The house was Victorian style, painted blue with carefully chiseled woodwork. It was old, that was obvious but right away I could tell that it was going to prove to be one of the few comforts I had in this new town. My dad put the car in park and turned to face me.

“So kiddo, this is it. It’s a lot bigger than it seems don’t worry.” He said clearly reading my look of dread.

“I’m sure its great dad.” I said painfully resurrecting a smile. Lily was on the phone with an old friend who had been running the store for the past few weeks, but she turned around to face me as well.

“You’re going to love this town Alexey, it sure is nice to be back.” She said as she began to step out of the car. My dad attempted to make strict eye contact with me then, but I rolled my eyes. Alexey was preserved for my parents alone, and my dad knew that if there was one way for Lily to get kicked out of our family it would be if she continued to call me Alexey.

The name, I don’t really mind. I admit that a more common name like Katie or Jenny may have been preferable, but Alexey I am proud to sponsor as long as people don’t get too hung up on it as they usually do. My name came about even before I was born. My mom, being the photographer she always was would study the works of various famous photographers because she couldn’t afford to go to school. She would spend hours in the library reading everything from fashion magazines, to photographer’s personal profiles. One photographer she became particularly interested in however was a man by the name of Alexey Brodovich, a Russian photographer who worked for Harper’s Bazaar some time in the 1900s. He inspired her so much that she named me, her first-and only daughter, after him .As I aged though and my mom wasn’t around as much to enforce the use of my full name, Alexey turned into Alexa and eventually into Alex.

The only reason I was strict about people calling me Alex and not Alexey is because I felt that since I virtually got to decide my own name, it was more a part of my identity than anyone else’s name, and I left it at that.

Today though I let her slight transgression slide and jumped out of the car and stood beside her looking up at the house more in curiosity than general awe as she was expressing. My dad came up behind us and wrapped his arms over both our shoulders,

“Welcome home girls” he said with a heart-felt smile slapped across his cleanly-shaven face.