Page 17 of Ruthless Lullaby

Which suits me just fine.

More than fine.

Chapter Eight

Mindy

So much for recharging my batteries over the weekend.

I accidentally sent nudes to my boss, my relationship ended, and my mom is in hospital. Not exactly the relaxing weekend I’d planned. Every inch of my body feels heavy and worn out. I’d applied some makeup to hide the dark circles under my eyes, but it didn’t change how I felt. I still feel like crap. What would help is a hit of caffeine, injected straight into my brain. As soon as I arrive at work, I'll head straight to the kitchen and make the strongest coffee possible to help me survive the day. And maybe another one before I meet Maron Korolev first time after sending him the damn nudes.

Relax, Mindy.

He gets thousands of emails, every day.

It probably went to a spam folder, anyway.

I force the image of Maron Korolev out of my mind and take a sharp turn, navigating the morning traffic. But as soon as I stop at the next traffic light, another thought invades.

My mother.

I’m worried sick about her. After I visited her at the hospital, I spoke to Dr. Walker, and he sounded optimistic; there are viable treatments for mom's cancer. That's the good news. The bad news is that these treatments are only partly covered byher insurance. And they’re not cheap. This would be a great time for my sister to chip in, but unfortunately, she’s too busy hating me and battling her addiction.

I did my mental calculations over the weekend, and I came to the conclusion that with careful budgeting and some sacrifices, I can just about squeeze the money out of my savings, and my paychecks at Global Media. If mom responds well to the first treatment, the entire therapy will be around fifty-five grand. Which is a lot of money for me. Right now, it seems like a pretty daunting task, but I have to do it. It’s the least my mom deserves.

But right now, my main problem is still the accidental email I sent to my boss on Friday. Scratch that. My main problem is thephotos and the videoattached to that email. I still haven’t heard anything back, and I’m dreading the moment when I have to face the music. Who knows, I may not even be an employee at Global Media anymore. If I know Maron Korolev well, he just told HR about the incident and had my access card deactivated, without communicating anything to me. But if that’s the case, at least HR would have told me something. Not to mention that Betty works at HR. She would be the first to tell me if I was fired.

“Maybe Maron Korolev never saw that email, after all,” I try to soothe myself, once again. “Maybe it did get lost in the thousands of emails he receives every day.”

I just hope I’m right and the email got lost in the ether or was marked as spam. Icannotbe fired. Not right now. With my mom being in hospital, IneedGlobal Media like a flower needs water. There’s no way I can pay for her treatment without a stable job.

"What the hell are you doing, you fool?" I mutter to myself in disbelief as a reckless driver cuts me off at the traffic lights, briefly pulling my attention away from my treacherous thoughts.

Then, there’s Alexis. I could ask her to help me pay for our mom’s treatment, she is my sister after all. But I know it would only lead to even more conflict, and I don’t want to risk that. Her own struggles make relying on her very risky. I can't afford to add any more instability to an already chaotic situation.

Alexis… my once bright and beautiful sister has been battling addiction to painkillers for three years, nine months, and five days. That’s how long it has been. That's when that fatal car accident happened.

There were three of us in that car.

Alexis, my twin sister, Emily, and me.

I was driving.

The events that followed have faded into a blur now. My mind has either erased or buried them deep in the recesses of my consciousness, most likely because they are too painful to remember. I can only recall fragments. The sound of screeching tires, the flashing of red lights, the feeling of rain hitting my face as I stumbled out of the car and called for help. My memory has erased most of the details.

But one thing that will forever remain etched in my mind: the moment my twin sister, Emily, died. I was there. I was there as she heaved her final breaths, watching her as her soul left her body, leaving behind nothing but a lifeless shell. The memory of her death will haunt me until my last breath. No amount of therapy could erase the image from my mind. Her cries of pain still ring in my ears as she calls my name for my help.

Mindywas the last word she uttered before she died.

My beautiful twin sister. Through our close bond, I could feel her suffering and agony, tearing at my heart and breaking me apart.

We were all taken to hospital. Emily died. Miraculously, I got away with a few scratches. Our mother was so traumatized by the loss of Emily, that I'm pretty sure it’s one of the reasons why she has cancer. If not the only reason. As for Alexis, she was prescribed too many painkillers to cope with her injuries and now she can't function without them.

“It’s all your fault,”Alexis would say. Maybe she’s right. Maybe it is all my fault.

Either way, I have my own punishment. I carry the weight of Emily's death, Alexis' addiction, and my mother's illness for the rest of my life. And perhaps my infertility is another form of punishment for my past actions. It's as if Mother Nature is sending a message that someone like me should not reproduce. And maybe it’s for the best.

The traffic slows down and my thoughts wander to Emily again. There are no words to describe how much I miss her. No. I don't just miss her. With her gone, a part of me has been ripped away. The void she left behind is a gaping wound that refuses to heal.

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