“Dudley, what the hell are you saying?” asked Steve, getting up out of his chair and walking over to stand near him.
“This man is an impostor,” said Dudley. “He is in hiding here. This man was in the Red Army. The Germans branded the Soviet officers with the hammer and sickles—before they shot them. The Soviets branded the Soviet expat soldiers with the SS Eagles—before they shot them.”
There was silence in the circle. Everyone gaped at Alexander, who said nothing, his mouth clenched, his eyes dark. Tatiana squeezed his leg. They exchanged a glance. She said quietly, “You think we should go now?”
“No, no, don’t be silly, stay for the fireworks,” Amanda said quickly. The girls tittered uncomfortably. Jeff said, “I’m sure Dudley’s mistaken. It’s some kind of mistake, that’s all.” Raising his eyebrows, he looked over at Cindy. “Cin, you know what? This is a very good time to go dance.”
Everybody got up except Tatiana and Alexander. Even Dudley managed to hoist himself off the chair. “What a great idea,” he said, crossing Alexander’s path heading to Tatiana. “Want to dance, Tanechka?”
Alexander stood up suddenly and body-checked Dudley, who lost his balance and fell to the ground.
“Dudley,” said Alexander, having already pulled Tatiana out of the chair and away, “if you’re right about me, then you must know what I will do if you touch her again.”
Before Dudley, back on his feet, could even open his mouth, Jeff and Steve were already between them. “Guys, guys, come on,” said Jeff, pushing Alexander away, while Steve pushed Dudley away. “Alex, what’s wrong with you? It’s a party. At my father’s house. Dud, forget it, come with me, let me introduce you to Theo. Come, you’ll like him.” With a sharp stare at Alexander, to say, cool it, can’t you see he’s just wasted? Steve led Dudley away, and Amanda was about to lead Tatiana away, but Tatiana went to Alexander, placed her hand on his chest and said, “Do you want to go home? We can go right now.”
Jeff said not to go. “He’s drunk. It’s nothing. Alexander, forget about him. He’s not worth it, man.”
Tatiana was not moving. She pressed against him and looked up. He brushed the hair out of her face, stroked her cheek briefly and then disengaged from her. “We’ll wait for the fireworks. Look, Margaret is looking for you again. Go. Just remember what I told you.”
Casting him a nervous look, she left, flanked by Margaret and Amanda, and Alexander remained with Jeff. Balkman came over, and they got caught up discussing breaking ground on the Hayes house and whose palms needed to be greased in order to get the inspectors to the site in two weeks and not in two overbooked months. Suddenly Alexander wasn’t paying any attention. The Balkmans had a large lawn, with a pool, a gazebo, landscaped bushes and trees. Across the lawn through the bushes he spotted a plaid shirt and a ponytail. From beyond the man’s jeans, Alexander saw the floral print of Tatiana’s green dress.
His gaze briefly losing its focus, Alexander barely excused himself as he made his way across. Tatiana was pressed against the wood fence and he was leaning over her. Alexander didn’t acknowledge Dudley as he pushed between them to separate them, his eyes on Tatiana’s distressed face. He pulled her away from the fence and only then did he turn. Behind him, Tatiana was grasping his shirt.
“You are completely fucked up,” Alexander said quietly to Dudley. “What are you doing? I’m telling you, walk away. Turn around, walk away, stay away from my wife.”
“What is your problem, man? This is a free country, unlike that red country you came from. And your wife, for your information, was talking to me. Weren’t you, Tania?”
Tatiana, her mouth tight and skin pale, took Alexander’s hand and said, “Come on, Shura. The fireworks are about to start.”
But Alexander could not walk away. He could not turn his back.
It was dark; there was much commotion. They were near the edge of the lawn slightly away from other people. The first burst of fireworks whistled into the sky and exploded. Over the whistling of the rockets, Alexander heard Dudley’s voice.
“You didn’t answer me,” said Dudley. “I said, what in the world is your fucking problem?”
“What in the world is your fucking problem?” said Alexander, turning square to him. “Tania, go wait for me across the grass.”
Tatiana squeezed his hand. “No. Please. Come on, Shura,” she said, trying to pull him away. “Let’s go home.”
But Alexander wasn’t moving. He and Dudley faced off, eye to eye.
“You’ve had a problem with me from the very beginning,” said Dudley, spitting out a black chunk of chewed tobacco.
“You’ve been out of fucking line from the very beginning.”
“Oh, really?” Dudley said. “Well, you want to take it outside?”
“We are outside, asshole.”
“Shura, please!” She walked between them, taking hold of both of Alexander’s hands.
“Tania!” Alexander ripped his hands from her, not for a second taking his eyes off Dudley. “I said go wait for me across the grass.”
“Let’s go home, darling,” she said, still in front of him, looking up at him, still trying to take hold of him. “Please.”
“Yes, let’s go home, darling,” mimicked Dudley. “Please. And I’ll get on my knees and suck your cock.”
“Shura, no!”
Alexander moved Tatiana forcibly out of the way with one hand and punched Dudley so savagely and swiftly in the face with the other that if Dudley hadn’t fallen backward, no one would have known that anything at all had transpired between them. The fireworks continued to burst in the sky. People were clapping, cheering. There was music playing. Harry James and his orchestra were finally beginning to see the light.
But fall Dudley did into the corner of the lawn, in the dark, near the bushes. Tatiana, ever the nurse, peered at him. He was bleeding profusely from the mouth. His front teeth were dangling by their bloodied roots. Alexander—who had been methodically trained and then baptized by fire in vicious hand-to-hand combat through the Byelorussian villages, fighting the Germans with knives and bayonets and with single fatal blows up through the nose—thought that Dudley got off easy. Without breathing out, he took Tatiana by the hand. “Now we can go,” he said. Nothing in his face moved.
Speechlessly she stared at him.
He walked across the lawn to the back gate. Margaret and Bill were standing on the patio watching the fireworks. Alexander, barely even stopping, came up to Balkman and said into the man’s initially smiling and then sinking face, “That’s it. I’ve had it up to here with you and your fucking business. I quit—for good. Don’t pay me for last week, don’t give me any of the money you owe me. I’m done with you. Don’t ever call me again.”
“Alexander! Wait! What’s happened?”
Balkman ran after him.
“Alexander! Please wait! Steve! What the hell happened?”
Alexander was moving quickly, pulling Tatiana behind him; she had to run to keep up. Outside on the front walkway, Steve intercepted them, running around to face them, panting, red, fists clenched. “How dare you! How dare you—after all we did for you—”
Alexander jerked his head back but not before Steve jabbed him hard in the chin, knocking him into Tatiana, who lost her footing and fell.
Alexander, without straightening out, punched Steve, smashing his jaw. Steve doubled over. Alexander uppercut him again but harder. He would have hit him a third time, but crumbling onto himself, Steve fell on the stone walkway. “Let’s see how well you lie your way through your miserable life now, you sack of shit,” Alexander said, kicking him hard, and then turning to a frightened and panicked Tatiana to help her off the ground.
They were driving in a matter of minutes. They were utterly silent for several miles.
“Are you all right?” Tatiana asked.
“I’m fine.” He wiped his mouth.
“You could’ve broken your knuckles.”
“They’re fine.” He clenc
hed and unclenched his fist.
She was watching him. “Shura...?”
“Tania,” he said calmly, “I don’t want to talk about a single thing, a single fucking thing. So just—sit very quietly and say nothing.”
She fell instantly mute. In a few minutes, he stopped his truck on an empty Shea Boulevard by the side of the road. Somewhere far away fireworks were going off. Inside the truck his unsteady hands were gripping the wheel.
“Darling . . .” she said soothingly.
“I have been such a fucking idiot. I don’t even know what to do with myself.”
“Please, it’ll be all right. Do you want me to drive?”
His head was on the wheel. She scooted over to him on the bench seat, sat by him. When he looked up, she took a napkin and dabbed his lip. He moved her hand away, and soon began driving again. “Are you okay?” he asked. “That bastard hit me knowing you were behind me, knowing you could get hurt. I didn’t even have a chance to move you out of the way.”
“Are you surprised he wasn’t more of a gentleman?” asked Tatiana.
“Did you not hear me when I said I don’t want you to say a single fucking thing?”
After a while she spoke. “Dudley asked me if I had heard the rumor about him. That he keeled a man in Montana. I said that he’d been at war, he must have seen plenty of death. And he said, ‘War isn’t real. Montana, now that’s real.’”
“I’ve seen Montana,” said Alexander, his hands grim around the wheel. “I don’t think it’s so real.”
Tatiana couldn’t sleep. He slept. She made out the hands of the clock. Ten to two. The house was quiet, outside was quiet, it was the deep of night by the mountains. Nothing was moving, except Tatiana’s anxiety, freely roaming around in her chest. She couldn’t sleep at all. She was unsettled and anxious.
Quietly reaching over him, she replaced the phone back on the cradle. He always took it off the hook at night before he made love to her.
Anthony was sleeping over at Sergio’s. She wished Ant were home, so she could go and check on him and feel a bit of comfort. Instead, Tatiana placed her hand on Alexander’s chest and listened to his heart. All her adult life this is what she did—listened to his heart. What was it telling her now? It was rhythmic, subdued, whooshing. Lightly she rubbed her lips back and forth against his stubble, kissed him softly, brought her hand down, cupped him, caressed him. He was deeply sleeping, but sometimes, if he felt her like this through sleep, he would roll on his side and throw his arm over her. Tonight he did not wake, remaining on his back. His lip was swollen. His right hand was swollen, iced over, bandaged. He barely let her bandage it. He hated to be pampered over his injuries. He liked to be pampered over other things, bathed, fed, fussed over, kissed—all that he took gladly—but he never liked any fussing over his wounds. It was like he was remembering himself incapacitated in Morozovo where he lay helpless in a hospital bed for two months until he was arrested and she was gone.
Tatiana tossed and tossed, and finally got up, threw on her cream camisole and went out to the living room. She got herself a glass of water, sat on a high stool near the kitchen counter; she didn’t move, she tried not to breathe. The air conditioner was off, there was no noise at all, and it was then, at two thirty in the morning, that Tatiana thought she heard the sound of a distant engine. Slightly opening the front door, she listened. Nothing. Outside was black dread, and there was no moon. After bolting and locking the front door, she went to quietly close the bedroom door, so as not to disturb Alexander and then from the kitchen dialed the hospital.
Erin, her friend and the night receptionist, answered, and the first words out of her mouth were, “Tania! Why was your phone off the hook? I’ve been calling and calling you!”
“Why? What’s the matter?” Tatiana asked quietly.
“Steve Balkman was brought in here again with some other guy. Balkman is still unconscious, but the other one was a wild animal. They had to subdue him with tranquilizers. He was drunk and bleeding. He kept yelling, threatening unbelievable things, and before they shot him up full of drugs, he kept saying your husband’s name, cursing! Do you know anything about that?”
“I do. Is Sergeant Miller there?”
“He went out on his break. Who is that man? And how do you know him? We’ve been trying to call you for three hours!”
“Let me talk to Sergeant Miller. That man needs to be detained.”
“Tania! He can’t be, he left already.”
“He what?”
“Yes, that’s what I’m trying to tell you! At one thirty he stormed out of here without a doctor, without a discharge, without anything. Just pulled out his IV, put on his clothes and left.”
Tatiana’s voice was a whisper when she said, “Erin, tell Miller to send a car to my house.”
“What’s going—”
Tatiana hung up. But now her heart was thudding so hard that she couldn’t hear the quiet, the outside, the inside. Was it a car she had heard? Or was it a fever? A delusion?
She was standing at the kitchen counter. The shades weren’t drawn in the living room. They never drew the shades. There was no one around. Was there wind? She couldn’t tell, but the black-and-blue shadows kept moving in long strides through the windows. She couldn’t hear anything outside. She was paralyzed with deafening fear on the inside. She needed to walk across the living room into the bedroom and wake Alexander, but she couldn’t move. It would mean walking across the house, past two unshaded windows, past two doors.
She was still in the kitchen when the shadow in her window rose in the darkness into the shape of a man moving slowly up the steps of her front deck. She always left that window open so she could see Alexander walking up the steps to his home. This wasn’t the wind!
She moved, she took three steps away from the counter, past the front door, and before she could take another, the door crashed open, and before she had a chance to scream, Dudley, his mouth full of black holes, his eyes filled with black rage, was in front of her. He grabbed her around the mouth and throat so she couldn’t make a sound and twisted her head back so hard she thought her neck would break. There was a pistol in his hand. And she had so solicitously closed the bedroom door to let Alexander sleep!
But the front door, the door! It was such a loud crash. Maybe he would hear.
He heard.
The bedroom door slowly opened, and Alexander appeared and stood naked in the doorway. Dudley showed him Tatiana. “Here I am, mother-fucker,” Dudley said, lisping through the missing incisors. “And here she is. We’re going to finish this in your house.” He was holding Tatiana around the throat. The cocked pistol was pointed at Alexander. “You pigging Red, don’t move. You think you can break my fucking face and get away with it? You don’t know soldiers for shit. I’ve brought it right back home to you.” Dudley’s hand around Tatiana’s throat fanned out over her breast. She exhaled piercingly, her eyes wildly pleading to Alexander, who stood like a tomb, not blinking, not breathing, looking only at Dudley. “Stevie told me she never had another cock but yours,” Dudley said. “Oh, we said, how sweet that must’ve been for you—with tiny little her. Well, guess what? I’m going to find out if she’s still like candy”—he smacked his lips—“find out right in front of you, and then you can have my sloppy seconds. Now step away from the door”— Dudley steadied his cocked weapon—“but slowly.”
Alexander did as he was told. He slowly stepped away from the door, and without anything else moving on him and without another instant of time ticking by, he raised his left arm that had been hidden behind the door jamb, pointed the Colt M1911 pistol straight at Tatiana’s face and fired in the dark.
The reverberating thudding impact of the .45 caliber round travelling a distance of 20 feet at a speed of 830 feet per second and breaking apart a skull was so loud and shocking that it felt as if Alexander had shot her. Dudley’s head exploded six inches away from Tatiana’s face. With Dudley still clutching her, they were both thrown back;
he hit the wall behind him and slumped forward to the floor in a heap on top of her. She was blinded, she couldn’t see, she didn’t even know if she was screaming, or crying, or dying. His arm remained around her throat.
Alexander was pulling her from under him, untangling her, lifting her. That’s when she heard herself screaming. She started flailing at him, hitting him, trying to get away from him. He said nothing, did nothing but held her to him; he held her to his chest while she thrashed and screamed in terror. His heart was just inches away through his breastplate. It was beating steady, it was pounding on, and he was saying, shh, and his heart was saying shh, and staying sanguine. But she couldn’t calm down. She thought she had been hit. Her skin was cold, her own heartbeat at two hundred. Alexander sat her down, held her firmly around the shoulders, pressed her to him, and put his hand over her mouth. “Shh,” he said. “Calm down.” His hand remained over her as she breathed in out carbon dioxide. “Shh. Shh,” he kept saying. He took his hand away, opened her mouth and exhaled into it. “Feel my calm breath? Now slow down, it’s all right. Slow down.”
Her eyes gazed at him in horror. “You shot me?” she mouthed.
He rocked his head, rocked his body, rocked her. “No. You’re fine. Shh.”
“I’m covered in—is that my blood? Is that my skull?”
He held her as she continued to shake. They were still on the couch when the lights of the police cars flashed outside. The silk camisole she was wearing was blood slick and sheer, and he was still naked. The police officers walked in through the open door. Alexander left Tatiana on the couch and went to put on jeans and a T-shirt, bringing her a terry cloth robe. She remembered about the blood on her. She struggled to her feet to go get cleaned up, but the police said no, Alexander said no.
She knew two of the police officers. One of them was Miller. More police came. A reporter from the Phoenix Sun came. He was shooed away, but not before he took pictures.
The police began to ask her questions and took Alexander from her, to ask him questions in the bedroom. When he stood up to walk away, she started to cry.