“Dragging out someone’s painful family history just because you’ve been rejected—don’t you think that’s despicable? I never realized you were such a low sort of man.”

“Did you think I was courting you? The way you did with Archum?”

Now I understood. He must have been mocking me — a woman who had just been discarded by Archum — which explained his strange behaviour today. Otherwise, why would he ever propose to me?

“How on earth do you even know about my family? Did Archum tell you?”

“Does that matter? Are you going to marry me or not?”

The ring Jürgen had held out still gleamed before my eyes. I snapped the case shut and pushed it back towards him. I was irritated by the mockery about marriage, but this was my workplace. I had no intention of displaying any personal emotions or getting into an argument here.

“Sit down.”

He barked the command just as I started to stand up. My body flinched at the harshness of his tone and, before I knew it, I had slumped back down into my seat.

“Jurgen, you’re twenty-four. You’re not so young that you’d mock me over a broken heart.”

“I never mocked you. Don’t brush it off so lightly. I said, marry me and let’s leave this country.”

“Leave? What, in exile?”

For a moment, I forgot he was a foreigner and blurted out the foolish question.

“Legally. We’ll leave lawfully.”

“Goodbye, then.”

I forced spoonful after spoonful of borscht down, suppressing the churning in my stomach. Never leaving food unfinished was a pitiful habit I’d picked up after the revolution.

“Isn’t it foolish to reject me for the sake of a man who’s off getting engaged to another woman?”

I set my spoon down on the tray. In the end, I couldn’t finish the soup. Rising from my seat, I felt I could no longer bear sitting across from him. Jurgen had always been strange, but today he seemed more unsettling than ever.

The wall clock read 12:11. It felt as though ages had slipped by since I first entered the cafeteria, though barely ten minutes had passed. On most days, the lunch break vanished too quickly—yet today it dragged on without end.

I carried the tray, dishes, and utensils back to Aunt Ira, who handled meals for the mechanics. I murmured the obligatory “It was delicious,” though with more than half left untouched, the words rang hollow.

When I returned for my coat, Jurgen was still there—sitting rigid, arms crossed, posture unyielding.

“I hope tomorrow you’ll have come to your senses, Jurgen.”

Just then, the light above him flickered. For a moment, his face was bathed in an even darker shade of gloom.

“You’re not having tea today?”

“No. If I drink it now, it’ll only make me sick.”

Fastening the buttons of my coat, I inclined my head slightly, as if to bid him off.

“That’s enough. Let’s pretend none of this ever happened today.”

“Svyeta.”

When Jurgen caught my wrist, I scowled irritably.

“Please come with me. There’s something important I still need to tell you.”

“At this hour? Really?”

I jerked my hand free and pushed the loose strands of hair behind my ear. As the youngest person at the repair shop, leaving without a good reason could cost me my job.

“Why not tell me to quit outright?”

“That works too.”

“Stop with the lousy jokes.”

I tied a scarf over my head and pulled on my gloves. Jurgen slipped on his coat as well, preparing to leave the cafeteria.

“If you marry me, you’ll have to quit anyway.”

I was exasperated by his tedious ramblings, so I quickly left the cafeteria. Light snowflakes drifted through the air like dust.

Jürgen followed me outside, tucked his cashmere scarf into his coat and continued to ramble on about marriage.

“It wouldn’t be such a bad choice. Living in an old apartment with a shared bathroom—it’s miserable, isn’t it?”

“Oh? So you must live in some grand place yourself, Mr. Jurgen?”

“There is a castle back in my homeland.”

“I thought you were a communist. Even if you went back, you’d hardly be welcomed. Don’t put on airs…”

Jürgen was usually quiet. If I said ten words, he might manage one in reply. Seeing him tell such dull jokes now felt strange and out of character.

“Ugh… it’s freezing.”

The wind was merciless. Snow fell steadily and heavily from the grey, bleak sky, coating the top of my head. No matter how tightly I fastened my coat, the cold seeped through and turned the tip of my nose red. I hurried towards the repair shop.

I longed to step inside, but my craving for a cigarette was overwhelming. In the end, I couldn’t resist. Instead of going in, I crouched at the back of the building and took out a Belomorkanal cigarette. It was a cheap ration cigarette, but nothing matched it for sheer harshness. I’d tried expensive, imported cigarettes that had been smuggled in from the West before, but I’d been bitterly disappointed by how bland they were.

Holding the cigarette in my mouth, I adjusted my coat so that it wouldn’t drag on the ground, then took a matchbox out of my pocket.

The wind was so strong that I couldn’t light the match. Shielding the flame with one hand, I managed to light it and quickly lit my cigarette. Taking a sharp drag, I felt my nerves begin to settle.

Alcohol and tobacco had always been a source of comfort for me, as they were for many people in Elkinsky. In a reality that one couldn’t endure sober, vodka and cigarettes at least let us forget for a while.

“Why not take opium while you’re at it?”

Jurgen’s scornful gaze, as though looking at a junkie, made me draw in another deep breath of smoke.

“Mm, opium…?”

Wasn’t religion once referred to as the ‘opium of the people’?

I held the cigarette in my left hand and pulled the necklace I kept hidden from beneath my clothes with my right hand. It was an old cross that I had inherited from my mother. I clamped it between my teeth and teased him softly.

“Like this? Is this how I should smoke it?”

“…Ah.”

I wiped the spit-covered cross against my sleeve and tucked it back under my worn work shirt. When the metal touched my bare skin, goosebumps rose on my arms.

Except when bathing, I always wore the cross. But I had never truly believed. My faith was nothing more than a childhood habit. Had the government persecuted me for it, it wouldn’t have been a devotion I would have risked my life to maintain. Nevertheless, it lingered within me as a kind of nostalgia.

“Would you like one, too, Jurgen?”

“I dislike cigarettes.”

I already knew that about him, but I pretended to be ignorant and held out a spare anyway.

Unlike Jürgen, I didn’t wear a wristwatch. I could only guess at the time. Probably around 12:25. My break ended at 12:30 – I needed to get back.

“I should go.”

I stubbed out my half-smoked cigarette, put it in my pocket and stood up straight. The half-melted snow was slippery and I almost fell in an undignified heap. Somehow, though, I regained my balance and saved myself from embarrassment.

I took a few more steps, only for my leather boots to sink into the slush up to my ankles. When I pulled free, the snow clung and slid down like dripping wax. The boots I’d polished that morning were ruined. I had a bad feeling about today, and irritation prickled sharply.

“Your brothers.”

I froze at Jürgen’s words. I had been walking back towards the shop when he mentioned my brothers and stopped me in my tracks. Again. He was dragging them into this again.

How did he even know about my family? I had never told anyone. I had kept it hidden, locked tight inside. The only person who knew was Archum. Had he told him?

I narrowed my eyes at Jurgen. He stood there, rigid and desolate, like some ancient spire.

“Your eldest brother is already dead.”

The moment those unexpected words left his lips, it felt as if a blow had struck me square in the chest.

“Jurgen… what on earth are you talking about?”

Reeling, I staggered a few steps closer to him.

“The other two are still alive.”

“Who told you that?”

“Are you finally willing to talk to me now?”

My hands trembled so violently that even striking a match felt like an ordeal. Somehow, I managed to light it and bring the flame to my cigarette. I drew in a deep breath, exhaling slowly through my nose, but no amount of smoke could calm the frantic pounding of my heart. It was as though a heavy darkness was creeping over my vision.

Jurgen was just a foreign student—there was no way he could possibly know about my brothers in the prison camp. He had to be speaking nonsense, oblivious to the truth.

And yet, as if sensing my doubt, he muttered.

“Even communist partisans turn capitalist when faced with money.”

I stood frozen to the spot, trembling and too stunned to speak or react.

“I have something to show you.”