FOUR #2
“It means you’ve been pretending this might sort itself out if you stare at it hard enough, and it won’t.” He looks ready to argue, but he doesn’t, which tells me I’m right.
“I know. Stop saying it like I’m an idiot,” he says, turning to me fully, his shoulders squared, temper flaring in a way I recognise and trust.
“I didn’t say you were an idiot.”
“Yeah, well, you were heavily implying it.”
“Subtlety is wasted on this family,” I mumble.
He stares at me another second and then, against his will, his mouth twitches. “You’re such a little bastard.”
“And yet here I am helping.”
He exhales through his nose, easing some of the tension. “Helping by talking at me?”
“That’s my best skill.”
“Your best skill is definitely self-obsession.”
“It’s a very close second.”
He looks out across the yard again. “She wrote a few days ago that she sat up half the night because she was sure she heard someone in the hall outside the flat. She said she took Vladimir into the bathroom and locked the door,” he says, quieter now.
I pause with a concerned look on my face.
Niko sees that and nods in agreement. “Exactly.”
“What happened then?”
“As far as I can tell, nothing happened. She said it was probably pipes in the wall or someone coming home late, but she still stayed in there for hours.”
“And this was in a letter? Do you still have it?” He pats his coat pocket and pulls it out. “Let me read it.” He hesitates, gripping the paper tight. “Come on. I’m not asking because I enjoy reading your love letters.”
“They’re not love letters.”
“That’s almost sadder.” He takes a second, then hands it over.
I move closer to the barracks wall, where the light from the doorway catches enough to read by.
Cassie’s handwriting is neat at first, and then it gets messy, as if she’s rushing to get the words out faster than she can write. It looks almost frantic.
Most of the letter is ordinary. Vladimir smiled, Vladimir won’t sleep unless he’s fed twice, the milk boiled over, and she nearly cried over a saucepan because, apparently, motherhood is glamorous. Then the letter edges into stranger ground.
She writes that the hall outside the flat sounds busy at odd hours, the baby startles in his sleep and sometimes looks over her shoulder when no one is there, she hates opening the curtains after dark, she knows it sounds stupid, and she’s probably just run down.
I read it through once, then again. “Well?” Niko asks.
I fold it carefully and hand it back. “No, I don’t like that.”
“Neither do I,” he says, taking the paper back and shoving it into his pocket.
“Has anyone actually seen her lately?”
“I don't know. Cassie mentions the woman next door sometimes, but that's about it.”
“What about you writing to her directly?”
“She’ll think I’m panicking.”
“You are panicking. You look one bad sentence away from punching through a wall.”
“That’s not panic. That’s stress.”
“That is panic in a different outfit.”
He actually smiles at that, faintly. “You should put that on a poster.”
“I would, but literacy rates are not on our side.”
He shakes his head, then sobers again. “I don’t want to make it worse.”
“You’re worried that if you push too hard, people will start treating her like she’s mad?” I ask, leaning against the wall. He doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t need to; his silence answers for him. “She needs looking after.”
“I know she does.”
“What if you move her here?”
“What?”
“Get her into military housing. The families’ block.”
“That’s not—” he starts.
“It is,” I cut in. “It’s not front-line barracks, it’s not her stuck in the middle of a yard full of idiots. It’s housing. Other families. Other women with kids. People in and out all day.”
He exhales slowly, thinking. “You think that’ll fix it?”
“I think it’ll mean she’s not alone in a flat, listening to every noise like it’s coming for her.”
He looks away, his jaw tight. “It’s not that simple.”
“No,” I agree. “But it’s simpler than worrying from miles away.”
He huffs out a breath in frustration. “I’d have to get it approved. They don’t just hand those flats out.”
“No, but they also don’t like problems. You’ve got a baby and a partner who isn’t coping. That’s a problem if it escalates.”
“She won’t want to leave,” he mutters.
“Probably not.”
“She hates feeling like she can’t handle things. How do I convince her?”
“You don’t make it about what she can’t handle. You make it about you. You want her closer. You want to see your son. You don’t like being this far away. All true, none of it’s a lie.”
He studies me like he’s weighing that up against every instinct he has to tell the truth. “She’ll hear what I’m not saying,” he says.
“Maybe.” I shrug. “Or maybe she hears what you are saying, and she’s not on her own in a quiet flat, convincing herself the walls are breathing.”
He goes still for a second, then drags a hand over his face. “I’d have to sort transport,” he says. “What if they say no?”
“Then they say no,” I reply. “But at least you tried something that might actually help instead of waiting for another letter you don’t like the sound of.”
His mouth tightens. “If I do this,” he says, quieter, “it’s not just a visit. It’s moving her, changing everything.” I nod along in agreement. “And if I’m wrong—”
“You’re not.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No, but I know you,” I answer. “You don’t get like this over nothing.”
He looks away towards the housing block. “Right,” he says after a moment. “I’ll speak to them. See what I can do.”
“Good. And if this works, I expect full credit.”
“You’ll get punched.”
“You’re too slow, old man.” That earns me a small, tired laugh. He turns toward the building, and we head inside together, the heat hitting us in a stale wave and the noise closing in around us.
Later, I don’t go looking for a reason to leave base, but the chance lands in my lap anyway. Supply run, paperwork, signatures, the kind of mundane thing no one wants and no one questions. I take it, I keep my tone level, and I don’t give anyone a reason to remember me on the way out.
I keep my head down, get the first part of the job done, make sure everything that needs signing is signed, everything that needs collecting is collected, and then I take the long way back, stopping off at the internet café.
Warm air hits as soon as I step inside. I pay for the time, take the same seat I always take, and log in.
The inbox opens, and there’s one new message. I read it once, quickly, enough to get through it. Then again, slower. He kept it simple. “This isn’t temporary.”
I sit back slightly, my eyes still on the screen. Then he asks if it’s temporary for me. I don’t reply, but I close the message and log off. This isn’t something I’m putting in writing; if he wants an answer, he can have it properly.
I push the chair back and leave before I have the chance to reconsider.
By the time I get back to base, the plan has already formed in my head.
There are ways to get hold of things if you know who to ask.
Equipment moves in and out all the time, not everything gets logged properly, and sometimes it gets “lost” in transit.
I don’t make it obvious or rush it. I take the rest of the day to finish what I’m supposed to be doing, keep everything routine, and keep myself where I’m expected to be.
Then, later, when it’s quieter, I take a detour. It doesn’t take long. A quick conversation and a favour that I’m owed. Then something is passed over that doesn’t get acknowledged.
I don’t bring the phone back to my room, that would be too obvious. It would also be too easy to find if someone decides to look.
There’s an empty barracks block two buildings over, mostly unused and rooms that don’t always get checked. I leave it there, tucked out of sight, exactly where no one’s going to bother going unless they have a reason to. Then I walk back like nothing’s changed.
Midnight comes and goes, and I lie there staring at the ceiling, going over the timing in my head.
Comms room. After midnight. He’ll be there or he won’t. Either way, I’m not answering that email. If he wants to know whether it’s temporary, he can ask me properly.
And I’ll answer him the same way.