EPILOGUE
ALINA
Oisin wakes up and announces the day like he’s in charge of it.
“Morning,” he says, loud enough to fill the room.
I open my eyes to sunlight on the wall and the weight of a small body climbing into bed without asking permission.
He crawls over me, then over Mikhail, then settles between us like this is where he’s always belonged.
Mikhail doesn’t pretend to sleep through it.
He turns his head, hair messy, eyes half open, and asks, “What are you doing?”
“Checking,” Oisin says, very serious.
Mikhail’s brow furrows. “Checking what.”
“That you’re both here,” Oisin replies, like it’s obvious.
Mikhail’s face shifts. He sits up slightly, not towering, not commanding. He meets Oisin at eye level on the bed. “We’re here.”
Oisin studies him. “Promise.”
Mikhail doesn’t roll his eyes. He doesn’t laugh. He doesn’t make it a joke.
“I promise,” he says calmly.
Oisin nods once, satisfied, and flops backward so hard, the mattress bounces.
“Okay,” he declares. “Breakfast.”
I push myself up and brush Oisin’s hair back. “You don’t even say please in the morning.”
“It’s morning,” he says, like that explains everything.
Mikhail’s mouth twitches. “He gets that from you.”
“I do not,” I reply.
Mikhail looks at me. “You do.”
Oisin points at both of us. “Stop talking and get breakfast.”
I laugh under my breath. It’s quiet, real, and it doesn’t come with a sting.
There’s no guard outside the bedroom door.
There are no raised voices in the hallway, and no one is waiting to deliver a message that turns the day into a crisis. The house still has security, I know it does, it has to, but the room itself is calm. Safety isn’t borrowed. It exists.
In the kitchen, Oisin climbs onto his chair and starts narrating his own life like he’s a commentator, and Sofia is already there making coffee, still pretending she doesn’t live here even though she does. She looks at Oisin and sighs. “You’re awake,” she says.
Oisin points at her. “You’re late.”
Sofia stares at him. “I was here before you woke up.”
He narrows his eyes. “Then why didn’t you bring me breakfast?”
Sofia looks at me. “He’s getting bold.”
“He’s five,” I say. “It’s his job.”
Mikhail walks in behind us with his sleeves rolled and his phone left somewhere else for once, and he doesn’t grab the room with his presence. He just enters it. He sets a plate down in front of Oisin, not with a flourish and not with a command. Just food. Just care.
Oisin stares at it. “Eggs.”
Mikhail nods. “You like eggs.”
“I do,” Oisin confirms, then he frowns. “But I wanted pancakes.”
Mikhail doesn’t threaten him, and he doesn’t shut him down. He asks, “Do you want pancakes tomorrow?”
Oisin’s eyes widen. “Yes.”
Mikhail nods once. “Then you eat eggs today.”
Oisin considers this like it’s a negotiation. Then he nods too. “Okay.”
Sofia mutters, “Who are you and what have you done with him?”
Mikhail doesn’t glance at her. “Drink your coffee.”
Sofia grins. “Yes, Boss.”
I watch the whole thing like my brain is still catching up.
Mikhail listens when Oisin speaks.
He doesn’t issue instructions. He asks questions.
He kneels sometimes. He sits to meet him. He doesn’t loom.
Power doesn’t press down in this room.
It steadies.
Oisin chatters through breakfast, then runs off to build something with blocks that will definitely become a “train station fortress” and definitely take over the living room.
Mikhail’s mother appears in the doorway long enough to confirm he’s fed and the house hasn’t burned down, then disappears again like a quiet approval stamp.
Later that afternoon, Mikhail finds me in the small chapel room.
He joins me there and gives me space until I move aside slightly, asking him to join me.
Moving quietly, he stands there beside me.
It’s private and quiet here, and it feels like a good place to pause and reflect on everything that’s brought us here.
There’s no crowd.
No men lined up to witness.
No spectacle.
Just Sofia, standing off to the side with a simple folder, looking both proud and annoyed to be included.
Mikhail stands in front of me, not in a suit, not dressed like a king. Just himself.
“I don’t want an audience,” he says.
“I don’t either,” I reply.
His gaze holds mine. “This isn’t to prove anything.”
“I know,” I say.
“It’s to say it,” he continues. “Out loud. With choice.”
My throat tightens.
We renew vows that were never truly vows the first time.
Not ownership.
Not a contract.
A decision.
Mikhail’s voice doesn’t shake, but I hear the weight in it anyway. The part of him that understands he crossed lines he can’t take back, and the part of him that refuses to repeat that mistake.
When it’s my turn, I don’t dress it up.
I don’t romanticize it.
I tell the truth.
I tell him I’m here because I decided to be.
I tell him I’m not afraid of him the way I used to be.
I tell him I won’t run.
When it’s done, Sofia clears her throat loudly. “Okay, that was disgustingly sincere. I’m going to go pretend I don’t have feelings now.”
Mikhail doesn’t stop her.
I don’t either.
After, we stand together for a moment, hands linked, and the quiet doesn’t feel like danger.
It feels like space.
I think about my life in clean, simple pieces.
Once, I was negotiated, redirected, and claimed without consent and told it was protection. I fought tooth and nail against the system until the system bent itself to adjust to me.
“You’d be proud of me, Mama,” I whisper to the air.
Once, I was stolen.
Now, I choose to stay.