We wait together, listening for the elevator. Once we hear the footsteps, my father opens the door, revealing Tomas in a black crewneck sweater under a leather jacket, jeans, and sneakers.
He looks my father straight in the eye. “Hallo, sir. Thank you for letting me up.” I can tell he’s been in his home country with his accent noticeably stronger now.
Oh fuck me. The Wall…just as broad and strong as ever, maybe even more now since I haven’t seen it for so long.
“It wasn’t me. You can thank my daughter for that,” he snaps in return.
Finally, Tomas turns his eyes to me, soft and apologetic.
“Luciana, can I speak with you? Please.”
I give him a hard stare, letting him stew. It’s the very least I can do without resorting to physical violence. But at the same time, I want to jump into his arms and kiss him until I can’t breathe. The sight of him sends electrical pulses to every nerve ending in my body, my heart pumping faster from the raw need to have him hold me.
But being me, I put up a wall as a defense mechanism to let him know it won’t be that easy to get back into my good graces.
Be strong, Gibbons. Don’t look at The Wall. Look at his eyes. His brilliant blue eyes.
Oh hell, I’m so fucked.
“Fine,” I snap at him. “But you’ve only got two minutes. Downton Abbey is on and I’m missing it.”
“Yes, of course,” he replies sheepishly.
I lead him back to my room, my father calling out, “Luciana, we’ll be here if you need anything.”
I turn back and give him a simple nod. “It’s okay, Daddy. I’ve got this.”
I step into the doorway and take in the view of Tomas sitting in my desk chair. I shut the door behind me and sink onto my bed.
Sitting up straight? Check.
Hands clenched together in my lap? Check.
Eyes directly on him? Check.
Ready to give him hell? Oh fuck yes!
I take a deep breath. “You have exactly two minutes.”
He clears his throat. “I used to be married.”
My mouth drops, eyes widen like saucers, and my heart drops into my stomach from the shock.
What in the holy fuck…
Is he joking?
I dig my nails into my palms and close my eyes firmly, biting my lower lip to keep myself from crying.
I don’t understand. Any of this.
Finally, I open them again, release my hands, and exhale deeply. “Go on. Please.”
“Her name is Petra. She was my childhood love. We got married when we were eighteen. We were very happy. I was helping my father on our family farm, she was an assistant teacher in the school where my mother works. More than anything, we wanted to have children.”
I watch as he looks up to the ceiling and shuts his eyes. Then he reverts his gaze back to me.
“A year after we were married, Petra got pregnant. We were so excited.”
I’m stunned with surprise. I can’t move. I can’t breathe.
Oh God, he has a kid? I can’t…I don’t…this is just too fucking much.
Breathe. Just breathe and let him continue.
He pauses. “It was a girl. Oksana. She was so beautiful. Green eyes like her mother. My blonde hair.”
Tomas runs his hands over his face. His voice turns rough. “A week after she was born, she stopped breathing during the night.”
Oh, no…oh, Tomas…baby…
He shakes his head over and over, holding up his hands helplessly. I can hear his voice choking up. “No explanation, nothing. There was nothing wrong with Petra when she was pregnant. No signs that anything was wrong with Oksana. After she died, the police investigated us for everything including child abuse. It was horrible. It broke us. Petra and me. We couldn’t handle it. So we divorced and I left everything. My parents, my country. I just needed to escape.”
I clamp a hand over my mouth, pivoting my head to the side. I can’t look at him.
Oh my God. I am the biggest bitch on the planet.
I let the tears fall freely now, wiping them from my face. I still can’t look at him. “I am so sorry, Tomas,” I whisper.
He nods in acknowledgment. “After I left, I wandered. Found work where I could. I picked grapes on a vineyard in New Zealand. Learned how to shear sheep in Australia. I travelled the world running away from my past. Then, when I lived in Kiev, I catalogued CDs and albums at a radio station that played classical music. I liked it there since the Czech and Ukrainian languages are both Slavic in nature, and I knew the Cyrillic alphabet already from learning Russian in school, so I got along fine.”
I leaned in closer to him. I didn’t know where this was going, but he captured my attention, and I wanted to hear more.
“One day, this older woman came in to be interviewed. She was a famous soprano back in the thirties and forties. Katerina reminded me of my grandmother, and she said I looked like her son who died from cancer. She took me under her wing. I lived in her house rent free and in return, I’d run errands for her, do some repair work around the house. Then one morning, she was playing a Puccini record and I started humming along with it when I was changing a lightbulb in her chandelier. She made me sing something, and I amazed myself when I heard how powerful my voice was. Then she had some professors from Kiev Conservatory train me, and when they thought I was ready, they helped me with my application to the Gotham Conservatory, and that’s how I ended up in New York City.”
I lean back on the bed, a bit calmer, but still anxious to hear what was next. “Thank you for sharing that with me. I appreciate it. But why did you leave me like that without any explanation?”
Tomas pulls my desk chair closer to me. “The reason I went back home was to give myself closure with Petra and Oksana. It’s been so many years and I just felt before I could move on with you, I needed to say good-bye to my past.”
I clench my fists, fighting the desire to be mad after what he’s just said to me. “I understand that. I just wish you’d told me all this. I didn’t know what to think. You never called or emailed. I was a fucking wreck.”
Suddenly, Tomas shoots up from the chair and falls to the floor at my knees, taking my hands in his. “Luciana, I am so sorry. I just needed to keep you separate from everything that was going on with me back home. I put you away in a box and kept you safe. I know that probably sounds ridiculous…”
I shake my head. “It doesn’t. In a weird way, it kind of makes sense. But would an email have killed you?”
He smiles briefly at my admonition. “I know. Please tell me you forgive me, because I want to be with you for the rest of my life.”
I pull my hands from his so I can caress his face, running my fingertips softly over his eyebrows, his aquiline nose, his chiseled lips. He holds his head up to me in offering, allowing me to continue with my ministrations, reveling in the feel of my hands on him again after so long.
I can’t believe he’d been carrying all this pain. Tears form again in the corners of my eyes.
This man…and all I did, berating him for keeping things from me. I wouldn’t know where to start imagining what he’s been through.
And I was so selfish, thinking it was about me, my weight, the way I talk.
It’s not always about you, idiot.
He is so lovely. He is my home, and he’s come back to me.
I smile back at him so widely, his face now mirroring mine.