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I will send you more next time I write! I know you aren’t as keen on sweet pierogi, but Leo might like them! Also please take care of my Tupperware. And wrap up warm. And do you have enough underwear? Please say hello to Leaf for us and tell him we’ll be stopping by to definitelynotbuy more drugs from him.
Lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of love,
Mama
P.S. Your father asks and I’m quoting directly here “to be remembered to you”. Do you think he’s taking the mickey?
Mum, it’s been 2 days.
M.
A NOTE OF ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
My heartfelt thanks to Eros Bittersweet who helped me put together Marius’s family pierogi recipe from her own family pierogi recipe. You can find her on Instagram at BittersweetRead (instagram.com/bittersweetread) or via her website bittersweetread.ca
AFTERMATH
“And you’re s-sure you don’t mind,” I asked, flailing clothes and toiletries into my suitcase.
Adam was sitting on the edge of the bed in the converted grain silo we had rented for a long weekend. He was ready to go and had been for a while. It was something I should have been used to—his lists, the separate bag for his electronics, his efficiently rolled socks—for he packed and unpacked regularly at home. I even imagined him running through this routine regathering of his belongings on his way back from whatever job had taken him away in the first place. And yet I was not used to it. I might never be used to it. This man, who was so accustomed to leaving places, leaving them now for me. Sometimeswithme.
“No, petal.” Amusement ran through his voice like an underground river. “I don’t mind. I don’t mind any more than I did two minutes ago. Or five minutes before that. Or last night.”
“But…” I turned, trying to remember which drawers I had emptied, which I had not. If I had left my hairbrush in the bathroom. My phone charger on the bedside table. “It’s nearly two hours out of our way.”
“I don’t have plans.”
“That still doesn’t mean—” I crashed to a verbal halt. Not so unusual for me but, for once, it was not the words I lacked. This was some deeper, more nebulous uncertainty.
Adam waited a moment to let me gather myself and when no gathering occurred, he reached out and caught my hand, tugging me gently over. “What doesn’t it mean?”
“It means, you shouldn’t have to do this for me.”
A somewhat less gentle tug brought me tumbling into his lap. Tumble, from the Old Englishtumbian. Its secondary meaning—to awkwardly fall—came later, though it would always be there for me: thema trip hazard for my tongue to send all the following letters sprawling. And then, of course, there wasto be tumbled.Like the heroine of a saucy book. Adam had probably intended only comfort, and the closenesswascomforting, but the touch of indignity made my heart flutter wickedly.
Silly heart. Read the room.
“I’d do damn near anything for you, Edwin.” Adam nudged my chin up so our eyes could not escape each other. “This is no hardship.”
I should have been used to this too. His boldness and his candour. The way he spread his love before me like a picnic blanket—when Marius’s had always been a treasure hunt, signs and signals, whispers in the dark, flickers of gold in the dust. “I s-shouldn’t have asked. This is s-supposed to be our holiday.”
He shrugged. “We’ve had other holidays. And there’ll be more to come.”
“I just…” My fingers tightened against his shirt. “I just need to know he’s all right.”
Adam’s hand came up and covered mine, rough to smooth, broad to narrow. “Who are you trying to convince? Because I’ve already said yes.”
“I feel foolish,” I admitted, dropping my head against his shoulder, relishing the faint sense of smallness I sometimes sought with Adam. Odd though it was to be drawn to something I had so often resented, having spent so much of my life quiet and overlooked.
He tilted his head in that inquisitive way he had. “For seeing your ex?”
“For always coming when he calls.”
“Well, you just told me that was for you, not for him.”
“I did what?”
“You said that you needed to know he’s all right. That’s about you, isn’t it?”
