Hinterlands
Feb. 16th, 2009 12:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
taras_olekseiTaras Oleksei was a long way from home.
He knew it with a certainty that lived quietly under his tattooed chest, as if he could feel how far he was from Leningrad.
It was nights like this - lying in bed, alone, bare skin freshly showered, warm under clean sheets - that he felt it more keenly than he did during the day.
Where you are isn't as important as who you're with, Lasha had said, and he was right, but when Taras was alone, the where grew longer, like a shadow under a low, harsh sun that never set, and just as hard to escape.
He held the phone against his ear, waiting, eyes closed to the darkness.
There was a pause, then a click.
"Connecting you now, sir," the operator told him.
The phone began to ring, and it sounded close.
He knew it with a certainty that lived quietly under his tattooed chest, as if he could feel how far he was from Leningrad.
It was nights like this - lying in bed, alone, bare skin freshly showered, warm under clean sheets - that he felt it more keenly than he did during the day.
Where you are isn't as important as who you're with, Lasha had said, and he was right, but when Taras was alone, the where grew longer, like a shadow under a low, harsh sun that never set, and just as hard to escape.
He held the phone against his ear, waiting, eyes closed to the darkness.
There was a pause, then a click.
"Connecting you now, sir," the operator told him.
The phone began to ring, and it sounded close.
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Date: 2009-02-18 10:53 am (UTC)He rose, lost for words, hanging his towel over the back of the chair haphazardly.
He reached for the covers and drew them back, sliding beneath with a shiver.
The satin sheets were always cold and sleek at first, before his body warmed them up, much like Major Isaev.
"Unless there's you."
He lay back, eyes closed, saying nothing for a moment.
Then he exhaled, slowly.
"An arabesque is a controlled leg raise. I'll show you, when you come back, if you want to see it."