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It had been three days since Lara opened her home up to the weary, dubbing it “the shelter” and providing the care she was so apt to give away to her distressed neighbors. The way her mind immediately went to tenderness and care was unfathomable. Truth be told, this plague business had shaken Yulia up a fair bit. She was a smart woman— educated. A mathematician, someone who knew logical worry from townsfolk chatter. Whatever was happening now must be dealt with swiftly; though, she had not a clue how it was to be done. It seemed like Burakh’s son, the one who had just returned on the eve of the outbreak, was the only medic equipped to deal with this in any capacity (well, besides that Capital swish Dankovsky), and Yulia listened to his large body move over hushed chatter in the other room. She took a languid drag off her cigarette, watching embers at the end curdle off to die in the ashtray. What smokes were left in shops were madly expensive so she had been attempting to pace herself, but in fiddling with the sad stub in her hand she knew it wasn’t an achievable goal. Things were just so stressful. In the other room, a chair scraped across the floor and Lara gave a muffled goodbye. Clunky footsteps, a door shutting. An exasperated sigh.
Yulia rose, smothering the last of the thoroughly-smoked cigarette into ash. Quietly, as if not to spook the other woman, she padded into the kitchen. Lara was sitting at her dining table— rounded, intimate— hands folded, anxiously tracing the mountains and valleys of her own knuckles. Her eyes, kind and deep like the ocean, were staring at the doorknob only half-focused.
“How is he… Burakh’s son?”
Yulia’s voice, rich and strong, brought Lara back to the current moment. “Artemy’s, ah, well. Imagine being the only surgeon during a plague.”
“Oh, officially a plague now? I still had a bit of hope that Capital man would have aided in reducing the spread, but alas,” Yulia mused, sitting in the only other chair at the table. “I’ve spoken to him a few times. He is a smart man— a theorist, which leads to interesting conversation, but he is too fond of hearing himself speak. I didn’t have much hope in him, but enough that I feel a bit foolish.” She thumbs at the carton in her pocket. “I’m running low on smokes too. And at a time like this…”
“He… he said he wants to get our old friend group back together,” Lara blurts, the glaze returning to her eyes once again. Fear, Yulia thinks.“Like a reunion.”
She hums in response. “Really? When?”
“Soon, he says. Before things get bad.”
“If things get any worse, Saborouv will implement a quarantine. I say it ought to be before daybreak tomorrow. Has he thought of that?”
“Unlikely.”
Yulia tsks quietly. “Who has he invited?”
“Myself, Stantislav Rubin, and Grigory— the, uh, warehouse ringleader. We grew up together.”
There is a moment, awkward but expected, where she considers this. “You spent your adolescence with those men?”
“It was mostly my childhood. We parted ways around when I was… 17? 16? It had been rocky for a few years before, though. But we had a lot of fun as young ones.” Lara was smiling now, obviously reliving wonderful memories. Yulia sat, letting her.
“I never really connected with other people until a few years ago. They were all I knew. Them and my father.”
“Not many… women in your life, then?”
Lara looks taken aback by the observation, framed as a question but spoken as an accusation. She thinks. “I suppose no, not many. I’m glad to have met you.”
“Likewise, both for my own sake and yours.” She means it. They let the pleasant nature of the complement settle, then Yulia resumes asking “Will anything come of it?”
“It’s truly hard to say. Stakh is very jealous of Artemy. He always was, a bit, but it was outweighed by affection. When Artemy left for the Capital, that changed things. The outbreak years ago— do you remember that? Well, that was the nail in the coffin for the two of them. Rubin didn’t even speak to me much after that. And Grigory, I’m sure you’ve heard rumors. I have no idea what’s true and what’s not, and I’d prefer to keep it that way. I would very much like to not have to burn my good memories of him. So,” Lara sighs, “if he can get us together, I’ll go for his sake, but if not… might be for the best.”
“I was in the Capital for the last outbreak,” Yulia answers, responding to the only part of Lara’s explanation she knows how to. “But I heard of the scope. If this is anything like what I heard…”
“Artemy Says it’s worse.”
Habitually, Yulia picks at her cigarette pack. Deciding to trade one vice for another, she unceremoniously stands from her chair and makes it over to a cabinet against the wall, with glass doors encasing oddly shaped glass bottles. She opened it, picking up an unusually tall bottle with a long neck, and held it as if questioning Lara. “Enough talk of plague, no?”
“God, Yulia, is this really the time to pull out twyrine? We can stop talking about the Pest if it makes you nervous, but…”
Her houseguest, sighing under her breath as she brings two glasses to the table, disregards her hesitance.
“My dear, listen. I’ve attended enough evenings at the Stamatin’s place to understand the difference between good twyrine and shit twyrine. You have a cabinet of the best an herb can brew, sitting there untouched as if mocking me. And on the eve of the apocalypse you still think there is a situation more apt?” The cork makes an appealing popping noise as it’s opened. The smell, earthen and pungent, is so rich that it alone is almost enough to induce headrush. It pours nicely, settling as a purple pool in a glass that is pushed in Lara’s direction.
“For a woman of the Capital, you sure behave like some of the men around here.”
“What, because I drink and speak my mind?”
Lara stammers, embarrassed. Yulia watches her face turn red and the corners of her mouth upturn. “No, forget it. I was only joking. You are very much a woman.”
Yulia hums contentedly, still looking sweetly at her beet-red companion. They each take sips from their glasses, Yulia with a casual ease and Lara with anxious, frequent gulps. A nice silence rests between them.
“I am glad you are my friend,” Lara declares. Her glass is half empty.
“Are we friends now?” Yulia chuckles. “I heard rumors you thought me much too intense— cold, stoic.”
Lara hums dismissively. “Well, maybe at one point I did falsely judge you, I can’t remember, but if I did I’m saying now that I was wrong. I must’ve mistaken your… intensity, for stoicism. But you’re very kind to me.”
“My intensity?”
“Yes, you’ve an… intense way of doing things. Know what you want. I don’t mind it, though.”
“Ah,” Yulia says, “that’s why you compared me to a man earlier. Well, yes, I guess in that aspect we’re similar. But… not the same.” She moves slightly closer to her friend as she speaks, confidently and smoothly. She’d been avoiding Yulia’s eyes for a better part of the evening, but in her twyrine-induced delirium Lara made the mistake of looking at her properly, and now she couldn’t look away. She wanted to scream, and didn’t know if it was because of fear or excitement. Perhaps both.
“Not the same…”
“Mm, I like to think I’m much better.”
“I— I wouldn’t know,” Lara admits. “But I’d like to.”
“How intense of you,” her guest teases. Her slender hand moves to Lara’s knee, tentatively and gentle. When a gasp barely escapes her but she doesn’t move, it settles solidly. Lara can feel it’s heat through her skirt, which travels directly to her brain. A decision has to be made, she realizes, and unlike everything else in this godforsaken town, she will not overly complicate it. With a final scan of Yulia’s flushed face, looking a bit smug, she moves in to press their lips together. It’s quite nice, she thinks, even though she’s terribly unsure of what she’s doing. Yulia is being very patient with her, and the hand not on her knee is caressing her neck and helping her move in the way she’s supposed to. She has a single moment where she thinks too much about what she’s doing, about what they’re doing, about kissing a woman, Yulia , on the eve of the plague, and she backs away semi-abruptly.
Immediately, Yulia asks, “What’s wrong? Did I do something—”
“I kissed you,” Lara blurts, extremely uncoolly.
“You… yes, you did,” she confirms, confused.
“A-and you’re not mad at me.”
“Quite the opposite, actually.” Her index fingers trace small, reassuring circles into the other woman’s thigh.
“I didn’t think you liked…that you were… with women…?” she trails off. “Wait, I’m drunk, you might just be drunk too. Never mind.”
“Lara, please look at me.” She does, embarrassed. “I am , and I do, with women. Okay? I thought you were teasing me about my interests earlier, by saying I ‘wanted like a man’. I thought you were flirting. I’m terribly sorry to have confused you—”
“No, wait, I-I was ,” she stutters, not for the first time tonight. “Flirting… I mean. I didn’t think you would notice, though.”
“You didn’t think I would notice an incredibly attractive woman flirting with me in her own home? Lara, I know I nurse a drink perhaps more than I should, but my capacities still function regularly.”
Lara’s face betrays her so easily, Yulia thinks. Just when she thinks it can’t get any redder.
“I thought I was the only one like this,” she whispers.
“Dear, look at me. Look,” she gestures to herself. “You think I look this good for— who? Bachelor Dankovsky? Please.”
Lara giggles slightly at that, her tense shoulders easing just barely. Yulia’s hand is still at her leg. “I can’t believe nobody’s shown you otherwise yet. You’re so pretty.”
Slower this time, both more sure of herself and trepidatious to admit it, Lara kisses her again. This time she moves her hands to rest on Yulia’s shoulder and cheek. This time, it’s easier, kinder, and sweeter. It makes Lara’s heart swell. Yulia is the one to move back this time, though not as quickly as the other woman did. She pecks the corner of Lara’s mouth as she pulls herself away.
“But you are drunk,” she admits. “And I’m not that scummy, I’m afraid. As much as I wish I was in this very moment.”
“Oh, damn you,” Lara sighs. “Well, that’s your fault. I was perfectly content to stay sober tonight.”
“Stay sober and continue to let you think you’re the only woman in this forsaken town who fancies other women? Hm, yes, I do think I forgive myself just this once.” Her hands find Lara’s and join together, comfortably resting atop the table. “If only for selfish reasons.”
The moon is bright in the sky now. Lara wonders if Artemy got home safe while Yulia handles her hands as if they were made of gold. Pale light slips through the window panes, doing more to illuminate the room then the dying candle atop the stove does.
“Will you sleep here tonight?”
Yulia, for the first time tonight, truly looks bewildered.
“Just to sleep! Just sleeping.” She rambles, frantic and red once more. “It’s been hard to sleep lately. You can borrow a nightshirt— I think I have ones large enough for you.”
“How could I reject such an appealing offer?” Both faces are pink with happiness and twyre.
That night, Lara is comfortably warm, and in Yulia’s arms, she dreams.