TO SERVE AND OBEY

Chapter 18

'Dedushka,' Aleska sobs, tightly clinging to her grandfather.

He is bedridden; frail and looking skeletal. Shocked, Aleska tries hard not to stare.

'What is it my child?'

It feels so good to hear her mother tongue spoken and especially from her beloved grandfather. They continue the conversation in raid fire Russian.

I missed you,' she smiles.

His fragile hand reaches her face. 'The last time I saw tears in your eyes was when you were a child,' he utters breathlessly. She is a tough one. He wonders about her uncharacteristic emotional state.

Is it Stone she is crying for then?

Aleska brushes her tears away. She looks at her grandfather, cups his bony face.

'I am going to cook you a delicious steak,' she smiles through her tears.

He tries to laugh. It's too much of an effort and coughs instead.

'Calm down,' she murmurs, lightly patting his chest.

"'Steak?"' He repeats. 'We can't afford that.'

'Yes we can,' Aleska smiles. 'We have enough money now. And I've already bought it.'

She received an extremely handsome financial reward for capturing Nazario alive and she has not spent her salary of the last four months. They were in a good enough position for Aleska to ask the military to grant her two months leave to spend with her ailing dedushka.

'You must save your money,' he says softly.

Aleska smiles. 'I want to spoil you. You have given me so much,' tears fill her eyes again.

'Where is my brave soldier? Who is this weepy, girl sitting on my bed?' His eyes light up affectionately.

The soldier became a broke hearted girl in the Amazon, and it was not the elements that had broken her.

'I am one and the same,' Aleska laughs through her teary eyes.

He reaches for her hand. Aleska places both her hands between his. 'You must settle down. It is time ---.'

'No! No dedushka!' She shakes her head, denying his claim. She was not ready to let him go. She needs him. He can't leave her alone in this cold, unkind lonely, harsh world. Who would be there for her?

'I am not young any more child,' he pronounces through much coughing.

'Sssh!' Aleska sobs, tears rush uncontrollably down her face.

Her grandfather, searches her face. His gentle eyes compassionate, loving, comforting. He smiles knowingly as if he perceives that something significant and momentous happened to his dearest grandchild in the rain forest.

'Why don't you go back dear?' Her grandfather softly urges.

'What? How can you say that? I love you. I want to be with you.'

'But you love another too, and your eyes are full with pain.'

'Dedushka ---' she sobs, looking away.

'Don't deny it child.'

Dedushka, let me take you outside in the sun. We will have a picnic. You can tell me again about you and babushka.'

He laughs. His eyes always lights up when he remembers his dearly departed wife.

Aleska prepares some bread to go with the steaks. She makes some coffee in a flask; wraps a blanket warmly around her dedushka and takes him outside in the wheelchair. Aleska spreads a mat on the ground. She sits at his feet and listens attentively as he relates for the hundredth time of when he first set eyes on the love of his life and how she was not interested and how he had demanded she marry him. Instead of taking flowers to the lady who held his affection, her grandfather had taken his ruined trousers to be sewn. Aleska's grandma had merely laughed in his face and promptly closed the door on him, but he had stubbornly pounded on the door until her father had opened it and the young dedushka had summarily asked the father for his daughter's hand in marriage. Because he was a strapping, good looking man, her babushka had not resisted for too long. She eventually fell in love with him and they stayed married until she had passed on after a long and eventful marriage.