Chapter 9 #2
“We can do this for as long as we have to,” Anton said, still determined to save every patient no matter how bad the odds, and how horrifying the injuries, given the kind of bombs and weapons the Russians were using, allegedly all on the war crimes list.
“It feels like the loaves and the fishes in the Bible every day,” Sasha said, and he smiled at her.
Even exhausted, with no makeup, and her hair in a clip helter-skelter, she was so beautiful, and he loved her more each day, for what she tried to do.
They both did. She refused to give up on anyone, and so did he.
He was sewing people up with whatever he had to use, and acted as though he were operating in the most luxurious well-stocked hospital, when they could have been doing surgeries in a campground or at an airport, as bad as the conditions were.
And Sasha delivered babies wherever she had to.
She went to deliver them in bomb shelters, in basements, in bathrooms, wherever she was called, or when rescuers came across people in need.
Wartime was so cruel sometimes as to who she and Anton could save and who they couldn’t.
They both cried when they lost a child, and the other doctors and nurses did too.
Sometimes they would share a meal with one of the other physicians or medics, or midwives or nurses, and talk about how insane the conditions were in wartime.
Four months before, they’d been normal doctors and medical personnel, and now they had to be magicians, acrobats, jugglers, and miracle workers.
They managed it more often than they thought they could.
The nature of the weapons and artillery being used was creating vastly magnified damage, sometimes with toxic substances on the bombs that would worsen the degree of burns and damage to human flesh.
Chemical warfare had not been used yet, but they were all terrified it would be.
Not to mention nuclear threats that would blow the conflict into a world war, which everyone was trying to avoid.
The price would be just too high for that, for the entire world.
But the nuclear threats were convincing and terrifying.
Even the doctors felt like they were walking a tightrope every day.
The doctors were living on reduced food rations too.
At first, the food at the hospital was plentiful, but as the supply lines were cut and the towns surrounded and barricaded, there was no easy way to distribute food.
Sasha had lost about ten pounds she didn’t need to lose, and Anton had lost at least as much if not more.
Patients and some of the medical personnel were living in a huge underground shelter the hospital had cleared in the basement.
Anton and Sasha preferred the privacy of their broom closet, and they could make love there if they had the desire or the energy.
Both had been waning lately, but not their feelings for each other, which grew stronger as the war got tougher, with the enemy more aggressive every day, punishing the Ukrainians because they refused to surrender.
The Ukrainians were far tougher than the Russians had anticipated, with a charismatic, courageous leader who refused to accept the enemy’s conditions and surrender.
The Russian army was being decimated by both professional and civilian military personnel, but the Russian government didn’t care, and claimed victory after every battle, which fortunately wasn’t true.
The Ukrainians were holding their ground, and winning in some instances, but the death toll and injuries were high on both sides.
There was no accurate record of the death toll now, because so many unidentified victims were buried in mass graves.
It was the ugliest side of war, bodies lying in the streets with tarps and blankets over them.
People were getting used to it, which was another terrible part of war.
Death began to seem commonplace, except for the children, who were a tragedy unto themselves.
Sasha wanted to take all the orphans home with her, take them in her arms and comfort them when she saw them crying, but there weren’t enough arms in the world to hold them, or enough parents to care for them.
There was no way to soothe all the ills of the world now.
There were too many tragedies to count every single day.
—
Anton hadn’t heard from Iryna since she arrived in Madrid.
He had no reason to, and he didn’t contact her either.
He didn’t have time, he knew she was safe, and he didn’t want to speak to her.
Danilo reported that she was well and adjusting to life in Madrid.
It was all Anton needed to hear. They had agreed when she left that it was over between them, and divorce was the only option left.
But there was no way to set it in motion with the war on.
Public offices were closed, courts were not in session, judges and lawyers were in bomb shelters like other citizens, or had fled the country until the fighting ended.
A divorce was entirely irrelevant at the moment.
And all he knew was that he loved Sasha as he had never loved anyone before.
In the few minutes before they fell asleep at night, Anton talked about the places where he wanted to go with Sasha.
Paris and Venice. He said he wanted to see the pyramids in Egypt with her one day.
He had been fascinated by them since his boyhood, for their size and majesty and mystery.
He wanted to go on picnics with her, and swim in the ocean.
He promised to teach her how to fish. He had grown up in Mariupol and wanted to show it to her, but now there was nothing left to see.
Sasha wanted to go skiing with him. She had been a downhill racer as a girl and almost made the Olympics. He admitted to being a terrible skier and she promised to teach him.
Anton was in regular contact with his son by text.
Danilo mentioned at times that his mother was a little lost in Spain without friends or the ability to communicate in Spanish.
He didn’t know about the divorce yet, and Anton was surprised that his mother hadn’t told him.
He doubted it would come as a surprise. Danilo had lived in the war zone between them all his life, with the social life and signs of opulence Iryna wanted to surround herself with, and Anton didn’t care about.
He had refused to join in her determined hunt to meet and associate with showy, “important” people, who were of no interest to him.
They had been a mismatch from the first. Iryna’s family was poor but ambitious.
With both their families medically oriented for three generations, Anton and Sasha had much more in common, and their only goal was to bring healing and comfort to their patients, even now.
Their educations were similar, and their interests, and it made a difference, as history had taught Anton the hard way.
Danilo was an interesting combination of his parents.
He liked some of the social life his mother enjoyed, though not to excess, and he was as broad-minded and steeped in the medical world of his colleagues as his father was.
His values were more grounded, like Anton’s.
He wasn’t impressed by riches and fame, but by people of valor with good values.
Anton was proud of him, and couldn’t wait to see him again.
Sasha was looking forward to meeting him.
Anton and Sasha had managed to squeeze a second cot into the broom closet that was now their home.
She was constantly on call at the hospital.
Other medical staff had also found places to sleep, so they could stay when they were needed or when it was too dangerous to go home.
Sasha and Anton were lying side by side on their double cots one night, talking about the trips they would take after the war. Sasha had just added Rome to the list.
She had been in her teens and loved it, and hadn’t been since.
They were talking in low voices in the dark when the air raid sirens went off, which happened several times a night.
Sometimes they went down to the shelter in the basement, and sometimes they were too tired to move, and stayed in their locked broom closet.
But the patients who could be moved were taken to the huge shelter under the hospital by the nurses and orderlies on duty.
“Oh God,” Sasha said in the darkness. There were no windows in their closet, which made it safer. “I’m so tired, do we have to? I can’t move.” They slept in scrubs in case they had to leave quickly, with shoes right next to them, in case there was broken glass on the floor.
“We should probably go,” Anton said, as tired as she was, and as soon as he said it, it felt like a wrecking ball had hit the hospital not far from where they lay.
They heard the explosion after they felt the impact and they both leapt off their cots and slipped on their shoes.
In a single swift gesture Sasha unlocked the door, and they both ran through it.
They knew it would self-lock as soon as it closed, and they had nothing of value there.
Sasha didn’t own anything after her building was bombed and didn’t care.
She and Anton had the only keys to the closet.