When Pasha was not yet five, the ground fell out from under him. His mother was gone. He stood pressed into the corner of the room, stunned, trying to understand the hush that smothered the house. Who were all these strangers? Why did they whisper, avoid his eyes, keep their hands folded like they were afraid to touch anything?
No one smiled. They hugged him and murmured, “Be strong, little one,” as if he had misplaced something precious. But he hadn’t lost anything—he had simply not seen his mother.
His father drifted through the day like a shadow. He didn’t come close, didn’t hold him, didn’t speak. He sat apart, hollow and far away. Pasha inched toward the coffin and stared for a long time. The woman inside was not his mother—no warmth, no smile, no lullabies. She was pale and still and frighteningly cold. He backed away and did not try again.
Life without her thinned to grey. Rooms echoed. Time tasted of dust. Two years later, his father remarried. Galina arrived and did not belong to Pasha’s world; she seemed irritated simply by his breathing. She grumbled, picked at him, hunted for reasons to bristle. His father stayed quiet. He did not defend. He did not intervene.
Every day Pasha carried a pain no one saw—the ache of absence, the pull of longing. With each morning, he wished harder for the time when his mother’s hands were warm and near.
Today was different—his mother’s birthday. Pasha woke with a single, clear thought: he had to go to her grave and bring flowers. White calla lilies, her favorite. He remembered them in old photographs, luminous beside her smile.
But where would he find the money? He went to his father.
“Dad, can I have a little money? I really need it…”
Before he could finish, Galina burst from the kitchen.
“What now? Already begging your father for cash? Do you have any idea how hard it is to earn a salary?”
His father lifted a hand. “Gal, wait. He hasn’t even said what for. Son, what do you need?”
“I want to buy flowers for Mom. White calla lilies. It’s her birthday.”
Galina snorted, folding her arms.
“Oh, flowers! Maybe a restaurant, too? Pick something from a flowerbed—that’ll be your bouquet.”
“They’re not there,” Pasha said, quiet but steady. “They only sell them in the store.”
His father studied him, then looked back at his wife. “Gal, go finish lunch. I’m hungry.”
She muttered and disappeared. His father returned to his newspaper. No more words. Pasha understood: there would be no money.
He slipped to his room, shook the coins from his old piggy bank, and counted. Not much—but maybe. He ran for the flower shop. From half a block away he saw them in the window: white calla lilies, bright as snow, unreal as a dream. He stopped to breathe, then pushed inside.
“What do you want?” the shopwoman asked, already unfriendly, sweeping him up and down with her eyes. “No toys. No candy. Just flowers.”
“I know. I want to buy callas. How much for a bouquet?”
She named the price. Pasha emptied his pockets, a small mountain of coins that didn’t reach halfway.
“Please,” he said. “I can work—clean, dust, wash the floors. Every day. Could you lend me the bouquet today?”
“Are you serious?” She snorted, irritated. “What do you think I am, a millionaire? Get out of here before I call the police. We don’t allow begging.”
But Pasha didn’t move. He needed those flowers today.
“I’ll pay it back,” he tried again. “All of it. I promise.”
“Oh, listen to this little actor!” she snapped, loud enough to turn heads on the sidewalk. “Where are your parents? Maybe I should call social services. Last warning—out!”
A man approached the door just then, taking in the scene through the glass. He stepped inside.
“Why are you shouting at him like that?” he asked, voice steady but stern. “He hasn’t stolen anything. He’s a kid.”
“And who are you?” she shot back. “If you don’t know what’s happening, don’t interfere. He practically stole the bouquet.”
“‘Practically’?” The man’s voice rose. “You’re hunting him like he’s prey. He needs help and you threaten him. Have you no shame?”
He turned to Pasha, who had shrunk into the corner, swiping tears from his cheeks.
“Hey, buddy. I’m Yura. What’s wrong? Not enough money for the flowers?”
Pasha sniffed and nodded. “I wanted calla lilies… for Mom. She loved them. She… left three years ago. Today is her birthday. I wanted to bring flowers.”
Something tightened in Yura’s chest. He crouched to the boy’s height.
“Your mom would be proud of you. Not every grown-up remembers the way you do. At eight? That’s a true heart.”
He stood and faced the seller. “Show me the callas he chose. I’ll take two bouquets—one for him, one for me.”
Pasha pointed at the porcelain-white blooms in the window. Yura hesitated a fraction—the very flowers he had come to buy. Coincidence, or a sign? He kept the thought to himself.
Minutes later, Pasha cradled the bouquet as if it might vanish. At the door he turned, shy. “Uncle Yura… can I give you my phone number? I’ll pay you back. I promise.”
Yura laughed softly. “I knew you’d say that. No need. Today is special for someone I care about too. I’ve been waiting to tell her what she means to me. So I’m in a good mood—and glad to do a good deed. Besides, looks like we share taste: your mom and my Ira loved these flowers.”
For a moment he drifted, eyes unfocused.
He and Ira had been neighbors, doors in opposite entrances. They met by accident, stupidly and bravely: a pack of hooligans, Yura stepping in, a black eye for his trouble, a thread of sympathy tied tight between them. Friendship deepened into love; people said they were perfect together.
At eighteen, the draft took him. It shattered Ira. The night before he left, they were together for the first time. Service was fine until it wasn’t—head injury, hospital, blank spaces where a life should be. He didn’t even remember his name.
Ira called and called. Silence. She thought he had abandoned her. In time she changed her number and tried to forget. Months later, his memory began to flicker back. He reached for her and found nothing. What he didn’t know: his parents had lied to her—told her he’d left.
When he finally came home, he went to Ira with calla lilies in his hand—and saw her on another man’s arm, pregnant, radiant. His heart broke clean through. He ran.
That night he left for another city. He married later, trying to patch the emptiness, but the stitches didn’t hold. Eight years passed before he admitted the truth: he had to find her, say everything he hadn’t said. He came back with calla lilies—and met Pasha instead.
“Pasha… right, Pasha,” Yura said, returning to the present. The boy waited, patient and small, bouquet pressed to his chest.
“Want a ride?” Yura asked gently.
“Thank you, no,” Pasha answered, polite as a grown man. “I can take the bus. I’ve gone to Mom before.”
He trotted toward the stop. Yura watched him until he was a speck, feeling a strange tug in his ribs—a familiarity, a thread pulling taut. Their crossing wasn’t chance.
When the boy was gone, Yura walked to Ira’s old building. His heart hammered as he stopped an elderly neighbor.
“Do you know where Ira is now?”
“Oh, dear,” the woman sighed. “She’s gone. Died three years ago.”
“What?” The word hit him like a blow.
“She married Vlad and moved in with him. Good man—took her in when she was pregnant. They loved each other, cared for each other. Then their boy was born. And then… well, that was the end. That’s all I know, son.”
Yura walked away like a ghost—late, always late. He pressed a hand to the ache in his chest.
Why did I wait? Why not one year earlier?
Then one word rose out of the fog: pregnant.
If she was pregnant when she married Vlad… the child could be mine.
His head spun. Somewhere in this city his son might be living. He had to find him. First, Ira.
At the cemetery he found her grave quickly. Grief surged—love, loss, regret, all at once. And there, on the polished stone, lay a fresh bouquet of white calla lilies. The same flowers. Ira’s flowers.
“Pasha,” he whispered. “It’s you. Our boy.”
He looked at Ira’s photograph and said, softly, “Forgive me. For all of it.”
Tears came and he let them. Then he turned and ran. He remembered the building Pasha had pointed out earlier. That was the place.
He reached the courtyard. The boy sat on the swings, pushing himself in small arcs. After he’d come home with the bouquet, Galina had scolded him for being gone too long. He’d slipped outside to be alone with the quiet.
Yura sat on the next swing and put an arm around him.
A man stepped out of the entrance, saw the stranger with the child, and stiffened—then recognized Yura.
“Yura,” he said, almost calm. “I didn’t think you’d ever come. I suppose you understand that Pasha is your son.”
“I do,” Yura said. “I came for him.”
Vlad exhaled. “If he wants to go, I won’t stand in the way. I was never much of a husband to Ira. Or a father to Pasha. She loved only you. I knew it. Thought time would change it. Before she died, she said she wanted to find you—tell you everything: the boy, her feelings, you. She didn’t make it.”
Yura’s throat closed. “Thank you,” he said hoarsely. “For taking them in. For not giving him up.” He drew a breath. “Tomorrow I’ll come for his things and documents. For now… let’s go. I have eight years to learn. I won’t waste another minute.”
He took Pasha’s hand. They started toward the car.
“Forgive me, son. I didn’t even know I had such a wonderful boy.”
Pasha watched him, steady. “I always knew Vlad wasn’t my real dad. When Mom talked about me, she talked about someone else. I knew we’d meet one day. And now we did.”
Yura lifted him, holding him close, and wept—relief and grief and an unbearable joy.
“I’m sorry you had to wait so long,” he whispered into his son’s hair. “I won’t leave you again.”