Itried to run, at first. The moment I realized what was happening, I took off, and got as far as the stairs. There, a man with a thick beard caught me by the arm, wrenching it hard enough to knock me off my feet. He jovially called for someone down the hall.
I screamed, but all the pale faces I saw on my way in retreated into their hidey-holes, like little crabs. A dialect of Russian I didn’t know boomed from somewhere behind me. They were laughing.
They came and got me.
Men I didn’t know, with faces that held no recognition of my humanity, took me into a room. I struggled, because whatever fate they had in store for me would certainly be worse than breaking a few bones on my way out. If only I could make it down the stairs. I was faster—I could run.
The needle came in the moment of my coldest despair. I only acutely recognized the prick as something medical, because the walls around me were nothing but cigarette grime and moldywallpaper, not like a hospital at all.
Everything was pain and fear, and then it wasn’t.
* * *
Burnt plastic and urine. Something soft touched my leg. My foot separated from the floor with a wet squelch. Everything was slow and blurry. That was my world.
They put me in a dark room packed with garbage up to my shins. I wouldn’t have found the bare mattress, but I tripped and was too afraid to move because I’d gotten lucky that I hadn’t stuck my hand with a needle yet. But they were all over, and moving meant risk. I couldn’t risk… risk…
I faded in and out, and in the haze, I realized I wasn’t alone. A woman huddled in the corner; face buried between her knees. So thin, the thickest part of her frame were her joints. When she moved, her unevenly cut, matted blond hair stuck to her shoulders.
“Elena?” I muttered with a sandpaper rasp.
The woman glanced up. She had the same bruise as the last time I saw her, but she seemed worse—much worse. Even in the darkness, I got the impression her skin had yellowed, and red-rimmed eyes turned milky and dull.
“Oh Elena… I’m so sorry…”
She slowly shook her head, and her gaze drifted. “You couldn’t have done anything,” she said. “It happened after Elit. They killed Dmitri—you know? It wasn’t the same after that.”
“I should have called!”
I couldn’t put my finger on what was happening; the wallsbreathed, but I couldn’t.
“I wouldn’t have answered. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. Lyosha wouldn’t give me any more money and would not let me leave. I had to, Katya. I had to do what he said to make whatever I could.”
“No, God, please—”
“It’s okay,” she smiled at me, wide enough for me to see her darkened gums, then all the way back until the masseter muscle peeked out the corners of her smeared lipstick. “You didn’t do this.”
I was already crying, but the sobs were dry. Everything swam. “I could have had Vitali look for you!”
“Even Mama didn’t know I was gone. It’s alright,” she repeated, and scratched her arm. Her nails pulled the skin down like stretchy fabric. “They call it krokodil, you know? It’s cheaper than heroin, and it keeps the girls sedated. No one cared as long as I didn’t inject into my thighs. Nowhere they could see when—”
She quieted.
“Careful with the needles,” she said. “There’s one five centimeters to the right. It’s rusty. Don’t move.”
How could she see that? It was so dark…
The ceiling moved, but Elena kept perfectly still.
“I’m so sorry,” I repeated. “I’m so sorry this happened to you…”
“Such is life,” she said. “At least you’ll get out. Probably. When Vitali comes.”
I nodded. “When Vitali comes.”
“Try to stay awake,” she told me. “Try really hard. They gave you the clean stuff until you could be inspected. They’ll give you the clean stuff until you yourself get dirty, and then it doesn’tmatter what they give you. Bye, Katya.”
“What?” I inhaled, and was alone. A broken chair and a twist of thick, metal wiring crowded the corner where Elena sat a moment ago. “Elena?”
