“Beautiful! Beautiful girl! Hey!” he called, waving. She ignored him.
“Look at that neck, Papa,” Pavel said, digging him in the ribs with his elbow.
Papa snorted and leaned forward. In his sunglasses, Pavel turned his head in Alexei and Dmitri’s direction. Dmitri sauntered behind Papa.
“Hey, baby!” Papa shouted. Drunk on his ass, leaning over the balcony, waving with both hands. Whistling at her.
Ivan and Pavel did the same, hooting, whistling. The woman didn’t react. She must have been used to this kind of treatment.
Papa leaned farther over. Ivan and Pavel crowded him in. And in that moment, Alexei finally understood what was happening.
“No, no, don’t,” Alexei said, rushing toward him. “Papa, step back. Step back now!”
Dmitri half turned, pushed Alexei hard against the wall, and mouthed,Stay back. Ivan and Pavel moved in closer, like advancing jackals.
Alexei lurched forward, trying to push Dmitri aside. Dmitri blocked his way. “Please, Papa. Get away from them!”
Pavel shouted, “Now!”
The vampires Karamazov started moving at once. Alexei lurched forward and found himself pushed against the railing as his three older brothers grabbed their father and started to hoist him up. A troika of murderers. Papa flailed and fought for purchase, but he had already leaned over too far. He was bowed outward, forward from the waist up, nearly clear of the protection of the awning.
“You bastards! Bastards!” he shrieked. “Help! Hey, help!”
A couple people looked up. A short man in a Jets T-shirt started tapping on his phone. A woman in a short denim skirt shouted, “Hey!” and began running toward the building and waved her arms. “Hey, someone call the cops!”
Alexei grappled with Dmitri, punching his shoulder with both fists. Dmitri shoved him hard; Alexei tumbled onto his backside and smacked the back of his head on the concrete. For a few seconds the bright world spun around, and his vision faded to gray with yellow dots.
Papa was yelling at the top of his lungs. Ivan was screaming, too: “You idiot! You selfish bastard! Die!”
Ears ringing, vision clouded, Alexei lunged at Dmitri’s legs. Dmitri kicked backward at him, shaking his head, bellowing, “Go inside! Get out of here!”
“Alyosha, save me!” his father shrieked. “Save me!”
All the rays of the sun gathered around Papa’s head like a halo.Or maybe his hair was catching on fire. The top of his head was less than an inch from the edge of the awning. One second, two, and it would be too late.
“God damn you all!” Papa shouted.
“Go inside, Lex! Pack our shit!” Pavel bellowed. “Get ready to run!”
“Oh, Lord Jesus Christ!” Alexei cried, flinging himself at his brothers, hitting, yanking at them. “Oh, God, my Father!” pummeling their backs and shoulders as they held Papa farther out and made ready to pitch him into the street. Was he burning? Was his face turning black? “Saint Sergius, on my soul!” He reached for Fyodor. “Papa! Papa!”
“Stop them!” Papa cried.
Then through all the yelling he heard a voice inside his head:Will you die for him?Oh, was it Christ who spoke? Was it the Lord?
“Yes,” Alexei said.
That drunken lout, the one who damned you—
“Yes!”
The demon who separated you from me?
“Yes! I will! I will die, I will die!” he yelled, raining fists down on Dmitri’s back. “Save him!”
Amen, said the voice.
The brilliant sunlight changed to washes of pink, light blue, lavender, swirls of soft color. The shouting faded and low church bells tolled. Images shifted, altered: his father stood out in bold relief, arms extended, but his brothers became cloudy, insubstantial. Alexei stretched his hands toward Fyodor Pavlovich. A strange pressure built in his shoulder blades, followed by a sharp release.
