Epilogue Four

...chasing that american dream...

June 6, 1955

Zhanna had planted her dreams. While others had failed, a good crop of them had sprung up over the years. Maybe they weren't castles or great oak doors but they were soft blue doors opening onto a hall of photographs, pooling out to rooms of light and air. Pressed blooms of poseys and daisies pasted to white paper hung in dark frames beside photographs of smiling families and happy faces.

Zhanna didn't need a castle, a hundred empty rooms or big oak doors to block out the world anymore. She planted her dreams in America, transplanting from New Jersey to Virginia to finally settle in Pennsylvania earth, the tangible life that grew slow and strong was safer than any corner she had dared imagine. They grew light as the feathers of doves, sturdy as the flowering pear tree that cast its shade and fruit over the truest form of her wartime dreams.

The garden was Zhanna's pride and a source of joy. Bottled and administered to the carefully instructed and dutifully remembered words of Agata Polyakova, she had spent hours trowel in hand and knees buried in the dirt settling her nerves and her flora into their homes.

Sunflowers bobbed in the warm breeze, Zhanna's hair brushing against her bare cheek, kept short now. It would only slip into her eyes when she leaned forward, a curtain to draw against the world when she needed it. Her herb garden thrived, the rosemary and thyme swaying.

Maybe it wasn't a castle but it was home and that was more than she had ever hoped for at the end of that war. Birds flitted on her pear tree, hopping from branch to branch, shaking the plump fruit loose and casting them to the ground below. She could fetch them but that would require ceasing the gentle rocking of her swing. The pears would keep for a little while longer.

Nothing could persuade her to rise from her perch on the swing that hung by rustic rope from her tree, the grass soft beneath her feet. The world that mattered to her was in this picket fence. Why would she rise from it and disturb the quiet peace?

Peace had altered it's form as she had grown older. Zhanna's dreams turned into Janna's reality. Being Russian, Polish, or foreign was still an undesirable identity in the land of the free but she had retained her fluency in survival. Zhanna's dreams were now Janna's reality and she didn't want to do anything to disturb it.

It hadn't always been back to the sun and face to the earth as she toiled over her plants. Sink's offer had proved too good to refuse for too long. Her work in the Capitol was short lived but effective. Zhanna had proved Svetlana Samsonova's use in the war and where her true loyalty had been found. Maybe it was too little too late but Janna had found sleep at night with her work. She had found peace and now she didn't dare disturb it by moving a muscle. Janna could scarcely breathe for fear of changing or altering it.

The blonde haired child bobbed among the blooms, her words still her own but mixing with the Polish and English of her parents. She could have been in her own world for all Janna knew, hands brushing the passing leaves as her gaze was fixed on the sky above. Janna had walked this path with her as an infant, cuddled in her arms as she explained the constellations to Danika's attentive eyes. Maybe she still knew the way, even after six years.

She was much too large to be cradled now and her place was taken by the sleeping form of Luke, still adjusting to the world around him. The perfect little fingers gripping the edge of the blanket, his hair a dusting of russet on his head. If Janna moved now, she could awaken the dozing infant and that was a risk she wasn't willing to take.

This garden that she had planted, tended, and wished for seemed too good to be true. Janna had spent the first few years pinching herself, blinking hard in case this was some figment of her imagination.

The sun couldn't have been playing tricks on her eyes. The little copy of Janna down to the blonde hair stood before her, the pale blue eyes the only thing not inherited from her mother. She twirled back to the shade of the pear tree, gathering the fruit without being asked, leaving them as an offering at her mother's feet.

Her correspondence with Ron, for she now called him by first name after nearly ten years of letters and telegrams exchanged, had led to the news not long after Janna's arrival to DC to work as Polish and Russian translator of the birth of the Zaitsev twins. Svetlana's children. Oceans apart and they were still hearing their names.

As her daughter pranced and giggled in the patches of sunshine, Janna almost pitied the children of her old guardian's daughter. The life they would be leading, now nearly ten years old. She had lived the only life they had ever known. Sympathy ripped through her, for those children who wouldn't know this sunny garden or planting their own dreams.

She had done her part, Janna had led Svetlana to her own redemption. Whether or not she drank from it's waters was up to her. Janna was free, truly free and she would have joined her daughter rolling in the grass if it wasn't for the infant in her arms.

Settling Luke in his basket on the grassy shade of the tree, Janna relented to her daughter's pleas. Giggling in delight, Danika gripped the rope of the swing tightly in her little fists as she took flight, swinging up, up, up into the sun-filled sky.

It had been ten years since Janna's last fall through the open sky but the weightless feeling was hard to forget. It was a thrill that couldn't be replicated but a rush she no longer relied on. Danika ate up the airborne moments, begging "higher, higher!" as her hair mixed with the clouds, the silver chain on her neck slicing through the blue sky.

"Higher!"

Higher she would take her, till they floated in those clouds like Janna had ten years before where she had fought for the life Danika now lived. The silver charm on her necklace sliced the blue sky, taking flight for the first time.

"I've got it, Mama!" Danika's hand pushed away any assistance. She would take herself higher where she could brush the clouds. Janna would gladly pull them down so Danika could reach them but she was a determined girl who demanded the sky of her own merit.

Was it too high? Was it safe? Slowing the momentum, Janna pulled Danika into her arms, not ready to let her fly on her own. At first she resisted but Janna held her tighter. One day Danika would take the stars on her own but the life Janna had fought for was one of safety. Safety was in her arms and on the ground.

"Too high, Dani,"

"I can do it!" Danika protested but she didn't resist, melting into her mother's embrace. It was warm in the garden and it was quiet there.

There would be time for Danika to take the sky. There would be time for Luke to make the world his own. But there was time to enjoy this peace, with the pear tree rasping above and the bees buzzing in the lilac bush. Janna had paid her price and she would relish in her peace. She had planted her dreams and Zhanna wasn't ready to harvest them quite yet. Her past wasn't forgotten and it was still marked on her body, in black numbers that were traced with little fingers and bullet wounds that were the resting place of brushed lips. She wouldn't forget it but she didn't want to relive it.

Zhanna wanted to pull her children tighter and cherish her dreams longer and she refused to let them slip out of reach. Danika could complain of cramped fingers and the garden could be called overly groomed but Zhanna would keep tending these dreams, guarding them against the tide with the power she had at her disposal.

"Mama, I want to fly," Danika said, prying herself loose from her mother's tight embrace and pointing up at the wide open sky. It was an empty canvas ready to be painted with the dreams and destinies of the new generation.

This world was made for them, this garden was a safe corner for Danika and Luke should they ever need it. Tide or sky, she had planted dreams for herself and she was planting hopes for her children.

"And you will," Janna promised.

"Will I get wings?" Danika asked, eagerly.

"No, my little bird," Janna smiled, straightening the silver chain that had crossed the Atlantic with her. Passed from mother to daughter, she wished only good things to come from her heirloom.

"But how can I fly if I don't have wings?" Danika asked, helping Janna stand, her brow furrowed at the notion of wingless flight. It seemed to stretch to an impossibility in her mind. Her eyes were paler than the sky, like the cold ice of winter, and they looked deeper than just the surface.

"You won't need them," Janna said, scooping up the basket with a still slumbering Luke.

"I won't?" She was still puzzled, following her mother back towards the house, where the fluttering white curtains peaked through the open windows.

"You are a Casimir. We can do anything." Janna said, neatly.

"That's very lucky," Danika said, though her brow was worried over the prospect. The idea of one's family being responsible for such an important dream was difficult for her to wrap her head around.

"We make our own luck, dear," Janna brushed the tangled hair from her daughter's forehead. "And you will be flying before you know it."

At peace with being temporarily grounded, Danika departed the garden, Janna pausing at the gate, looking back over at the culmination of years of dreaming. Years of mourning gone untouched. Those neat plots that had her mother's legacy etched into the very bones. Her father's favorite blooms planted next to the white rose bushes that climbed the arbor. Her past wasn't forgotten, just tucked into corners of her new life. Danika's Polish floated back to her on the wind, the stumbling pronunciation was music to Zhanna's ears and she could have sworn the flowers swayed in time though there was no wind to be felt.

She hadn't felt their hands in hers in years but she could still hear their voices on some Atlantic wind, blowing from farther than just the coast. The words were too soft against her ears but she knew it was them. She could wish that they were beside her but in truth, they already were. Her past was all around her and her future was marching before her, the blonde head bobbing towards the window boxes of daisies and the pale blue eyes in her arms. Zhanna had planted her dreams. It had grown soft as the feathers of doves and sturdy as the pear tree in her garden. There were no sturdy oak doors and it was no wealth but it was enough.

FINAL EPILOGUE

...THERE CAN'T BE SONGS FOR EVERY SOLDIER...

The year is 1957. Easy Company is hosting another reunion, and for the first time, Sveta and Ron decide to attend. Sveta brings Lena, loathe to ever let her out of her sight. Sveta is terrified, but she reminds herself that she has been through worse. Much worse.

Besides, she knows this will be the only reunion she is likely to ever attend. They're leaving the United States. As much as she's enjoyed the years in Boston, she misses Russia and misses having a purpose.

At the Reunion, she's cordial with the enlisted men who show up. Most leave her alone. Not all, though. She talks to Johnny briefly. She meets Guarnere's wife and child. But for the most part, she keeps to herself. Lena does not, though. She eagerly practices her English with the men and their children.

Sveta is glad to see Zhanna and Dick are happily married, though she hides it. Though seeing Zhanna alive and well makes her breathe a sigh of relief, it also brings up all sorts of trauma that she wants to stuff down. They discuss simple matters.

She also speaks with Nixon. It's awkward at first, but they come to a mutual understanding that they both royally fucked up during the war and are sorry about it. He makes small talk about her daughter. That is when she admits that Lena has a brother back in Russia. In an effort to make Nixon understand that even after the war, she lived her life in fear, she explains that she had to drug him to keep him quiet so she could get Lena out. She regrets it deeply, but sacrifice is necessary in war. Nixon finally admits she was in deeper than he could've ever comprehended. Sveta admits she didn't help his paranoia.

She, Ron, Nixon, Dick, Zhanna, Harry, and Lipton gather together. Ron does most of the talking, Sveta exhausted and carefully watching Lena play with Guarnere's young son. Ron goes on to explain this is likely the last time they'll see anyone for a while. They're moving to West Berlin. Ron accepted a position a head of Spandau Prison, and Sveta has been hired to tutor the men on the army base in Russian.

It ends with a reflection on Sveta not being willing or able to change her name from Sveta to something less "Russian" despite the Red Scare... in the end she is unapologetically proud of the Motherland and her people, though not its leaders. She cannot follow in Zhanna's...Janna's...footsteps. She will forever be Svetlana Alexandrovna. It is in her blood. She is a Samsonova, like her mother before her, and even when in active rebellion against the ruling regime, she will love Russia.

She has broken the cycle of abuse and suicide. And for that, they're all glad.

Of course, there's still the problem of Dmitri. Lena, an aspiring actress, is recruited into the CIA in her early twenties due to her extensive foreign language skills (English, Russian, French). She accepts, partly to help her naturalized home, partly to find her brother again. And she does find him, only this time wearing a KGB uniform, as he too searches for his twin.