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earning at nine years old that there was no such thing as a circus boat was more devastating to Dmytro than discovering a few years earlier that Santa Claus didn’t exist. A man who’d bring you anything you wished for so long as you were nice had seemed highly improbable from the start. But an escape filled with all the precariousness of a tightrope walk? That wasn’t too good to be true. Especially the way Arkadii told it.

“It’ll be cold and we’ll probably get seasick. The food will be awful, but we’ll get used to it. And there’ll be tigers. Wouldn’t you like to see a tiger, Dmytro?”

His brother would go on like that, whenever their father got too awful. Or their mother started packing for another retreat with her friends. Or the house filled up with strangers who laughed too hard and pinched the boys’ chins, saying they’d be just like their father one day. On nights like that, Dmytro would slip into Arkadii’s room and they’d lie back-to-back in the dark while Arkadii explained about the circus boat.

“Tomorrow, we go out the back. Take the bus to the docks. Sneak onto a circus boat. We don’t stop for anything.”

Except tomorrow, they never did. In the morning, Arkadii would have a science project to finish and he’d paint Dmytro’s fingers with baking soda paste, threatening to turn him into lava. Or their mother came home with donuts. Or their father had left for a conference. And things seemed bearable. At least, for one more day.

Until the night Dmytro sat pushing at a plate of pork and cabbage, not eating because of a loose tooth. His father told him to stop fussing, then grew impatient and dug the tooth out with a spoon, right there at the table. When Arkadii tried to pull their father’s arm away, their father slapped him. 

Later, his mouth still stinging with copper and salt, Dmytro crept into Arkadii’s room. His brother was curled on his side, facing away from Dmytro, but Dmytro didn’t try to climb on the bed. He had a stuffed backpack in one hand, dangling from a frayed strap. He’d been keeping it under his bed for two years, just in case. 

“Can we please go tonight?” he said, forming each word carefully because his lips were still throbbing. “Find the circus boat?”

“Grow up!” Arkadii snapped. “There’s no such thing.”

Dmytro stood there for a long time, prodding his tongue into the heart of the sore spot so he’d have a good reason to cry. Then he took his backpack, went across the hall, and silently closed the door to his own room.

He never asked his brother for anything after that. But no matter how old he got, whenever Dmytro tasted salt, he felt the sway of the sea and the matted weight of tiger fur.