Epilogue

A dacha garden in June seven years on: old apple trees, a swing with an oak seat on a branch, a man and a woman near fifty on the veranda steps, a black cat stretched on the lowest step.

Seven years later.

June 2048. Father’s dacha in Yerino. The same Melba apples, the same Yellow White. The swings — the same, the second set, with the oak board and the parachute cord. Over seven years Karl has retightened the cord three times (he does this every summer, before Lia’s arrival in July); the board — polished smooth by feet; the brass rings in the Melba branch — darker, oxidized naturally.

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