2
KALINA
Wings flapped rapidly outside. On the ledge of the stairwell anchored to the exterior wall of the apartment building I was last moved to, the pigeons cooed in alarm. Others flew off.
It was no wonder that they were unsettled, disturbed by the ruckus of partiers and normal people celebrating the new year.
Normal people.
I sighed heavily as I stood slowly.
I wasn’t normal.
Nothing about my life could count as anything resembling normalcy.
Walking across the small, barren bedroom was an exercise I usually enjoyed. What I needed was to run.
To sprint away without any tethers. To dash into the open with only the wide sky watching over me.
But that’s not happening.
I reached the narrow window, a slit in the wall that gave me the only clearance to witness the outside world. The real one, full ofnormalpeople.
Not this imprisonment of an existence I was supposed to calllife. Not this identity of a younger sister, shackled and sheltered by an older brother.
Pushing the curtain aside, I peeked at the limited view I was allowed at this location. The last place Erik had moved me to had a bigger window in the bedroom he'd locked me in. My brother constantly moved me around, with no rhyme or reason to the transportation.
After our parents died and he took over my life, assuming guardianship of me when I was twelve and he was nineteen, he considered himself my master. My teacher. My ruler who could move me around as he pleased. My captor who would keep me locked in a room without a single care for my mental health or need to be part of the real world. With the normal people.
You’re normal.
I peered at the bigger but duller pigeon strutting on the ledge. With her darker plumage and basic appearance, I knew she was the female. She had no need to attract a male, no concern to present herself and win over another for her future.
And that was normal. As far as a bird could be normal or not, she was exactly as expected.
You’re normal, too.
I considered her mate. The male pigeon didn’t let her stray too far, ever watchful with his quick eyes to track where she went.
That’s normal.
He wasn’t stalking her out of malice or for control, but because he was concerned about her, wanting her to be free of danger. That regard of well-being wasnormal. It was something I would never experience in my life again.
So long as my brother wanted to train me into a model, obedient, and subservient wife for the highest bidder, I would lack that kind of care. And while he entrusted his friend, Yusef, to condition me into the locked, caged animal that I was, I would never have the opportunity to feel a man’s watchful eye on me—not out of control, not as a means of dominance and possession, but out of…
Love.
Another dreary sigh left my lips as I watched the pigeons, envying how the pair had it better than I did. Mere birds were more fortunate than I was. Mated for life and free to soar in the open sky, they had an envious life of such freedom that I could never dare to hope for.
“I told you, Marco.”
I froze internally, always alarmed when Erik’s voice came through the walls. My older brother had a loud yet whining tone that would likely set anyone’s teeth on edge. It chilled me. It infuriated me. Fourteen years, I dreaded him speaking and dictating how my life should be lived.
As a thing.
As a commodity.
As a means for him to reap the rewards of a get-rich-quick scheme in selling his sister to the highest bidder.
