Having no idea how to answer that, Nikolai remained quiet and let her finish.
“I think that’s a nice change of pace for him, because he’s been embarrassed by his living situations for so long, feeling like there was something he had to hide. And now he can be proud of where he’s living and who he’s living with. In many ways, it’s a dream come true for him.”
None of these emotional truths ever would have occurred to Nikolai, but he said, “Yes, if I were Pavel, I would think so, too.”
“And how about you? How do you think it’s going with Pavel?”
“How do I think it’s going with Pavel,” he repeated, not quite understanding her meaning.
She talked slowly, like the ESL tutor he’d been given when he first joined the Polar. “Do you like how your relationship is progressing?”
He thought about this question. “It progresses fine,” he answered. “Pavel is clean and fed and back in school. As you said, now he is very proud of his home and his family.”
“Yes, but…” She reset, putting on another one of her bright smiles. “I’m happy that you came home early. Really happy. And I want to apologize for not giving you positive feedback on that action earlier. I wish I had responded better, I was just so surprised to see you come in. And I wish I had known you were coming home earlier so we could’ve all eaten dinner together.”
Nikolai had to work hard to keep his face expressionless, to not let her see the pathetic soar of emotions her words sent off inside his chest. She was happy he’d come home early. Her vision about how she should have responded to it was nearly the same as his wish. Them all eating dinner together, like the happy families he’d only ever visited, but had never been a part of. The knowledge that she, too, wanted this, made the hot ache inside his chest gentle into a quiet warmth.
“It is okay,” he told her. “You did not know I would come home early. I should have told you.”
She leaned forward. “Is coming home earlier something you might be able to pull off more often?”
His heart nearly stopped beating. She wanted him to come home earlier more often.
“Da,” he answered, wondering if he was in the middle of some kind of dream, if he shouldn’t pinch himself to make sure. “I can come home earlier. Not on game nights or when I am on road with team, but other times, I can come home earlier and work here.”
Her face lit up. “Really? Because if that’s the case, maybe we could push dinner back an hour and you know… establish a family dinner routine with Pavel?”
A family routine. It was as if she knew his secret wants without having been told. And this time he couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he answered, “Da, Da. That is good idea. I will come home early and eat family dinner.”
She clapped her hands together, her genuine smile making him feel like he’d just won a trophy. She was beautiful when she was angry, but in that moment, he realized she was even more so when she was pleased.
“Okay, cool! Then I think we have a potentially good dynamic on our hands.”
He had no idea what she meant by that, but he agreed, “Cool.”
“And in the interest of your family dynamic, could you explain a little more about what’s made you so anti-birthday party?” she asked
He froze, not liking that the subject had come back around to his past. Not liking it at all.
“It is silly custom.”
“Yes, birthdays along with love,” she said, her tone dry. “And you don’t think that’s a hard stance to take on things? Maybe something you might want to reconsider now that you’ve been given custody of an eight-year-old?”
A bad feeling began to boil inside his chest. “You are counselor,” he realized out loud.
“Not my official title,” she answered carefully. “But yes, it’s one of the roles I serve at Ruth’s House.”
He gave her a heavy frown. “I did not ask for your counseling, but you have come here to shrink my head. Like I am hurt woman. Like I am child, same as Pavel.”
She went still in a way that let him know that this was exactly why she’d come in. Not because she’d been truly happy about him coming home from work, but because she’d had an agenda.
“I…” she stopped, took a deep breath, before quietly saying, “I don’t want to argue with you.”
“No, you want to be counselor to me,” Nikolai said, growing angrier by the second. “You think I am—how you say—traumatized. Like Pavel. Damaged.”
She shook her head, her lips setting in a defensive line. “Those aren’t the terms I would use for you or Pavel, but do I think you should maybe talk to somebody? Yes. You literally drove straight from the police station to get Pavel, but now you’re barely interacting with him. And the few interactions you’ve had with him always seem to end up with him feeling ashamed. Like when you told him men don’t cry, and tonight with the birthday party stuff.”
“How did I shame him?” Nikolai demanded. “All I said was—”
“All you said was that birthday parties are a silly custom.”
“They are silly customs,” Nikolai said, his voice full of icy derision. “You Americans and your sentimental, unnecessary customs.”
“Pavel’s American, too,” she reminded him. “And his birthday is in three months. Three months prior is around the time when regular kids start asking about what’s going to happen for their birthday.”
Nikolai hadn’t realized that and his surprise must have shown, because Samantha shook her head at him like she was dealing with the world’s biggest idiot.
“Pavel never asks for anything. Ever,” she said quietly. “But maybe he’s starting to trust that he’s in a stable environment now, because he was obviously using Mateo’s party to introduce the idea of having a birthday party of his own tonight. Until you made him feel like it was shameful for him, a little boy, to ask for something nearly every other little boy his age in America is getting. So yeah, fine, go ahead and think birthday parties are silly. But I don’t care what you say, Pavel deserves a party. Deserves it more than most after what he’s been through. And if you don’t throw him one, I will.”
That proclaimed, she stood up and slammed out of his office. Leaving Nikolai behind to feel like the opposite of a man on the verge of establishing a family. Despite the addition of a child to his household, and the eminent arrival of another one inside Samantha’s womb, that dream seemed even farther away than it had before Pavel and Samantha had come to live with him.