I was weak. So damn weak.
I rested a hand on my protruding stomach. No, I had no clue how long I had been here. Enough time had passed for me to be showing as a pregnant woman. I patted my stomach in a soothing gesture and continued singing and squeezing the rock in my hand and releasing it. Squeezing and releasing it.
I knew that Daniil was alive. Thoughts of him were so real in my mind that sometimes I thought he was standing right in front of me in the darkness. Or holding me as I fell into a wary sleep. Or as I hummed the song he had played to me the last night he and I had made love in the music room.
I thought a lot about him. He was the only thing that kept me sane. At least, as sane as I could be right now. I had never wondered what it would be like to become a prisoner in solitary confinement, but I somehow bet that even those people had more interaction with humans. Life as I knew it had changed. My world was the bomb shelter. That was all and my visions of Daniil in the darkness.
And I sang…
My stomach grew larger, and while my babies grew, I talked to Daniil. He sat across from me in the darkness, and he spoke to me about the trees and the sunshine and the wind. He told me about how the sunshine would glisten off the leaves of the trees around his home, and the wind would gently blow the limbs around. I asked him questions about what they looked like in Moscow, but he never answered those questions. He always spoke about the trees in New York.
Until one day, his tone changed.
He wouldn’t talk about anything beautiful anymore.
It…I wasn’t sure, but I felt funny about it.
I couldn’t pinpoint how I felt since I hadn’t felt anything in so long in my new isolated world, but he kept repeating one sentence, again and again, his tone getting harsher every time I tried to speak with him about something else.
“Stay alive,” he would repeatedly say. “Don’t let them have our babies.”
I knew nothing else, so I did.
One day, he disappeared. I was alone again.
I felt my first emotion in what felt like forever. Anger. I was furious he had left me. I wanted him back. I wanted him desperately. And so, I did the only thing I could do. I began working on my shackles. I was going to get Daniil back. And no one was going to take our children from us.
My fingers bled. My arm that I knew at one time had broken, worked oddly, but it none of it hurt. I felt no pain. I felt nothing as I pulled and dug at the stone walls where my shackles were held. I had plenty of time to work since no one ever came down here anymore, except for the one man who gave me my food and changed my buckets.
So, I sang and worked. Sang and worked, filled with my fury. It felt good.
I was hot. I didn’t think that was a good thing since I had been cold for so long, but I kept working, the stone around the bolts in the walls finally beginning to crumble after the constant wiggling and digging I put them through. My fingernails were gone. Lost in the stone surrounding the walls, and every time the man entered, I made sure to sit against the walls so he wouldn’t see the blood streaks. If I could see them in the darkness, then he would most definitely be able to see them when he let in the blinding light when the door opened.
Sweating, I yanked, trying to stay silent as I grunted and pulled, putting all of my weight into it, yanking hard to the right. I wiggled the chains, feeling the bite into my ankles and wrists, but it didn’t hurt. The pounding in my head didn’t even hurt. But it was odd the heat I felt.
Ignoring the odd sensation, I ducked below the short ceiling and moved, pulling the chains tight to the left this time, hearing a satisfying tumble of rocks, only to land hard on my left side when the shackle on my wrists released from the wall.
I paused, listening hard over my singing and the music outside. Hearing not a stir from outside the door, I began to work my ankles free now. I would still be cuffed, but not to the wall. I would be able to run. If I could just get my feet free from the wall.
Later, I waited. Just beside the door. Sweat poured down my face, my temples throbbed, and my pregnant belly got in the way some, but I waited, hunched and ready. It was dark out. It had to be since there was no light under the door. My food would be coming soon since my stomach growled, reminding me that it was almost that time.
I whispered quietly the last song Daniil had played me, quietly telling my missing Daniil I would be with him soon. I just had one obstacle to go through. No one else was here. I was positive of that. I had listened once I got my feet loose. I had only ever heard one pair of footsteps all day as I had lain by the door listening. That and maybe some TV.
So, I waited.
When I began to waver on my feet, I gripped the long bolts I had in my hands tighter.
Daniil had told me to stay alive. I was going to—unlike my jailer.
Not so long ago, I would have cared about what I was planning. I didn’t now. I didn’t give a shit about anything but getting out of here safely.
I heard it. Him. My jailer.
He was coming down what sounded like a set of stairs now that I listened more closely.
I shut up. Singing would give me away. I couldn’t have that.
I wiped the sweat from my face and ducked even lower. I was going to have to sweep up at him to get the angle I needed since the ceiling was so low. I could envision exactly what I needed to do, almost seeing the scene play out in front of me as clearly as I had seen Daniil. I adjusted and took a tiny step back. And then, froze.
