A week later, as Anna sat at home thinking of summer and her sister’s countryside house, a knock startled her.
Baron ran to the door. It was Pavel, discharged and standing there with a bouquet of flowers. She welcomed him in, humbled.
As they drank tea, Baron made himself comfortable beside Pavel, quickly accepting him.
After a quiet moment, Pavel began to explain what had happened that night. He had been walking home late, the snow thick on the sidewalks.
His mother worried when he was late, so he took a shortcut through a little-used street.
Suddenly, headlights appeared behind him. Before he could react, a car hit him, sending him flying into the snow. The driver sped off.
Lying in the cold, pain radiating through his body, Pavel couldn’t move. Thoughts of his family tormented him—what would happen to them if he died?
He believed it was the end until he heard her voice. Anna’s call to the dispatcher had been his only tether to consciousness.
At the hospital, doctors had called him lucky—only bruises, a couple of fractures, and hypothermia. Without Anna, he likely wouldn’t have survived.
