I reached the bus stop and thank fuck the bus was actually on time for once, rumbling down the street as I stuck my hand out.
“Where the fuck are you going?” Rumi demanded. The bus haltedin front of me. “Come get in my car, I’ll drive you wherever you need to go.”
“Goodbye, Rumi,” I muttered as the bus door creaked open.
“I’ll give you one month, Ri. One month to get over this toddler tantrum. And if you decide to continue to behave like a child, Iwillgo to the police.”
“You do you, Rumi.”
I stepped onto the bus, tapping my Opal card and quickly finding a seat on the side that faced away from where I just knew Rumi was standing and scowling up at the windows.
Pizda.
One month. I had no choice but to take her seriously this time. If she was desperate enough to lurk outside my apartment building in her car, waiting for me to emerge, she was desperate enough to follow through with her threats.
As the bus rumbled towards the uni campus, I tried to put together a list of all the things I needed to do if she did report me to the police.
All I could come up with was ‘freak the fuck out’ and ‘disappear, so Kat doesn’t get dragged into this shit’. Maybe a good swim would help? I’d always done my best thinking in the pool.
The bus slowed at another stop, and my phone buzzed.
Stefan: How are you going with that letter from the faculty?
Stefan: Dad is getting really impatient
Stefan: And he has been talking about sending someone out to keep an eye on you until you return
I closed my eyes, letting my head fall back against the seat. Of course, this would all be happening today. I had threats flying at me from all directions. It was like the walls were closing in on me. And still the three dots were flashing. Stefan was clearly writing me an essay this time.
Stefan: Give me SOMETHING, Ri! Something to keep them off your back, just until you finish your degree. After everything we went through to make this happen for you, the last thing I want is for them to get suspicious and ruin it for you at the last minute
“Ce pula mea?” I cursed, staring down at my phone. Whatwewent through? What the fuck had Stefan gone through to get me here? Asking a question of daddy, that was all! Yeah, okay, his father was a totalgaoaza, and approaching him with anything was enough to make fully grown men shit their pants … but whatIwent through, to get out, to have these four years of freedom … to hopefully escape for good … he had no fucking idea what that had been like.
I shakily typed out a reply.
Irina: Sorry cuz, I know he did one for me. I’ve been studying hard, and it slipped my mind. I’ll find it and email it to you later today, promise.
His reply came so fast, I knew he’d been sitting with his phone in hand, waiting.
Stefan: I’m doing this for you, Ri. Please don’t forget that.
Why did that sound like a threat? Or was paranoia starting to warp my thoughts about everyone?
The bus lurched to a halt, and I looked up, cursing vibrantly in Romanian when I realised it was my stop.
“Nu pleca, batrâne nebun!” I shouted when the driver started closing the doors as I raced down the aisle. The driver muttered something under his breath, something that sounded like, “Pay attention, you little skank.” And fuck, I wanted to bite so badly. I wanted to round on him and demand he repeat himself, and then scream out all my fear and frustration at this random, crusty old bus driver.
But I didn’t. I got stiffly off the bus, and I tried to do some of that deep breathing that everyone always said was how you find calm, and it did basically nothing except make me feel like I couldn’t quite get enough air.
I had never needed to swim more in my life than right at that moment. I needed it more than I needed sex. And damn it, sex wasn’t something I’d say no to at this point either.
My student card, of course, no longer worked to get me access to the pool, and because I was also no longer employed by the swim school, I had to pay the casual entry fee. Which I did using cash … because paranoia.
Once inside, I claimed a spot on the bleachers closest to the fast lap lane. I stripped out of my T-shirt dress and grabbed my cap and goggles, heading straight for the pool edge.
“Oh! It’s you!”
My heart thundered, fear coursing through me that someone was about to accuse me of being an illegal alien and use their goggles to handcuff me while they called the immigration police to haul me straight onto a flight to Bucharest.
