Chapter 13 #2
“It’s—” Kirill coughs and winces, rubbing his throat. “I think it’s spam or something, it’s from another country. And they texted you, but it’s in English, so…” He shrugs.
Sasha’s never been more grateful that Kirill’s horrible at English, can read even less of it than he speaks—because sure enough, when he checks his phone, the texts are from Danny.
Unknown: Can you call me??
Unknown: I really want to talk to you about something
Inwardly, Sasha winces. He’s been letting Danny go to voicemail all week, texting feeble excuses afterwards; if he keeps this up any longer, though, he’s going to have a hard time explaining himself.
Shit. Maybe he should just call Danny back now, while Kirill’s resting and Alina’s around to keep an eye on him.
“Weird,” he says aloud, trying to sound unconcerned. “I’m going to go check on dinner, do you need anything?”
Kirill doesn’t, so Sasha slips away to the kitchen, then pretends he has to grab an unspecified object from his car.
He might as well not have bothered—Alina barely glances up from her cutting board—but just as he’s about to leave the apartment, he doubles back, remembering something from earlier that he’d wanted to mention to her.
“Um, so, Kirill asked me if he took analgin after lunch, and he sounded kind of confused? I don’t know, maybe he just forgot, but…”
Alina looks at him, the knife pausing in her hands. “Okay, we’ll see,” she says carefully. “I’ll mention it to Nadya.”
Nadya’s her childhood friend, and also a nurse, which is why Alina had called her when Kirill refused to go to the hospital.
She’s been stopping by every day after work, checking his vitals and examining his head and neck; Sasha had overheard her telling Alina that there was a risk he could have a stroke, even two weeks after.
Alina hadn’t repeated this to either Sasha or Kirill, and Sasha almost wishes he’d never eavesdropped, because—fuck.
A stroke. Nadya had said it was a “small” risk, but still, what does that actually mean?
He was already on edge from everything, and now he’s googling stroke symptoms in the middle of the night, trying to reassure himself that Kirill’s headaches are “only” from his concussion.
The fact that a concussion is the better outcome here is just—yeah.
Outside the apartment building, he finds a quiet corner of the parking lot and calls Danny, who picks up on the first ring as if he’d been holding his breath, waiting for it.
“Hey. Thanks for calling,” he says in a rush, more or less confirming Sasha’s suspicion. “Is everything okay?”
Sasha really hopes this isn’t what Danny had wanted to talk about. He knows Danny deserves at least a reason after being ignored all week, but he also knows that under no circumstances would Kirill ever want Danny to find out what happened, and what he doesn’t know is how to reconcile the two.
“Yes?” he tries.
“Oh. Okay. No, it’s just, I’ve been trying to call you…” Danny trails off, obviously hoping for an explanation, and Sasha clears his throat.
“You want to talk about something?”
There’s a long pause before Danny says, “Um, okay,” and Sasha winces, realizing how abrupt he’d sounded.
“Uh, yeah, so, I guess, um… I don’t know if you’ve heard anything about this doctor”—Sasha doesn’t recognize the name that follows—“but it’s been, like, all over the news here.
Or, like, the gymnastics news, but it’s definitely gonna be on, like, the news news soon, cause it’s just, like, totally crazy, like, my dad was saying—”
Sasha can already tell he doesn’t have time for this, whatever it is, and honestly, it doesn’t seem all that important.
“Danny, I can’t talk now,” he interrupts. And then, hearing just how inadequate that is, he finally admits, “Kirill is here.”
“Oh. Okay.” There’s another pause, Danny audibly taken aback. “Um… should I call later or something, like, when’s a good—”
“No, uh—how do you say, he is staying here. Until we go back to Round Lake. In October.”
“Why is he—wait, are you saying you, like, don’t want us to talk again until October?”
“No, but…” Sasha bites his lip, trying to think through their options. Alina’s used to his Sunday “walks” by now, but Kirill isn’t, since Sasha always takes Danny’s calls in his dorm when they’re at Round Lake. What if he gets suspicious, or worse, wants to come along for some fresh air?
And Sasha can’t plan in advance anymore, thanks to Danny’s erratic tour schedule; there’s only so many spontaneous strolls he can go on, which means even more excuses, inventing errands or other bullshit reasons to leave the apartment.
How long can he keep that up before he runs out of ideas, before Kirill and his mother start asking questions?
“Okay,” Danny replies after several seconds of silence, his voice flatter than Sasha’s ever heard it. “Well, why don’t you just give me a call whenever you’re available.”
By the time Sasha realizes that Danny’s actually upset with him, he’s already said goodbye and hung up.
*
The leaves in Moscow start changing color, and so do Kirill’s bruises, blue and purple giving way to a sallow, sickly yellow.
Sasha helps him comb through apartment listings, the two of them hunched over their laptops at the kitchen table; he runs errands for Alina, looping from the pharmacy to the grocery store and back again; and he spends far too much time checking his phone, even though Danny’s barely texting him anymore.
“Barely” meaning one or two times a day, instead of dozens—but it’s enough that it’s noticeable, enough that Sasha feels guilty, because he knows Danny wants him to call and he can’t.
Every time he tries to leave the apartment, Kirill invites himself along, restless now that his injuries are on the mend.
It doesn’t matter if it’s a walk or an errand; he even tags along to Sasha’s gymnastics practice, swearing up and down that he only wants to stretch.
(Coach Arkady doesn’t ask questions about the fading bruises, though he clearly doesn’t believe the tripped-into-the-vault story that Kirill tells the children bold enough to comment.)
There’s never a spare second, never a chance to slip away for a phone call—at least, not the kind of call that he owes Danny, which is definitely longer than a few breathless minutes hiding in the gym bathroom.
Though he does get desperate enough to try that once, waiting awkwardly in a stall for a child to finish at the sink, only to give up when two more walk in right after the first one leaves.
So he doesn’t call, and Danny doesn’t text. Or barely texts.
After a few days of short, sporadic messages, Sasha caves and sends him a peace offering: a video of a puppy he’d spotted on his way home from the grocery store, chasing its tail in a park.
Danny replies immediately, an Aww doggo with several heart-eyed emojis, and for a moment everything feels normal again—but then he asks if Sasha has time to talk, just as Sasha’s setting the table for dinner.
So Sasha says no, and Danny says K, and then the conversation stops altogether.
Sasha knows it’s his fault that they’re at an impasse, but he can’t help feeling frustrated.
What the hell does Danny expect from him, trying to keep a secret like this with no fucking privacy?
He’s in a three-room apartment with paper-thin walls, Kirill sleeping less than two meters away from him every night; sometimes he thinks maybe he should just wait until he’s back at Round Lake, since at least there he has his own dorm.
But October seems agonizingly far away, and after another week goes by, Sasha finds himself reduced to replaying Danny’s Instagram stories at the lowest possible volume while Kirill’s brushing his teeth.
“LA, you guys were amazing, we’re really feeling all the love out there,” Danny gushes to his followers.
He’s walking downtown with Matt, both of them carrying coffee cups; Matt looks like the only thing he’s feeling is exhausted.
“Glendale, Arizona, you guys are next—don’t forget your tickets, you can use my code DANNY2016 for $10 off. Can’t wait to see you there!”
It’s stupid promo shit, but it’s also Danny’s voice, and his smile, and Sasha misses them both so much it’s embarrassing—case in point, he’s watched this story three times already.
He doesn’t even want to know what he’d do if Danny weren’t on Instagram so often; he might actually just shrivel up and die.
A noise in the hallway catches his attention, and he exits Instagram as Kirill shuffles slowly into the room, frowning at something on his phone.
“What’s wrong?” Sasha asks, hoping it’s not one of his parents. Kirill’s blocked both of their numbers, but Sasha wouldn’t put it past either of them, Irina especially, to try contacting him from another phone.
“Did you see this?” Kirill holds up his screen, and Sasha recognizes the logo of a gymnastics blog they both follow, although he can’t make out any of the words on the page. “About the doctor on the Americans’ team?”
As Sasha leans over to read the headline, something tugs at his memory—hadn’t Danny mentioned a doctor the other week, right before Sasha cut him off?
“He was working with the girls.” Kirill passes the phone to Sasha, his mouth twisted in a grimace. “Sick bastard.”
About two paragraphs into the article, Sasha realizes just how badly he’s screwed up.