August 2032

Carefully as not to disturb the sleeping boy, Ilya let himself sit down on the side of the twin bed. His watch read 23.57.

It had been a tradition he had accidentally started on Mikhail's first birthday. His son had been sleeping peacefully in his bassinet and Ilya just couldn’t help himself but stare down at that tiny baby, that was just minutes away from officially not being a baby anymore, despite still feeling so terribly small to him. 

He still remembers the way his heart had soared in pride and love as the clock had struck midnight. August 30th. One whole year of Mishka. The time had dragged as well as flown by. It certainly hadn’t been easy that first year (nor the ones coming after), but they had made it. He had made it. And despite the many ups and downs of his first year of parenthood, Ilya couldn’t have done too bad, if this perfect little being was the outcome. 

Ever since that first time, Ilya had snuck into his son’s room, a few minutes before midnight the night before his birthday, just to be there with his baby in the first few minutes of the new year in his life. His heart already felt heavy at the prospect that soon enough this little private tradition of his might have to come to an end. 

Gently he brushed through blonde curls atop the kids head, that had started growing darker these past years, now more resembling the sandy shade of blonde on his own head, instead of the almost white color of his baby days. A little mournful he lightly tugged at one of the strands that were much shorter than a few weeks ago. The kid had decided to cut the curls he had kept on the longer side his entire childhood short for his birthday, proclaiming that he needed a new hairstyle, because his old one made him look like a little boy. 

Moving on from his curls, Ilya adjusted the blue blanket on his son’s shoulders a little on the side his arm hadn’t escaped, hand holding tight to the stuffed brown bear that had to sleep on the nightstand next to, instead of in the bed these days. 

Wistfully he looked back down on his watch. 00.02.

Twelve years old. As always his heart did that weird little dance between aching melancholia and deep deep love. A rollercoaster of emotions he had never grown used to despite being a dad for twelve years now. 

However this year, no matter how hard he tried to ignore it, something felt...wrong. It wasn't the usual bittersweetness that came with another birthday. It sat lower than that. Older. Familiar.

Ilya barely remembered anything from his own childhood, almost like a heavy cloak had been thrown over his memories the second he had stepped on the plane that had carried him thousands of miles away from his motherland for the final time.  

But what Ilya still remembers is being twelve years old. He remembers wandering into his home on a cold winter's afternoons after practice, calling for his mother but getting no answer, looking for her, but instead only finding only her soulless cold body and an empty tiny orange bottle next to her. 

The devastated look the first responder had given him, leaning over his mother’s lifeless form, while he stood in the corner, hockey stick still clutched tightly to his chest, eyes wide in fear. The endless line of people clad in black lining up to shake his hand after her funeral. An unsettling stillness that had moved into their home in her stead. 

Over the years Ilya had made peace with his mother’s passing, or at least as much as one could. She was gone and there was nothing he could do about it. 

However as he had ventured into parenthood he had found himself missing his mother in a whole different way. Somebody to run to for advice, to ask if his son really was as similar to him as everybody liked to say, somebody to cry to because no matter how much he loved his kid, sometimes it all was just so much. 

Shaking himself out of it he stared down at Mishka’s relaxed sleeping face, smiling wobbly at how young he still looked like that. His son had just started to enter his ‘too cool for stuff’ phase, so Ilya wasn’t allowed to kiss him on the forehead at the schoolgates anymore, his bear now had to sleep on the nightstand and he had talked about redecorating his room soon. His voice had only recently started catching every now and then, every time it happened Misha looked horrified, while Ilya secretly wanted to laugh.

But just sleeping like that, he still looked every bit the baby Ilya had held in his arms twelve years ago. 

Had Ilya looked…that young when…?

Furrowing his eyebrows Ilya pulled his hand back like he had been burned. Rigid he got up from the bed, flashing one last look back to his son, before leaving the room, softly clicking the door shut behind him. 

Confusedly he stood outside the room, he felt strange. 

Looking up, his eyes locked onto one of the many photographs that were lining the hallway. His mother and him after one of the first hockey games he had won, he couldn’t have been older than eight, almost being swallowed whole by his uniform, but flashing the camera a thousand watt smile, as did his mom. The strange feeling continued to rise in his throat like bile, the longer he stared at the picture. It was one of the only ones he had of them together, having gotten a few of them out of his childhood house after his last trip to Russia. 

His neck started prickling and he continued to stalk over to his own bedroom, to calm himself down from whatever weird episode he was currently experiencing. 

Shutting the door behind him he leaned against it, closing his eyes, trying to force a calm breath. 

Opening his eyes again, Ilya paced up and down his room a few times, coming to a halt as he focused on something in the corner of his eyes. Carefully he plucked the golden pictureframe from the wall. It was way bigger than the one in the hallway. He had searched the entire city for a photographer who had been able to save the old, almost faded picture and gotten it framed to save it from further damage. 

It showed Alexei, Irina and himself, in matching outfits, all smiling so hard, their eyes were squinted close, clearly an outtake the photographer had accidentally captured during the photo session.

His mother had thrown her head back laughing, one hand disappearing into Alexei's hair while the other rested against little Ilya's shoulder. It was one of the only pictures where he was actually able to see the resemblance between him and his brother, they both carried their mother's smile. 

Ilya knew that in the official photo all three of them were neatly posed next to each other with polite small smiles on their faces. It had hung in their living room until Polina had taken over the interior design after his mother's passing. But he had always liked that one better. 

His hands shook around the frame, threatening to crush the glass. It was taken a few days before his own twelfth birthday, just half a year before his mother had passed. Ilya always figured he must’ve looked much older when it happened, he had certainly felt like it, wise beyond his years. 

Except now all of the sudden. He didn’t. The Ilya in the picture looked exactly like the little boy that was peacefully asleep in the room down the hall. 

Grinding his teeth, his eyes narrowed in on his own young happy face, blood rushing in his ears. Something hot and ugly climbed its way up his throat.

His jaw hurt. Fingers digging into the frame even harder.

It took him a terrifying second to recognize it as what it was. Anger.

Ilya was angry. Angry at his own mother. 

Startled, he took a few stumbling steps back, hands still shaking around the picture. 

How dare she? How dare she leave him, when he had been this? His vision blurred. 

No matter how much his own son thought himself all grown up, Ilya knew how very vulnerable he still was. How much he still needed his father to shield him at least a little from this cruel world. 

And he knew how hard it all was. Depression was no stranger to him. Ilya had always understood that it wasn’t a choice. But every time the thought had even crossed his mind, he knew he could never leave, not if his child was still here, needing him. Ilya knew that twelve year olds still had nightmares, that sometimes they needed to crawl into their parents bed during a thunderstorm, that they needed somebody to tell them that everything would be all right in the end.

How couldn’t it have been the same for her? Had he been that easy to leave?

How could she look at him...and still go?

A sharp crack split the silence.

Ilya flinched.

The frame hit the floor.

Shocked he stared down at his hands, that are now empty, but at least have stopped their violent shaking a bit. 

He stills for a moment, trying to calm his breath enough so that he could hear if any sound from his son waking up from the crashing sound could be heard. 

Nothing.

The house stayed quiet. Slowly Ilya lowered himself onto the floor beside the shattered frame. Glass glittered around his feet. Carefully, almost reverently, he picked his mother's photograph out from between the broken pieces of glass.

A crack now ran straight through the middle of her smile.