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A woman is defined by what she does for a man. Love him. Nurture him. Marry him.
A man is defined by what he does for a woman. Love her. Protect her. Marry her.
You are Olga “Olya” Orlova.
You are defined by what you don’t do for your lovers, or if not that, then by all the ways you fail to do what you’re meant to for your lover.
You don’t quite slot neatly into any of the roles, do you?
You’d much rather be alone most of the time. Until you need them. You do not nurture them, though, nor do you protect them. Not the way a woman would. Not the way a man would.
You sit on the sidelines of your love life and cheer for the opposing team.
Maybe if they push hard enough, they’ll break you into something proper.
Two boyfriends, one girlfriend, none of them have succeeded.
They loved you like you were a woman, they loved you like you were a man— they loved you like you knew how to love properly. Like you knew the ways in which you should love to fill your role. Kiss and hug and be tender and soft. Make them dinner, too, all of them wanted that.
When she made you a man, she wanted you to cook.
When he made you a woman, he wanted you to cook.
Why, you don’t know.
You were supposed to cook though, weren’t you? A lover does cook for their partner.
A woman is defined as a wife, a man is defined as a husband, nothing is given the grace of being defined as a friend. A mother or a father. A boyfriend or a girlfriend. Ma’am or sir. All have roles with the phrases that you fail to fill, standards you fail to meet.
-/-/-/-
You are Olga “Olya” Orlova and you are sleeping with Sergei.
He is not your husband, your boyfriend, or your lover.
He is Sergei.
He is simply happy to be with you, regardless of what you want out of it. He does not push the way you expect him to. He even cooks for you every now and then, he’s bad at it, but he does.
You hold his hand over dinner because that’s what a loving girlfriend does, does she not? She sighs dreamily too. You’ve heard the man can also do that.
Sergei just looks at you awkwardly. He asks if anything is wrong. Says you don’t normally act like this.
Oh.
So he’s noticed then.
You gently let go of his hand.
You say that nothing is wrong, you thought it’d be sweet, a reward for being able to cook something good for once.
He says it’d be sweeter if you didn’t think he needed a reward for cooking dinner. There’s humour under the earnest concern.
How lucky you are for such a kind man to love you.
How unlucky he is to love you.
A disgrace of a woman, an excuse for a man, a thing that lay incorrect in bed with that which fucks it.
You hum out a bit of a laugh, smile. It’s not what a woman would do, or a man. You do it anyways. You say something stupid.
He laughs back, such a sweet man, so foolish.
-/-/-/-
There is nothing to define you with.
You realize this as Sergei distantly cards his fingers through your hair. An idle motion. It’s getting longer again.
You ask him to cut it for you.
He shrugs and says sure before grabbing scissors and his clippers.
Just a bit off the top is all. Nothing severe. You hold a chunk of it up and ask he give you an undercut.
It won’t change anything that matters, not really. Only the exterior will change.
The interior?
Well, you will still be Olga “Olya” Orlova.
A hollow shell.
A heartless monster.
A stalker.
A mannish woman.
A womanish man.
“You sure?” Sergei asked, pulling down chunks of your hair till it was even in the back. Not too high up either. A cautious amount.
That’s fair.
Your hair is nice.
“Just do it,” You near demand.
And he does.
The vibrations resonate in your skull, humming through the bone layer. The sludge of nothingness is almost shaken free, almost.
You’re not sure what you expected.
A sudden stroke of womanliness, a need to nurture this man, cook for him and bear his children? Or maybe the inverse? An influx of manliness, coddle him and, well, even if that were the case you’d lack half of the deal.
Blonde hair simply falls, and falls, and falls in thick short sheaves to your shoulders and the floor. You can feel it stick to the back of your neck. There is no weight to it though. It’s hair. You wanted it to fix you, maybe, but it didn’t.
Now you have an undercut and Sergei’s rough hands are brushing the hair off your bare shoulders.
You absently run your hands over it in repetition. Short and fuzzy and kinda like Sergei’s. It’s nice.
“Good?”
You nod along.
“Good.”
-/-/-/-
A woman is defined by what she does for a man.
A man is defined by what he does for a woman.
You are Olga “Olya” Orlova.
You are defined by the fact the lady at the coffee shop mistook you for a man with your hair tied up until you opened your mouth. By the fact that Sergei calls you “ma’am” in bed and “love” over breakfast and “Olya” around everyone else. By the fact that you are nothing more than a gaping absence of roles left unfulfilled with roughly defined outlines from where the absence causes collapse and cave ins.
You don’t slot neatly into either role because of the clawing void in your bones, do you now?
You’ve recently come to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter either, not really.
Sergei still cooks dinner every other night you spend together. Still touches up your undercut every now and then. Still has a violent thrum of love for you, he doesn’t care that you’re starving it with your own lack of the feeling.
When you knock your head against his shoulder, stand with your chest pressed to his back, arms wrapped around his waist— you can feel your dysfunctional heart beat in tandem with his perfectly healthy one.
It’s not like it matters much that two hearts will beat in sync.
It does matter that Sergei asks how your day was, says he’s (trying) to make your favorite food for dinner.
You butt your head up against his back, between his shoulder blades. “Thanks.”
“What for?”
A shrug. “For making dinner.” It’s a half lie. You are thankful for that. You’re just not sure you have the articulation for the rest of what you’re thankful for.
He half laughs, so tender. “Whatever you say.”
Oh, what a sweet man he is.
How lucky you are he’d rather be this with you than properly in love with anyone else.