de Stockholm. Tu as le syndrome de Stockholm. Nous avons le syndrome de Stockholm.
Before the silent maid could take my leftovers away, I grabbed the plate, slipped on my coat and shoes, and headed outside. The sun had set, but bright lights lit the yard and my way to the kennel.
Once again, the guards’ conversations faded as soon as I stepped out the door. Though the aloof dogs suddenly seemed interested in the dumplings on my plate, and they each took one, licking my fingers clean. I saved a pelmeni for the surly one, who sat alone in the corner staring at me. I dropped it beside him, but he didn’t move toward it. The other dogs gave him a wide berth, and I wondered if he was the alpha of the pack or just temperamental.
The sound of steps crunched in the snow behind me. “Stay away from that one,” Albert said. “He is not right in the head.”
The dog was probably the only one who was right in the head in this place.
“What’s his name?” I asked.
“Khaos.”
“Zdravstvuy, Khaos,” I whispered.
I turned to Albert and shoved the empty plate against his stomach. He grunted and grabbed the fine china before it fell.
“Thought you needed something to serve all that betrayal on,” I told him sweetly before heading back to the house.
Nearing the front door, I passed a guard with a cruel edge. He nudged the man beside him with the butt of his rifle and said something that evoked a laugh between them. A week ago, the obvious insult would have felt like a stab to the gut; like they could see straight through me to all the dirty secrets inside. Now, in this fortress of evil, those secrets were the only way I’d endure. Something inside of me didn’t just want to survive, but to thrive.
When I turned to look at them, something in my eyes made their laughter fade. I closed the distance between us, grabbed the unlit cigarette from the cruel-looking man’s lips, and put it between mine. Mechanically, the guard beside him handed me a lighter.
I held down the button to release the butane in my cupped palm, and then I lit the gas with the lighter, so the flame was captured in my hand. It was a simple trick being an only child with a wild spirit taught me as an adolescent, but judging by the wary way the guards watched me light a cigarette from a pyro ball in my hand, I must be a witch.
I always was a Practical Magic fan.
I slipped the smoke back between the slack guard’s lips, and when the cigarette went up in flames, curses erupted, and they both jumped back with a pat or two to their clothes.
Then, I turned to walk away, palm smarting beneath a cold Russian sky, and the first genuine smile touched my lips.
madrugada
(n.) the moment at dawn when the night greets the day
Hands in my pockets, I stood in front of the library window watching light search the horizon. The grandfather clock chimed the eight a.m. hour, signaling I got less than three hours of sleep after returning from Moscow last night. But as soon as the sun rose, so did I.
Old habits die hard.
The quiet winter morning remained still when the first ray of light reached the toes of my boots. Dust particles floated in the thin golden beam. The sight reminded me of sunlight filtering through a grimy apartment window; of frozen breaths from chapped lips, hunger, and fading yellow bruises.
First light in my childhood meant my brother and I had to run the streets and steal pastries from local bakeries. Kristian would scope the restaurant out, and I’d do the dirty work. My mom wasn’t exactly a cook. Or a mother who fed her kids. After she died, we were homeless and better off. To this day, my body still awoke charged every morning, expecting the need to find food. The involuntary response was called trauma, but I thought that sounded a bit dramatic.
When light glimmered on a flaxen head of hair, a lash of heat licked through me, slid down to solidify in my groin, and stretched my body taut. The rising sun created the perfect illusion of a halo on top of Mila’s head before she disappeared behind the trees that outlined my property. For a second, I thought I was so sexually repressed I was imagining her. God only knows how many times I’d thought about fisting