A conversation between old friends Genevieve Navarro and Magdalina Kovak. Set at a cafe in Philadelphia, PA, on a brisk day in September, 2011.
“So he is your fiancé?”
Alina couldn't help a smirk as she watched the way her friend across the table tried not to blush. As long as she had known Genevieve Navarro, Alina has never thought of her as being easy to fluster, but she certainly looked flustered now, as she took an awful long time drinking her coffee. Alina gave a laugh. “Merlin, Gen, why didn't you just say so when we were at the gala? I half-thought he was like, the secret lover you were hiding from your husband or something, and you're not even married – unless there's something major you forgot to include in your letters recently.”
Gen rolled her eyes. “Of course not,” she replied in exasperation, as if that were a ridiculous idea. They were sitting at a cafe table in Philadelphia, not too far from MoMoWA. Between their respective work schedules, it wasn't easy finding a time that worked for both of them – but lunchtime, at least, was universal. Alina speared her salad on her fork while her friend talked. Gen had a salad in front of her as well, although she seemed more interested in the coffee – Alina privately thought the hot brew sustained her more than the food did, although how Gen managed to drink so much of it without milk or sugar was entirely beyond her understanding. “It was just. . .” Gen hedged as she seemed to consider what the most appropriate description of the situation would be. “. . . complicated – at least at the time.”
“Complicated.” Alina echoed, her tone amused. “Right. And now you're getting married?” Gen gave her a wry smile and flashed the ring on her left hand – rubies, it looked like, with a platinum band. Alina laughed again. “That's great news, Gen, really. Congratulations.”
Gen looked pleased in spite of her earlier self-consciousness and went back to her coffee. “What about you?” her friend asked when she emerged from behind her coffee mug. “It's been awhile since we've really gotten to catch up. Any new special persons in your life?”
Alina thought of Hunter and immediately averted her gaze. “No, of course not,” she replied casually, looking more like she was talking to her salad than to Genevieve. “When would I even find the time?”
Gen scoffed in disbelief. “Well, that was a boldfaced lie if I've ever seen one,” her friend said dryly. Of course, Gen was a prosecutor and had therefore met more than her fair share of boldfaced liars throughout her life, but Alina still smiled and rolled her eyes. She watched as Gen put down her mug for the first time in the last hour and fixed her with that characteristically demanding stare of hers. “Come on. Tell me who it is.”
“It’s no one,” Alina insisted halfheartedly. Gen only raised an eyebrow at her, and Alina amended herself. “Okay, so I might have met someone – but it's nothing.” More disbelief in her friend’s gaze. “Probably. Most likely.”
“Nothing because. . . he's not interested?” Gen asked calmly, reaching for her coffee again.
Now it was Alina’s turn to scoff. “No,” she replied immediately. Alina didn't think of herself as a vain woman, but she wasn't blind. She'd dealt with the advances of men all her life, and the subtle shift in Hunter’s gaze when he looked at her – well, it hadn't gone unnoticed. He hadn't acted on it, at least not yet, but still, Alina didn't imagine lack of interest to be the problem. “But it would be . . . complicated, I think, if it ever came to anything.”
“Complicated. Right.” Gen said with a smirk, doing a spot-on impression of Alina only a few moments ago. They both laughed. “So what's wrong with him then?” Gen asked lightly. Then her expression got a little more stern. “He's not married or something, is he?”
“Oh, sweet Circe no, nothing like that,” Alina replied hurriedly, and the severity faded somewhat from her friend's face. Alina speared more salad onto her fork as she thought over her words. “There's nothing wrong with him,” she continued casually enough. “Or at least, not that I've noticed yet. But he's a client of mine, and um, sort of the center of a lot of attention – ” Wow, talk about an understatement, considering she was talking about the wizarding leader of an entire magical nation. “– it would be difficult, I think, to carry on anything worthwhile.”
“. . . But?” Gen prodded, an eyebrow raised.
“But –” Alina agreed with a small laugh. “– he is charming. And intelligent. He seems like an attentive listener. He's an interesting conversationalist.”
“And handsome, I assume?” Gen asked casually.
Alina thought about the almost completely nude photoshoots from Hunter’s youth, and the first impression she'd gotten from him when they'd actually met – an older version of that same man, who had grown to exude a natural sort of authority. She tried not to let her expression betray the tingling sensation that thought had sent through her body. “He's certainly not hard to look at,” Alina replied nonchalantly.
Gen gave her a vague frown. “Then I'm afraid I don't see what the problem is.”
Alina was silent for a long beat, using her salad as an excuse to buy herself a few more seconds before she had to answer. “I'm not sure,” she sighed finally, her gaze still on her food. “Sleeping with a client. Doesn't that sound like – I don't know – a conflict of interest or something?” An unexpected noise caught her attention, and Alina looked up with a frown. “What's so funny?”
Gen was choking back laughter over her coffee mug. “Nothing,” she said hurriedly over suppressed snickering. “Oh, Merlin – nothing, I'm sorry, I shouldn't be laughing.” She took another drink of her coffee – wasn't that mug empty yet? – to drown her laughter, although when she put the mug back down, it still looked like she was fighting a smile.
Alina noticed that Gen had wrapped her hands a little further around her mug so that one finger could absentmindedly rub the ring she had shown earlier, although she still didn't feel like she understood what had brought on her amusement in the first place. Before she could think on it much more, Gen started talking again. “It's just. . . take it from me when I say that a conflict of interest is not a good enough reason to not pursue something that could, y’know, be really great. If that's the only thing holding you back – well. You might regret that in the future, that’s all. Your work might be important, but it’s not going to help keep your bed warm at night.”
Alina couldn't remember the last time she'd seen her friend look quite so solemn. But still, she only nodded and looked back down at her salad. “I suppose,” she agreed with a sigh, the hesitancy still alive and well in her voice. Gen frowned at her, looking confused by her tentative tone – but after a moment, her expression cleared, only to be replaced with sympathy. She took another drink of her coffee before daring to ask in a gentler tone, “Have you heard anything about Max lately?”
Alina’s heart gave a pang in response. She moved her food around her plate aimlessly for several long quiet beats before she found the voice to answer. “Yuli sent me a letter a few weeks ago with an update and some pictures,” she said, looking up. “He seems to be doing well. You wouldn't believe how big he's getting. Apparently Olenna has signed him up with one of those no-maj youth sports leagues – soccer, I guess. Yuli says sometimes she sees them practicing when she takes her daughter to the park. She says he seems like he's good at it. Like it looks like he's having fun.”
Gen gave a somewhat bittersweet smile and nodded. “That's good, then.” She brought the coffee mug back to her lips and took a long drink before she asked, with slightly more trepidation, “And Aleksey?”
At the mention of her ex-husband, Alina’s gaze hardened slightly, and she sat up a bit straighter. “Still in prison, as far as I know,” she replied stiffly. That wasn't strictly true, of course. Alina thought of the orchids that had been on her desk and felt her stomach clench uncomfortably. She tried not to jump to conclusions – even if they were from Aleksey, that was no guarantee that he had been released – and if Gen noticed something was off, she didn't say anything. She continued drinking her coffee, her gaze inscrutable.
“Alina,” she said finally. “Have you been with anyone since your divorce?”
Alina felt the heat bloom in her cheeks and she pursed her lips, but she said nothing. Gen seemed to take that as an answer. She could see the concealed concern mingling with the surprise in her friend’s eyes, and braced herself for whatever came next. “Alina,” Gen said mildly. “It's been three years.”
“I know,” Alina shot back. She caught the defensiveness in her tone and winced. She tried to temper it when she spoke again. “I-I know. It's just . . .” she trailed off. How did she explain – that for a long time, she had just assumed she would never take a different lover other than her husband? She and Aleksey had had more than a decade to learn each other’s bodies, to discover what triggered every moan and tremble and hitched breathing. The idea of someone new – it was so much more intimidating than she would that thought beforehand – and Alina couldn't deny that there was a part of her that was terribly afraid no one would ever know her as well as Aleksey had.
Alina didn't give voice to any of those fears, but there was an understanding gleam in Gen’s eyes that made her think that maybe her friend already suspected how she felt. Gen sighed and put down her mug, reaching for her friend’s hand. “Alina, I know it's hard, but. . . trust me, nothing good comes from holding on to the past like that. I've done that, and it just – it wears on you. When you cling to the past, it makes it impossible to live in the present, to think about the future. You deserve better than that. You deserve to be happy right now – but you can't do that if you let the past hold you back.”
Gen’s words felt like they cut to Alina’s very soul, but she managed a small smirk. “I'm sorry, are you – Genevieve Navarro, the payback queen – telling me that I should just let go of the past?”
Gen laughed and pulled away, flashing her ring again. “What can I say, Miss Kovak? I'm a changed woman now.” Her smile got a little softer, and she tilted her head, taking obvious care to speak in a more meaningful tone. “You'd be surprised what other people could open your eyes to, if you're willing to let them in.”
Alina smiled gratefully at her friend, before taking in a deep, nervous breath. It felt a little like she was closing her eyes and preparing herself to walk blindly off a cliff, but maybe Gen was right – maybe she just needed to have a little faith and take the chance that if she fell, someone would be there at the bottom to catch her. “But what will I wear?” she wondered out loud.
Gen grinned. “Oh, don’t worry,” she replied simply, reaching again for her coffee mug. “Shopping is always something I can clear room in my schedule for.”
Anonymous said: MEC THAT WAS SO GOOD IM CRYING IM IN PAIN THE FUCKKNG ANGST IM NOT OKAY
Anonymous said: eliott’s a dumbass and i feel so sorry for Lucas 😭
Anonymous said: what have you done choupi :( i’m crying poor lucas and fucking idiot eliott!!!!!
Anonymous said: welp that chapter was cruel. i love you choupi but whyyyyy
Anonymous said: CHOUPI what was THAT ??? I mean it was great as always because you’re a wonderful person that the Gods had sent down to earth to make us all fall in love with your writing....but still. I didn’t need my heart anyways I guess :,)
me: the last scene of scarlet letter ch3 will be bad
hi choupi! i'm curious what happens more often - you writing a scene and then making an insta edit for it or you making an edit and then writing a scene around it? hope it makes sense. :D
Other than chapters 8 and 11, I am 200% insta edit first, then write/rearrange the scenes to fit it kinda person ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
The home of Aleksey, Magdalina, and Maksim Ovechkin, on a cold day in October, 2007
The grandfather clock in the hallway ticked steadily, the echo of such a small sound somehow feeling as cacophonous as crashing cymbals in the silence. The house was quiet. Of course, the house had always been quiet – even after Max had been born, the house had been meant for more than a family of three – but this was a different kind of quiet. It was stifling, and lonely, and heavy with anticipation. Alina thought perhaps she might suffocate in this silence, and maybe that would be all the better – it would save her from having to make her decisions, and from what would inevitably come next.
Alina sat, in this dreadfully silent house, on the couch, her knees tucked to her chest like she was curling into herself. She was alone here. She had sent Max to her sister’s hours ago, knowing that he would be endlessly entertained by his cousin’s antics. She almost regretted it – a part of her yearned for her baby, to hold him against her and brush his hair with her fingers and watch him fall asleep in her lap in picture perfect innocence – but no. No, it was better this way. She wanted him to be happy, and if he were here, he would be able to sense her disquiet, her inner turmoil, and even if he didn't understand, he would grow upset over it. And right now, Alina wouldn't have been able to calm him. She could barely even calm herself.
It was better that she be alone right now. Alone to process the events over the last few days. Alone to consider the decision that would affect their future.
Alina rested her chin on the tops of her knees, staring, as she had been for hours, at the papers lying inconspicuously on the coffee table. She made no move to pick them up and read them – she had asked her lawyer to draw them up, after all, and she knew what they said. But even though it was just paper, it felt magnanimous, with a presence so strong, it practically could have been another person in this lonely house. Alina almost wished it was. She would have appreciated someone else to push the blame onto. But it wasn't, and the only people Alina could find to blame for this mess were Aleksey, with his secrets and his schemes and his lies, and herself, for being so willfully naïve for so long.
Aleksey. It still left her breathless and dizzy, what the lawyers had told her. The number of charges against him were staggering, and even if they didn't have enough evidence to make the more serious accusations stick, he was still facing a decade of jail time, or more. A decade. Alina hadn't quite realized until that moment how much could happen in a decade. What would her son’s life be like? Max would start school by then. He would be talking, and he might have friends to play with. Their family might have grown, and he could have had siblings. And now . . . Alina struggled to conceptualize what it might be like, going ten years without her husband even being able to hold their son.
Well, her ex-husband, if the papers in front of her had anything to say about it.
They had offered to let her see him, to give them some time together before matters proceeded any further. Alina had declined. She had no idea what she would say, and even if she did – she couldn’t imagine it would be anything pleasant. There was a hard, tight knot of anger in her stomach that had left a bitter taste in her mouth, and if she came face to face with her husband right now, the chances were good that her bitterness would fly off her tongue to form furious accusations in tones not suitable for an audience. She told herself that seeing him right now could only hurt his future case – and it only made her all the angrier that they had somehow gotten to a point where she needed to consider that at all.
Alina’s anger wasn't new. It wasn't even unusual. Alina and Aleksey fought like they loved – often, and passionate, and borderline violent. Of course, Aleksey had never laid a hand on her when they fought, and never Alina on him – but glass and dishware had been known to explode with the crackling intensity of her magical energy whenever he made her particularly angry, and doors had been known to slam to the point of near breaking under his hand, and Alina had once thrown her wedding ring at his head hard enough for the sharp diamond to cut a thin line of blood across his cheek.
She had felt bad about that one. That specific instance, as with all the others, had been resolved later with quiet apologies and admissions to wrongdoing, a gathering of one another into each other’s arms, and murmured assurances of love that would last throughout the night and well into morning. It was easy, for their anger and resentment to slip over the thin dividing line to transform into love and comfort. The most natural thing in the world, it often felt like.
But not this time. Not anymore. Aleksey couldn't whisk away her anger in a breeze of lingering kisses and soft words. It was too big, too monumental, and her sense of betrayal cut too deeply. He could try to fix it, to promise the things he knew she wanted – change, and honesty, and simplicity – and it wouldn't matter. Because he had promised all those things already, and Alina had believed him then, only to be proved that he was incapable of following through on his word. And now it was too late. Aleksey, damn him, had landed himself in prison, and the marriage, the family, the life they had worked so hard to build – it was all broken.
For a long time, Alina had turned a blind eye to the things that Aleksey and his family did in the shadows. She had known, of course, Aleksey had told her – but it was . . . easier to pretend she didn't.
She had pretended not to know what the source of their seemingly unending wealth was, pretended not to see the way Aleksey and his goons would slip inconspicuously out of a room at the slightest nod, pretended to believe her husband’s job really took place in his office, with a desk and paperwork and conference calls. She didn't ask questions when Aleksey came home covered in the sort of grime that wouldn't have been found in any kind of office she knew about – she didn't even ask questions when he came home with his lip split wide open, bloody, like he'd been on the wrong end of an uppercut. She only admonished him for being careless, used a simple healing charm to knit the flesh cleanly back together, and kissed the small scar it left behind, telling herself all the while that it was better that she not know where that mark had come from.
Stupid, Alina thought now.
She should have owned up to her knowledge then, been more insistent on change, and perhaps they wouldn't be in this situation now. But she hadn't. Alina suspected Aleksey thought she kept quiet because of the kind of life it provided her – and that was true enough, to an extent. She loved the gallery she ran, purchased by her husband as an anniversary present, and she loved the gifts that he would bring her every few days – jeweled necklaces that he hung from her neck with a kiss pressed to her skin, or orchid bouquets he'd present her as soon he walked through the door, or soft, sensuous clothing he’d lay out on the bed for her in an unspoken hope that she would wear it for him – the evidence of his affection took her breath away, but they weren't the things that mattered, in the end.
Alina had kept quiet for much simpler reasons. She loved Aleksey, and when it came to choosing between him and anything else – even her own conscience, her own morality – Aleksey always won out.
Until he didn't.
It was Max. Having Max – it changed everything. It changed her, and for a while, she thought it had changed Aleksey too. Suddenly she found she was hyper aware of everything, and ignorance was no longer an option. How could it be, with the dangers that seeped from the shadowy underbelly of the world that her husband spent so much time in. Aleksey would have enemies – enemies who might, in order to get to him, decide to come after his son. And that thought alone was enough to make Alina stand her ground.
The fight that had resulted – it was like a hurricane, worse than any fight they had ever had before. They yelled and they cursed and they broke furniture with magic and kicks. And then, just like that, it was over. Aleksey relented, and swore to change, to be different, to be better, for Max’s sake if not for their own – all because Alina had done something in this fight she had never done before. She had threatened to leave.
And it wasn't until later, as she was laying in their tangled, chaotic mess of sheets that always came as the aftermath of one of their fights, watching the rise and fall of Aleksey’s chest as he slept, that Alina knew with a steely, pained certainty in her gut – that she would have gone through with it, if she'd had to.
And now here she was. Staring at divorce papers in front of her and remembering Aleksey’s promises with bile in her throat. She had made herself believe him, when he made those promises. Had made herself believe that, if he wouldn't do it for himself, then he would at least do it for her, and for their son. Of all the things that her husband was, she had never thought him a liar – at least, not to her. But clearly that had been a naïve thought – Aleksey hadn't kept his word, maybe he hadn't even tried – and, if she was being honest with herself, maybe she'd never quite expected that he would. Because when the muggle investigators had practically stormed through her gallery without warning, seizing everything and declaring the entire building a crime scene to be used as evidence against her husband in a court of law, Alina couldn't even say she'd been all that surprised.
But that still left the decision to be made, and honestly, who was she kidding, trying to convince herself that there was any other decision she might come to? She meant it when she had told him she would leave, then and now, and Aleksey had made his choice regardless. Still, that didn't make it easy. A pen lay waiting beside the paper, taunting her – she felt like she was staring down at the last thirteen years of her life condensed to a few meaningless pages, and her dreams for the future were left to evaporate into the air, unwritten. She would just have to write new dreams for the future somewhere else, she supposed, her thoughts feeling distant and unattached – but one way or another, Aleksey wouldn't be in them. He had made sure of that, in more ways than one.
It was with a surge of bitterness that Alina finally sat up and snatched the pen, flipping through the pages quickly to sign and initial wherever was required of her. She signed with her maiden name, Kovak, instead of Ovechkin, and it had been so long since she had written the word that it felt clumsy and unnatural in her signature. Just for now, Alina thought determinedly. She would get used to it soon enough. When she was done, she straightened the pile of paper and stuffed it into the accompanying manila envelope. After a moment, she pulled off her wedding ring as well, and slipped that into the envelope too. It was no longer hers to keep, and besides, the paperwork would have to make its way to Aleksey at some point, and he would understand – the finality of it. That she was done.
She left the manila envelope on the table. She had made arrangements with the lawyer to come to her final decision by tomorrow - he would see the envelope as soon as he came through the door and understand. But as for Alina, well, she didn't plan on being here. Divorce or no, there had been no question of whether she would stay here without Aleksey. She had no desire to try to live her life while having to look over her shoulder for one of his family’s goons every day. No, Alina had other places she could go. Russia had never been her only home. And once she got things stable enough, she could send for Max. Alina had already briefed Yuliya on what the plan would be, if it came to this, and she knew her sister would take good care of Max for the weeks it might take Alina to prepare a new life for the two of them.
It was vaguely alarming, even to herself, that she had already had the framework of a plan in her mind by the time she understood what was happening. Maybe a part of her had always suspected this day might come.
With a deep breath, Alina stood up and waved a wand over a nearby suitcase she had already packed. She didn't want it to look like she was fleeing, in case any overly interested eyes were following her path – but luckily, as powerful as they might be, the Ovechkins were only a muggle family, with no real idea what she was capable of. Alina slipped the shrunken suitcase into her pocket, and strode away from the table with its terrible manila envelope. It was only when she reached the door that she hesitated, and she looked around, fully expecting that this would be the last time she would see the home she had once been planning on raising her son in.
She would miss this place, despite everything.
With a pang of heartache, Alina reached for the door and stepped out into the cold day, leaving the home to its lonely silence.
