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“Co the Gero so that they will be safe And all workers’ children o That is all there is ”

“What if I don’t see theain?”

Ma the tiny space between theets into bed, takes Sasha’s side, and pulls Vera into her ar “We women make choices for others, not for ourselves, and e are mothers, webear e must for our children You will protect them It will hurt you; it will hurt the and do what they need you to do ”

“Sasha told”

Mah Even your Sasha They uns and their ideas and they think they know courage ”

“You’re talking about Papa now ”

“Maybe I am ”

They lay for a while longer without talking

For the first ti about her father Ason what is to come She closes her eyes and in the darkness she is on the street in front of their old apart her papa leave

Her fingers are freezing beneath her woolen gloves and her toes tingle with the cold

“I want to co her face up to hi around them; flakes land on her bare cheeks

He s above his lip “This is no place for a girl, you know this, Veruskha ”

“But you’ll be reading your poetry And Anna Akhmatova will be there She is a woman ”

“Yes,” he says, trying to look stern “A woirl ”

“One day,” he says, pressing a gloved hand to her shoulder, “you rite your beautiful words By then they will be teaching literature again in our schools instead of this terrible Soviet realisress Be patient Wave to o inside ”