59
CORA
“Maybe I should sit at the head.” I stand back and try to imagine the place setting there. “Do you think it would be too formal to have the whole length of the table between us?”
Niles has endured an hour of my fidgeting and fussing already, so the poor man just shrugs. “Whatever you decide will be fine.”
That’s nice and all, but I’ve never doubted my own decisions more than I have today. Gold or silver cutlery? Should I wear a pantsuit or a dress? Full face of makeup or keep it minimal?
“Your dad doesn’t care about any of that,” Ivan told me this morning before he climbed out of bed. “He is just excited to sit down and get to know you. So let him see you. Be yourself.”
The trouble is, I don’t know who I am.
A month ago, I was a waitress at a cheap Mexican restaurant. I lived in a dinky one-bedroom apartment and spent my limited free time watching reality television until my eyes bled.
Then I was a target, bait, Ivan Pushkin’s fake fiancée, Mikhail Sokolov’s forced fiancée (again), and now… Now, I’m building a life with the man I love. I know how to move forward with Ivan. I know how to leave Alexander and my mother and Mikhail and Francia behind me.
What I don’t have a single fucking clue how to do is merge my past and my present.
My dad was firmly in my past. Where does he fit in now?
My thoughts are spiraling out of control when Niles lays his hands on my shoulders. “If you want my honest opinion, Mrs. Cora, I think you two should take your dinner at the kitchen island.”
“What?” I spin away from the table and face Niles. He’s only a foot away, which is the closest we’ve ever been. He’s always struck me as a rich, formal grandpa. You know he loves you, but he isn’t going to say it. “But you spent so much time getting the dining room ready!”
“I did. And then you spent twice as much time moving it all around and rearranging.”
I drop my face into my hands. “Ugh. I’m sorry. I’m being the worst. You worked so hard and I undid all of it. You’re better at this than I am. I should have just left it the way you had it. Maybe I can move it back and—”
I’m already halfway turned around when Niles stops me. “No.”
I blink at him, too stunned and frazzled to find any words.
“You need to take a deep breath, dear.”
I inhale and exhale slowly. “I’m freaking out.”
“You are,” he agrees. “Which is why you’re going to stop touching everything and trust that it will all work out. You like to eat at the kitchen island, so do that. Do what you are comfortable with and forget about appearances or what anyone else will think. Be yourself. That is enough.”
I’m obviously teetering on the edge of a nervous breakdown, because Niles’ little speech has me holding back tears.
“Niles, I—just, thank you. I appreciate everything you’ve done today. But therapy sessions are probably outside of your job description. You can go. I’ll figure this all out on my own.”
“Anything Mr. Pushkin asks me to do is within my job description.”
It takes me a second to register what he’s saying. “Hold on—did Ivan ask you to help me?”
“He was worried about you,” he says by way of explanation. “And he told me that if you were spiraling, I was supposed to grab your shoulders and tell you to take a deep breath.”
I’d be mad that Ivan thinks I need to be managed if it hadn’t worked so well.
“Did he tell you to give me a pep talk, too?”
He shakes his head. “No. That was my choice. Did it help?”
I smile. “Yeah. It did. Thank you.”
Sometimes, I forget that along with Ivan, Anya, Lev, and Yasha, I also gained an entire Bratva. A family who will support me and take care of me. Including Niles.
I’m almost at ease when the doorbell rings. As soon as it does, I stiffen and my anxiety ramps right back up to eleven out of ten.
Then Niles lays a hand on my shoulder once more. “You’ll be fine, madam. I’ll answer the door and escort him to the kitchen.”
I’m too nervous to do anything more than nod and head in the direction Niles points. It’s my own dad. No one should be this nervous to see their own dad.
Then again, no one should be forcefully separated from their dad and live on the streets as a teenager. But shit happens.
Dinner is keeping warm in the oven and, as soon as I step into the kitchen and the swirling aroma of roasted meat and potatoes, I know Niles is right. This is the gathering place. Where Ivan and I make coffee in the morning. Where Anya paints her nails while Lev and Ivan talk out on the patio. It’s the heart of the house and I’m comfortable here.
I’m also very glad I swapped out my dress for a pair of dark wash jeans at the last minute.
Be myself. I’m enough.
I repeat those words to myself over and over again, but I’m still standing awkwardly by the island when Niles walks into the kitchen with my dad right behind him.
“I’ll get you both some drinks and then come back in a few minutes for dinner.” Niles ushers him into the room and then tosses me a subtle wink before he disappears.
My dad and I stare at each other for a second before he holds out the bouquet of flowers I didn’t even register he was holding. “These are for you.”
“Oh. Wow. Thank you.” I fumble with them for a second, our hands brushing awkwardly.
I can’t believe I used to hug this man and let him read me stories before bed. He’s a stranger now in every way that matters.
“Niles keeps the vases… somewhere.” I gesture vaguely towards the pantry. “He’ll put these in one later.”
“Before he does, make sure you get this out.” He reaches out and plucks something out of the center of the bouquet. “It’s my poor attempt at an edible arrangement of sorts. I remember you liking those.”
I’m not sure what he’s holding until he flips the white bag over.
“Is that saltwater taffy?”
He smiles. “From that shop we used to go to. Marina’s Confectionery. It’s still open. They moved to a bigger location, but they still make taffy. Isn’t that wild?”
Instantly, crystal-clear memories of hopping down the sidewalk hand-in-hand with my dad flood back to me. Every so often, he’d take me with him to the hardware store. Afterwards, we’d walk down the block and buy a bouquet from the flower stand and a bag of saltwater taffy from Marina’s. I’d ration out the taffy for weeks afterward, eating only one piece or half a piece per day to make it last.
All at once, the anxiety I’ve felt all day shifts to something else. Something raw and painful that I’ve tried to squash down for years.
“Are those okay?” he asks, misunderstanding my sudden tears. “Do you not like them anymore? I should have guessed. It was years and years ago when you used to eat those. I just thought—”
“I love them.” I swipe at my eyes and put on a smile. “I do. I love them so much that I… I haven’t had them since you left. Er, since we left. It was too hard to remember the old days.”
His face pinches with sympathy.
I shake my head. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t going to do this. We were going to have a normal dinner, but I already made it weird. I didn’t mean—”
“You didn’t make it weird. You made it honest.” He blows out a breath. “All of this is hard, Corde—Cora. But we’re here and I’m glad we’re trying to figure it out. No matter how uncomfortable it is.”
“You’re uncomfortable, too?”
“Oh God, yes,” he groans. “Don’t get me wrong—I’m happy to be here. I’m so glad you agreed to have dinner with me. But I guess owning up to your shit is never easy. No matter how much you want to. And I do want to. That’s what I’m here to do. I want to tell you how sorry I am about not reaching out to you sooner. And for being angry.”
Niles hasn’t even come back with drinks yet and we’re already diving into the deep end. It feels nice, though. I’m tired of putting up a facade.
“I was angry, too. I still am a little bit,” I admit. “Not at you, necessarily, but at the situation. And, yeah, partly at you.”
He shrugs. “That’s okay. Hopefully, we’ll spend enough time with each other that we can sort through all of it. Because I don’t want this to be our last dinner. I don’t want to go another ten years without seeing you.”
I lay the candy on the counter and grab his hand, holding it loosely in mine. “Then we won’t.”
He smiles and we sit down at the island.
It becomes clear very quickly that I spent all day worrying about nothing. My dad isn’t here to judge the house or my hosting abilities. He isn’t nitpicking and looking for cracks in my story. He is here to get to know me. To make things right.
He even tries to make things right between me and my mom. “I’m not saying you should forgive her, but I think you should understand her,” he says at one point.
He tells me about her life growing up. The reason she was so good at living on the streets is because she’d done it before. Her entire childhood was in constant flux. No stable house, no guaranteed meals, no one to depend on.
“When you and your mom left, things weren’t great for me at work. We were struggling financially. It wasn’t anything too serious, but even the whisper of problems sent your mom spiraling. I’m not surprised she ended up running to Alexander. All she wanted was stability.”
“Financial stability,” I clarify. “Because that man is not mentally stable. I don’t think Mom is anymore, either.”
I tell him about the last few weeks and what Mom and Alexander tried to do to me. I cry and he looks murderous, but we talk each other down. Then, somehow, we start laughing.
The conversation ebbs and flows effortlessly. We reminisce on good memories, talk about the hard times, and, best of all, talk about absolutely nothing. The weather, television, our favorite music. We talk until I forget why I was nervous in the first place.
When he’s done with the apple turnover Niles made for dessert, my dad sits back and smiles. “You seem really happy here, Cora.”
I can’t help but smile back. “I am happy. I’m… I’m in love.”
I haven’t fully admitted it to Ivan yet. Not in the exact words. But he knows.
“He loves you, too. The way the two of you are with each other… Well, anyone can see how you feel. I’m glad you’ve found someone.”
A new wave of tears threatens to flow—who knew one person could be this happy?—when I hear the front door open.
I glance at the clock. “Wow. I didn’t realize it was already after ten.” Ivan told me he’d make himself scarce until my dad was gone, but he probably didn’t think our dinner would go this long.
“It’s a lot later than I thought.” He stands up and stretches. “I should get going and let you get to bed.”
“Or you could stay for a few more minutes? Ivan is here. Maybe we can all… talk?”
Like a real family, I think.
I know one night is not enough to fix everything, but it’s a good start. And Ivan is the one who pushed me to even being open to this idea in the first place. I want him and my dad to get along.
“Yeah, sure,” he agrees. “I can do that.”
“Amazing. I’ll go grab him before he sneaks upstairs. He’s probably trying to give us space.”
I lightly jog out of the kitchen and down the hallway towards the entryway. “Ivan! You can come back here if you—”
I slam to a stop in the entryway as Francia turns to me and smiles.
“Were you expecting someone else?”