Page 95 of Volatile

I smile at her even though it’s unnatural, so she knows I’m fine and she slowly walks away.

Inessa sits opposite with her easy authority, but she softens when we’re finally alone and gently lays a folder on the table. There’s a new quality in her voice as she stares at the bland paper. “We were trying to find out what happened, and Vlad got the records from the hospital.”

Oh. I’m blank.

Hospital records. The hospital that Vitali raced to, where he wouldn’t speak or look at me because his dream was being shattered in front of his eyes.

This is how fish must feel in an aquarium. They’re just placed in a glass box for everyone to gawk at with their mouths opening and closing and nothing discernible leaving. Before my dad died, Inessa was like my surrogate sister, she was the person I’d play dolls beside. Never with because she hated them and she’d cut their hair off if Dariya refused to take them away. If the experimented versions were left with her, she’d dismember them and leave their headless bodies in Dariya’s rose beds; that was the first and only time I’ve ever seen the Pakhan laugh and he lined Mischa, Inessa, and me up beside the flowers before he interrogated us on who ruined them.

Then my dad died, and my mother had her opening to take over my life and she had to become nothing to me or she’d be another relationship the toxic bitch would ruin.

Right now, she speaks to the ten-year-old she knew.

“You don’t have to say or do anything you don’t want to, but don’t hide. Okay?” My vision blurs with my eyeballs burning as she softly adds, “Remember, I’ll move worms for you.”

I only manage a feeble nod and she’s out of her seat. She sits next to me and wraps her arms around my shoulders, blocking anyone from seeing the bitch melt. Why the fuck am I crying?! I didn’t even know about the baby; I didn’t plan a life or have any excitement. Vitali’s sadness is justified, mine fucking isn’t.

As though she can hear my thoughts, her whisper has my emotions turning more intense.

“You can be upset, Queen Bitch isn’t here.”

A watery laugh leaves me at the nickname we gave my mother. I’m an uglier crier as she lovingly said, I wasn’t punished for the noise but making her bargaining chip less attractive.

Inessa doesn’t force me to speak, she’s mellowed since we were children, but she can’t help herself from speaking just like then.

“You’ll have whatever you need, and you don’t have to tell anyone else, but if you need anything we’ll make Vlad pay for it.” She squeezes my shoulders and falls silent while I battle my tears.

THIRTY-FIVE

Vitali

Ineed a few kilos of something to deal with the fuckers opposite me. They’ve spent a week acting like I don’t exist, and they don’t walk towards the house, instead they choose my favorite place. Fuck them, at least I’ll have the memory of watching the sun come up with my girl while they get their rage out, only now it’s an opposite as the sun makes its slow descent over the paddock and there’s not an ounce of joy in me.

Val has always been the emotional one, Vlad is the sarcastic angry prick he’s been all his life while I am the entertainment, and Dima is the guard making sure we don’t fuck up beyond repair.

Right now, I feel like death and Val chokes on his own bullshit as he turns to me, scrubbing a hand over his ugly face and his whiny tone pisses me off.

“Why didn’t you tell us?”

They wonder why I keep shit to myself when we grew up with a cunt who called us weak more than our names. If we got sick, we were weak. Bruises from fights he forced us into, weak. Couldn’t stay awake all night because I was fucking five, weak.

I shrug, acting more like a child than I did when I was one, as I lean against the table and repeat, “I’m a weak, pathetic cunt, remember?”

The bitterness doesn’t belong to me, it’s new and no one reacts with anger. Val steps closer to me and grabs my nape. He squeezes as he forces me to look at his shitty face. “I fucked up, don’t pout about it.”

I don’t need his bullshit version of an apology and pull away from him. It’s the same shit we’d do after beating the shit out of each other – sit with our heads together and promise we didn’t mean to hurt the other person before Vlad came in our room and made sure we weren’t hurt. I’m not four, five, or six anymore and I don’t need him to pretend he knows how to fix a bloody nose when in reality it’s broken because he sat on top of me and kept punching me in the face while Len cheered him on.

“Pout about what?” I ask as he stands like a dumb dickhead. “Being exactly like what Len called me? Or you beating the shit out of me my entire life?”

His face falls and he sounds small, childlike, as he says, “I didn’t want to do it, and you did it to me too.”

“Yeah, I didn’t break your fucking ribs, arm or nose though, did I?”

Dima drags him back before I can get pissed off and Vlad freaks me out when he tempers his voice as he says, “That shit is done and it isn’t on either of you.”

“Yeah, you kicked the shit out of us too,” I scoff.

There’s no remorse as he fires back, “Would you have preferred I allowed those cunts to do it? Don’t be petulant, Vitali, I already have to deal with my wife and Valentin’s tantrums.” He takes a step closer to me and lowers his voice. “You get one pass with your grief, use it against everyone else and we’ll be behind you.”

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