4. Sofia #3
Not a polite laugh. Not a nervous laugh. A full, horrified, delighted laugh that makes me pull the phone slightly away from my ear.
“Oh my God,” she says. “You’re inviting the devil to your wedding.”
“It’s not confirmed he’s the devil.”
“Sofia, my father once called him the reason men lock doors.”
“That could mean many things.”
“It means don’t mail him embossed cardstock.”
I look down at the envelope. “Dmitri suggested it at lunch yesterday,” I say. “My uncle nearly had a stroke.”
“Ah,” Anya says. “So naturally you decided to help.”
“Naturally.”
“You are insane.”
“I prefer under-stimulated.”
“Sofia.”
“Anya.”
She exhales. I hear movement on her end, a door closing, her voice lowering. “You understand this is not like sending an invitation to an ex-boyfriend to make the groom jealous, right? This is Damir Volodin. Men don’t say his name too loudly in clubs where the walls might be listening.”
“I’m not inviting him to brunch. It’s a church.”
“That doesn’t make it safer.”
“It makes it ironic.”
“It makes it a crime scene with stained glass.”
I smile despite myself. God, I miss her.
“I just need the address.”
“You just need therapy.”
“Can you get it?”
“I can try.”
“Anya.”
“What? I said I can try. My cousin Arman runs a courier company that handles private deliveries for half the men your uncle pretends not to know. He might know which address receives Volodin’s formal mail.”
My pulse gives a strange little jump.
Formal mail. As if this is reasonable. As if Damir Volodin has a neat place where invitations to unwanted weddings may be delivered between bank statements and death threats.
Anya’s voice sharpens. “But listen to me. If I get this for you, you don’t write anything stupid.”
“I would never.”
“You once wrote ‘condolences’ on a birthday card because the man was turning forty.”
“He appreciated honesty.”
“He stopped speaking to you.”
“Exactly. Gift of silence.”
“Sofia.”
I soften, just slightly. “I know. I won’t write anything extra. Just the invitation.”
“Why are you really doing this?”
The question catches me before I can prepare a joke. I look around my room, at the fresh flowers I didn’t choose, the dress waiting for my fitting, the envelopes on my bed like little folded verdicts.
“Because they told me not to,” I say.
Anya is quiet.
That’s not the whole truth, and we both know it. But it’s enough.
Finally, she sighs. “I’ll call you back.”
She hangs up before I can thank her.
For the next hour, I pretend to address the acceptable envelopes. I write names in careful script, because if I have learned anything from this family, it’s that rebellion goes down easier when dressed beautifully.
A cousin.
An aunt by marriage.
Two women whose faces I vaguely recognize.
Anya, because no list approved by a Sokolov man gets to decide who loves me.
By the time my phone buzzes, my hand is stiff and my mood has soured into something bright and reckless.
Anya has sent only one message. Just an address in an old district of Moscow, attached to a building I recognize by reputation if not by sight.
Volodin House.
My throat goes dry, and for one second, the whole idea stops being funny.
Damir Volodin is no longer just a name that upsets Dmitri. He’s an actual man with an actual address, and I’m holding an actual invitation to my wedding, which I am apparently about to send to the most dangerous person my uncle knows.
I should stop. I should tear the envelope in half and flush the pieces.
I should do literally anything else.
Instead, I pull one of the blank envelopes toward me. My pen hovers.
Then I write: Mr. Damir Volodin
The ink dries slowly.
His name looks obscene on the cream paper. Not because it’s ugly, but because it belongs there too well.
I add the address beneath it, each letter careful, elegant, perfectly legible. Nothing extra. No note. No joke. No explanation. Just the invitation.
Just the one thing my uncle forbade.
When I’m done, I sit back and stare at it. My heart beats too quickly. This is stupid. This is childish. This is dangerous.
This is the first decision about my wedding that has belonged entirely to me.
A knock sounds at my door, and I almost jump out of my skin.
“Miss Antonova?” one of Polina’s assistants calls. “The courier is collecting your envelopes.”
I look at Damir’s name. For one final second, I give myself the chance to be sensible.
Then I stand, gather the envelopes, and open the door.
The assistant smiles politely. “Are these ready?”
I hand her the stack. Damir Volodin’s invitation rests in the middle, hidden between a cousin and a woman named Irina who once told me my hips were “traditional.”
“Yes,” I say. My voice sounds perfectly calm. “They’re ready.”
She leaves with the invitations held against her chest, unaware she is carrying a small act of war down the hallway.
I close the door. Lock it. Then I press my back against the wood and laugh once, breathless and terrified.
For the first time since this wedding was announced, I don’t feel like I’m walking toward a cage. I feel like I have opened one.
Only a little.
Only enough to let something dangerous in.