Too quiet.
My father's death left a vacuum that none of us know how to fill. The staff moves through the halls like ghosts, afraid to make noise. My siblings scatter to their corners, processing grief in their own ways.
Karolina threw herself into planning the foundation.
Vladimir disappeared to the stables.
Aleksander returned to his own estate, claiming business couldn't wait.
Oleg went back to training, punishing his body because he doesn't know how else to punish his heart.
And Natalia...
I find her in the media room.
She's curled on the massive sectional, buried under a mountain of blankets. The television casts blue light across her face. A pint of ice cream sits in her lap, spoon sticking straight up like a flag of surrender.
"Natalia."
She doesn't look away from the screen.
"Dmitri."
I check my watch.
"It's two in the afternoon."
"I'm aware."
"You're eating ice cream."
"Also aware."
I move into the room. Settle onto the arm of the sectional. The movie playing is something animated. Bright colors. Talking animals. Not the kind of thing I'd expect from my twenty-year-old sister.
"What is this?"
"My third movie of the day." She finally glances at me. Her eyes are red-rimmed. Puffy. "I started with something French and depressing. Then something British and depressing. Now I'm watching a cartoon about a fish because I ran out of tears and needed something that wouldn't make me feel anything."
"A fish."
"His name is Nemo." She scoops ice cream into her mouth. "He gets lost. His dad finds him. Everyone lives happily ever after."
"Sounds riveting."
"It's not." She shrugs. "But it's better than thinking about how Papa is dead and I killed our mother and nothing will ever be okay again."
I want to sit beside her.
Pull her into my arms. Tell her she's wrong.
But the words stick in my throat.
I can't do it.
Can't offer comfort I don't know how to give. So I stand.
"Mrs. Pavlov will bring you dinner," I say.
