by Tessi, Zoya
“Are you alright?”
“I'm not alright! I can’t stand this anymore. My life is turning to shit!” I said, injecting more than a little melodrama.
“What happened?”
Sniffling quite a lot, I told him about the Black Valentine concert and the tickets Beth had bought, and explained that Alex had cruelly forbidden it. I knew all the time that Nikolai wouldn’t be swayed by my begging and that he’d side with Alex from the get go. In fact, if things were all up to Nikolai I’d be far away from the city, locked up with a bunch of armed goons. Anyhow, it wasn’t my true aim to get around Nikolai... just to make sure Alex heard every word.
“He’s totally right. It's not safe.”
“But dad...”
“I'm sorry Princess”
“I don’t believe it! You’re both the same!” I hung up and ran back to my room, throwing the door closed with my full force to complete the effect. Then, humming to myself very quietly, I started to get ready for classes.
***
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Beth asked on Saturday night, as she stood over a pot of steaming hot goulash, stirring it absently.
When it came to the quality of the idea, I was sure it was top-notch. For several days I’d been doing my best to show Alex that I’d given up on the idea of going to the concert, so he wouldn’t suspect at all that I had a very cunning plan. I put on a show of ignoring him and acting all hurt, and made a call in his presence to tell Paolo I wouldn’t be going. In a fine display of acting, I even managed to stage a bout of crying one morning when Beth put on a Black Valentine song.
“Very sure,” I nodded and held my hand out in front of Bethany, "Did you get them?”
I saw her hesitate before sliding a hand into her pocket to pull out a small plastic bottle, reluctantly laying it in my palm.
“Just so that you know, it wasn’t easy to get hold of these without a prescription. I had to promise Ryan that I’d go out with him next week in exchange.”
“I think it’ll be worth it. I'm just sorry I won’t be around to see Alex's face when he wakes up and realizes what happened,” I rattled the bottle of sleeping pills and smiled to myself.
“Well I’d think twice about it.”
She was right. I really didn’t want him awake when we get back. I wasn’t looking forward to being choked to death, so better to avoid it.
“You know, I'm not sure playing a trick like this is such a smart idea. To be honest, that look of his when he seems to see into your soul... it makes me nervous.”
“Yeah... he’s known to have that effect,” I shrugged, “That's his standard ‘I hate the whole world’ look. The thing is, his mother fell coming out of some department store when he was just a baby. As I heard, he hit his head real bad on the sidewalk. He’s probably been wacky since then,” even though none of that was true, the words seemed to flow out of me.
“Aaaah... that explains a lot then,” Beth nodded, confused, and I had a hard time not letting on.
“Better get down to work.”
Looking across towards the other end of the apartment, I made sure we were alone , opened the bottle of pills and shook out three, lining them up like small blue soldiers. Then, with the back of a spoon, I carefully started crushing them up.
“The bottle says one per night for an adult,” Beth was standing on the other side of the table, looking worried, the large bowl of goulash between us.
“For normal people, maybe. For Alex we need a horse’s dose. “
“Yes, but... what if we kill him?” she looked at me, nervously biting her nails.
“We’ll wrap his body in some old rug and call Paolo to help us bury him in the park over by the university. If you really want, we can plant some daffodils on the spot.”
“What?” Beth’s eyes moved frantically in their sockets and I had to control myself, or else fall into a hysterical giggling fit.
“Come on... I'm only kidding. Don’t worry about Alex. He’ll just have a good long beauty sleep.” I smiled, working what was left of the pills into an even finer powder.
“Don’t you think he'll notice something?”
“He shouldn’t. I guess we don’t really want to be around when he wakes up though.”
I swept the powder off the side of the table and into a clean bowl using the side of my hand, then ladled some of the goulash on top and gave the whole thing a stir, trying not to think about what might happen if Alex did cotton on to the plan.
When I felt sure the specks of blue were mixed in well with the food, I dipped my finger into the sauce and marked the bowl with two red spots on its rim.
“We wouldn’t want his dose ending up in you or me, would we?” I explained when I saw Beth looking even more puzzled than before. “This is how we’ll know which is his.”
“Yes of course,” she mumbled almost too quietly to be heard.
“Alright then. Now pass some bowls over for us. Alex went to take a shower exactly five minutes ago, so he might show up any second. Hurry.”
We’d just finished laying the table when he came through into the kitchen, looking like his thoughts were very far away and, without a word, sat next to me.
Whether it was because he didn’t look as pissed as usual, or because of the long-sleeved t-shirt that covered his tattoos, he seemed like a different person. It made me wonder what he might have been in life if he hadn’t gotten tangled up with Nikolai and the rest. He acted like he was at home in that criminal underworld, but I knew that wasn’t the whole truth. The fact that not one honest-to-goodness smile of joy had crossed his lips since I met him, almost a month ago, spoke volumes.
I can’t do this! He’s just doing his job – protecting me, and I’m about to drug him.
A pang of guilt struck me out of the blue and it felt like I was flying into a panic for a split second. On impulse, I almost reached over and knocked his bowl to the floor so that it would smash, but he’d already taken up a spoon and started eating.
Damn. It’s too late now.
As we ate, I tried hard not to let my gaze linger on his bowl, but from the corner of my eye I could see that his goulash was disappearing pretty fast. The dose we’d given him ought to keep him asleep for at least twelve hours, which was more than enough time for us to see the concert, go to the after party and get home without him even noticing.
There was an anxious moment a bit later when I noticed all the sauce he’d left at the bottom of his bowl, but I reckoned he’d had plenty of the sedative by now and felt pretty sure things were all going according to plan.
After dinner, Beth disappeared to her room to start getting ready, while I settled myself on the couch in the living room, determined to look as miserable as humanly possible and stared blankly at the TV. A few minutes later, when Alex came through to sit near me, I shifted my position so that I was as far away from him as I could get, determined to play the poor victim down to the last. I pulled a blanket around me and somehow topped even my own expectations by letting go of two small tears that trickled down my cheek. They may have been down to the nervousness that was already prickling my skin.
“Princess...”
“What?” I sniffed and wiped my eyes, my hand inside the sleeve of the old jumper I was wearing.
“I'm sorry it’s like this. Really I am.” he sighed and moved a little closer. “I know how much you wanted to go and… If you want, when this is all over I’ll take you to any concert you want.”
I buckled slightly and looked at him, confused. The sleeping pills were obviously having some pretty weird side effects, and not the ones listed on the bottle, since he really looked like he meant it. This couldn’t be the real Alex. I knew he’d rather strangle me than take me to a gig like a normal person.
“Even a Miley Cyrus concert?”
“Don’t push it.” he flashed his crooked smile and spread one arm out behind me along the back of the couch, turning his attention to the movie.
I secretly glanc
ed at the wall clock and realized it was a full half an hour since we’d had dinner, which meant the pills should kick in soon. It was vitally important to make sure he stayed on the couch and didn’t get up and move around. If that happened he’d surely notice something funny going on.
I took the only course of action possible and snuggled up close to him, letting my head come to rest on his shoulder. The look on his face told me he wasn’t expecting it, but he made no comment as he brought his arm down around my shoulders.
“So, you're not mad at me anymore?” he whispered a little later, his lips just brushing my ear, and I just shook my head.
Though I didn’t want to admit it to myself, it had been quite some time since I’d really felt angry with Alex, and I didn’t like where that was heading. Closing my eyes, the thought of going out suddenly lost its appeal, and I started to imagine what it would be like to spend the night in his arms again instead.
Fortunately, the sound of the shower running in the bathroom brought me out of my daydreams and cast those ideas aside. Listening to Alex’s breathing, which was obviously slowing down, I forced myself to lie still until his body relaxed completely. I finally lifted my head just a little and confirmed from his face that he was in a really deep sleep.
Cautiously, I slipped out of his embrace, lifting his heavy arm off my body and sliding underneath. With a little difficulty, I got him into a position that looked sort of normal for a human being.
“My God, you weigh more than a tank!” I groaned and took a deep breath.
I was half way to my room when a new compulsion took hold of me. I moved back to the couch, took a pillow from a nearby chair and pushed it gently under his head. Turning once to make sure Beth wasn’t anywhere around, I crouched down in front of him. Feeling like I might be walking through the gates of a forbidden city, I reached out my hand and let the tips of my fingers move over the lines on his forehead, then his nose and finally his lips. It felt very odd to see him so peaceful and vulnerable and, not able to resist the temptation, I brought my face close to his and kissed him.
Realizing what I’d done, I got up quickly and took a few steps back. I wasn’t sure how, but it seemed like I’d completely blanked out the fact that this interloper on my couch was, in fact, a tough criminal.
Maybe going to see a shrink wouldn’t be such a bad idea.
By nine o’clock I was dressed to kill in tight black jeans, a shiny silver shirt and black boots with dizzyingly heels, ready to head hot to town. We’d just passed through the door of the apartment when one last idea popped into my mind.
“Just a minute,” I moved back through the doorway to the dresser in the hall, picked up Alek’s bike keys and dropped them in one of the ornamental floor vases full of old, dry reeds.
“You don’t think he'll wake up and come after us, do you?” Beth asked as we were leaving the building and walking toward Paolo's car.
“No way. When we came out he was sleeping like a rock, but I thought just in case. And even if he does miraculously wake up before we get back, he won’t know where we are. There’s really nothing to be afraid of."
The stadium where the band was playing was only seven blocks away, so we managed to get there just as the support act was finishing. After getting our tickets checked and passing through security, we made our way to the fan pit in front of the stage to get the best possible view. Finally, I let myself relax and got swept away by the atmosphere.
After four songs I’d almost lost my voice from singing along – screaming, Bethany said – but it didn’t stop me from shouting even louder when my favorite number came on, ‘My Life’s a Lie’.
I watched the girls around me screaming and waving their arms in the hope of attracting the singer’s attention, while he was giving every impression of making love to his mic stand, all long black curls and ripped leather pants. Behind me, Paolo was doing his best to attract the attention of a much taller redhead, while Beth thrashed around to my right, moving pretty well to the rhythm but elbowing me in the ribs a little too often. The guitarist had just played the first few bars of a new song when Bethany grabbed my arm and started to shout, looking past me and back through the crowd.
“Oh, crap! We’re gonna cop it now!”
“What is it?” I asked, following her wild look.
My heart sank through the floor when I made out Alex negotiating a path through the fans around fifteen rows back.
“Shit, shit, shit!” I quickly crouched down and pulled Beth with me, drawing a couple of confused looks from the people around us.
“H... how?” Beth looked at me, her eyes wide and shining.
“How the hell should I know?” I snapped, “He should have been far gone for twelve hours or more, and it’s not even been two!”
“What shall we do?”
“Run for it. Come on!”
I took her hand and, still crouching, dragged her in the direction of a glowing green exit sign mounted high up on the wall.
“And Paolo?” she asked as we were squeezed through the jostling crowd.
“We'll call him later. Hurry!”
After several minutes of pushing, elbowing and trampling on feet, we found ourselves in front of the exit. I turned to see if Alex was following us, and froze.
With a look like he’d reached breaking point, my protector-turned-pursuer was standing right where we’d just been enjoying the music, and looking right at me. Our eyes met and for a few seconds I stood petrified, my feet turning to concrete. Beth shouted something in my ear and started tugging at my shirt. Snapping out of the trance, I grabbed her hand and pushed through the heavy doors. One dim corridor and another set of doors later and we were in the parking lot.
Running straight up to one of the waiting cabs, we shouted to the driver to go almost before we’d closed the doors. He turned the key straight off and pulled away, probably recognizing that we were nearly hysterical. I squeezed the seat behind me with all my strength as I kept my eyes locked on the doors we’d left by, expecting Alex to appear at any second. Only when the driver hung a left and the stadium fell from view did I breathe a sigh of relief and turn to face front.
“We got away”, I declared, “I guess the crowd slowed him down.”
“So what are we gonna do now? Go home?”
“Of course not,” I tried to sound firm and gave the driver the address of the club where the after party was going to happen.
“Are you sure? If he found us here... maybe he’ll follow us there too?”
“No way. He probably realized straight off that I’d gone with you to the concert, after he came round. He could easily have checked the venue on the Internet, but I don’t think it’d be as easy to find the party.”
“I hope you're right, because he seemed really, really angry.”
“No wonder,” I tried to laugh, “I can only imagine what kind of dent his ego got when he woke up to find me gone.”
“I don’t even want to think about it. And how come he woke up so soon? One pill should have been enough to keep him asleep till noon tomorrow! That’s what I thought, anyway.”
“Maybe the ones Ryan gave you were out of date.”
“No, I checked the bottle,” she shook her head, “But isn’t all this little beside the point? OK, he said you couldn’t go to the concert, but how come he can even decide something like that? Ever since he showed up he follows you round and he never lets you out of his sight, like you two are joined at the hip or something. Why do you let it go on like that?”
Oh, crap!
My brain was suddenly working overtime, going over all excuses possible, but none of them sounded even remotely plausible. Everything Beth said was right and I’d been expecting her to launch into these kinds of questions. Maybe the only surprising thing was that she’d waited this long. I’d hoped to have a little more time than this to come up with an explanation. I didn’t want to lie, but I couldn’t tell her the truth either.
“Alex feels protective towards
me... far too protective. He probably thinks now that we live together I’m his responsibility. And just look at his personality. He’s a control freak if ever there was one…” I kept my eyes fixed on the road ahead throughout, not looking Bethany in the face once.
“Well OK, but couldn’t you talk things over with him? Why did we have to drug him to go to the concert? I went along with it and all, but bizarre or what?”
“With him, there’s no discussion. When he gets something in his stubborn head there’s no more arguing. I wanted just to avoid all the squabbling and go with you tonight,” I shrugged, though it felt sort of forced.
“Sasha, you and I both know that what you just said is a big pile of steaming horse shit. You never back out of a fight. In fact, you get off on them! There’s something else going on. Something you’re not telling me.”
“You're wrong,” I turned my face to the window.
“Whatever you say. I don’t want to push it any more. But when you’re ready to talk about it, I’ll be here to listen, OK?”
I only nodded and we were both quiet for the rest of the cab ride.
When we got inside the club it was already packed out and it seemed like a popular enough place on any night. Feeling guilty that I’d lied to Beth, and nervous at the thought of facing Alex, who’s head might actually explode pretty soon, I felt a powerful urge to run off and hide like an injured pussycat.
Not having any better options, I headed straight for the bar. Beth saw where this all was going and opted to join a table full of guys nearby. They’d been looking over at us since we walked in and seemed more than happy with her intrusion.
Only after I’d felt the second vodka burn in my throat did I remember that I’d sworn off the demon drink only few weeks before. It might have been true that I rarely drank in general, but I had been totally wasted tree times in last month or so. To make matters even worse, I’d been driven to the bottle each of those times by a man. To be clear, I don’t see anything wrong with a drink or two to loosen up at parties and get into the groove. Drinking to escape your problems is another thing. That’s just kind of sad. And, this time it wasn’t about forgetting Tyler. Now there was another guy on my mind.