She rose and sat on a low bench.
Her lips quivered. “Papa died, you know.”
Yevgeniy Borisovich passed away suddenly, in the same fateful September. He had a second stroke the possibility of which had been unanimously denied by his expensive doctors. Nina had never seen her father before his death.
Nina sat silently for a while, and then said, “Don’t you worry about me, mama. I’m all right. I’m teaching now, and I like it.”
After leaving the bank, she came to work in the very university that she herself had once graduated from. In his will, her father had left her one half of all his money, so Nina did not have to work now, but teaching was to her liking. The students who were separated from her by a mere ten years seemed children to her, while she felt very adult and wise. She liked her work, but soon there was going to be a break in it.
“I’ll bring you your granddaughter as soon as I can, promise,” she said to the dark marble slab which held a small, framed portrait of a young, cheerful woman – her mother. “And now I’d better go – I got a bit chilled.”
Nina stroked the slab with her hand, then rose and went away with a waddling gait of a pregnant woman.
At the cemetery gate, her miniature Folkswagen was parked. She had finally learned how to drive and got a license.
As she was opening the door of her car, Nina noticed a large automobile parked not far off. It was a VIP affair similar to the one she had once been driven in.
“Nina.”
She turned round. Before her stood Samsonov.
He sank heavily to his knees. “Nina, forgive me, I’m an idiot.”
Nina gazed at the dear face. Her man had a weary look; his massive features were sharpened, and his hair seemed to have receded even more from his forehead.
“Nina, that was all Sinitsin’s doing. It turned out he had long hated me and worked for Atlas. He replaced the plan. We found all your materials on his computer. Thank Ariadna, she sorted it all out, and we were able to make use of some of the stuff from your Plan C, so things are not all that bad now…”
Samsonov was kneeling on a thin crust of ice covering a spring pool. Under his weight, the ice broke and dirty slush came out from under it.
Tears ran down Nina’s cheeks.
“Get up, stupid, you’ll ruin your trousers,” she said.
He got up and took her timidly in his arms.
“Can you ever forgive me?”
Nina took his hand and put it on her belly.
“Meet your daughter.”
It took him some time to grasp what she had said; then he dropped down on his knees again and pressed his head to her belly muttering something.
Nina made him get up.
“Kiss me.”
A woman and a man joined in a kiss under bare, black trees. Aside, the Future was waiting patiently. In the future, they got married and their daughter arrived. Afterwards, they separated and then got together again. Another child was born… A whole life lay ahead, but for now, a man and a woman were standing at the gate of an empty cemetery, unable to break their embrace. Their endless kiss had both sweetness and bitterness to it, and Love was stretching its invisible wings over them in that cloudy sky, that cold spring wind.
2018, Moscow
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