Page 9 of Teach Me How To Fly

My father pushed him away with his devilish action, and I was mad at him for what he had done.

That day, I discovered a new face of my father I didn’t think I would ever get to see. He managed to ignite the feeling of hatred inside me and it was disappointing for me to feel that way. I didn’t want to know what hate felt like, but now I did.

He tried to talk to me so many times, but I didn’t want to hear any of his excuses. Every time I looked at him, the image of Maksen being shot came to my mind and made my skin crawl.

I wasn’t going to forget what he did to him, and that scared me, because that meant that I’ll hate him for each second of my life. And no girl wants to hate her father.

I started drawing into my sketchbook and I didn’t know exactly what it was going to turn up to be in the end. I just knew I had to get those thoughts out of my mind and drawing had always helped me.

I began tracing fine lines with the tip of the pencil, and then I continued by making tiny circles.

The sound of the gunshot.

The blood.

Maksen being hurt, his face portraying true pain which he seemed to enjoy.

He enjoyed the pain.

My nails bit into my own palms as I felt a shakiness in my limbs. I tried so hard to hold back a cry, because that day kept replaying in my head.

How could someoneenjoypain?

The pencil’s tip broke when I pressed it too harshly on the paper, and a sigh escaped my mouth. I stood up and made my way to the desk to search for another one. As soon as I closed the drawer, a knock on my door caught my attention.

“Come in,”

The door opened and my father appeared from behind it. I breathed out and tried not to chase him away from my room. He closed the door as he stepped towards me and I felt the need to sit on the chair.

I was waiting for him to talk and tell me the reason why he came here. I felt how my facial expression tightened and my muscles quivered while he was looking at me so attentively, as if nothing happened.

“It’s been two weeks since you started avoiding me,moye solntse,?*” he said in a low tone of voice and my stomach curled hearing what he called me.

He always loved to call me ‘his sun’ in Russian because he thought everything sounded more beautiful in our native language. I didn’t know how to speak it properly, but I understood when somebody else did.

“I know. I still don’t want to talk to you,” I declared.

A pinch of sadness crept into his icy eyes, but it didn’t impress me.

I knew he was my father, but now he didn’t matter to me anymore. Looking at him made me realize that if I would’ve lost him, I would’ve lost the only parent I had on this Earth. His actions enraged me and there was an ongoing fight inside me between the girl who missed talking with her father, hugging him, seeking comfort in his words, and the girl who accepted the harsh reality that revealed itself when her father shot her best friend. If he had the heart to do such a thing to Maksen, then he had no heart and the father I grew up with was a lie.

“What can I do to make you forgive me? It hurts me so bad to see my beloved daughter passing by me like I’m a stranger to her,”

It hurt me more to see my beloved father shooting at his most loyal man as if he was a stranger to him, I thought for myself and kept my gaze on him.

“I need time,” I said as I started to play with the pencil on the desk’s surface.

He kept silent for a few moments and tilted his head in approval. I’ve never seen him like this. I never heard him trying to make someone forgive him for something he did. If there was something my father wasn’t good at, it was saying that he was sorry.

“Then I’ll give you the space you need,” he murmured and moved his feet to the door. “Maybe you’ll make up your mind once I’m back home. I’ll leave for a week, but you’ll have Katya and all the maids with you,” he added and opened the door.

As I always have. The same old people beside me,I told myself.

“Okay.”

“Remember the rule, Annalise.”

Do not leave the house, Annalise,his voice made an echo inside my mind as I knew the rule better than anything else.

---