Kremlin dreams

I sometimes think my body hurts this way from missing Chloe, but it might just be the stale Crimean winds coming in from the east. We spent 48 hours in Odessa a few years ago, the first time we decided to act on that invasive restlessness we had both felt for as long as we could remember.

"Close your eyes and point somewhere" she said over a map of the world. "That's where we'll go". We explored smoky strip clubs (all of them disguised as smoky restaurants) and drank Champagne in our room at the Bristol. The staff humored us because we weren't Russian mafia, because we flirted shamelessly and paid with crisp American dollar bills.

Now I can feel the thunder closing in again, Henry follows the news with his usual distracted interest. "Napoleon seems unhappy" he says. The lingering cold from the winter still wakes me in the mornings before the sun comes out and takes some of the pain away.