Half Life

up all the floor space in his apartment, all of us sweating and whispering Latin to one another in the almost darkness. But then he frowned instead.
I stood up quickly, accidentally bumping Agata’s shoulder with my knee. “Thank you, Emilia. Let’s end for tonight.”
Kadi stood up next. “This was so wonderful,” she gushed. “Thank you for letting me join in, Marya. Next week you’ll come to my home. There’s more room, and there’s a piano. I’ll teach.”
Everyone else’s eyes turned to her now, including my husband’s. But mine were only on him. It was too dark in here for me to really understand the look on his face, or what he was thinking as he took in her red silk dress, her pretty blond hair, her invitation to teach piano, of all things. Kadi was everything he’d had once, in his other life: wealth and privilege and destiny. And for a few seconds, I felt something strange bubbling up inside of me, a flicker of doubt.
All the women whispered goodbyes and left, one at a time. Agata left last, and as soon as she shut the door behind her, Kaz came to me. Two strides, and then his arms were around me.
He put his finger to my face, traced the lines of my lips ever so gently, until my doubt and my worry turned into a half smile. Steady. “I love you so much, Marya,” he said. “What would I do if anything ever happened to you, kochanie?”
My dear sweet devoted husband. “Nothing will happen,” I promised him.
“But there were too many women here tonight. It’s dangerous for you all to meet like this. What if you are caught? Arrested?”
“It was only seven,” I said. “Our apartment is just so small, it felt like more. And who’s to say we were not here . . . baking together?”
“But you weren’t,” he snapped, the crease of his frown growing deeper. He sighed, then pulled me tightly against him. He kissed the top of my head. “You are everything to me,” he said into my hair. “Everything.”
Everything. I felt a crushing weight in my chest, and for a moment, it was hard to breathe.
I still had my family: Papa and Hela were only a short train ride away in Warsaw and I visited with them every few months, and Bronia was still writing me letters from Paris, though more infrequently now, since my niece, Helena (who Bronia wrote they’d nicknamed “Lou”) had been born. As far as I knew, he hadn’t talked to his parents nor any of his siblings since we’d been married two years earlier. I had my friends in Flying University now, too. But what did Kazimierz have in Loksow? His work, the insufferable young boys he taught, and . . . the inability to further his own education, to light his mind the way he needed.
If only he were able to take up his own studies again, I would no longer be his everything, his only thing. Maths would consume his mind, I knew it would, and I would be able to breathe a little easier and focus on my own studies. That gave me an idea: tomorrow morning I would write Papa and ask if he would send the money he was still saving for me for the Sorbonne so Kaz could use it for his education. Paris now felt like a world away. The only real way for me to get there would be for Kaz to finish his education first, and be sought after enough in his field to secure a job in Paris so we could afford to move there and both be fulfilled.
I liked this new plan of mine, and I knew Papa would want to help. I exhaled and reached my hand up to Kazimierz’s face, ran my fingers against his beard. “Come to bed, my love,” I said. “You worry too much. Everything will be all right tomorrow, you’ll see.”
Kazimierz leaned in closer again and kissed me, and then all else fell away: concern, regret, suffocation. For at least this night, he was my everything too.

Marie
Paris, 1894
My mind has been filled with my studies at the Sorbonne, focused on passing my exams at the top of my class, putting all the other students, the men, to shame, while also having enough money to move to my own room closer to school, and to stay alive, warm, and fed. So I have not thought about Kazimierz Zorawski in years, until the letter arrives from Hela from Warsaw, with a newspaper clipping inside:
Julius and Kazimiera Zorawski proudly announce the marriage of their eldest son, Kazimierz Zorawski, to Leokadia Jewniewicz, esteemed concert pianist and daughter of prominent mathematician Hipolit Jewniewicz. Zorawski is completing his doctorate in mathematics at Jagiellonian University . . .
I put the clipping down, not wanting to read any further, my face already turning hot at the words about his fiancée, Leokadia: proudly, esteemed, prominent. All the things his parents never would’ve said about me, and probably still wouldn’t, even now. Never mind that I passed first in my class in my physics examination, or that I was awarded the prestigious Alexandrovitch Scholarship last year that had come with a generous and much needed 600 rubles. But my world is bigger now than the Zorawskis. I do not regret the choice I made to come to Paris, even if it is still a constant struggle to prove myself as a woman. I have opportunity here nonetheless and my freedom to learn, and that is everything. I put the clipping back inside of Hela’s envelope, then hide it all inside a chemistry textbook, on the shelf in my lab.
I’ve already stayed much too long in the lab, and I am running late for a meeting with Professor Kowalski and his wife.
AS I WALK ALONG THE STREETS OF THE LATIN QUARTER TO the Kowalskis’ hotel, I try to put the newspaper clipping out of my mind. I have other things to worry about. I was recently tasked with doing a