Between Belief and Loyalty

Red Bear Retreat was quiet.

Rain tapped softly against the windows. The air smelled faintly of pine and damp soil. Arina sat at the small desk in her room, hands wrapped around a cup of instant coffee that had gone lukewarm. The furniture was modest, sturdy. It was simple. Predictable. Safe.

Just what she wanted.

A donated copy of Turganev’s Fathers and Sons lay open on the bed, unread. Her thoughts wandered.

She checked her messages. Her inbox. Any place he might’ve left something.

But he had left.

One day, while she was away, her father, Viktor, had gone out and never came back. No note. No warning. No word. Just… gone. It wasn’t the first time he’d vanished on a drinking spree, but this time, he stayed gone.

In his absence, there were no insults, no threats, no bruises to hide away at work. The air in her life felt… cleaner. Quieter. And yet, some part of her still ached. Arina was not naive, but she was loving. And even a cruel absence could bruise in a way a hand could not.

She was so grateful that Alexei and Ivan had allowed her to start using Jabber. As she scrolled through the messages, she smiled and brushed some of her dark hair behind her ear.

Messages from Anna Daniels, Ami Troy, and others made her smile despite the heaviness in her chest. Each one reminded her that she could still reach people in ways Ivan and Alexei never could. They marched through the world with boots and banners. Arina, by contrast, reached out with words.

She stared at the screen and her fingers hovered. And then, she typed.

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@krasnayadevushka To those with kind fathers: treasure them. To those without: hold fast to those who walk beside you.

Delete.

She tried again.

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@krasnayadevushka I did not know it would feel like this.

Delete.

The cursor blinked at her.

She tried again.

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@krasnayadevushka @russianbear Happy Father’s Day, Starshy Praporshchik. You walk slowly when I fall behind. You listen, in your own way, even when you don’t agree. You accept me as myself. You have power but never make me feel small. I know what you are. I’ve seen what you do. But I choose to believe you are more than that. Thank you for believing in me.

Her finger hovered above the ‘enter’ key. That small space between skin and plastic stretched out like an eternity.

She didn’t send it. Instead, she sat with it for a while and then closed the lid of her laptop.

Arina rose, walked to the bookshelf, and placed the unopened copy of Fathers and Sons back in its place. She didn’t need to read it. She knew how it ended.

Some fathers leave. Some are taken. Others… are remade.

She stared out the window.

She let the silence settle like rain.