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It had been almost two years since they had met in the Kremlin and that he would have sworn that their acquaintance would end with him snapping Valery Legasov's neck. Now he was trudging over a thick blanket of snow through streets that had become familiar to him during this time, having bought a well-earned treat for the scientist and his velvet-pawed flatmate. It was a late snow, the last gasp of winter, which buried the constant restlessness of Moscow and brought with it a peculiar silence. A silence that also echoed in him and made a still young and unbridled feeling between silenced thoughts suddenly become so loud that he had to follow it to the Kurchatov Institute to Comrade Legasov's office.
The porter looked at him sceptically through a pane of glass, while the politician, who went in and out of the institute without a second thought, brushed the snow off his shoulders. Like the streets of Moscow, he now followed the corridors almost blindly. A dog returning to its master, an electron finding its way back into the orbit of its nucleus.
The silence stretched through the dark corridors, inviting a scientist like Legasov to lose himself undisturbed in his work, and a man like Shcherbina to lose himself unashamedly and with the same devotion in the vicinity of this scientist. Legasov's work might have been the most important in the entire Soviet Union, but tonight he had to spare a few hours for something that was more important than the Soviet Union or Chernobyl and filled Shcherbina's heart so much that it almost ached. But the pain was forgotten when, after a short knock, he opened the door to his scientist's office and Valery looked at him from behind his desk, startled at first, before giving him one of his rare shy smiles. It filled the silence inside him instantly and before he could put his relief at being reunited into words, Valery had jumped to his side and snuggled up to his chest like a cat that had been deprived of cuddles for too long.
"Borya…" purred his lap cat, "what are you doing here?"
"Keeping a busy man from his work."
With a grin, he ran his hand through Valery's hair, which had darkened over the winter and would soon be coloured by the sun back to a shimmering shade of red.
"And for this," he added, holding Valery's face between his hands and pressing an innocent kiss to his lips. The younger man still visibly struggled to endure affection directed at him, regardless of whether it was their first or hundredth kiss.
He bashfully lowered his head and took Boris' hand, as if he wanted to apologise and make sure the other understood. And Boris understood, understood him and his past, his struggles with it and himself, and the care with which this side of Valery had to be treated. A gentleness that was not at all typical of Boris Shcherbina, but which he was prepared to show anew every day for such a tender and unlikely love.
"Let's go for a walk, Valera."
With his eyebrow raised critically and questioningly as he so often did, the scientist glanced briefly at the window, behind which the wind was blowing thick snowflakes by, unconvinced that this weather was suitable for a housecat like him and probably fearing that the politician wanted to talk about their work away from other people's ears.
"I've missed you," he whispered in Valery's ear and breathed a kiss into his neck, "it's nothing."
Valery's expression relaxed again and he nodded before resting his head briefly on Boris's shoulder and then reluctantly pulling away.
"Give me a minute."
Between piles of files and notebooks, Valery sorted a few loose pieces of paper in an order that only the most ingenious minds could comprehend and which Boris no longer questioned. By now, he had become accustomed to the chaos that always accompanied the academic everywhere and in which he (in most cases) found what he was looking for. He noted with approval the remnants of biscuits scattered all over the table and the usual number of used teacups, as the scientist often forgot to eat and drink when he was completely absorbed in his work and had to be reminded by Boris that the chemical processes of his body also deserved attention in order to function.
"It's not very cold. And a lovely night, too lovely for you to spend it here alone. I've brought you a little something. So you're not ending up empty-handed."
"Mhh, I see, bribery then," Valery replied with a suppressed smile as he slipped on his coat.
"I'm a statesman," Boris murmured and walked towards Valery to close the last buttons for him. "And a diplomat by the way, there's something for the cat too, of course, I don't want to make your roommate jealous."
"She'll soon love you more than me, maybe I should get jealous."
"Like master, like cat," Boris laughed in his deep, raspy voice and couldn't stop himself from hugging Valery once more and wondering how he could bear even a second without this closeness. They stayed like that for a moment, enjoying the intimacy, the warmth of each other, which was so different from everything else around them and which he longed for so much.
At last he detached himself from his beloved atomic nucleus, in whose orbit he belonged, if they both wanted to persist.
"You should always come at this time of day, then there's less chance of you fighting with one of my colleagues," Valery remarked cheerfully as Boris held the door open for him.
"Someone has to tell these arrogant idiots the truth," grumbled Boris, who hated every single one of the rivals who saw Valery's sacrifice as nothing more than an opportunity for their own advancement. He would have preferred never to leave his side, to make sure that no word or deed in this institute or anywhere else could hurt the man who had become the dearest and most precious to him in such a short time. He would personally let the Soviet Union perish if it would save Valery Legasov.
Smiling and shaking his head, Valery walked past him, brushing his hand over his evening visitor's one last time before he was forced to fear any affection out there again. Boris's gaze lingered on Valery's temples, where he could see the scientist's hair turning grayer and thinner by the day. A painful reminder of how little time they had left.
But they were together, here and now.
They didn't need to touch or speak to feel each other's closeness and love. Perhaps they were not particles, but waves that could oscillate together even in death. The scientist himself had explained it to him, this new physics that had led to a whole new understanding of the world in which they lived.
Silently, they stepped out into the cold, white night together, while Valery hunched his shoulders, shook himself and looked at his companion with a playfully reproachful expression, the joy at the sight of his companion obvious on his features.
The soft snow flew into the bright spots of the streetlights, settling on Valery's hair and shoulders and crunching under their shoes. Where the snow had previously swallowed up the sounds and fleeting thoughts of everyday life and longing had filled the void, a familiar warmth spread out that he had not felt for so long and that was entirely Valery Legasov. If they had met under different circumstances, if it had not been necessary to love in secret, if death and their love had not been so inextricably linked, would he have been able to feel the same then? The unstoppable effects of Chernobyl had also dissolved their boundaries, they blurred into one another and yet the politician was not afraid of losing himself. Their waves did not overlap to extinguish each other, they amplified each other.
They turned off the main road into one of the small parks surrounding the institute, where the light from the street lamps was lost among the trees and bushes, just like during their night walks in Pripyat. Unlike there, however, the snow reflected their light and that of the moon, which stood guard over them between the bare branches.
One thing never changed: after a few steps, Valery paused, reached into his pocket, pulled out a cigarette and lighter and, with trembling fingers, tried to light the cigarette between his lips.
Boris also paused, looked at the scientist and wondered where the overwhelming feeling of happiness that had so suddenly overtaken him had come from. Drawn to Valery by this feeling as if by a puppeteer, he reached for the lighter and took his cold hands between his own. Valery's fingers were delicate and slender; next to them, Boris' hands looked like the paws of a bear. He gently brought them to his lips, kissed the knuckles and breathed warmth back into the cold limbs. It was the echo of a night together in Pripyat, he imitated a gesture, the first gentle touch that the younger man had flinched from back then, full of fear, worry and self-loathing. Now there was astonishment on Valery's face and as Boris took the cigarette from his mouth, the gap between his front teeth flashed out in a tentative but so sincere smile. He ran his thumb carefully over the scars on Valery's face, brushed back a few of the thinning strands of hair from his forehead and thought about how this face had become as familiar to him as his own reflection.
The night was quiet. No footsteps, no passing cars disturbed the peace. He knew it was selfish to follow his own instincts. That Valery's shyness had good reasons, that it was right to fear the public and people. But he didn't care, overcome by longing and melancholy, he embraced his scientist. He didn't feel as small as he looked in his big jacket. Tense, broad shoulders slowly gave way under the firm embrace and with a shuddering breath, the warm body nestled against his. The cold night air stung his lungs and he pressed his nose between Valery's neck and shoulder, inhaling beneath the smell of cigarettes and cheap aftershave what was uniquely Valery and spreading through him, numbing any pain.
Valery hesitantly held on to his back, his insecurity evident in the gentle touch, which became firmer every second until he almost returned the politician's relentlessness. For a moment, they merged in this small, quiet spot where the reality that was Chernobyl and this society did not reach that night. He remembered another night in a run-down, dark room in Polissya, where he had asked the chemist about his science, about atoms and neutrons and finally also about the plasma of stars and the sun and how nuclei fused together there. Even the Kurchatov Institute had not yet been able to tame this reaction, it was so uncontrollable that it could only be used as a weapon.
He separated from his nucleus, although fission inevitably led to decay. It hurt and it would always hurt, the price of their connection.
What he felt was reflected in Valery's face and he wished for nothing more than to be able to ignore the laws of his own science and society for him alone. Before the sadness could fully take hold of Valery, he took his face between his large hands and kissed him, briefly but fervently, hoping to put even a fraction of the love and devotion he felt into it.
"Don't think too much about it," Boris murmured, handing him back his cigarette and lighting it for him. A question seemed to fight its way to the surface inside Valery and Boris preceded it by grabbing the scientist's hand to continue walking with him through the quiet night.
He heard Valery's footsteps in the snow, his breath as he took a deep drag from his cigarette, and felt his warmth, even though he had let go of the other man's hand and didn't dare do more than brush against it now and then.
"There's really nothing," Valery whispered barely audibly, "that you want to talk about?"
The worry and fear Boris heard in his words reached straight for his heart and he couldn't help but grab the scientist's hand again in return and squeeze it tightly.
"The night felt lonely without you. I missed you. That's all, really."
For his opponents, the politician used his deep, rumbling voice as a weapon, threatening and shouting to back his victims into a corner. For Valery, the harsh, threatening sound of his voice gave way to a tender and gentle tone that many would not have thought him capable of and which he admittedly only rarely used. Valery had effortlessly coaxed it out again, reminding him that his devotion did not belong to the state alone. That a part of Shcherbina was also this, this night, a longing that was stronger than any state and that he had never thought he would be able to feel again.
Unlike Boris, who pursued this feeling as confidently as anything else, Valery struggled with himself and every gesture of affection, embrace or word. If he didn't fear condemnation from others, he recoiled from his own defamation, which whispered to him that no one could actually love Valery Legasov. Fortunately for Valery, Boris was stubborn and passionate enough to fight these self-doubts every day, to reassure him of his love and not take offense that Valery doubted it.
He could almost hear the wheels turning in Valery's head, who was probably trying hard to work out whether he could really be the sole reason for this nocturnal excursion. At the beginning of their acquaintance, the scientist would have objected, searching for the true, hostile intentions he must have had as a politician. But with each passing day, each passing week, his persistence had convinced Valery more and more that he could trust his words and actions. So he didn't talk back and trotted quietly alongside Boris, in silent agreement that they needed neither a reason nor words to enjoy each other's closeness and understand each other.
They made their way through the snow like this for a while and Boris was sure that Valery sensed the same comforting presence in the silence that every fiber of Boris's body craved and that quieted his soul.
They reached the Moskva River, the deserted promenade along which many Muscovites strolled during the day, but which lay deserted on this night, as if welcoming the last two inhabitants of the city. Only the occasional car rushing past reminded them that they were not alone. But were they ever?
The streetlights and the moon were reflected in the calm water and he even imagined he could make out the stars as tiny bright specks in the water. They were so far away, so unreachable, but their reflection on the black surface of the river seemed so close, as if he only had to reach out to grasp them.
He took Valery's free hand, who was taking a drag from another cigarette, and led him to one of the empty benches where they sat together and held his hand there in his lap. Valery looked at him with a longing that should have been reserved for the stars, proving that underneath all the restraint and insecurity smouldered the same love and devotion that he himself had followed here and that he could no longer hide or keep to himself. Because it was not a weakness to love and he had believed for too long that his strength was at odds with the gentle feelings and tenderness he felt as strongly, perhaps more strongly, than political calculation and the urge for control. Gentleness was not a quality the hot-tempered politician was said to possess, but the way he held Valery's hand, stroking the cold back of it, there was no gentler being in the Soviet Union.
"After my wife's death," the politician's rough, firm voice broke under a weight that made Valery wince, but Boris only gripped the other man's hand tighter, "after her death I devoted my life only to my work, to the Soviet Union. Because I thought it would be enough. To love the state in order not to feel the grief. But what is left of this state after Chernobyl? I was lost. As if she had died once again, along with the other victims..."
Boris looked at the scientist, just as Valery had often looked at cryptic formulas and calculations, at first tense and uncertain, then a little more confident, hopeful that perhaps he had found what he was looking for.
Familiar blue eyes gleamed behind the thick glasses in the light of the lanterns, just as they had done in the small town of Chernobyl in the bright sunlight that had caught in Valery's hair instead of the snowflakes and made the blue of his eyes and the red of his hair appear so vivid. Warm life there, where the cold ashes of the destroyed reactor had settled over the land and its people, warm life here in the snow of a last winter's night.
Back then, as so often, Valery had been the stronger of them. The question of guilt and truth, the future of their country, the future of a lover... everything had weighed on Valery's shoulders as they had led him to the slaughter that had been the Chernobyl trial. And yet Valery had not worried about himself, but about Boris, assuring him that he was the most important thing to him.
He had almost lost Valery and now it was up to him to prove that he felt the same way, that all the losses were worth it if he could steal a few moments with Valery from the clutches of an apparatus that despised and punished them both for it. He had willingly traded the last political power he had left for it, knowing that Valery would never give up his science, no matter how unfairly and cruelly it treated him. And Boris loved and understood him so much that he accepted the suffering that this science brought upon them both. Valery had to know that he did not love him carelessly, but with all the consequences.
"I was convinced that I would never be able to love anyone like that again. That everything I did and felt was for the sole purpose of suppressing a greater, more significant feeling of love and sorrow. To feel less."
His heart pounded and he had to pause once more, overwhelmed by the same emotions he was trying to explain to Valery. To calm himself, he searched Valery's hands for the scars from past mishaps in the lab, ran his fingers over the finger Valery had broken as a child and complained about when he wrote for long periods of time, shaking his hand in pain.
In such a short time, they had gotten to know each other's scars, whether they marked their bodies or their souls.
"No one probably knows better than you. That some things don't get better from being ignored. I realize that now. Chernobyl made me feel her loss all over again, just as painful and unbearable as if she had just died. But Chernobyl didn't just bring this memory of her back to the surface, Chernobyl brought me you."
He couldn't go on, say what he wanted to say, without continuing to seek Valery's proximity, so he leaned towards him, pulled his cold face closer and kissed the ever troubled eyebrows.
"Between all the suffering," he whispered to him, "I found something else that I thought I had lost forever. Valera, you are not her, but... in you I have found that love again. You are so much happiness in this misery. I love you, Valery, more than the Soviet Union or this world."
Boris had never been good at showing his affection so openly, at not conforming to the image of a man who made grand gestures of love only for the socialist state, but he did it for Valery as naturally as he had brought him 5,000 tons of sand and boron, a lunar rover or gingerbread from his hometown. Chernobyl had made him a different man, the consequences of the catastrophe had changed his cells and DNA like radiation had changed the country. If they had destroyed something in him, Valery had put it back together again, different perhaps from what it had been before, but no less himself. From his fingertips holding Valery's face to his chest, he felt all the cracks being filled, all the wounds numbed, a balance in his heart and soul that only the closeness of the other could provide.
Noble gases were one of Valery's favorite topics, and unfortunately Boris understood far too little of his research, but he had grasped the basics, the most important parts. Because they defined his life after Chernobyl. Because he, too, was an element that strove for the stability that characterized this group in the periodic table and that he had lost. And that he had regained in his relationship with Valery.
He didn't know if this equation also applied to Valery. Who the scientist had been before Chernobyl, whether Chernobyl had changed him just as much, and whether Boris could ever be enough to replace the science that had abandoned the scientist after he had devoted his life to it. But it didn't change the devotion of the politician, who had also been abandoned by politics. It didn't change his love.
"Borya," Valery whispered, leaning into the gentle touch, then reaching for his hand and looking at him so timidly and vulnerably that Boris feared he had made Valery's burden heavier. But despite his obvious concern and all his characteristic shyness, the courageous scientist suddenly held his head firmly and kissed him.
They had grown accustomed to stolen kisses in the darkness of a deserted city, to the art of hiding feelings that were too big for secrecy in every little touch or gesture. On some days, the particularly difficult days, Boris could no longer bear this charade. He threw himself at his scientific advisor at the first opportunity, needing to feel Valery's closeness, his warmth, his life. If Boris' love was that of a loyal and passionate St. Bernard, Valery's was like a cat purring around his legs, but keeping an eye on its surroundings, ready to flee to safety at any moment. This made Valery's love and trust all the more precious to him. Because it triumphed over a memory, a fear that had burned itself into Valery's soul before he had really grown up, because he had always been the braver of the two, and one that Boris had been unable to protect him from. It wasn't cowardice, but a survival instinct, and Boris himself had begged Valery to obey it instead of condemning himself, his science, and his country in front of the whole world. But Chernobyl had changed Valery too, allowing him to say the unspeakable without regard for the consequences for his own life and finally to do what he had never dared to do before. Not for the protection of others or for the truth or any noble ideals, but selfishly for himself, for feelings that overshadowed even his old survival instinct.
After his confession had burned on his heart and tongue, the warmth that now spread through him was tender and gentle, however vehemently it was expressed by Valery. He pressed Valery even closer to him by his shoulders, just as greedily and without regard for the world that surrounded them. It was only when they had to let go of each other to catch their breath that Boris dared to look around. The night lay as calm and deserted as before, untouched by their passion, and he should have breathed a sigh of relief at this realization, but intoxicated by Valery's closeness, he almost wished that all of Moscow saw and understood how unique and absolute their bond was, better than any of the chemical compounds Valery had wasted state money on in his lab.
Still a little out of breath, Valery rested his head on his shoulder with a sigh.
"Thank you, Borya," he murmured as Boris buried his nose in his hair and closed his eyes to focus on Valery alone again, "thank you for telling me."
He searched for Boris' hands and clasped them as if seeking support for what he was going to say next.
"I don't know if I can ever live up to it. But... I will try. I've been alone for so long Borya, but I meant it, you're the most important thing, for Chernobyl, yes, but most of all for me. And without you..."
Boris heard Valery take a deep breath and exhale with a hitch, then the politician straightened up and saw his beloved rational academic trying to blink away his tears.
"It's all right, Мой любимый," Boris assured him tenderly. Before the tears could run down his cheeks he kissed them away on both sides and took him in his arms, hugging him tightly and hoping that he could somehow make Valery understand that he was enough and would always be enough.
"It's not something you have to earn. It's just the way it is. Don't think too much about it. You worry too much, you always do."
"I love you," Valery sobbed into his shoulder and Boris stroked the back of his neck, where some of his unruly hair was curling.
"I love you too, Moй кот[1]," Boris replied and was sure he had coaxed a grin out of his cat at the pet name. Lost in thought, he stroked the snowflakes from Valery's shoulder which were melting under his fingers. The snow still lay in a thick blanket over the city, swallowing up their voices and footsteps, reflecting the light of the street lamps and the moon, but tomorrow all that would begin to disappear under the weak spring sun, turning this night into a fragile memory that ran through his hands.
Valery's shoulders felt firm under his hands. Firm and warm and alive.
"Borya, I really love you, but it's cold."
A deep, rumbling laugh shook the politician's chest and the scientist in his arms, who looked at him from under a raised eyebrow, his eyes swollen and his shy smile revealing the gap between his teeth.
"So I'm not warm enough for you, I see."
"And you don't purr."
"Unlike you."
Laughing, he pulled Valery to his feet, then had to lean on him as a painful cough overwhelmed him, causing his whole body to shake with pain, an affliction that had become increasingly frequent lately.
"Borya, you'll feel better with some warmth and a cup of tea," Valery assured him worriedly after he had caught his breath, placing his hands on Boris' chest.
With a nod he took Valery's hand and together they followed their footsteps back a short distance until they were back in Soviet reality, where men did not love each other and nuclear reactors did not explode.
Valery's apartment was not far from the institute, so he didn't have to wait long for warmth, and Boris didn't have to wait long to caress and spoil the scientist as he deserved. They had barely closed the apartment door behind them when Boris grabbed his prey and pushed Valery against the coat rack, putting into this kiss everything he had said and felt so deeply that it was almost impossible to contain when he brought it to the surface.
"Don't try to distract me from your tea," Valery complained, smiling and out of breath, only to bend down to the cat, who greeted them with her tail raised. "Hello, Molecule, Dad brought you something."
"The way to a cat's heart is through its stomach. And the way to a scientist's heart, I've learned."
After hanging up their jackets, he led the cat and the scientist into the kitchen, where he had already deposited their treats in Valery's mostly sparse refrigerator. While Valery filled the samovar, Boris began to fillet the fish for the cat, accompanied by Valery's admonitions to make sure to remove all the bones.
Molecule greedily pounced on the neatly filleted fish, and Valery looked almost as greedy at the watrushka that Boris served him after finding his plate and cutlery in the now familiar mess. As a true proof of his love, Valery first prepared the tea for Boris before he began to devour the sweet pastry.
"That's exactly what I needed today, thank you Borya," Valery mumbled with his mouth full, his content and satisfied expression underlining his words.
"Is there a day when you don't need cake?"
"Well, some days I need it more than others."
Boris was happy about every bite Valery took; his appetite had become so poor that some days he didn't eat anything unless Boris forced him to, and his suits, which were terrible fits to begin with, fit even worse.
They usually talked about their work, what little of it they had left, which often made him either depressed or angry. So they talked about everything else, about Boris' daughter, the cat's new favorite sleeping places, or how much Boris missed skiing and how Valery preferred to spend cold snowy winter days in bed or on his sofa.
"Then we should make ourselves comfortable there, what do you think?" Boris suggested as Valery picked the last crumbs off his plate with his fingers.
"Oh yes, you can warm me up again."
They spent the rest of the evening cuddled up together on the much too small sofa, Valery half lying on Boris with the cat on his stomach. Boris read to him an article from a chemical journal that he didn't understand at all, which prompted Valery to give another lecture on noble gases. But eventually they lay there together in silence, in the quiet night, with the wind still blowing the snow past the window, the only sound Valery's quiet breathing, the only feeling the beating of his heart, the only thought that he could no longer exist without him.