Why did you have to die, Seryozha? If only you had held on a little longer, I might have been able to save you. Might I have been able to save you if Jürgen had made his offer sooner?

I buried my face in my hands and began to sob uncontrollably. Yesterday, everything felt unreal, but today, I could feel the weight of my brother’s death bearing down on me.

Poor Seryozha… Even in this bitter cold, he must have been forced to work outside.

I had never visited him in the camp. He loved me so much, and yet I hadn’t gone to see him once. This thought filled me with shame.

The truth was, I’d been too afraid. The camp terrified me. I knew that if I had seen my brother wasting away under forced labour, it would have destroyed me.

In truth, I had already given Jürgen my answer. I couldn’t ignore my brothers who were trapped there. However unsettling Jürgen was, I had no choice but to accept his offer of help.

Nearly an hour later, we finally arrived at the repair shop.

“I’ll come pick you up at the end of your shift.”

“That’s not—”

“I’ll be waiting.”

I wiped my tears away with my sleeve and nodded. As I started to stand up, he took my hand.

He took the ring box out of his coat pocket and opened it. Inside was the same diamond ring that I had seen the day before. Without asking my permission, he took my hand and slid the ring onto my finger.

Although it fit perfectly, it felt like a shackle.

“Go on.”

I scrambled out of his car and strode quickly toward the repair shop.

‘What do I do? What do I do? What do I do?’

Was I truly going to marry him like this?

The moment I stepped inside, my legs gave out beneath me, and I sank to the floor.

“Are you all right, Svyeta? Still not feeling well?”

Sensing my presence, Mr. Smirnov crawled out from under a car to ask. I shook my head.

I took off the ring Jürgen had forced onto my finger and hid it deep in my coat pocket. Then I put on my overalls and quietly started work. Due to the heavy snowstorm, there had been an unusual number of accidents, meaning there was more work than usual.

Nevertheless, quitting time was always six o’clock — one of the few benefits of the Elkinsky Government.

But I couldn’t bring myself to leave. I was certain that Jürgen would be waiting for me outside, and this thought paralysed me. My colleagues had gone home, the shutters were down, and the shop was dark.

Alone in the gloom, I crouched against the wall and drank vodka straight from the bottle.

I couldn’t summon the courage to face him.

Taking a cigarette from my pocket, I lit it, inhaling the thick smoke and exhaling in the vain hope of clearing my head. But his face wouldn’t leave me.

In some ways, I already knew. Jürgen despised me. Perhaps it was more than dislike; perhaps it was outright hatred.

“Who knows. Perhaps out of hatred.”

From the beginning, I had found him disturbingly unpleasant. Now I understood—it was because he hated me.

“What are you doing here alone?”

Jürgen entered the darkened shop. I looked up at him, still holding a cigarette between my fingers.

“I told you I’d come at the end of your shift. Doesn’t it bother you, keeping someone waiting?”

He bent toward me, plucked the cigarette from my hand, and tossed it aside.

“Quit.”

“You’re going to interfere with that too?”

Grinding the still-burning stub under his heel, he replied,

“Yes. I’d hate to believe the stench has already seeped that deep into you.”

I froze in shock. Could he really have used such crude and vulgar language? He had always been so polite before. Hearing him cross the line like that really shook me up.

Yes, I had always found him strange. He had always made me feel uneasy. But even so, I had never thought that things were bad between us. Perhaps we weren’t close enough to call it a friendship, but we had certainly got to know each other well after three years of countless conversations.

And yet… that? That insult?

I bit down hard on my lower lip, then met his eyes coldly as I threw his words back at him.

“Still, there are plenty of men lining up just to get between my legs.”

✹✹ ✹✹ ✹✹ ✹✹ ✹✹

The road was still congested. Jürgen and I weren’t speaking anymore. Exhaustion overcame me as I stared blankly out of the window. Before long, I fell asleep.

When I opened my eyes again, I saw that a dense forest stretched out beyond the window. Startled, I turned to look at Jürgen.

“Where are we?”

“On the way home.”

“…You mean your home?”

Jürgen drove on in silence, his saloon car winding its way through the coniferous forest. Eventually, we arrived at a single-storey stone house.

I had always assumed that, like the rest of us, he lived in a flat. But no — Jürgen lived in a detached house, and a fine one at that.

The Elkinsky government had long since converted lavish private residences into state offices. Most citizens were confined to cramped apartments, while only senior government officials were permitted to live in such houses.

So how could Jürgen, a foreign student, possibly be living here?

“Get out.”

He opened the passenger door for me. I stumbled after him, unsteady on my feet. When he unlocked the front door, a narrow hallway came into view.

Following him down the dark corridor, I emerged into a wide hall. But it was barren—not even a small sofa in sight.

It was far too large for a man living alone. And yet, for all that space, not a single piece of furniture filled it.

At one door, Jurgen pulled a key from his pocket and turned the lock with a sharp click.

This must be his room.

The interior was strikingly spacious. People with houses this size usually have separate study and bedroom spaces, but Jürgen’s room combined the two.

Unlike the peeling paint in the hallway, his room was immaculate to the point of being unnerving. The walls were white, the furniture gleamed and the marble floor was bare. The bedding was laid out without a single crease.

Every detail betrayed a compulsive precision.

One wall was entirely taken up by shelves crammed with books. Beside them stood a wide walnut desk that was perfectly arranged. On the desk were a silver pen holder, a globe and a neatly stacked file tray — all of which were expensive and immaculate.

The room could not be described as well-decorated. However, its extreme neatness created a sense of balance, like the even arms of a set of scales. And yet, despite this perfection, I felt deeply uneasy.

Jürgen looked as though he belonged in an interrogation room. His colourless room felt more like a prison office than a home, and I turned pale with cold dread.

“From now on, you’ll be staying here.”

He took my coat from me, his tone cool and final.

“You mean you want me to live with you?”

“Can’t you?”

He opened the wardrobe and hung my coat inside it. Like the rest of his bedroom, the wardrobe was arranged with obsessive precision — every item was aligned perfectly.

“This is too sudden. You haven’t even given me time to pack—”

“I’ll have someone move your things.”

“Wait, Jurgen.”

Pressing a hand to my forehead, I let out a weary sigh.

“Let me ask you once more. Do you really mean to marry me? Can you truly promise to free my brothers from the camp?”

“I promise.”

I faltered. I should have answered ‘yes’ immediately, but it was as if a weight had been tied to my tongue. No words would come.

I looked up at him in anxious silence. Despite being much shorter than him, he didn’t nod. Suddenly, his pale grey eyes darkened, his pupils swelling until they seemed to swallow the light.

“So, Svyeta—go wash up.”

The word ‘s*x’ — so foreign, so stark — flashed across my mind and I swallowed hard. Despite having known him for three years, I could never picture us lying n*ked together in his bed.

I had always thought of Jürgen as an ascetic man. He came to the cafeteria every day at noon, but I had never once seen him eat. He would simply sit there silently and disappear as soon as lunch ended.

“Scrub yourself clean. The corners of your mouth, between your toes, and underneath too. I can’t stand filth or foul odours.”

I stumbled back, horrified, but he only laughed, seemingly amused.

“Ah. The bathroom’s over there.”

He nodded towards it, and when I followed his gaze, I saw it: an enormous door designed to open on both sides, leading into a vast bathroom.