Tatiana and Alexander: A Novel(89)

"Why do you do that?" he asked. "Why can't you just tell me to stop being an idiot? Why can't you raise your voice, tell me to shut the hell up?"

"Is that what you want, Alexander?" she said. "You want me to fight with you? We have a handful of days left and you want me to fight with you?"

He hugged her. "Not a handful. Eight. Now tell me what can I do for you? What do you want me to do? You want me to carry something for you? Can I chop wood? Make another fire? Chase you through the woods? Can I carry you?"

He heard her say something in a broken, muted whisper that didn't sound like happiness or even love. It sounded like a gasp torn from a lifetime of grief.

Alexander couldn't respond, couldn't look at her. He pretended he hadn't heard, patted her back, kissed her neck.

Her voice a little happier and thickening, Tatiana answered. "You can do anything you want to me. As you know--I like it all."

Alexander knew Tatiana loved to be carried by him. She loved to be lifted in his arms, or slung over his back, or carried like a backpack. He knew she was remembering Luga every time he picked her up...Luga, when all of Lazarevo was still ahead of them.

When Leningrad was still ahead of them. When Dasha was alive. When she had a family. Could Alexander love her enough for all of them who once sat around her, drinking their tea, smoking, teasing her, neglecting her, loving her? Could he give her enough?

Yes, he could. For the next few days.

And then what?

Alexander brought her inside and laid her on their bed. The stove was still warm from morning.

"I know what you like..." Alexander whispered. Lifting her dress, he exposed her hips and opened her legs. He loved looking at her as he alternately caressed her and put his mouth on her. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

He heard her moaning for him. He stopped touching her for a moment and listened. "Shura...Shura...come up, please, come up."

He knew what she wanted. And he wanted to give it to her. "What do you want, Tatia?"

"Come on, Shura," she whispered. "Come on..."

Alexander went back to touching her. "Look at you," he whispered, lowering his face to her.

He had to stop. He could tell she was moments away. "Not yet, Tania. Who is my good girl..." he whispered. "Who is my beautiful good girl..."

In frustration, she tried to move away. He held her in place, while his careful tender fingers stroked her.

Tatiana was nearly crying from tension. Alexander wanted to put his mouth on her again--but he waited.

She clutched at him, moaning for him to climb to her. He resisted.

Finally she breathed out the words he longed to hear.

Groaning from the excitement of hearing her say it, Alexander whispered, "All right, Tatiasha." He barely had time to enter her, before he was flooded with her relief. Eight days left, Alexander's body cried, his tingling throat cried.

Alexander was going sick out of his mind. He was on a suicide mission--he wanted Tatiana to stop loving him before he left. He wanted her to be glad he was leaving.

What he wanted was tomake her glad he was leaving, not for her to be glad out of her own accord. He wanted to be the one to facilitate this change in her.

Her vulnerability ate at him so much he couldn't look her in the face.

What was happening to him? It was so hateful.

"Come on, lift me up," Tatiana said another night. "Lift me, take me standing like I know you love, take me however you want, but please don't be upset with me, Shura."

He turned from her.

"Honey," she whispered. "Husband...Alexander..."

He couldn't look at her.

Tatiana stood in front of him, topless, nipples erect, her loving face, her wet lips. They forgot the tea, forgot his cigarettes, forgot his anger, forgot it all, all they did, pleading, moaning through the crescent night, was forget it all.

As always. There was nothing else when they were in their cabin. Just Tania and Shura, and they adored Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

each other, and their hearts were breaking, as they implored the God who made them, let us have this for another wordless moment, let us haveus for a moment longer. Alexander took her against the wall and kneeling on the hard floor and on the high counter he had made, and on their bed, he took her gently and roughly and slowly and quickly, but in the end his heart was still breaking.

There was a desperation to their lovemaking--a brutal relinquishing of happiness that was as gradual and inevitable as the low tide. Whereas before Tania and Shura were starving for each other and made love to wake the gods to proclaim the eternalWe to life, now they made love to stave off death, to stem the flood of destruction that awaited them upon his leaving--itself as inevitable as sunset.

Their feverish arrhythmic, broken, violent coupling was a cry to the gods, to any gods who would listen. Pleasure was mixed with a propellant ache; the greater the pleasure, the emptier the heart was after.

Five days left.

The following rainy night on the floor by the fire, he once again stopped himself from release. Alexander thought if he stopped himself, maybe he could stop time.

How long can he keep himself? How long can he watch her, how much longer can he hear her voice, smell her breath when she moaned and when she whispered, like now, what was she saying...I can't even hear her, I want to finish, but no, I can't..."What, Tania?"