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Moscow, 1995.
“Ilyushik!” Irina Rozanova laughed.
Her four-year-old son was padded to the max in his blue parka, his gray mittens peeking out from his sleeves, his hat so low on his forehead it was nearly covering his eyes. On his feet were his brother’s old skates, and on his face, a sour expression that filled Irina’s heart with the purest joy.
Ilya had been used to the usual routine: wake up, get dressed, eat breakfast, walk with Mama and Alexei to school. Walk home. But today had been different. They’d walked somewhere else, hopped on the bus, and ended up in a new, strange place that seemed halfway familiar. A huge oval of ice, people skating, but different. This wasn’t like where they went with Alexei after school.
This was completely outside. No buzzy, fluorescent lighting that cast a yellowish tinge on the ice. None of the damp, mildewed smell that filled the rink’s air. Just crisp winter air and a bright sun.
From her bag, Irina retrieved her skates and Alexei’s from when he was Ilya’s age. Even Alexei’s skates had been hand-me-downs from an untold number of previous owners. She had replaced the laces and mended the fraying tongue of the boot herself. There was no chance they’d be able to afford even half of Alexei’s gear new. She made do with what she could find and revive with her own two hands.
She’d laced her own boots first, showing Ilya what to expect, then sat him on the bench to lace his own. His small legs dangled from the bench, four inches off the floor, unaware his mother was trying to grab his foot. When she had wrestled him into his skates, she stood him up.
Ilya looked up at her warily, still unwilling to walk. Whatever she had put on his feet felt weird, and now he was standing taller than usual, unsure of what to do.
“Look,” she said, standing up tall on her brown leather skates, grabbing his mittened hand in her own. Her curly, golden hair had been secured in a braid behind her back, covered in her knit white hat she’d made herself. “Mama has her skates on now, too!”
Ilya looked at the ice. It was mostly old men and women, the occasional mother with her children. Everyone else was at work.
He watched as every now and then, a child went tumbling down on the ice and stared at his mother with a nervous expression. If that was what skating meant, then he didn’t want that.
“Come on,” she said, with a cheerful nudge toward the rink. “I've got you. You won’t fall, I promise.”
—
Ilya’s first time on the ice was underwhelming. He was content to let his mother grab his hands and glide him around, watching as she skated backwards effortlessly, lithe and mesmerizing. For a moment, it was only them on the ice. He watched as her face turned pink in the cold, her face frozen into a smile.
—
Wake up. Get dressed. Eat breakfast. Alexei to school… and again, the rink, and again, more skating.
“We don’t have to skate,” Irina offered, kneeling in front of her son, zipping up his coat and pulling up his hood. Ilya blinked. He hadn’t been sure what he wanted to do. It all seemed too complicated. Whenever she had let go of his hand, for half a second, he could feel himself lose his balance until she had grabbed on again. He hadn’t wanted her to let go.
He shook his head, his face always scrunched in that sour, grumpy expression that made Irina laugh.
“You look like grandpa with that face,” she said. “My little old man. Your face is going to freeze like that, Ilyusha.”
And her laugh was always contagious enough that he’d relent, laughing with her.
“Come on, bunny,” she said. “We can’t let Alexei have all the fun, can we?”
—
It had taken many, many lessons before Ilya had gotten the hang of it. He much preferred the lazy gliding he could do next to his mother, his skates railroad straight. No pushing, no thinking, and best of all, no falling. It upset him a great deal to fall on the ice. He felt the heat rise in his face, the burning embarrassment of feeling he had failed, somehow.
“See? You’re just like your mama!” she would say.
She told him stories on the ice how she had been taught to skate in school.
“I was the worst one,” she would say. “I was always falling down. I was so clumsy and uncoordinated. So it’s my duty to make sure you don’t end up like me.”
—
“Mama! Mama!” Ilya said, rushing to his parent’s bedroom with his skates. He’d created a precarious stack of books piled high on a kitchen chair to grab them from the closet.
Irina was still in bed, her eyes unfocused, the feeling of needing to do everything and wanting to do nothing scratching at her like a street dog.
“Mama,” he whispered as he tiptoed to her bedside. Irina rolled over and looked at her son, her stomach dropping as she told him, “Not today, sweetheart.”
Ilya dropped the skates with a frown. They landed on the carpet with a light thud, tumbling into the mess of the already untidy room.
“Why?” he asked in his little voice.
Her heart shattered.
“Mama isn’t feeling well,” she said, swallowing hard, forcing her tears down.
Ilya nodded, his face that usual concerned expression. He climbed himself into bed, curling up in the space of her stomach.
Irina kissed his head and enveloped him in her arms. She wiped her tears away before they soaked his hair.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, so quietly even she could barely hear.
—
Skating lessons had become more erratic as time had passed. What had been a daily activity for a few weeks had slowly faded into sporadic sessions. He couldn’t understand why, only that he had learned to adjust to a new life where days outside the dilapidated apartment they called home were a rare treat.
—
“Ilyusha,” she whispered in his ear. “Do you see that little boy?”
Ilya turned to his mother, crouching by his side. He nodded.
“Want to see if you can skate faster than he can?”
Her expression turned devilishly playful. He nodded, a grin on his face. He liked seeing her this way. It had felt like every day was a gamble to see if his mother woke up that morning as herself, bright eyes and adventure in her every breath. Today, she was back again. It was like she was herself but amplified on those days, a concentrated version, making up for lost time.
They stepped onto the ice together.
Ilya let go of Irina’s hand and raced with all of his might down the straight, hockey-stopping at the end. The snow he’d created showered a less-than-impressed man who seemed less impressed at Ilya’s skating and more irritated that his mother hadn’t kept him in check.
“I’m sorry,” Ilya said quickly, bowing his head down.
Irina glided over to him slowly, wiping her forehead in mock-exhaustion. Irina glanced at the man who had locked eyes with her, her expression steeled.
“Control your son,” said the man to Irina. She nodded with a polite smile, but quickly grabbed Ilya’s hand and brought him to her as the man skated past mere inches from them. Irina exhaled a shaky breath with closed eyes. Ilya’s heart pounded.
She returned her attention back to her son, forcing back a smile.
“You are too fast!” she said, picking him up with a spin, her long hair flowing behind her. Her smile bloomed when she looked at him. “My sons are so good at skating, I don’t know how. You didn’t get it from me.”
—
Ilya doesn’t remember her the way she’d described herself. She was always so graceful and controlled. Fast, too, when she wanted to be. That’s how he keeps her: the smile reaching her eyes, gliding effortlessly on the ice.