Knocking a few times, no one came to the door to answer. Looking around before trying to enter, I fiddled with my key rings, the silver flashing under the lights of the fluorescent bulbs that lined the ceiling of the hallway.
Gabriel had given me the key for a just in case situation. I swore on God’s holy nightgown if I entered this apartment and found him having an orgy, I was going to shoot him with his own gun. There was no excuse for not answering my phone call…even if you were in the middle of a fuck session.
The lock clicked and the door parted. It was pitch-black inside and I found the light switch on the wall. The was no sign on Gabriel, and I almost turned to leave except that I saw the gun he carried was sitting on the coffee table, and beside it was a half-done line of coke.
“Gabrielle!” I gave a holler and pulled out my gun.
My mind and mood immediately shifted; something wasn’t right.
I went through the apartment and flipped on every light until I reached his bedroom. A cry peeled from my lips as I found him face down in the bathroom, beside the toilet. Putting the gun away, I eased him onto his side and felt for a pulse.
My fingers, shaking finally found the side of his neck. The entire time, I silently prayed to God that he wasn’t dead. Prayed that we still had more time to be brothers…
Then I found it.
It was short and thready….pushing against my fingers.
A pulse.
A small sigh escaped my lips and then I sprang into action. Dialing a number we had on file for a doctor that worked for the Bratva, I realized I was shaking. Was it from fear or adrenaline, I couldn’t tell?
The doctor advised me to try and wake Gabriel and that they would be there as soon as they could. Hanging up the phone, I slapped at my brother’s face. His lips almost seemed to have a purplish tint to them but I couldn’t focus on that. Dragging him into the tub, I turned the shower on. Cold water exploded from high up above us. He only shifted a bit.
“Fight little brother,” I whispered.
Figuring the water wasn’t doing much of anything, I ended it. Getting him out of the wet clothes, and into fresh pyjamas bottoms, thoughts of us as children floated through my head.
It seemed as though it were yesterday, and I would get him up for school. Our mother would already be at work when the alarm clock would ring through my ears. It would rouse me and grumbling I would stumble over to Gabriel’s bed.
“Brother, it’s time for school,” I would say.
I would tousle his hair and he would ease one eye open. “Five more minutes, please brother.”
Every single morning, he would ask for five more minutes and I would relent as I went into the kitchen and fix the same breakfast. Two eggs, and oatmeal. I was eleven years old with the weight of the world on my shoulders, but we had survived.
We could survive anything. We were of Petrovich blood. We shouldn’t have been deprived of a father, of our birth right. But we had been and soon the man that had taken everything from us would pay with his life.
I swore it on my father’s name.
The knock from the Bratva’s doctor startled me. Checking through the peephole, I found him standing there looking patiently and dressed in black. Letting him in, he immediately began to assess the situation.
I watched with arms folded from a safe distance. He had a bag with him that he went to and pulled out a bottle of what looked like a nasal spray. Looking over his shoulder he spoke.
“Your brother is definitely suffering from an opioid overdose,” he stated with no emotion in his tone.
“Will that help?”
“Yes, it should reverse the symptoms,” he gave the bottle a slight shake and then began administering.
He stood once he was finished and began to pack his things.
“Is that it?”
“Unless you plan on getting him to the hospital,” the doctor shrugged. “I have a nurse who is on her way up. She will sit with him to monitor him throughout the rest of the day.”
A knock came on the door and I crossed to open it. To my shock and surprise, I found the nurse from the hospital. Surprise played out on her face as well.
“Mr. Petrovich?”
