Chapter 43
NORA
Three days after I refuse to leave my husband, I walk into his reopened terminal wearing navy scrubs under a wool coat.
Tess follows in black trousers, and Amina carries the white bakery box our clinic manager sends whenever life becomes too large for a sympathy card.
Two guards trail us through the private entrance.
They have learned to remain outside sterilization rooms, accept patient rescheduling as serious business, and stop trying to carry my lunch.
The terminal is moving again. After weeks of grounded aircraft and locked doors, every working crew and taxiing jet makes the recovery look costly and hard won.
Engines sound beyond the heated glass. Ground crews in bright coats guide a powerless aircraft beneath a tow bar toward an inspection bay, their wands cutting orange paths through fine snow.
Fuel sharpens the air each time an exterior door opens.
Inside, polished metal reflects the blue-white light from the apron, while coffee travels through the operations floor in thick paper cups.
My first visit taught me how easily Konstantin could make aircraft, people, and cargo move around him.
Today, the evidence of failure remains visible beside the restored power.
One sealed maintenance bay holds the sabotaged plane under continuing evidence control while investigators supervise the final repair.
New access stations stand at every inner door, with no shared service sessions hidden under their screens.
The replacement system is Irina's, rebuilt around every weakness her husband's betrayal exposed.
She reviews the final credential purge beside Mikhail in a simple gray dress, far removed from the severe suits she wore while tracing Anton's access.
At her right, Larissa leans over the table to argue that the new identification photographs make everyone look recently arrested.
Dasha has wisely brought neither child onto the active floor, though paper airplanes covered in marker have colonized one corner of Mikhail's desk.
Irina looks up as I approach.
For a fraction of a second, uncertainty touches her face. Then Larissa shifts aside without comment, leaving a place for her between us.
I put the bakery box between us. "Bribery from the clinic. Its success depends on whether you like lemon."
Irina opens the lid. "I've been rebuilding access permissions since the judgment. I like anything I didn't authorize."
She takes a lemon bar, remaining between Larissa and me without having to entertain us, apologize for grief, or prove that exposing Anton cleansed her of loving him.
Across the operations floor, Galina's reconstruction requires no new credentials. The rescued album lies beneath a clear conservation cover beside two scanners, where photographs sent by relatives from three countries are being paired with the interviews she began recording yesterday.
Dasha lays a rink schedule beside the album. Through spring, the municipal facility belongs to the family on two Wednesday evenings each month, with private ice filling the other weeks.
"The children need to learn where Konstantin first cheated," Galina says.
Mikhail looks offended. "I fell because she pulled me down. She was taller, which everyone keeps omitting from the official account."
Galina writes both versions under the scanned photograph of two boys on skates.
The estate remains gone. Its history has begun moving through living mouths, damaged paper, and children who will inherit competing accounts of every fall. The recovered photographs can't restore what burned, though they keep the destruction from becoming total.
At the far end of the table, the proposed bride ends a secure call with her father and smooths one dark red sleeve before returning to the documents he can no longer overrule alone.
Her signature sits beside the port seal on the first restitution release, sending money to temporary housing for estate staff before any family reconstruction.
On the page beneath it, the western route transfers under the authority she gained in the ceasefire.
"He wants to delay the route transfer until the broker's hearing," she tells Mikhail.
"The agreement gives him no delay."
"I reminded him." She signs the final page. "The route transfers at six."
Nobody looks toward her father for confirmation.
Tess watches the exchange from beside me. "I feel underdressed, even in the trousers I save for patients who bring lawyers."
The proposed bride gives Tess a cool look that softens near the end. "Then you're appropriately dressed."
The hangar door opens behind Mikhail, and Konstantin comes through with his coat open over a dark suit. He checks the operations table, finds me, and changes course without breaking stride.
As he crosses the floor, Mikhail reports that every aircraft has completed inspection, the sabotaged actuator connection has been repaired beneath investigator supervision, and flight restrictions will lift for this afternoon's proving run.
Konstantin gives the correct acknowledgment at each point without taking his eyes from my scrubs.
The first passenger departure remains scheduled for tomorrow morning.
"You came from work."
"Observant."
His hand settles at my waist, warm through the coat. Three days of sleeping beside him haven't made the contact commonplace. My body remembers his mouth between my thighs before my mind can provide a more appropriate response for a working terminal.
"How was the clinic?" he asks.
"Two fillings that should have been crowns, one teenager who flosses only before appointments, and a security guard with excellent gums. Tess has him using the floss from his go bag."
Konstantin looks toward the guard by the door. "Promote him."
"Periodontal health doesn't affect rank, but I admire your priorities."
Amina hugs him before his status can frighten her out of it. His arms remain half-raised for one startled moment, then close around her with reluctant care.
Tess offers her hand instead. "I prefer a handshake. My boundaries become flexible only where pastry is involved."
My dangerous husband laughs once, nearly lost in the engine noise beyond the glass.
Lunch arrives at the hangar worktables instead of a ceremonial room, putting operations staff beside relatives, port advisers, and the clinic friends who knew me before any of them.
Weighted maps remain open beneath the plates, coffee crowds the safety reports, and people eat whenever radio calls or requests from the ground crews leave their hands free.
When my telephone alerts me to tomorrow's first patient, I confirm the appointment without hiding the screen. Dasha asks whether I plan to keep my normal clinic schedule through the pregnancy.
"As long as my doctor agrees."
Amina answers before I can say more. "We can adjust rooms and breaks without treating her as breakable."
Dasha tells me she approves of Amina, an opinion my friend already holds about herself.
Dasha opens her telephone to a photograph of her youngest child showing two lower teeth with another pair above them. "Since I've got two dental professionals trapped at lunch, when should this one have a first appointment?"
"By the first birthday," I answer.
Tess leans over the photograph. "Also, that front tooth is going to win every argument in the house."
"She already does."
The conversation moves from teeth to the municipal rink, followed by whether Galina can be trusted to identify relatives in old photographs without revising their behavior. Irina corrects the year on one skating picture. Galina hands her the pencil and turns the page without taking it back.
By late afternoon, the first cleared aircraft starts its engines under the terminal windows. The vibration rises through the floor into my shoes. Mikhail stands with both hands in his pockets while the jet rolls forward.
For once, nobody asks Konstantin to stop the movement.
The aircraft turns at the far edge of the apron, pauses beneath a wash of white deicing mist, then continues toward the runway.
It carries no passengers today. Mikhail has loaded ballast to make the final proving flight match a standard departure, with maintenance staff watching every system from the ground.
When the wheels leave the runway, applause begins among the mechanics nearest the glass.
It travels across the operations floor without becoming a ceremony.
Mikhail lowers his head for a moment, his face visible only to the family standing beside him.
Beyond the window, the aircraft climbs through a colorless sky as if ascent were ordinary again.
I touch his sleeve. "You brought them back."
He looks toward the aircraft climbing above the lake. "A large number of tired people brought them back. I complained until they did it correctly."
"That sounds like leadership."
"Don't tell Konstantin. He'll give me another job when I'm trying to sleep."
The jet banks over the water, its lights remaining visible until the terminal glass loses them.
At home, I leave my clinic shoes beside the garage door.
Konstantin follows me into the kitchen, removing his cuff links while I take a bottle of water from the refrigerator.
One sheet on the counter contains our practical future, including my prenatal appointment on Friday, Grandma's security review after Monday cards, and an estate survey that will wait until Galina decides which ground should remain untouched.
My clinic schedule stays in place. The house from the separation package remains titled in my name, available whether I use it as a residence, lease it, or leave it empty. Nobody suggests folding it back into his holdings now that I chose him.
If security wants to change my route, the team brings me the reason before touching my calendar. My direct police contact remains active. The app account is closed only after investigators preserve its final contents, and no family device can answer through my name.