Epilogue
Three Years Later…
SCOTTIE
The captain says we’re starting our descent into Kalispell, and my son chooses that exact moment to body-slam my sternum with his forehead.
“Da-da-Ad-da,” he yells, which in toddler means I own this row and all who sit in it.
“Easy there, Rocket,” I grunt, catching him before he can launch himself at the poor business person in the first class aisle seat next to us in 3B. “Let’s try not to go all WWE until you’ve got grandpa to wrestle with.”
My father can’t wait to get his hands on this little guy.
It’s only been a month since they were in Seattle for a visit, but my dad and his first grandson were inseparable for the entire four days.
My mother sent a picture of the fully enclosed trampoline he bought and set up in the backyard, now covered in snow, for the anticipated Christmas visit from us in Whitefish this year.
He bounces onto Katerina’s lap like the seatbelt is more of a suggestion than a law.
She’s got one arm banded around his waist, the other braced on the armrest, dark hair twisted up in some low, messy knot that makes me want to drag her into the teeny airplane bathroom and remind her what got us a one-year-old in the first place.
Instead, I settle for tugging the little sock back over our son’s exposed heel.
“Roman,” she says in Russian, firm but soft. “Sit. We’re landing soon.”
He slows down, blinking up at her with a face that is… yeah. That’s my smile. But those eyes? That soul-deep, steel-blue focus? That’s all his mother.
He presses his hands to the window, fogging up the plastic. He makes some grunting noises that sound as close to mommy as he’s gotten so far, and gasps out at the snowy city below us.
I lean over them to look. White blankets the mountains all the way down their slopes. Trees dusted. Roads are clear but edged with plowed piles. Whitefish in winter. My favorite place on earth.
“Get used to it, kid,” I whisper, kissing the back of his head. “You’re gonna spend a lot of Christmases here.”
Katerina glances at me over our son’s curls, and the look in her eyes does that thing to my chest I still haven’t built up a resistance against, even after three years.
It’s soft and full and a little disbelieving, like she’s still afraid she’ll wake up back in Moscow and this…
me, Roman, our ridiculously imperfect and messy life, is something she made up in a dream.
“You done already?” I ask quietly.
She nods, but I know her better than that now. I see the tension in her shoulders, the way she keeps glancing at our son like she’s checking that he’s really here. That we’re really doing this.
First Christmas where my dad can walk out onto the porch to meet us instead of wheeling out as far as my mom shoveled the snow.
Yeah, I’m not exactly calm either.
“You sure you don’t want me to take him?” I offer, reaching for Roman, mostly because I need to hold something that isn’t my feelings.
She smiles, shaking her head. “He’s fine. Besides, you’re still too tall for these seats. You need your knees.”
I shove my hand over my heart. “You wound me.”
Even first class is starting to lose some leg room these days.
“And you’ll survive.” She adjusts Roman’s little Hawkeyes beanie—the one Isla had made in her new athletic wear line for this year, which says Rookie across the front.
With so many of us now having kids, she’s putting together a bigger kids line, and Roman has two of everything. “We’re almost home.”
The word slams into me, the way it always does when she says it, when it’s not just Montana or Seattle or some faceless hotel in a road city.
Home.
Wherever she is. Wherever this kid is. Wherever my parents are now that my father can do things he hasn’t done in far too long.
The plane dips lower. Mountains fade to fields. The landing gear thunks down.
Roman squeals like we’re on a rollercoaster. I laugh. Katerina squeezes my hand over his wiggling legs.
Yeah, we’re home for Christmas, and four nights before, I have to get back home for an away game.
Deplaning with a one-year-old and two carry-ons should count as a cardio workout, especially the way that Kat packs.
By the time we make it through the tiny Kalispell airport, Roman has tried to kick off both socks three times, wave at everyone in security, and flirt shamelessly with a college girl in a red beanie who told him he has “dangerous eyes.” I’m not sure whether I’m flattered or offended.
We step out into the cold, and my lungs immediately remember what Montana’s freezing air feels like. It feels sharp with an inhale, but I like the way it’s scrubbing the city off my skin a little.
Roman sucks in a gasp and clutches at his mom.
“Yup.” I tug his little coat tighter. “That’s winter, bud. It’s supposed to be cold.”
He looks unconvinced.
The rental car is a truck because, of course, it is. Kat gives me a look when she sees it.
“Subtle,” she says. “Very restrained, Easton.”
“This is restrained,” I protest. “Wait until you see what my cousins drive.”
We’ve talked about buying a cabin here, just for the off-season, and she’s excited about the idea of our future kids getting to spend more time with their grandparents and have a little time outside of the city every summer, so she’s going to have to get used to this.
She rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling, and while she buckles Roman into his car seat, I take a second to look at them both and just… let it all settle in.
Three years ago, I picked up a Russian ballerina from a plane in a fur wrap and a glacier stare.
Now she’s in thermal leggings, fur-lined boots that reach up over her calves, and a big winter ski jacket to cut through the cold.
She sings softly in Russian, a Christmas song that I know well enough about ‘Ol Saint Nick, while she double-checks our son’s seat straps like she’s been doing it her whole life.
I climb behind the wheel. The road from the airport to Whitefish is so familiar I could probably drive it blindfolded, but today every mile feels different.
“Think he’ll remember this?” I ask once we hit the highway, glancing at Roman in the rearview. His eyes are wide, following everything.
“Probably not,” Katerina says, leaning her head back against the seat. “But I will.” She looks at me. “And you will. And your parents definitely will.”
I swallow around the lump in my throat. “Yeah. They will.”
“He’ll remember the next one… when we come back,” she assures me, and then reaches her hand on the sleeve of my jacket, to remind me that this is just the start.
Fields turn into tall pines, then into glimpses of the lake, slate gray under a pale sky. Whitefish Mountain looms off in the distance, dusted in powder.
Katerina presses her palm to the glass. “It’s more beautiful than I remembered.”
I reach over and lace our fingers together over the console. “Welcome back, Mrs. Easton.”
Her lips curve. “I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of hearing you call me that. If feels brand new every time you say it.”
“Good,” I say, pulling onto the familiar gravel drive. “Because I plan on calling you that in front of everyone we know until you’re sick of me.”
The house appears around the last stand of trees, smoke curling from the chimney, Christmas lights already strung across the railing in somewhat uneven lines. A big wreath that my mom made in one of her art classes she teaches at the old folks home once a month.
And then—before I’ve fully stopped the truck—the front door bursts open.
Mom barrels out first, wearing a thick sweater with a reindeer that lights up and twinkles and an apron dusted in flour, yelling something about pie and “my baby” and “give him to me right now, Scottie, so help me.”
Right behind her, holding onto the porch railing with one hand and a cane in the other, is my dad.
For a second I can’t move.
He’s been out of the trial for just over a year.
I’ve seen the videos. I’ve been home twice, and they were just in Seattle visiting, but each time I see it, it takes me a minute to believe that it all happened.
He may never progress past the cane, and he uses a walker if we have to go somewhere where we walk long distances or for large amounts of time, like the local high school football games or the county fairs.
But seeing him there on the porch, standing up straight in the December cold, waiting to walk down the steps to meet me?
It knocks the wind out of me.
“Scottie,” Katerina says softly, touching my arm.
“Yeah.” I blink hard and force myself to move. “Yeah, I’m good.”
Because how could I not be? My father is walking and has gained back so much of his independence, and I owe it all to Katerina and her grandmother.
I swing out of the truck and come around to unbuckle Roman just in time for my mom to reach us.
“Oh my God, give me that baby,” she orders, which is how I lose custody in under three seconds.
Roman goes to her without a fuss, because he knows my mother as well as anyone else sides up.
She came and stayed with us for two months when Katerina gave birth.
She took care of all the cleaning, cooking, nighttime feedings with a bottle…
anything Kat needed after her cesarean, which put her in bed for longer than we expected.
But just like my Russian mafia princess, she’s tough as nails.
My mother snuggles him up, kissing his cheeks noisily while he pats her face. “There he is. There’s my little Rocket. Look at you. Look at your cheeks. Oh my gosh, Scottie, you were never this cute.”
“Wow, thanks, Ma,” I say faintly.
Katerina laughs beside me, and I swear I could live in this moment forever.
Then I look up at the porch.
My dad takes a careful step down, then another. His cane taps on each stair. His left leg is a little slower, a little stiffer. But it moves. It holds.
“Don’t you dare rush him,” Mom hisses at me over her shoulder like she can read my mind.
I don’t move. I couldn’t if I tried.