In the girl’s eyes, bright blue, transparent like river water at noon, defiance flashed. The same look her father had when he went on his last trucking run.
— You think the city’s paved with gold?
Evelyn approached her daughter, automatically adjusting the dress collar.
— It has its own troubles, its own woes.
Sophia pulled away from her mother’s hands, as if they burned her.
— At least different woes. Not these endless cows, gardens, hay. I don’t want to be an old woman at thirty like you.
The words slapped Evelyn across the face harder than a slap. She stepped back, suddenly keenly feeling every wrinkle on her face, every gray hair, every day without rest that had drained her youth drop by drop.
— Curse you and your beauty!
She whispered.
— It’ll be the death of you, mark my words.
And Sophia’s beauty was indeed special.
Not the rural kind, colored with healthy blush and sturdy forms, but something otherworldly, delicate. Sky-blue eyes, high cheekbones, graceful neck. When she walked through town, dogs stopped barking, and old men followed her with gazes tinged with longing for lost youth.
Sophia knew about her beauty. Knew from the boys’ stares, the whispers behind her back, from how the literature teacher compared her to heroines in classic novels. «Beauty is power!» a visiting female photographer once told her, taking shots for the local paper.
It opens doors closed to others. And Sophia decided to use that power.
— Mom!
Her voice softened, almost pleading.
— Why didn’t you remarry? We’d have a stronger house, bigger farm!
Evelyn turned to the window. Outside, the summer day was fading, filling the room with golden light.
— After your father, I let no one into my heart. And I was afraid!
She fell silent, but Sophia knew the rest. Afraid a stepfather would harm her daughter. How many times had Evelyn seen men’s gazes change when looking at a growing stepdaughter.
Iron will and sacrifice that the daughter sometimes admired and loved, sometimes fiercely rejected.
— Don’t worry, Mom! I can stand up for myself!
Sophia tossed her braid and suddenly smiled.
— Stephen’s coming today. Heard? On his new motorcycle.
Evelyn nodded. Stephen was the son of the forester from the next town over. Sturdy, hardworking guy, he’d followed Sophia since third grade like a puppy.
Gave her snowdrops in spring and strawberries in summer, waited after school through rain and snow, carrying her backpack on his shoulder. He was kind, reliable. The type who builds houses to last and loves one woman his whole life.
But Evelyn saw that wasn’t enough for her daughter.
— Stephen’s a good guy,
She noted cautiously.
— He’s a bore,
Sophia cut off.
— Only knows about his forest and farm. What to talk about with him? How good the hay is this year?
She took her festive beads from the nail, cheap glass sparkling in the sun, her mother’s only jewelry.
Evelyn watched her daughter and thought about her own mistakes. Maybe it was wrong to raise the girl alone. Maybe without a man in the house, something important wasn’t passed on, wasn’t explained.
She couldn’t teach her daughter to value simple happiness, to see beauty in ordinary life. Even books didn’t help. Sophia read voraciously, but it only made her dream more.
About cities, travels, glamorous life. About what’s beyond the horizon. Or maybe it was that Evelyn had grieved her fate too bitterly, cried too often at night, thinking her daughter didn’t hear.
Kids sense everything, even the unsaid. Outside the window, a motorcycle rumbled. Sophia clapped her hands.
Stephen. Early. Evelyn looked out the window.
Stephen, a lean but wiry guy of about twenty, shut off the engine of his new motorcycle. Light hair fell over his forehead, his open face glowed with the confidence of a man who knew his place in the world. Good guy, Evelyn repeated to herself.
Won’t hurt her. Won’t wrong her. I know, Sophia brushed off, adjusting her beads.
That’s why he’s boring. She grabbed her cross-stitched purse and fluttered out of the house, slamming the door. Evelyn heard her laughter ring in the yard, the motorcycle growl, carrying her daughter to the dances at the community hall.
Evelyn sank heavily onto the bed. How to explain to her daughter that real life isn’t like in books? That even in exhaustion after a day’s labor, even in calluses on palms, even in the repeating cycle of rural chores, there’s its own truth and beauty? How to tell that it’s hard to be happy where you’re not? That you need to learn to find joy in what you have? But those words would ring false even to her. Because deep down, she understood her daughter’s thirst.
And perhaps even envied her determination to break out of the cycle Evelyn had lived her whole life in. Meanwhile, Sophia, hugging Stephen from behind, raced down the dusty road to the community hall. The wind tousled her braid, the sun dipped toward sunset, and ahead lay a summer evening full of music and hopes.
The hall buzzed like a hive. Girls in flowery dresses, guys in ironed shirts, smell of cheap cigarettes and cologne. Rural celebration.
Simple joys. But Sophia, entering the hall hand in hand with Stephen, felt she was destined for something greater. Later, when the dances ended, she stood by the river, gazing at the dark water.
Stephen sat nearby on a fallen log, talking about something. Seemed like plans to buy his own house, how he aimed to put up a new frame by fall. Sophia wasn’t listening.
She watched the water flowing away from the town, through forests and fields, past other towns and cities, to unknown distances.
— Sometimes I feel like this river,
She said suddenly, interrupting Stephen.
— Can’t stay still. Have to run, search for where to flow into.
Stephen fell silent, looking at her profile in the moonlight. He’d loved her for years, knew every feature of her face, every tone of her voice.
And now he felt he was losing her, though she was right there.
— The river always comes back as rain,
He said quietly.
— Water cycle.
Sophia smiled, but not at him, at her thoughts.
— I’ll come back different. I’ll be rain that brings new life. You’ll see, Stephen.
She didn’t know how prophetic those words were. Didn’t know that in a few months, two city guys would appear in town, changing her fate.
Didn’t know that her escape for a beautiful life would turn to tragedy, and the river would indeed return her to town. But not as living water, but as sorrowful memories. For now, she stood by the water, young and beautiful, full of life and hopes, while Stephen looked at her with eyes full of love and foreboding of loss.
The town beauty. A bird straining from its cage. A moth flying to the deceptive light of city lights.
They appeared in town during the height of haying season. Two city guys in a shiny Ford, raising a cloud of dust on the only street. The locals watched with curiosity and distrust—what did these clean-cut fellows in pressed shirts and fashionable pants want among their leaning fences and flower gardens?
Victor and Dennis came for dances at the community hall on a random tip. «Girls in Oak Hollow are a sight!» someone told them in a city bar. And here they were, two friends since childhood, both from good families, both with prospects, both seeking adventure.
Victor was more reserved, dark-haired, with attentive eyes, a fine intellectual face. His manners held innate politeness, behind which hid iron will. He was finishing law school and dreamed of a diplomatic career.
Dennis—the complete opposite, light-haired, noisy, with an open smile and a habit of slapping interlocutors on the shoulder. Son of a noted surgeon in the area, he followed his father’s footsteps but was more interested in earning from private practice than saving lives.
— What a backwater!
Dennis grimaced, surveying the town street.
— You sure something’s worth it here?
Victor shrugged. He wasn’t against adventure but inwardly prepared for disappointment. What could this godforsaken place offer them? Then they saw Sophia.
She entered the hall at the dances, and it was like a light flared under the low ceiling. In a simple cotton dress, with her light brown braid over her shoulder, she seemed a vision from another world. Stephen, faithful as a shadow, held her arm, but at that moment, he might as well not exist.
Not for her, not for anyone else.
— Wow!
Dennis exhaled.
— You seeing what I’m seeing?
Victor was silent. He didn’t just see a beautiful girl. He felt something turning in his life, like an unknown force abruptly changed the flow of his fate’s river.
Their friendship with Dennis started in kindergarten. Son of a professor and son of a surgeon, both from elite circles, they grew like brothers. Together they gnawed at the granite of science, together discovered life’s first joys, together dreamed of the future.
So much bound them that destroying that bond was impossible. But when they both moved toward Sophia, tension hung in the air unspoken.
— Excuse me!
Victor was impeccably polite, approaching the rural beauty.
— May I have this dance?
Stephen tensed, but Sophia already placed her hand on the city guest’s shoulder. Why not? She smiled.
They twirled to the old record player playing trendy tunes. Victor held her carefully, like a precious vase, afraid to damage it. When he returned her to Stephen, Dennis immediately swooped in.
More assertive, more confident.
— I’m Dennis, a doctor,
He introduced himself with a wide smile.
— And you, beautiful stranger?
— Sophia,
She answered, accepting the invitation again, not glancing at the darkening Stephen. He stood by the wall, watching his girl dance with the city dandies. His work-roughened hands clenched into fists and unclenched.
But he was silent. He knew how to wait. Always had.
The difference between them was too obvious. The city guys in expensive watches and shoes, smelling of cologne. Stephen in a simple shirt, with hands forever scented by the forest, with a trusting gaze of a man unknowing of deceit.
On the way back, Stephen was quiet. His motorcycle growled along the night road, carrying them from the hall where the city guys remained, promising to come again next Saturday.
— I liked them,
Sophia said when they stopped at her gate. Interesting. Stephen looked at her with a long gaze. City tricks.
They’ll play and toss. Sophia laughed brightly, throwing her head back.
— And maybe I want to be played with? More fun than rotting here.
Stephen frowned. There was poison in her words he didn’t want to accept.
— I love you,
He said simply.
— Always have. Always will.
Sophia softened, touched his cheek with her palm.
— I know, Steve. But love’s not enough. I need life. Real, bright.
She went into the house, and he stood long at the gate, gazing at the dark windows. Victor and Dennis started coming every week.
First for dances, then just because. With gifts, bouquets, promises to show the city. They vied for Sophia’s attention, but their rivalry was steeped in old friendship.
Neither crossed the line into real enmity. Evelyn watched the city suitors’ courtship with growing anxiety.
— Daughter,
She said one evening as Sophia prepared for a date with Victor.
— It’s not good, walking between two fires. Choose one and stick to him.
Sophia fixed her hair in the mirror.
She wore a new dress, a gift from Dennis, brought from the city. Why choose if I can have it all? She turned to her mother with defiance in her eyes.
— Victor’s smart, interesting to talk to. Dennis is fun, generous. What’s wrong with that?
— That while you flutter between them, you’re wasting your girl’s heart in vain. You can’t play with men; they’ll burn you.
Sophia waved it off.
— Don’t teach me, Mom. I’ll figure it out.
But somewhere in her eyes, doubt flickered. She herself didn’t know what game she was playing. For the first time, she felt strong, desired, able to control fate.
Not just her own, but others’. Meanwhile, Stephen kept coming to her house. Quietly sat on the bench, talked with Evelyn, helped with chores.
Waited. Hoped. In the city, Victor and Dennis had their own story, one Sophia didn’t suspect.
A story of friendship rooted in childhood vows, shared victories and defeats. A story of rivalry that was always part of their bond but never destroyed it.
— She’s incredible,
Victor said once as they drove back from town.
— Yeah,
Dennis agreed, lighting a cigarette.
— Rare find. Even in the city.
They were silent, watching the road unroll under the Ford’s wheels.
— You’re in love.
It was a statement from Dennis, not a question.
Victor didn’t deny it.
— And you?
Dennis shrugged.
— She’s beautiful. And yeah, I want her.
— But in love?
— Don’t know.
Silence hung between them.
Heavy, ringing. For the first time in many years of friendship, they were at a fork where paths could diverge forever.
— What do we do?
Dennis asked finally.
— Let her decide,
Victor answered.
— And whatever happens, we stay friends.
They shook hands, sealing the deal.
But both knew the test wouldn’t be easy. Meanwhile, Sophia sank deeper into the dangerous game. Met one, then the other, sometimes on the same day.
Accepted gifts from both, listened to confessions from both, danced with both at town dances, provoking snide comments from local girls and anxious looks from Evelyn.
— You’ll burn, girl,
Her mother said, watching her daughter return from another date with shining eyes. Such games lead to trouble.
But Sophia just laughed, sure of her invincibility. Youth always thinks it’s immortal, can cheat fate, outsmart life’s laws. She didn’t notice how Victor and Dennis’s gazes changed from admiring to possessive, how their friendly rivalry gradually grew into something more dangerous and dark.
One evening, when Sophia returned from the river where she’d met Victor, she saw Stephen sitting on the bench by their house. He was whittling some wood. His hands moved confidently, precisely, no extra motions.
— Waiting for me?
She asked with a light mockery. Stephen raised his eyes, calm, deep.
— Always waiting,
He said simply.
In those two words was such strength, such unshakable certainty, that Sophia suddenly felt uneasy. Behind all her game, all her dreams of the city, lay loneliness, deep, ringing like a bottomless well.
— And if you don’t wait?
She asked quietly.
Stephen shrugged.
— Then that’s fate.
He handed her the wood he’d been working on.
It was a small bird figurine, skillfully carved, with fine details, wings spread, ready to fly.
— That’s you!
He said simply.
— Flying somewhere? Maybe you’ll come back someday?
Sophia took the figurine, and suddenly her eyes filled with tears.
She didn’t cry, just stood holding the wooden bird in her palms, feeling the warmth seeming to emanate from it. The warmth of Stephen’s hands, the warmth of his love, simple and true. But Sophia didn’t choose Stephen.
Soon she came home with Victor, who promised marriage. But a few days later, she fled town with one suitcase with Dennis. Dennis’s city apartment greeted Sophia with cold splendor.
Polished furniture, crystal vases, heavy drapes. Everything screamed wealth but whispered emptiness.
— Like it?
Dennis asked then, hugging her shoulders.
— Now this is your home.
He said «your,» but from the first day, Sophia felt everything belonged to him.
Including her. Their marriage happened two months after her flight from town. Swiftly, without long thought.
Victor stepped back, nobly as always, saying he’d be happy to see them as a family pair. But in his eyes, Sophia noticed a shadow she couldn’t decipher. Dennis was generous with gifts and stingy with attention.