Page 72 of Repluse

“He won’t have to wonder anything, Frank. I’m done. If he asks, I’ll tell him it’s because our marriage is over, and I want a divorce. The only thing he’s had over me for years was him keeping my mum in that place. Now I’m free. Apart from my looks and a strong will to survive, my mum gave me very little in her lifetime, but in her death, she’s given me freedom from him.” My lips tremble as I talk, and I can barely breathe and get my words out through my sobs. “Can… Can one of you arrange a car to take me…?”

“Already done. It’s outside waiting.”

“Mils, there’s something?—”

“No. Not now.” Sam interrupts whatever Frankie wants to say. “Right now, it’s about her. We’re doing it her way. Anything else can wait.”

With Sam’s suit jacket over my shoulders, I’m flanked by the boys as we walk through the club and out to the car. I keep my head down but don’t bother putting my mask back on. At thisstage, I don’t even care if I come face to face with Logan and Alice.

CHAPTER 21

Mila.

I want to sit here sharing memories, reliving happy times, but I don’t have any. She left me before I could even remember her ever being present, then when I got her back, she was gone. The person she’d once been, the bright, beautiful, vivacious Sofia Kovalenko people told me about no longer existed.

The tears I’ve cried are as much for myself as they are for my mum. For the relationship I never had with her. The relationshipwenever got to have. I’m sad that her life went the way it did, that it ended the way it has, and I’m mourning something that never existed.

My sister has always told me I’m a lot like her, not just physically, but with my love of music, the joy I get from dancing, and I wonder if, like me, she listened to music to drown out the sadness inside her like I do. If she danced to forget, the way I do. Don’t get me wrong, they both bring me happiness, but they also serve a purpose.

I brush my fingertips over the soft skin of her face and study it. Taking her hand in mine, I attempt to take in every minute detail.

When you watch a film or anything on the telly that shows the face of someone who’s supposed to be dead, the thing they get wrong is the mouth. This is what’s running through my mind as I hold on to my mum’s cold, limp hand and stare down at her face. Apart from her mouth, she doesn’t look any different to the countless times I’ve sat in this place and watched her sleeping.

Her mouth is slack now, drooping downwards in an unnatural manner, and this is where actors go wrong. They don’t relax their face enough and let that tension go.

I realise I’m pulling faces, attempting my best ‘dead’ face as I’m thinking all this, when the door opens to the room we’re in.

“I’m so sorry to interrupt, Mila, but I thought you might like to go through this while you’re having some quiet time with your mum.” Amanda, one of the staff members, comes in carrying a small box. Placing it on the table next to the bed, she looks from me to Mum. “She was beautiful, your mum. You and your sister look a lot like her.”

I smile my alive, not ‘dead person’ smile but don’t say anything. It’s almost five in the morning. I’m out of words. Out of words and tears, but not pulling strange faces, apparently. I have an overwhelming urge to giggle and wish the boys were here to deflect. They get my weird sense of humour, especially Frankie, but, not wanting to cause a disturbance in the middle of the night if Logan turned up, I asked them to wait outside.

“I’m not sure what’s in that, but it was about the only possession she had. It was missed when she was transferred from the hospital but sent over a couple of weeks later. That’s probably why it was never handed over to you or your sister.” Amanda stares between us again before tapping the top of the box. “Well, you’ve got it now.” Another small smile, then she leaves.

I place my mum’s hand back on top of her other one that’s resting on her chest. Reaching for the box, I note that it’s madeof some kind of metal, and not cardboard as I’d first thought due to the amount of dents in it. It’s white, with tiny blue flowers printed on it, and about thirty centimetres long, twenty wide, and fifteen deep. I stare at the box and wonder why I’m calculating the measurements rather than opening the fucking thing.

Is this grief, I wonder? Is this what grief does to your brain and your thought process, or am I just traumatically delirious? Or would that be deliriously traumatised by tonight’s, this week’s, my life’s events, so much so that I’m having some kind of breakdown?

I’m about to attempt taking off the bent and buckled lid when my phone vibrates inside the pocket of my hoodie I changed into when the boys took me home before we came here.

Logan has called me six times, so I’m expecting it to be him. Once I’d been home, changed, and we’d driven here, Frankie had given Bec permission to deliver the message to Logan that he needed to call his dad urgently.

That was four hours ago.

His first call to me was just an hour ago, so finishing his fuck fest at the club had obviously been a greater priority than comforting his wife on the loss of her mother. Not that I care for his comfort. I’m actually dreading him getting here.

I won’t cause a scene and ask him for a divorce at my mother’s death bed, but I don’t think I’m capable right now of hiding the fact we’re done.

He’s going to wonder why I didn’t call him, why I haven’t answered his calls, and how I got here, because no doubt, he’s called, and the staff would’ve told him I’m here. Either that or he likely tracked my phone. He would’ve checked the Uber account, seen that I didn’t get here that way, checked the banking app, and checked for a payment to a taxi firm. He’ll be going out of his fucking mind not knowing, and I’m glad. I think.

Or maybe I just don’t care. I can’t decide.

My head hurts, my heart hurts, and my life’s a fucking mess is what I’m thinking when I read the message from Sam.

Sam: Logan’s just rocked up. You want us to come in? x

Me: No, I’ll be fine.

Sam: I’m not comfortable with you being alone with him.

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