Page 91 of Hateful Vows
The worst is behind us but I don’t feel better at all.
THIRTY-EIGHT
DANTE
Idon’t know for how long I come in and out of consciousness, awoken by hunger or the need for a fix.
At least, Gio has switched off the overhead light and my eyes don’t burn all the time. My hands touch a smooth, bouncy surface underneath me. It’s nice that he gave me a mattress. I hate that I will dirty it when I inevitably soil myself again.
Maybe I’m dreaming because someone who looks familiar is always hovering over me, long dark lashes and silky hair floating above my head, just out of reach. Two someones. The other has gnarly scars on his handsome, severe face that I want to lick.
“If he wants to lick your face, Aleksei, you should rejoice. He’s getting closer,” a voice belonging to someone I think I used to know says but it’s all blurry, my head a constant swarm of fog.
A weight settles on my side, fluffy and soft, emitting a loud noise, like a little motor. Its body is warm and soothing. I try to touch the thing but I can’t lift my arms. I think it knows what I want because velvet material touches my fingers. Maybe it’s a rat, but my mind has decided it’s a cat. I don’t want to think about petting a rat. I’m already so far gone.
A nasty cold shiver spreads over my body and I shudder, begging for the drug that’ll take it all away. The first ghost of mypast takes my hand and kisses the back of it. It feels nice, but my body still hurts everywhere. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I’ll give you anything, but never that.”
Her name swims at the back of my head.
My eyelids become heavy, but before I succumb to a dreamless sleep, her name escapes my lips in a whisper. “Irina.”
THIRTY-NINE
DANTE
London is bustling underneath the high ceiling windows of our penthouse. Cars and people alike move like ants from my point of view on the plush chair, high above the after work traffic and the rhythm of life. The rain pattering against the glass in a soothing melody doesn’t affect them as they go home or to meet their friends.
To live.
And I’m suspended in a stasis.
After Irina and Aleksei took me back here, to our home, I was stuck in a delirious state for three days. I’ve been awake for a week now, properly fed, hydrated. Washed. I even managed to get to the swimming pool on the top floor this morning and do four laps under the supervision of my physiotherapist. I hated every minute of it, how weak I was and out of breath. But I walked there by myself, swam by myself, and felt like a man for the first time in weeks.
Yet, I’m missing the most vital part of myself.
Irina and Aleksei.
They both avoid me, only coming to my room when I’m sleeping or half-awake.
The drug withdrawal is hard to experience, and probably hard for them to watch. But every step is a distance between us, like a wide canyon I don’t know how to cross. And they don’t either.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Don Ventura. I didn’t know you were awake. Here’s the dinner Mrs Magda prepared. She’s a scary woman, even more than Mrs Ventura.” Francisco starts rambling, and I smile kindly at him. The kid has come to see me every day after school. He managed to keep me in good spirits when heaviness tried to settle over the past few days.
“Thank you, kid. How’s your mum?”
He shrugs, and I grimace. Francisco’s lost so much in a short amount of time. So did I. Sometimes, he just comes to my room to do his homework. We don’t talk. We don’t need to. Grief and pain just have to be experienced, not rehashed with empty words.
“I’m glad you’re not dead,” he whispers softly, then sniffles, wiping his nose with his sleeve.
I might not be dead but I don’t feel alive, either.
“Oh, you’re awake. Do you need anything?”
I glance at my viper of a wife, except she looks like a mouse, eyes wide and frightened, shifting from foot to foot. Her hair looks dull, and she wears a simple wool dress she’d never have been caught wearing before.Before him.
She’s even going barefoot.
Whatever happened with Gio didn’t only change me, and I hate him with renewed passion for it. He did this to us. Stripped us of what made us strong to reveal charred bones of uncomfortable vulnerability none of us knows what to do with.
