Ариана Баженова – Intertwined Fates (страница 21)
– Thank you for your support! – I only whispered, unable to raise my eyes to him. «You’ll succeed, you’re responsible,» he whispered back.
At that moment, it seemed like bright flowers had blossomed in my soul under the hot sunlight – despite the frost outside. Leo supported me in front of everyone, like a true knight. I remembered all our cozy get-togethers in his office and video calls to discuss the project from home, the warm touch of hands during the excursion.
The meeting ended, and everyone left the room. I lingered a little, collecting sheets of paper with notes, and went to the door. Leo remained in the office when everyone left, and waited for me near the exit. I looked up at him and saw how he looked back – tenderly and patronizingly. He was happy to stand up for me and proud of himself.
«Leo, thank you again,» I barely audibly said, trying not to betray my traitorously ragged breathing. We walked down the narrow white corridor as slowly as possible, discussing various little things. As we were going down the marble stairs, I accidentally tripped, and the sheets of paper I had carefully collected fell out of my hands with a loud rustle. Leo turned around in a flash:
– What are you doing! You scared me! I was already tensed, ready to catch you! – he blurted out loudly, so that the employees standing by the stairs heard us, and bent down, collecting the papers.
– Thank you. Everything is falling out of my hands, I need to sleep more, – I smiled embarrassedly, taking the stack of sheets from his hands.
– Take care of yourself, – he said briefly, and we went our separate ways.
And only at the end of the day, calmly finishing work on another report, inspired by our warm conversation today, I felt the first cracks appear in my heart.
A colleague from the neighboring department ran into the office, loudly exclaiming:
– And I told you that Lev’s wife, Christina, is pregnant! Look, she’s going on maternity leave in April!
I glanced at her briefly and immediately looked away, feeling how all the weight of the world was gathering in them. A deep furrow ran between my eyebrows. I knew that they had been unable to have a child for so many years – gods, why now? When everything was just starting to get better?
The world before my eyes swam, shattered into pieces, like a kaleidoscope, and I turned away to the window, absentmindedly looking at my gloomy reflection. It was as if someone had struck me with a sharp point under the solar plexus, and I almost doubled over, greedily gasping for air. Now I didn’t even try to hide my grief from my colleagues, which shone through in my every movement and gathered like heaviness around my eyes. Just a little more – and streams of tears will flow from them.
I need to hold back, not to burst into tears right here, wait until I get home…
Pregnant? But how can that be? After all, we are already in love, and the ice between us has broken – it can’t be stopped.
I didn’t know that in one day you can experience so much delight and so much pain.
***
Tuesday. This weekend we were supposed to present our psychology project. I was nervous, because I felt a great responsibility, especially at my first training in my life. So today after lunch we scheduled a training session with Leo in the conference hall.
I knew that psychology and emotions are his element, when he takes off the protective masks of an intellectual, and a conversation about them will be lively, interesting and sincere, unlike some report on abstract topics. It will be a real hour and a half of rest in the middle of a hard working day, a breath of fresh air.
If only I could forget this pain from the news of his wife’s pregnancy, which in an instant darkened all hopes. An immoral pain, to which I, in fact, had no right. And yet, it was destroying from the inside.
I wanted to go up to Leo, shake him by the shoulders and throw out all my despair in a scream: «How could you?!»
But what would he answer me? How could he do what? Have a child with his legal wife after we worked on a work project together and when he stood up for me at a meeting? Seriously?
I don’t even have the right to show the pain that’s persistently twisting my insides.
I have to survive another day, step by step. I threw a small thermos I had long forgotten into my bag: today I was going to secretly pour coffee in our office, take a couple of paper cups and take it all to another building, where our rehearsal would take place.
Through these difficulties, I was going to treat and please Leo, and also create a working mood for myself, since the caffeine had long been absorbed into my blood and kept me afloat.
Before leaving, I looked in the mirror – I chose a strict black shirt dress, cinched at the thin waist with a belt with a snake print. Clear forms and nothing superfluous. Nodding to my reflection, I left the house, once again making the long walk to work across half the city.
Running into the conference room five minutes before the appointed time, I set the cups on the table, poured coffee. I connected the presentation, into which so much effort and time had been invested. Leo slowly entered the office, threw his jacket on the sofa and sat down next to me at the table.
«Here. Black, no sugar,» I confidently pushed the cup towards him.
«Thank you, that’s how I drink it. As if you’ve known me for ages,» he smiled.
«Start your story,» I nodded warmly to him, «your block opens our module.»
Leo paused slightly, then began telling me the introductory part. I followed his story with interest. It was obvious that he was making up a speech on the fly. This made me smile.
He caught my sly glance and gave in – he began to openly discuss with me how best to structure the presentation in this or that part. His speech was full of vivid examples and jokes on the verge of decency, so that I laughed loudly and heartily, losing control of myself, and tears appeared in the corners of my eyes.
– Stop laughing at me! Now I’ll look at you, how you’re going to tell it! – he exclaimed with feigned indignation.
I slid a tender glance at him and, after hesitating for a second, reached out and brushed a thread off his sweater. Then I turned away from the screen, leaned back in the chair, stretching out my leg in a high boot. My hand lay on the armrest, accidentally exposing a deep, bright scratch recently earned through carelessness.
– What’s wrong with your hand? – he exclaimed worriedly, as soon as I turned my hand over. I turned around and saw that he reflexively extended his hand to mine, holding it back a millimeter so as not to touch my skin.
– Oh, nonsense, cooking. Domestic injuries, – I smiled and began to tell my block, picking up his speech.
Luckily, we fit in exactly an hour and a half, as we originally planned.
– Forgive me for laughing at the beginning. I was laughing not at you, but with you. You charge me with a good mood, positive emotions of a high degree of intensity, – I made a reference to the terms from our lecture and smiled.
He narrowed his eyes, pretending to look at me critically:
– Okay, I’m not one of those who take offense, – he finally stopped pretending and winked.
I beamed, laughed and began to pack my things. Despite the recent injury, which I thought was incompatible with life, my soul was now filled with lightness, I wanted to soar, dance and even sing – the latter happened extremely rarely with my reserved nature. I did not want to work.
I went outside, turned my face to the cold winter sun and listened to the crunch of freshly fallen snow under my heels.
The snowflakes shimmered with mother-of-pearl and sparkled – it was the icy calm and peace of nature. They lay and shimmered in the same way hundreds of thousands of years ago, before the arrival of man, and now they calmly cover the asphalt, the roof of the business center and the barbed wire on the fence.
«It was so nice when we just lived in the wild and were a part of it,» flashed through my mind, and I shook my head, driving away the strange thoughts that again referred to the past, in which I could not live. Or could I? I often caught myself comparing our time with past eras and even analyzing what had become better and what had become worse.
«What past lives, I can’t even figure out this one!» I grinned with annoyance.
It seems that today I failed to fit into the sharp turn of fate. Four months ago, it made a sharp turn, bringing Leo and me together with the hands of Eva Schwein. The ice between us began to melt quite recently, but I was not completely sure of this either – Leo looked so cautious that he hid in his shell at the first opportunity.
Maybe these premonitions and visions are wrong? Since nothing has happened between us in four months, it is stupid to hope for anything further. When we present the project, there will be nothing else connecting us. No matter how hard it is, it is better to let go of something that has not yet really begun.
If this is fate, then he will come back.
Chapter 4. Two of Cups, King and Queen