Chapter 5
“What?” Yelena folded her arms, staring up at her older sister from where she sat on the bed that she had pretty much been pushed onto as soon as they had returned from their shopping trip. “You wanted to talk? So talk.”
Natasha let out a sigh. “I like to think that I still know you after all these years,” she took a seat on the bed beside Yelena. “But if I’m reading the situation wrong, then please correct me?”
Yelena swallowed hard, ignoring the pit in her stomach at the impending conversation.
“It’s okay to not be ready,” Natasha stated and Yelena pretended that she didn’t know what she meant.
“Ready for what?” Yelena tried to hold her stare steady but lying to her big sister made her insides twist.
Natasha pinned her under her stare. “Ready for snow.” Natasha wasn’t going to back away from the topic, Yelena knew that much. “I can take Daria to go and meet up with Max. You can stay here with the girls.”
“Daria needs me.” That was the crux of it. Daria was attached to Yelena by the hip. Wherever Yelena went, Daria would follow if she was let. Daria didn’t go anywhere without Yelena.
“Of course she does,” Natasha reached out to take Yelena’s hands and gave them a small squeeze. “You are her mother, Yelena. But that doesn’t mean that you have to push yourself for her. For them. Being a mom doesn’t mean doing things like that.”
“Isn’t it?” Yelena knew that mothers were supposed to put their children first. They were supposed to do anything for them.
Natasha’s eyes were soft as her thumbs ran along Yelena’s knuckles. “Being in the snow triggers you, Yelena. You get panicked and upset and you lose yourself.” As if sensing that Yelena was going to try and interrupt, Natasha continues. “And it’s okay that you’re not ready to face the snow. You don’t have to push yourself into triggering situations for the sake of your daughters.”
Yelena pursed her lips, staring down at their hands. “I don’t understand,” she admits. “Am I doing something wrong?”
Natasha let her hand go and reached up to cup her cheek, tilting her chin up to look at her. “Of course not. Despite how we were raised, we are all in different places. Not all of your girls are the same. Mischa has a girlfriend and moved out while Alice isn’t ready yet. Varvara is loud and wild while Daria is quiet and shy. Some are ready, others aren’t.”
“But I’m their mother.” The name held a lot of weight to Yelena. “I don’t want to let them down.”
“I know that you love those girls more than anything. They know that too. But they wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself trying to do something for their sake,” Natasha stroke Yelena’s cheek with her thumb.
Yelena leaned into the touch with a sigh, her eyes sliding shut. “If I can’t do it then how am I supposed to teach them that it’s okay and help them do it?”
“Maybe they’re not ready either,” Natasha suggested. Yelena hadn’t thought of that before and she felt like a bad mother. “Why would you extend a kindness to them that you wouldn’t give yourself? Why do they deserve it but you don’t?”
Yelena doesn’t have a good answer for that. She doesn’t know. Maybe she doesn’t deserve it. Maybe it was because she had to repent for the awful things she had done.
“Exactly,” Natasha moved her hand and gently poked Yelena’s forehead. “I know you. You deserve the same soft kindness that they do. If you’re not ready- if you’re never ready- then that’s okay.”
“It doesn’t feel like it,” Yelena wanted to believe her sister, to trust that Natasha wouldn’t steer her wrong, but her mind was telling her something different.
“I know. But it is, I promise,” Natasha smiled at her, nothing but honesty on her face. “What happened to us was horrible and it’s okay to not be okay from that.”
Yelena knew that. She had told her girls something like that many times. She just never bothered to apply the same thing to herself.
“C’mere,” Natasha reached out and pulled Yelena into a tight hug. “I know that it’s hard but things get better. Be patient with yourself.”
Yelena took a deep breath and sunk into her sister’s arms. “I’ll try.”
Yelena hadn’t realized that her girls had a distinct lack of winter wear until it came time for Daria to get ready to go out to meet with Max.
Surprisingly, it wasn’t Natasha that had the best advice to offer but Phoebe.
“You can borrow my gloves,” Phoebe was helping Daria tug on a pair of purple gloves. “They’re waterproof, mostly. Sometimes water gets in through the seams but you should be fine. Because you don’t have snow pants, I recommend putting on a few pairs of sweatpants or pajama pants. You’re going to get wet most likely so you can easily strip off the top layer when you come inside so you’re not soaking. Make sure to tuck the cuffs into your boots too so that snow doesn’t get up your pants.”
Daria stood in place as Phoebe instructed what she would need. Varvara would fetch the items and Phoebe helped situate it correctly on her. Yelena watched as Phoebe tucked Daria’s sweatpants into her boots and tied the laces, smiling up at her.
“There we go. The important rule about the cold is layering up. It’s easier to wear too much than too little. You can always take layers off but if you don’t have any extras then you can’t put any on,” Phoebe continued. She had the attention of most of the girls as they watched and listened.
Daria tried to use her notebook to write a question but the gloves were too thick and she tried to sign instead before she got frustrated and pulled the gloves off.
Phoebe wasn’t fluent in sign language yet. Yelena heard from Mischa that she was trying to learn but it was taking her some time. Phoebe glanced at her girlfriend for a translation.
“She wants to know if you’ll go with her,” Varvara answered before Mischa could. She then turned to look at Daria. “I wanna go too.”
“I’ll go pick up some more gloves real quick,” Natasha said. Yelena glanced at her and Natasha gave her a reassuring smile.
“I’ll go with you,” Mischa offered tentatively since Phoebe was helping the girls. Natasha slung an arm around her shoulder and they left the room to head to the store.
Yelena felt a little useless, unsure of what she could do to help. As if sensing her inner turmoil, Ksenia wrapped her arms around her waist and smiled up at her. Yelena melted at the action, smoothing back Ksenia’s hair and kissing her forehead.
Viktoria draped over her shoulders like a blanket and Yelena turned to kiss her cheek as well, watching Phoebe and Daria.
Natasha returned rather quickly, bearing not only mittens but hats as well.
To Yelena’s surprise, Alice suited up with her littlest sisters. When it was time, Natasha took Daria, Varvara, Phoebe, and Alice out to go and meet Max. Yelena could see the clearing they would be playing around in from the back porch so that was where she hovered. She couldn’t stand all the way out on the porch but she stood just outside the door close enough to feel the warmth radiating through the crack she left.
Frank dropped Max off, having a brief conversation with Natasha before he left. Max immediately bounded over to Daria and started excitedly gesturing.
Yelena watched as Max scooped up some snow and patted it into a ball before she dropped it in the snow and nudged it with the toe of her boot. Yelena couldn’t help but smile slightly when she saw Daria and Varvara hunched over to watch Max roll the ball around until it got bigger.
Yelena glanced at the door when it opened to reveal Viktoria stepping out in her snow gear. She gave Yelena a hesitant smile before she stepped off the porch and slowly shuffled forward toward the field until she reached Natasha, upon which her aunt reached out to grasp her hand in reassurance.
Mischa was the next to slip out of the house, preferring to dart across the snow as if she would lose her courage if she slowed down. She skidded to a halt, crashing into Phoebe, and Yelena watched the girl laugh and kiss Mischa’s cheek.
Yelena glanced back inside at her two girls left. Ksenia and Irina were watching the girls play in the snow warily.
Varvara was the one to come back first, her cheeks pink with the cold as she told Yelena breathlessly that Max said they needed a carrot for the nose of the snowman they were making.
“I dunno why but that’s what she said,” Varvara shrugged. Irina went and fetched her one from the fridge and Varvara snatched it before returning to the others.
“What are they doing?” Ksenia mumbled to Yelena when they started to wedge sticks into either side of the sculpture.
“Making a snowman,” Yelena replied, glancing over at her daughter. “Like in the pictures you’ve seen.” Her younger girls had seen snowmen in adverts and cartoons but Yelena hadn’t realized they had never seen one in real life.
“But theirs isn’t…” Ksenia pursed her lips as she trailed off, trying to be nice about the lopsided pile of snow.
“I know. But they’re having fun,” Yelena let out a soft laugh.
Irina nudged her to ask if she was going to join them. Yelena’s breath caught in her throat at the question.
“Maybe,” she said offhandedly and Irina shot her a look but didn’t push it.
Yelena’s chest grew tight when she watched Max flop back in the snow, Daria observing her carefully as Max spread her limbs and began to move them up and down. After careful consideration, Daria carefully sat in the snow next to Max to mimic her.
Yelena remembered vaguely hearing something about snow angels when she was a child and she assumed that that was what they were doing. She watched the others slowly fall in a row to do the same thing and then witnessed her girls glance at each other when Max stuck her finger in the snow to draw a halo over where her head had been.
“Mama,” Ksenia gripped the sleeve of Yelena’s shirt as she quietly spoke. Yelena glanced down at her to see that Ksenia was staring right at the little group playing in the snow. “I want to go.”
“Okay. Do you want help getting ready?” Yelena asked her.
“I want you to come with me,” Ksenia insisted, giving Yelena’s sleeve a small tug. She then turned to Irina and repeated the same thing. “I don’t wanna go by myself.”
“Your Aunt Nat can come over here and guide you out,” Yelena replied and Ksenia eyed her.
“Do you not wanna go outside?” Ksenia questioned quietly, her brow furrowed in confusion.
“I would love nothing more than to go outside and play with you and your sisters,” Yelena pulled Ksenia against her as she thought about how to best word things. “But… I am not good with the cold. It brings back memories of times that I would rather not think of and I’m having a hard time replacing bad memories with good ones.”
Ksenia frowned as she soaked up Yelena’s words. “You’re… not ready?”
Yelena took a deep breath and nodded her head. “Yeah… I guess I’m just not ready yet.”
Ksenia eyed her. “Rule number ten.”
A small smile crossed Yelena’s face at the reminder of the rules posted on the fridge. She would sometimes state a rule that applied to one of her girls if they were unsettled or unsure. Ksenia was doing something that Yelena had done hundreds of times to her. “Rule number ten. Remember that you are safe here.”
Ksenia nodded her head and glanced over at Irina to ask if she would go outside with her.
Yelena’s last two girls left the house to join their sisters and Yelena was left alone, stuck tucked against the wall because she couldn’t make herself wade out into the snow.
Yelena instead watched and observed her girls playing around, some of them hesitating and glancing back at her for reassurance.
She did want to join them. She even shuffled to the edge of the porch just before the sprinkle of snow falling. She saw Natasha give her an encouraging thumbs up but Yelena took one step out into the snow and immediately retracted.
It wasn’t fair. She wanted to join her girls. But despite the fact there was no more Red Room, the actions and memories followed her around and dragged her down.
Whenever it happened to her girls, Yelena would tell them to be patient with themselves and that it wasn’t their fault. Ksenia’s red days, Daria’s meltdowns, Varvara screaming curse words, Viktoria breaking things, Mischa working out until she couldn’t, Alice’s wailing, Irina’s need to push through migraines until she had bloody noses.
“Why would you extend a kindness to them that you wouldn’t give yourself? Why do they deserve it but you don’t?”
That was what Natasha had told her. Why did her daughters get the love and support that she wouldn’t grant herself?
“Hi, Ma,” Varvara trudged up to her, snow still clinging to her jacket as she yanked the hat from her head and shook her hair out.
“Hi, Vars,” Yelena greeted her. “Everything okay?”
“Can we come to play in the yard here?” Varvara leaned against Yelena, melting snow soaking into Yelena’s hoodie. “Closer to you?”
Max was a teenage girl and was unlikely to ever tell anybody their actual address. Sharing it with someone was a security risk. But Varvara smiles up at her hopefully and Yelena couldn’t find it within her to say no. “Alright.”
“Yes!” Varvara fist pumps. “Thanks, Ma!” She called out, already halfway down the steps to tell her sisters.
Yelena leaned against the wall and watched.