We can’t forget that I owe you my life.” She gazed at him. “We can’t forget that I belong to you.” “I like that sound of that,” Alexander said, hugging her tighter.

Tania, last time in Morozovo, I let you go, but not this time. This time we live together or we die together.

Ask yourself these three questions, Tatiana Metanova, and you will know who you are. Ask: what do you believe in? What do you hope for? But most important - ask: what do you love? ... I know who I am, she thought, taking his hand and turning to the altar. I am Tatiana. And I believe in, and hope for, and love Alexander for life.

I tend to be a great optimist when it comes to the United States and the American way of life, I think precisely because I wasn't born into it.

I was blinded by stupidity for a brief moment in our life, for a flicker in the eternity in which you and I live, and I stumbled.

Where was he, her Alexander, of once? Was he truly gone? The Alexander of the Summer Garden, of their first Lazarevo days, of the hat in his hands, white toothed, peaceful, laughing, languid, stunning Alexander, had he been left far behind? Well, Tatiana supposed that was only right. For Alexander believed his Tatiana of once was gone, too. The swimming child Tatiana of the Luga, of the Neva, of the River Kama. Perhaps on the surface they were still in their twenties, but their hearts were old.

Please stop looking at me, she thought, afraid of his eyes and terrified of her own heart.