasn't before. It led her to Paris and while that didn't go quite the way that she had hoped for, that she had fled in angry tears back to the hotel, what Gleb has told her offers odd promising.

Without all of her memories, her instinct and intuition is all that she has left. It is tell her something now. Encouraging her to keep going, that it will be okay. Another possibility remains.

"Yes, exactly. There are certainly worse things. It could be expected and unlucky," she lets out a small laugh, a mirthless thing as she tries to grasp at a levity that has fled as awkwardness returns. Did she bring it back when she moved her hand? She was just reacting to his lack of response, going forward when there was nothing telling her to stay that particular course. "But you're right. Luck will always matter, as will having a strong and steady heart."

Those words, thought months ago as she looked over Paris are echoed here. Fear, luck, and having enough courage to keep going. All of those are necessary, but for this city and for this walk. The smell of the cold ocean makes her sigh happily, memories of Russia carried on them mixed with sand and salt and fish. "When I close my eyes, the air smells like it does on the coast of St. Petersburg."

A strong and steady heart. Gleb isn't sure if that's something he can lay claim to or not — if the way she turned his head and his heart and his loyalties, the way he can't seem to get her out of his thoughts or shake these foolish feelings for her that have welled up inside him, is a weakness, or if his resolve in going to his own death so that she might live is a sort of strength all its own. He knows which he would prefer, of course, if only because it's easier than the notion of being a traitor to his own cause, but he supposes it doesn't much matter either way. These things have all happened, become immutable fact, and all he can do is try to pick up the pieces and live with that aftermath. He couldn't take any of it back now even if he wanted to, and he doesn't. That he loves her, like his name and where he was born, is simply something that is; for her to live is worth his death, no matter what form that may have taken.

They've spent more than enough time on that subject for one night, though, especially when it's one they've never addressed outright before. Besides, she sounds too content when she mentions St. Petersburg — it doesn't occur to him to correct her on the name and point out that it's Leningrad now — for him to want to take that away from her. "At least it's one thing that's almost the same," he says, looking back over at her with a faint smile. The reminder of home, albeit not his first home, is indeed a welcome one, however different their surroundings might be. Then again, he doesn't much care where they are. To have her walking beside him is enough, even if it means resisting the temptation to take her hand in his or wrap an arm around her shoulders and draw her close. The chill in the air, mild as it is, might give him an excuse for the latter, but he would know his real motivation, and as such, can't bring himself to act on it. "It must be nice, living out near the water."

It will never be Leningrad. Not to her. Not even when it was changed to Petrograd could she give up on St. Petersburg. It was the city where she was born, where her father was born, where so many of her ancestors called home. It was the beating heart of a Russia that no longer exists. It was the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics when she left, the borders closing like a wall behind her as she jumped off that train. Sometimes when she passes by the train station, she can hear the song of farewell echo just as much as she can hear the gunshot that took Count Ipolitov from this world and into the next. He never got the freedom that she knew, never got his escape.

"It is," she says inclining her head towards him just in time to catch him smiling softly at her. A warmth heats her cheeks and she is glad that the cold and dark conceals it from him. How could she possibly explain it when she herself doesn't fully understand it? The heavy weight of the conversation from minutes before is shifting away. It is the most that they've ever talked about it, possibly will ever talk about it, but there had been a faint release in it. Like a breeze from a window that has been opened after being stuck shut. A smile starts to bloom across her face as the water comes into view and her apartment building along with it. "When the summer comes, I will have my windows open all the time, just to take it in. It is nice now, not so noisy or crowded, but we'll walk the boardwalk in the summer and just enjoy it, won't we?"

It's strange to be thinking that far ahead. Since arriving in Darrow, Gleb hasn't been able to do so, too caught up in trying to make sense of the present to consider the future, even one that's only a few months off. Chances are, if the past two months are any indication, that time will pass far more quickly than it currently seems like it will. Even so, there's a moment where it feels odd to be trying to make any plans at all, as if there's anywhere either of the two of them could go from here. People vanish, he's heard, and not the way that people back home would, where everyone knew what that really meant. That's such an abstract concept, though, that he hasn't thought about it applying to them. Maybe it's just that it's hard to believe that she could want that — some nebulous time spent together when the weather turns warmer. She's here now, though, and he's already told her the worst thing about himself that he possibly could, the one that's the likeliest to send her running. He's not sure what it means that she's still here, but he's grateful for it.

"Yes," he agrees, as if he could do anything else, his smile widening just a touch as he sees her starting to do the same in turn. "I suppose we will." The boardwalk is all closed down now, only a handful of shops open year-round, but the structures all still stand. It's easy to imagine how beautiful she would look, illuminated by the colored lights, but he tries to set the thought of that aside quickly. The present is far more important, even if he has to bury a faint disappointment that they're nearing her building. At least the discomfort from moments ago has subsided, leaving them to end the evening on what he hopes is a nice note. "Something to look forward to, perhaps?"

"Yes, certainly something to look forward too." Anya can't quite imagine what summer will look like here. Her mind can conjure up laughing children and beach picnics and far fewer clothes than the summer holidays of her youth. She hasn't had a chance to relax and enjoy nice weather in years, either working or walking through it. For Gleb, she assumes the story must be similar. There had been wars going on, new societies to rebuild. The promised spring didn't come quick enough.

She gives him another smile before moving to extract her keys from her too-small purse. Holding them in her left hand, she guides them to her apartment door, glad that there aren't any stairs for them to walk up. In her heels that would be almost treacherous.

The conversation has turned back to a nice, mellow note, but here at the door of her flat, she is almost sorry that the night is truly finished. It always had to come to an end. They couldn't keep walking for forever, but part of her wishes that it could go on. But barring inviting him in — an idea that makes her heart pound — this is all that there is left.

Sliding her key into the lock, she turns it and opens it just enough before turning back to him. "Thank you for walking me home, I appreciate it," she says softly, as she looks up at him. Then an impulse seizes her and she takes a step and brushes quick kiss against his cheek. It's more of the ghost of a kiss than any actual contact.

Returning to the ground, she steps back into the doorway. "Goodnight, Gleb. Please get home safe."

And just like that, she steps into her apartment, sparing a brief glance back at him as she closes the door.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[no one falls in love under fluorescent lights]

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