Page 113 of Kadra: The Unfeeling

And as the storm continues, I wait for him. I wait for the man who made me feel safe without ever laying a hand on me. With just one word and one look. The hours fly by and with every minute that passes that he never comes, my heart breaks a little bit more. I thought I’d learned my lesson.

I should have known to not count on anyone else but myself.

So, I allow myself to cry with the sky.

I feel everything at once, the pain too much to bear.

And when my eyes are tired and my body weakens, that’s when I settle until a pain in my stomach hits me out of nowhere and a second later I feel a warm substance between my legs. Reaching inside my underwear, I feel it. When I pull my hand out, I see red.

Blood.

A million thoughts cross through my mind as I stare at the blood on my fingers. I’m older and smart enough to realize what this means. I knew it was a possibility when I got away from the bastard, I just hoped it wouldn’t happen to me.

God couldn’t punish me twice, could he? That’s what I told myself but oh how wrong I was.

And as I lay there with a broken heart and blood on my hands, I thought of what could’ve been. The life that didn’t get a chance. For a moment, I allow myself to think about what life would have been like with another little life. Someone that was only mine. Then I think of the kind of life my sisters and I had and maybe this is for the best. A life of blood, tears, and pain is no life.

I should be relieved that I don’t have to carry a reminder of that awful night but I’m not. Instead, I numb the pain and push everything that has the power to hurt me down where I don’t have to think about it again and hope for my sanity, that it works.

I kill every emotion that weakens me and what I can’t kill I lock it away.

Looking all around me, one last time, I take a deep painful breath when he’s nowhere to be seen.

Rising to my full height, I take one last look at Amadeo knowing this will be the last time I’ll step on these desolate grounds. “Happy Birthday, Amadeo. Goodbye.”

That was the last time I cried.

The last time I asked why me.

The last time I put my hope in someone else.

I never went back and I buried my broken heart there where no one could ever find it.

Or so I thought.

But then life had another plan and I had to keep swimming until I made it to the shore.

I wish I knew back then what was waiting for me on the shore.

Vitali and Azariel.

* * *

“I know it isn’t fair to you… you didn’t owe me anything but your presence back then gave me strength and hope. I was a young girl that felt so alone and angry all the time and when you came into my life at that time I finally experienced what it felt like to hope. Maybe it was a silly girl crush but it also meant everything to me and when I needed that strength only you gave me and you weren’t there, it broke something in me. Hope has always been one fickle bitch but that day she was especially cruel.” Taking a deep breath, my body trembles in his arms as I let go of the last weight that’s been pulling me down all these years.

No one knows the full extent of my pain and my misery. Not my men and not even the closest thing I have to a brother, Valentino.

Now Vitali does.

Now he knows all of me.

My broken soul is in his hands now.

I feel Vitali’s gloved hand caressing my cheek, and I look into his eyes which look just as broken as I do. Feeling vulnerable, I revert to old habits. “Save your pity.”

“I’m far from pitying you.” His expression is determined, hard, and honest. “I want to murder him. All of them, for you. Every single fucking person who ever made you cry.”

“I can fight my own battles, Vi.”

---