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The result fills the screen.
Probability of paternity exceeds 99.9%.
15
VERA
It's Friday, and Misha wakes at six thirty.
The estate has curtains thick enough to block daylight but no power over a three-year-old who remembers there’s a playroom down the corridor.
He climbs across my stomach, plants one knee beneath my ribs, and announces, “The yellow car is missing.”
“It’s on the chair,” I say, keeping my eyes closed.
“No. That’s the old yellow car.”
I open one eye.
Three yellow cars sit on the chair.
Misha points at them from beneath a fall of dark hair. “The fast one is missing.”
At home, mornings have order. He goes to playschool, argues over shoes, eats half a banana in the car, and spends the next few hours under the care of teachers who believe glue sticks, songs, and scheduled snacks can civilize small humans. Galina collects him afterward, takes him back to our apartment, cooks whatever he has decided he’ll eat that week, and puts him down for a short rest.
He rarely sleeps.
Misha likes to stay awake until I return from work, even when my return is after bedtime. I asked Galina to try earlier dinners, longer naps, shorter naps, while I used threats, bargains, and one disastrous sticker chart. Eventually, I gave up and reduced my professional commitments where I could. Marina helped arrange my scheduled cases in earlier slots, Ivan Zorin took two late trauma lists without complaining, and Kira Karpova covered enough midnight work to earn my loyalty for life.
Now Marina is dead, my hospital is compromised, and Misha has no playschool, no Galina, and no routine beyond the guards stationed throughout the west wing.
This is Misha’s favorite game. He hides his toys in my room, then makes me play detective even though he points at the hiding place until I find them.
He takes the car and grins. “You finded it.”
“You put it under my pillow.”
“I hide very good.”
“I slept on it.”
“That’s why you finded it.”
“Next time, hide it somewhere that doesn’t hurt Mama.”
He thinks about this. “Okay. Under your bum.”
He drives it across my blanket, over my thigh, and down the mattress. By seven, he has opened every drawer Mrs. Wentworth filled yesterday and changed clothes three times because one shirt has a bear, another has two bears, and the third has pockets large enough for cars.
None of the clothes came from me.
Tiny socks fill one drawer. Sweaters, pants, pajamas, undershirts, boots, gloves, and a dark blue coat hang inside the wardrobe. New books cover the low shelf in the sitting area, including picture books about trucks, bears, whales, and one called Doctor Shark.
On Wednesday, Oksana brought Misha back from Alexei’s room with several toy cars and a handful of drawings, including the Doctor Shark picture he and Alexei had made together. Misha gathered everything against his chest and announced, “Alexei gave me these.”
“Of course he did.”
Now the shark from their drawing appears on the cover of one of his new books.
