"Ma, don't be silly. I've got that tonight."
Red had just found a knife in the drawer and had been about to begin chopping up the vegetables that had been left on the counter, when she heard Yuri's voice behind her. She turned around to look at him standing in the doorway. Red hair tousled from sleep, a slight stubble on his face, and dressed in a pair of worn out sweatpants and a baggy t-shirt.
"I'm just trying to keep my hands busy," she confessed.
She'd been home for a couple of hours by this point, but felt completely on edge in this familiar space that was completely different from how she remembered. Of course, she shouldn't have been surprised. In twenty years, furniture is bound to need replacing and she hardly should have expected Dmitri to live in a shrine of her possessions and personal taste. Her books were still on the shelves and most of the apartment was laid out the same way, but Dmitri had boxed up all of her belongings awhile ago. She felt like a visitor in Dmitri's home right now, and not like she belonged.
"Sorry that I didn't come with Pop to get you," Yuri said, coming over to kiss her cheek in greeting. "I needed sleep. I have to leave for work in a couple hours."
"I didn't expect you to," Red replied, and it probably was better that he hadn't.
Although, she and Dmitri might have benefited from having a buffer between them. They had barely exchanged more than two words back and forth. Red hadn't felt capable of participating in a conversation and had spent the entire drive staring out the window like she was seeing the world for the first time. The changes of scenery, the movement, the busyness as rolling countryside turned into city. Everything felt so strange to her and much too big.
"I knew you were sleeping," she said. "I was trying not to wake you."
"You didn't," he assured her. "I always wake up at this time. Usually make supper for me and Pop first and then get ready to hit the road."
"You drive all night?" she asked.
Yuri nodded his head. He went to put a pot of coffee on while he explained all the basic and uninteresting elements of his job as a truck driver. He worked nights and only had Sundays off, so he never had bothered getting a place of his own after his divorce. He only was ever really there to sleep anyway.
"Where's Pop anyway?" Yuri asked, pouring her a cup of coffee.
"Napping," Red replied, sliding into a chair at the kitchen table resignedly.
She added some cream to her coffee when Yuri passed it to her and then brought the hot drink to her lips. It was amazing how good it tasted. She sipped at it slowly as Yuri started chopping up the vegetables he had set out for their supper. He explained that Maxsim would probably be by to see her in the morning, and that Vasily had said he'd wait until he heard from her before he brought his kids over. It was a lot all at once, and her family was taking their cues from her. The problem was that Red didn't know what she wanted herself.
"How's the store?" she asked.
"Doing well," Yuri replied. "Lida does most of the work. She brings the baby and all the customers just get to admire her while they do their shopping. She's there now, in fact."
"What about Papa?" Red asked.
"He does his part, I suppose," Yuri replied, dicing up a green pepper. "But you know what he's like. I can't believe he just left you on your own so he could sleep. What's he even tired for anyway? I'm the one who's up all night."
"I can manage," Red said, bringing her cup to her lips. "I don't need him to watch me."
Though she felt a lot less confident than she pretended. She'd been into her bedroom, which felt so cluttery to her that she didn't see how she was even going to unpack the boxes Dmitri had brought up for her. She was pretty sure he hadn't thrown out a single thing since she'd been gone. She doubted even half of the shirts taking up all the closet space would even fit him anymore. She wanted to go through them, but it also seemed wrong to do exactly that. Like she didn't have the right anymore.
"I'm just making a simple stir fry," Yuri explained. He took some diced chicken out of the fridge and mixed it in a pan on the stove with some oil.
"I'll cook tomorrow," Red offered.
"I thought you'd rather get back to the store tomorrow," Yuri replied, popping a piece of cauliflower into his mouth.
"I will soon," Red said vaguely.
This morning when she'd gotten out of bed, she had expected to hit the ground running. Yet all she had done since she'd gotten home was wander aimlessly around her apartment. Opening cabinets and drawers, memorizing where things were. It completely exhausted her, and she had considered crawling into bed beside Dmitri to take a nap as well, but that didn't feel right either. There was so much to learn and discover. She hadn't even met her grandchildren yet. She was expected to go through bins from twenty years ago to find something to wear, and that seemed ridiculous to her as well.
"Where are the garbage bags?" she asked, after draining the last sip of coffee from her mug.
Yuri pointed to the cupboard under the sink and she got up to open in. She took out three bags and then left him to walk down the hall to the room where her husband was sleeping. Her boxes were stacked up beside the window and she lifted the lid on the first. It was full of shirts that either didn't fit anymore or would be out of date even if they did. She opened the first bag and started tossing all of them inside. She did the same with all her skirts as well. She threw out everything except for a couple pairs of shoes and a winter coat. Then she was able to breathe a little bit better.
"I want to go shopping tomorrow," she said to Dmitri, who had woken up about halfway through her purge and been watching her from the bed.
"You should ask Lida to go with you," he said, reaching over to open the drawer in his nightstand. He pulled out an envelope from the bank, with her cards to their joint accounts still stuck on the paper with adhesive. He handed it to her, and to Red it felt like she had just been gifted the keys to the city.
"I'm starting from scratch," she said, her fingers wrapping around the cards in her hand.
"Get whatever you need," Dmitri told her. "Whatever you want."
"We can't afford that," Red looked up at him.
"Well, just this once," he replied, and she nodded slowly.
"And then we have to tackle this bedroom," Red said, glancing around. The closet doors barely could close because of how much stuff was jammed inside. His dresser drawers were overflowing, and there was a stack of clothes on an armchair in the corner.
"It's like you became a hoarder," she commented. "You wear the same thing every day. Why do you need so much stuff?"
"You can get rid of it all," Dmitri said good-naturedly. "This is just what happens when you're not around to take care of me."
"More like, this is what happens when you're too lazy to do laundry so you just keep buying new clothes to wear instead," she guessed correctly, as she got up to go inspect the closet.
She rightly suspected that the pile on the chair was the group of items he actually wore. The dresser was next, and aside from the piles on the closet floor, she was pretty sure that the neatly hung shirts on the rod had been hanging in there since the last time she'd been here.
"What exactly do you do all day?" she asked him sarcastically.
"The store doesn't run itself," Dmitri replied.
"Nice try," she smirked. "Yuri already sold you out and told me Lida does most of the work."
"She and Vasily need the money," Dmitri shrugged. "And what other boss, besides the Grandfather of your children, is going to let you bring them to work with you?"
"Probably the same sort of Grandfather who's never volunteered to babysit," Red answered.
She was moving quickly now, tossing items Dmitri hadn't looked at in years into the garbage bags along with her own old things. It made her feel a little bit more like herself. Putting her mark back on the family home she had raised three children in and lived in nearly her whole adult life prior to Litchfield. It seemed that her mark hadn't been erased, it had only been buried under all of Dmitri's old stuff.
"Everything is going to be better now that you're back where you belong," Dmitri said gently. "We have a fresh start."
"Does that mean that you still don't regret marrying me?" Red asked, emptying some of the hangers now.
"Of course not," Dmitri assured her.
Red paused, measuring her nerve, before deciding she did want to go there.
"But isn't there someone else?" she asked, with her back still to him.
Slowly she turned around to face him and forced herself to look him in the eye. She saw him visibly pale over the unspoken thing she had never wanted to know the answer to before. Though being back on equal ground with him now, compelled her to ask. She wouldn't have been surprised either way, and didn't really even hold it against him if he had. She just didn't want to start the first day of the rest of her life on a lie, but Dmitri's eyes told her everything she needed to know.
Dmitri cleared his throat first and then swore, "not anymore."
Red turned back to his closet, and bent down to gather up a whole pile of old t-shirts off of the floor. She shoved them into one of the garbage bags.
"How many were there?" she asked, when she finally looked up.
"Galina," he sighed.
"In this room?" she asked, and she watched him shake his head at her recognizing that it wasn't a denial, but a signal to not go there.
"You're my wife and I'm here with you," Dmitri said finally. "I just want us both to have a clean slate together. I think that's possible. Don't you?"
"I guess we'll just have to wait and see," she answered finally.
She had four huge garbage bags ready to be taken out by the time Yuri finished preparing dinner. The ceramic plates felt so heavy to her as did the quiet rapport at the table with just her husband and son. She was physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted by the time they finished eating. Yuri had to hurry to get ready for work, and nothing had felt better to her in years than the hug he gave her before walking out the door. Not timed, not watched, just a genuine expression from her son that made her feel just a little bit more reassured.
She was so occupied with her own heavy thoughts about the shock of being back here, that she didn't have an ounce of energy left to consider how everyone else was feeling too. She understood it was a bit awkward and she could tell Yuri didn't really know what to say. She was trying to act like her usual self to make things feel alright for the both of them, but she was struggling to find the right words as well. She was sure it was written all over her face just how overwhelmed she was, and it was something of a relief when Yuri finally left and Dmitri went to watch TV.
She took a bath, using up all the hot water and filling it as high as the tub allowed. Savouring every single second and feeling like this was the height of luxury. She felt amazing and stayed in long after her fingers and toes started pruning. She laid there until the water cooled down, and then she washed her hair and used an ample amount of creamy soap all over her body. She wasn't scrimping anymore, she was indulging.
"I think I'm going to do that every night," she said, walking out into the living room to join Dmitri once she'd finally persuaded herself out of the bath.
"You should," Dmitri replied, eyes on the television screen.
Red had put on a black shirt of his that reached her mid-thigh like a nightgown. She hadn't saved any of her old pajamas and was planning to buy new ones tomorrow. She sat down beside him on the couch, remembering how this had always been the way of things. Dmitri watching the television, and her usually reading a book.
"When are you going to go to bed?" she asked.
"Maybe after this," Dmitri shrugged.
Red didn't want to admit it out loud to him, but the last thing she wanted to try right now was falling asleep all alone in the dark by herself. She sat close to him and stared at the screen for the longest time, finally getting the nerve to lean over and rest her head on his shoulder. His scent was still the same as she remembered. She found it calming, even as she acknowledged she hadn't worked out how she felt about him, and was too tired to care much about it right now.
"It's a lot," she said quietly, which basically summed up this whole day. Her whole life.
Dmitri reached up a hand for a quilt tossed over the back of the couch. He gently placed it over her, and she squeezed the fabric in her hand. She remembered its pattern and that they had had it for a long time. Though she couldn't recall where it had come from. She guessed it didn't matter. She felt very overcome with emotions, and she could have cried had she not been so beaten down. Too raw for sleep, but too worn out for anything else. She lay there on her husband's shoulder for most of the night. Neither of them speaking, but neither willing to move.