Illya
Tapping my foot furiously as I watched Sylvie unlock the door through pupils narrowed to slits, I didn’t try too hard to hide how miserable I felt. It happened in slow motion— the click of the lock, the turn of the knob, and the door popped open. When the barrier swung open, my eyes snapped up, and Sylvie’s pointed features twisted like a deer getting whacked with a front bumper.
Something flashed in her dark eyes, and I knew thatsheknew she’d been caught. I could tell by the look on her face that she was still under the influence, so it’d been less than two hours since she bought that shit behind the dumpster.
Well, she won’t have anywhere to go but that damn dumpster in a minute.
“Don’t even try to deny it. Get your shit and get the fuck out.” To be honest, the drug use was bad enough, but Sylvie had lied to me to do it— the same, bullcrap story as every other drug addict. Her face froze at my hard-edged demand, and my eyelid twitched in agitation at the notion that she’d try to lie to me again. I had a pretty alright phone with a pretty alright camera, and there was no way she’d convince me that what I saw was something else.
“Illya, I can explain. That wasn’t for me. This girl at work pays me a little to go get it for her, like . . . like a middleman.” A harsh guffaw burst from my throat, and I shook my head as Sylvie walked over to me with panic slowly settling on her features. Her voice heightened, developed a little stutter as her mind tried to keep up with her lie, and an ugly, black blotch opened up in my chest. “Please, I swear, I didn’t use. I wouldn’t . . . I would never jeopardize— ”
“Get your shit and get out, or I’ll throw you out.” In a place like this, there was no lease, no nothing, just pay my rent, keep my head down, and hope ICE doesn’t show up and clean the building out. Grinding the words through my teeth, I knew there was no help for me if Sylvie didn’t leave on her own— either I physically removed her, or I threw up my hands and walked out.
Neither would be painless, I knew, and my heart twisted at the huge, fat tears that sprang to her eyes. Sylvie opened and closed her mouth a few times, standing there stupidly, and I grabbed her arm to yank up her thin sweater. She couldn’t react fast enough, and I ground my teeth hard at the track marks on her arm. I’d judge that she’d used three, maybe four times over the past week or two, but the amount didn’t matter. Throwing her arm back, I scoffed in disgust when she stumbled a little, and I raked my hand through my hair viciously.
“How dare you lie to me, Sylvie?” Hissing through clenched, aching teeth, my eyes stung with how pathetic she suddenly seemed. I could barely look at her. “How dare you? Don’t you stand there and lie. Don’t say a single word. Either get your shit and get out, or I’ll throw you and your shit out the window.”
“Illya, can we just talk about this . . . please? I made a mistake, okay— I know it— bu— ” Pulling my switchblade out of my fanny pack, I flicked open the pointy end, and Sylvie sputtered a little as her eyes grew big and her face pale.
“I’m not gonna say it again.” She just stood there, staring at my switchblade as I twirled it around, not brandishing it per se but proving I was serious. Of course, Sylvie didn’t need to know how badly my stomach roiled, how weak my knees were. I mean, we went through a lot, and I thought we were best friends. Drugs killed more than just the physical, though. Her dark gaze flickered to mine, and I jutted out my chin in defiance even as I struggled to breathe.
My heart pounded hard as she sort of deflated, and Sylvie shuffled heavily over to her cot under which all her stuff was stored. We didn’t have much, and Sylvie was very much a sentimental person. Watching down my nose as she sat down heavily, I held my breath in flaming lungs while my heart made a bid to squeeze through my ribs. Holding her head in her palms, she started crying in earnest, and my conviction wavered for a fraction of a second.
Relapsing didn’t mean Sylvie wasbad,just that she was weak. She’d done well while sober, and maybe something happened that tipped her over the edge. True, she kicked the habit, but it never truly went away.
Flames licked my throat and engulfed my spine at the notion that Sylvie would turn to drugs because she felt like she couldn’t confide in me.We were supposed to have each other’s backs, but I seem to always have yours, and you don’t have mine.
My switch trembled slightly as I snapped it shut, and the sharpclickpulled a hiccup from Sylvie from beyond her palms. Walking over on unsteady legs, I knelt down and didn’t try to hide my sneer when she peeked at me through her fingers. The hope that her crying had moved me shimmered in her eyes, and my disgust coated my tongue as my stomach flipped dangerously.
I put my hand on her knee, and Sylvie wiped her eyes with a sniffle that grated my ears. Reaching under her cot, I grabbed her duffle bag of shit and stood up too fast for her drugged up mind.
And I threw that shit right out the window of our third-story apartment.
Sylvie jumped up with a gasp of shock, running to the window and half hanging out of it. I heard the distinct thud of her bag smacking into the pavement, and I propped my fists on my hips when she whirled around to glare hotly at me. A scary kind of cold gripped my bones in a vice, cooling my breaths and slowing my heart even as she trembled with rage.
Her duffle bag had some important items in it— expensive stuff from her grandparents that she couldn’t dare part with.
“You better go get that before someone snatches it.” I barely heard my own voice over the ringing in my ears, and Sylvie went wide-eyed as she switched emotions. Panic drenched her features, and I watched through a veil of grey when she ran out of the apartment. Shuffling to my own cot, I grabbed the locks I’d bought at the grocery store for an astronomical price, and the metal was frigid in my palms.
It’d take me minutes to change out the locks, and I put my knife away to take up a screwdriver instead. Sylvie had clothes and stuff under her cot, but I’d throw that out when I finished securing the door.
“I can’t believe this.” Grumbling to myself as I worked to unknot my gut and breathe a proper breath, I shook my head and sucked up air through my nose. The heat of my apartment was strangely absent, but I didn’t put too much thought on it as I started on the knob. Five years of friendship, extremely close friendship, was just . . . gone.
Poof.
“It’ll be fine. It’ll suck ass, but it’ll be fine.”Maybe, I could squat somewhere to save money.I really didn’t make a lot with all things considered, but I had fairly good credit, and I didn’t want to ruin that by neglecting my bills. Squatting wasn’t new to me, and I scowled under furrowed brows at the dull, brass knob as it started to come loose. “I’ll ask around at work. Marcella had talked about wanting a roommate.”
In the fifteen minutes it took to change out both the locks on the door, Sylvie hadn’t come back, and I tossed lock parts onto my cot to walk to the window. Her bag was gone, but she was there, curled up on the sidewalk, bawling her eyes out. Guilt stabbed my heart, but I shut the window and blocked out the heat of the day to lean on the wall and slide down to my butt. Pulling my knees to my chin, I hugged myself, and the skin on my chest strained and stretched painfully as my ribs threatened to concave on my insides.
“Don’t feel bad. I gave her three chances. She should’ve taken one of them.” Even as I grumbled to myself, my eyes stung and my mouth watered dangerously, and I buried my face in my knees. “Don’t feel bad.”
