Weeks later, when spring softened the edges of winter, Tanya packed her sketches into a crate and prepared to leave. The house with the green paint looked the same, but the rooms felt altered, as if now they had a memory of someone having rested there. Lidia pressed another ticket into her hand — not for another performance but for a future she might return to. Yuri waved from the café window, as if to say: go, but remember.