18
ALEXEI
I’m lying in bed, looking up at the ceiling as the night goes on outside the bedroom window.
Isabella and I have been making love on a regular basis, which, all things considered, I think has been good for my nerves. For a few hours, I forgot the threat to my life lurking all around me, within my own brotherhood. I lost myself in her body, a feeling that I now realize is pointless to try and avoid. Sex with her has become a welcome reprieve.
I think about what I said to her this morning. That I’d protect her, no matter what. It’s something I never had the chance to say to Kira. Over the years, I’ve told myself that it was because she was a part of this life. Her father was one of us in that he served under my father as aboevik, a soldier with a solid reputation. There was talk among everyone that he was going to be elevated to brigadier once we were married.
But she understood this life just like I always have. And she knew that if she were to be with me, then it was my duty to protect her.
At least, that’s what I’ve been telling myself. Maybe that’s why it feels like a betrayal that she was killed anyway.
Isabella stirs in my arms, shifting and turning her back to me. I look over at her, the curve of her bare back, the faint smell of her sweet jasmine mixed with sex. I don’t know how I feel about her. It’s not like I’m required to feel anything other than obligation.
But sometimes, I look at her and imagine what it might be like if we’d met organically. Maybe if I’d seen her walking down the street one summer, her curvy hips sashaying in a mini skirt, her hair long and in a ponytail swaying in time with her hips…
I touch her softly along the nape of her neck, weaving my fingers through her hair. It’s grown since she chopped it all off a month ago. Still not at her shoulders, but getting there.
What if I had coffee with her one day and we connected about something other than sex? What if I saw, then, the way her full lips twist up on one side when she thinks something is funny but is trying to hold it in? What if I noticed her sitting on the balcony, cup of tea in hand as she watched the afternoon rain pour over the city, the gray world beyond hanging in her ocean eyes?
What if it all happened and no one had to force it on us? Would I have these same conflicting feelings? I don’t know.
But I thought to promise her safety. And she might be from a different family, but I’m sure she knows all about the risks of being a part of all this. Like Kira, I don’t have to promise anything.
My mind drifts back to Kira and my heart feels heavy in my chest all of a sudden. I didn’t know then…
I hang onto that thought. It repeats and turns in my mind as if it needs examining.I didn’t know then…
I give Isabella a gentle kiss on the shoulder and I get out of bed, being careful not to wake her, and I kneel down to grab the box of memories from under my bed and I leave the bedroom.
In the living room, I open the box. The first thing my hand touches is one of the many letters we used to send to each other. That was something that was her idea. She liked to text me, even enjoyed an occasional phone call. But she loved letters. In high school, she’d leave them in my locker between classes.
I open the first one I come across and pick up the soft scent of roses from her perfume. I scan words that I’ve read a million times before. This one was about something that happened in her class. Her English teacher and his polka-dot tie… and how much she wished we were in the same classes. Kira had all AP classes, so there was no hope that we would ever be together in anything academic. But she would describe things so vividly that I sometimes felt like I was sitting right next to her.
Mr. Rodney and his stupid polka-dot tie and musty smelling cologne… The girl with the side ponytail and braces in her algebra class… All these things that I imagine other teenage boys couldn’t care less about, I lived on. I devoured it all like food and water in a desert.
I set the letter aside and find an old photo, and a chill runs up my spine. In it, I’m standing with my arm around her. She smiles into the camera as she leans into me, her honey colored hair shining in the sunlight nearly matching the strap of the yellow sundress she was wearing.
It was my twentieth birthday. I have other photos from that day in here. Pictures of Anya dancing by the pool with her then boyfriend, of Dmitri leaping into the pool, his legs pulled up to his chest and mouth open as he screamedCannonball!
But this one of me and Kira is my favorite. I’m smiling here, freely and easily. I was smaller then, still tall, but I was much leaner than I am now. I didn’t have a care in the world and no way of knowing that an hour from that moment, my entire world would change forever.
My father had a property a little farther up north, surrounded by woods. It was the perfect place for summer vacations and parties. It had a pool and a tennis court a little farther down the hill behind the house. We even owned a little dock by the lake where we’d go swimming or boating some years.
It was an easy day. A perfect fucking day. And then, at some point, Kira and I went into the house. She led me by the hand, intending on taking me up to my room for some privacy.
It plays like slow motion in my mind. Her turning and smiling at me, her hair brushing against her cheek. In the next second, her head jerks forward and a dark, smoking hole forms in her forehead. Blood splatters my face as she falls forward into my arms.
To this day, I don’t remember hearing the shots. I don’t know how they all missed me. I must have been standing there among the hail of gunfire, holding her in my arms, for a million years. At least until I felt someone tackle me to the ground.
It was Dmitri. The second he heard the shots, he came running into the house. The moment he saw me, he tackled me, holding my head down as the gunshots rang out all around us.
Kira wasn’t the only casualty. She wasn’t even the primary target. They were looking for me, or perhaps, my father. The fools got out of their truck, stood right in front of the porch, and opened fire without any regard to whoever might be inside.
Later, I’d find out that they were some low level gang from the city, pissed at my father for taking over their territory. While I knelt over the body of Kira, tears running down my face, he and his men pursued them and made sure they never saw the light of day again.
I never promised to protect her, and I should have. She was going to be my wife. I didn’t protect her, and I should have.
