What if it was me.
What if I did this.
What if I’m lost further in the darkness inside me than I realize?
What if I do it again?
40
EVELINA
Milena
Are you ok?
No,I'm not.
It’s been two weeks since I was attacked outside the Syndicate party. But that’s not why Milena’s texting me. She and the rest of our friends don’t evenknowabout that, because I begged Val not to tell anyone.
No, she’s 100% texting me because she just got the same news alert that I did.
Moscow: Former NYC Crime Boss Pavel Nikitin Arrested in FSB Raid of Minsky Bratva.
Physically, I’m fine. The two big lumps on the back of my head have disappeared, and the cut on the side of my neck from the knife is just a fading pink line. For the first few days after it happened, I was jumping at my own shadow or the slightest sudden sound. But that has abated for the most part.
But again, the attack isn’t why I’m not okay.
The headline involving my dad being arrested by Russia’s version of the FBI does have a lot to do with it, but it's only part of the reason.
It’s Vaughn.
For the first couple of days after I came home from the hospital, he was right there, permanently at my side. I mean the man literally made mepeewith the door cracked open, as if I was going to get jumped in his own bathroom.
But since then, he feels a little more distant. It's like the walls between us that I thought were coming down are slowly being put up again.
He won’t sleep with me, either—in either sense of the word.
He literally won’t sleep in the same bed with me. He brings me to his bedroom every night, and tucks me in. He’ll even crawl into bedwithme and let me fall asleep against his chest. But if I wake later, he’s gone, sleeping alone in one of the guest rooms.
It's confusing, and it stings. Especially because when I ask, he tells me it’s because he’s been having nightmares and doesn’t want to wake me. Which I'd almost believe except he won’t look me in the eye when he says it.
He also won’tfuck me. I’ve asked, but he keeps saying I need to rest, because I’m still recovering. Like suddenly, the man who gets off on fucking me like he’s trying to murder me with his cock is afraid he'll hurt me.
Thatalsostings, because I really want him to.
Ineedhim to.
He's like a drug. Or therapy. When we slip into that headspace together, where he’s my monster and I’m his prey, and he owns and controls me in every possible way, it’s like I can breathe easier.
See with more clarity.Bewith more honesty.
The brutal violence that we create in bed is my catharsis, and without it, I feel like I’m backsliding into a nervous version of me I don’t recognize anymore.
Me
You saw, huh?
Milena
