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If someone had told twenty-year-old Mikhail he would be celebrating the holidays with a spouse and daughter, he would have called them a liar.
If someone had told twenty-year-old Mikhail he would be ‘marrying’ a man– a Jewish one, no less– he would have called them a fool.
Well.
“Da,” says Clara, snuggling into Mikhail’s gigantic arms. She gurgles a little bit. “A-ba ba ba ba. Da-da. Pfah-tee.”
She sounds, Mikhail thinks, all the world like a human baby. Herbert must’ve been serious when he said he was planning to give her vocal cord surgery, then.
Maybe she’ll be talking like a human some day. Hopefully she will not have a mouth on her like her Uncle Jeremy– or, you know, like Uncle Jeremy’s children.
(Although, tragically, Mikhail is not too well-versed on the minds of babies; Herbert says a great deal of phrases like sensorimotor or theory of mind and what have you, which Mikhail’s English vocabulary is still slightly too limited to fully understand in context…)
“Yes, very good, darling,” Herbert coos. His attention turns to Mikhail, a grin splitting his face. “Misha, look, she’s making such amazing progress already, isn’t she?”
“Yes, she is,” Mikhail says, stifling a laugh.
“Ba-da,” Clara says, raising a furry hand up to the shamash. She giggles.
“Oh, no, no, малышка, we do not touch that—”
“Ach, it’s alright, Misha.” Herbert smiles. “She’s just curious, isn’t she? And who are we to stop that?”
Reluctantly, Mikhail relents. “Be careful, though.”
“When am I ever not?” Herbert says, scoffing. He brings Clara slightly closer to the menorah and hands her a match. “There you go, darling. You do the honors.”
Somehow, she manages to both firmly grasp the match in her tiny little fingers and successfully light the first candle. The flame writhes into existence, dancing up and down and up and down, but never growing too large.
And Herbert’s grin grows ever wider, and Mikhail does, admittedly, feel a surge of pride within himself. It’s certainly better than the panic it’s just replaced, at least.
Herbert murmurs something quickly, sing-song, and Mikhail supposes it must be in Hebrew (his father knew some, he’s sure, but he never bothered to teach him).
“...amen,” he sings, voice light and soft. “Alright, Clara, liebling, I’ll get your present now, hm?” He smiles, then turns to Mikhail. “And yours too, Misha. Could you be a mensch and get the mashed-up latkes from the fridge–”
“Да.” Mikhail does just that. It’s a little container of potato-mush– it doesn’t look particularly appetizing when compared to the real latkes, quite frankly, but Clara certainly can’t begin to eat solid food just yet. He sets her down in her high chair and takes out a large spoon.
“Pa, pa, pa,” she says, wiggling about. “Papuuuu– uhl– ya!”
“Close enough.” Mikhail laughs lightly. “You must open up, alright?”
And Clara, darling little angel of a child she somehow is (relatively, anyways), obliges. She swallows the latke mush and does not even spit much of it out at all, which Mikhail considers to be a very good sign indeed. Only a little bit of her onesie ends up being stained.
(And she is an easy baby– by baboon standards, that is. She cries often, but not more than is normal for babies. She is energetic, but prefers not to tear the entire house apart. And they can speak English and German and Russian and get the impression that her little brain is taking it in, translating it to babble in her vocal cords.)
Clara has just the most adorable set of big brown eyes– and, at this point, she has already almost figured out how to use them to her advantage. Such is the consequence of implanting a human brain into a primate, Mikhail supposes. She really does make his heart melt like almost nothing else can.
(And, of course, such is the reason she is absolutely spoiled rotten by her grandmother and aunts whenever they come to visit…)
There is the sound of creaking wood from behind Mikhail. Instinctively, he turns around– but it is just Herbert, of course, because there is no one else it could be.
“I have your presents!” he exclaims, a gleam in his eyes. “Here, here, take them.” To Mikhail, he hands a medium-sized rectangle wrapped in silvery paper and tied with a powder-blue bow; to Clara, he hands a smaller box. Mikhail echoes the motion, and sets a box of his own down on the table before her.
“Alright then,” he says, and takes the box Herbert has given him into consideration. He unwraps it, and as the shape suggests, it is a book.
Not just any book, though. It’s a signed copy of Tolstoy’s Resurrection. Despite how aged it clearly should be, the thick hard-cover shows only minimal wear, and the pages are slightly yellowed but altogether not too softened. And it’s beautiful. Mikhail’s never seen a cover like this before– it looks very expensive, frankly.
He looks up, raises an eyebrow. “Herbert, любимый, how much did this cost you?”
“Oh, you know, an arm and a leg.” Then, to clarify: “Not my arms or legs, of course.”
“Yes,” Mikhail says drily. “Of course.” And softer: “Спасибо, Herbert.”
“It was no trouble at all.” Herbert smiles. “And now your turn, hm, Clara?”
Clara babbles in agreement. Out come her presents from the wrapping: Mikhail has given her a teddy bear, and Herbert has given her a stuffed doll displaying a replication of the human nervous system. She seems to much prefer the former.
“Do not worry, Clara,” Mikhail says, if only to placate her not-so-subtle disappointment. “You will get presents for американское Рождество, too.” Lucky thing, she is.
“Yes, you will!” Even if Herbert does not celebrate Smissmas so much as one typically might, he does not seem to have any issue with participating in some of its traditions. Mikhail vaguely recalls a time where he sang Smissmas carols with the Pyro and Demoman and, when prompted by Mikhail, claimed it was because they were in ‘desperate need’ of his ‘gorgeous tenor voice,’ then lapsed into a rant about how he had wanted to be an opera singer for a time as a child. “Besides, I think we spoil you enough as it is.”
Mikhail feels inclined to agree. “Oh, here, now you should have your present. I insist.” He holds out a box wrapped in cream-white paper, and Herbert takes it graciously.
He unwraps it, and there it is, just as Mikhail carefully picked it out: a little metal case, engraved with the rod of Asclepius and sprigs of garlic to its sides. And inside, carefully-placed surgical instruments, all lined up in a row.
A gasp. “New tools…oh, they’re beautiful. Danke schön, ziskayt.”
“Я тебя люблю,” Mikhail says cheerily. “Happy Chanukah, родной. Even if you say it is not that important of a holiday.”
“It is not,” Herbert agrees. “But I love you too. More than anything.”
He leans over and plants a kiss on Mikhail’s lips, firm and purposeful.
(Clara makes a noise of what Mikhail can only assume is disgust. Alas, it does not dissuade him.)