Chapter 8
It had been almost a whole year… No, eleven months and twenty-one days since the accident. Or so called a trial at murder…According to the people who had surrounded her but left her. She had been used, and misunderstood, betrayed by the ones she had trusted the most. Her own father avoided her daughter’s gaze, and Ivan just often gave her a passing glance with disappointment and sympathy.
They weren’t listening to her. No one would listen to the dyke murderer who tried to kill her own lover and her lover’s ex-fiancée. Vik was making this “attempt at murder” a novel, feeding each pages to the ear hungry media.
She had gone to talk to him once. They talked for about fifteen minutes. And she knew from then that she would need a miracle... Or perhaps the long awaited awakening of her sleeping lover, Yulia.
Life was like an elastic band aimed at your face pulled back, just waiting to be released and to be snapped at your face. The held back band is unpredictable, strained by the second at every bug one steps on and kills without one’s knowing. Karma is a bitch.
*****
Three months ago…
“I want to know why you are telling them lies. You know I didn’t drive. You know I wouldn’t do a thing to harm a strand of Yulia’s hair… Why are you making me the criminal?” Lena half asked and half implored. She thought Vik was one of her trusted friends, one of the friends that she could depend on.
Vik reached up to his bitten down cigar stuck between his lips, and tenderly pried it away, opening his mouth to blow the thick smog right into the vulnerable red head’s face. He smirked before slowly standing up and fixing his tie around his neck.
His gelled back hair and frameless glasses revealing a sharp and not so kind beady eye seemed to accentuate his true self a lot more, the side of him which planned everything from the so called “accident”, and fed off from moments like these.
“Lena… Don’t you remember that night? You said you had just gotten your driver’s license and you insisted countless times that you wanted to drive for a while. You must’ve been hammered to not remember clearly.” He stated. It wasn’t a suggestion. He said that as if he was giving out a fact.
“Stop lying! You know I didn’t drive! You’re the one who did!” Lena screeched, her fists clenched.
With a fake cough Vik sighed. “Lena, you should really get going, I’m going to have guests over here soon.”
“Fuck your guests! I’m not leaving until you tell the police the truth!!” Lena screamed, collapsing at her spot to a sitting position.
“Miss Katina, the truth is I am indeed going to call the police and tell that that a wannabe murderer is inside my house accusing me of everything that she’s done!! Now get the hell out!!” Vik shouted back, slamming his fist down on the dresser. Lena winced, as if every syllable of Vik’s words hurt her. And they did.
With last gleam of hope diminishing, she reluctantly stood and walked out.
*****
With her best clothes fitted and worn, she grabbed her purse from the living room table. With a last check on the mirror, she walked out of her apartment’s door and locked it with haste care.
Her hair was up in a loose pony tail, her features almost bare of any make up. Her expression was to say the least, apprehensive looking, almost deathly pale and clammy.
She had at least seven job interviews that day and she didn’t want to be late. Slipping her keys into her pocket she pressed the button for her elevator and when the doors of the lift slid open, she went in.
But as the door slid back into a close, a sudden shot of pain bolted right through her head, and her ears started to ring. Losing her composure, she faintly swung to the lift’s wall beside her and clutched at her ringing left ear.
“What the fuck….” She muttered before another pain bolted through her skull once more. She whimpered, this time collapsing on her knees. Feeling a sticky substance oozing onto her palm that was grabbing her left ear, she pulled it away to check it out. It was red.
With a last shiver, her eyes rolled into the back of her sockets before passing out in the lift.
*****
Vik came out of his daily evening shower with only a towel tied around his waist to cover his credentials. He was still shiny perspiration of the drying water, his hair dripping on his floor. Rubbing his face with his hands vigorously, he took a seat on his bed and turned on the TV.
But what he saw next almost made him scream like a little girl. It was a black and white picture of him, trading seats with the unconscious red head.
“The hell?!” He cursed out loudly. His breath came in short, as he began to panic. He quickly changed the channel but his remote seemed suddenly dead. He angrily threw away his remote to the floor which went shattering to pieces everywhere. He looked around his room for any signs of breaking and entering. There was none.
Then suddenly there was three banging knocks on his firmly closed room’s door. He head snapped up to greet the ominous ambienced silence, his eyes studying the closed door. Then sounds of feet shifting on the floor on the other side could be heard. He stopped breathing, but only concentrated in staring.
An envelope, plain white and glued to a neat close was slipped in through the crack under the door. Grabbing his empty flower vase on his night stand, he quietly walked towards his door and yanked it open.
He screamed at the top of his lungs with his vase ready over his head and ready to strike.
But no one was there. Exhaling with relief and still left over fear, he back tracked, and set the vase down. He bent down and plucked the envelope from the floor. Savagely tearing it open, he unfolded the white lined paper.
‘I know what you did. As you saw on your TV, that was a recording of what I filmed that night. The tape is in your VCR obviously. But don’t dance with joy just yet… I have at least seven more copies of those same images in my hands. Don’t try to reach me, because I’ll reach you first.’
He read it couple of more times, dumbstruck. Crumpling the piece of paper in his palm nervously, he trashed it with a blank mind. There were goose bumps all over his body, the hair on the back of his neck slowly standing up. He needed a plan.
Reaching for his phone, he quickly dialed Kolya’s number.
*****
“As you can see in the pictures of your x-rays, there is a troublesome clump that’s forming inside the depths of your brain. I believe there is a leakage on one of your neural veins, creating a clot that pressing on other veins.” The doctor explained calmly and professionally. His fingers were crossed, and his shoulders rigid.
Lena broke out of her trance and looked up to her doctor with unfocused eyes. “How would this affect me?” She asked in a shaking voice. The doctor sighed before collecting up all the x-ray films from the light board.
“I am going to be frank with you. This will cause severe discomfort, and I forbid you from doing any intensive physical activities until I can figure a way to remove the clot and fix the leakage.” He said in a hesitant voice. With a light frown, he reached for his tie and loosened it.
“Am I going to be okay? I’m not going to die… Am I?” Lena asked.
Doctor pretended that he didn’t hear the question and quickly made himself busy by scribbling on his clipboard urgently. But when he didn’t answer, Lena urged.
“Doctor? Am I going to live?” Lena pleaded.
The doctor desperately looked up to the girl and frowned. “The chances… Are low.” He whispered. Lena’s sight was beginning to blur, and she looked away, towards a mystery spot on the floor. But the doctor continued, to somehow make up for the bad news. “…But please, I will try my best to help you, and to ease you of your pain. Let me do my job and I will try as hard as I can to save you…”
Lena wasn’t listening. She missed all her job interviews today. All seven of them.
*****
Vik was anxiously puffing out smokes from his mouth, with a cigarette in between his fingers. Then his eyes lead him to a non-smoking sign. He cursed under his breath before spitting on the sign and putting his cigarette out. He plopped down on a chair and helplessly stared at the person in front of him.
He was back at the hospital, in Yulia’s room. His eyes were red, and his wardrobe was less than impressive. He stared maniacally at the sleeping brunette.
“Yulia… Why are you doing this to me? I just want to love you… God that’s all I wanted! I just wanted to love you!” He shouted, his voice raising. He suddenly jumped to Yulia’s sleeping form and grabbed her limp hand. He held her hand with both of his, as if he was treasuring it.
“Am I wrong? Am I really wrong?” He whimpered. He was scared shitless. But with an exasperated growl he jumped to his feet and grabbed his coat from the hanger. But as he was ready to stomp out of the room, something stopped him dead in his tracks.
“Vik…? Vik… Where are we, Vik?” It was weak, and he barely heard it. But he did. It was Yulia’s signature voice. He whirled around, and with thunderstruck expression and a gaping mouth, he stared back at Yulia’s very much awake features.
“I… Kind of feel… lightheaded…Vik? Help me up…” She talked again.
[ya...that's rite. yulia's gonna kik sum ass!!
]