Sex, Lies & Nikolai (5 page)

I don’t sleep all night. I toss and turn, unable to keep my mind from wandering back to Nikolai. I brush my fingers across my lips that many times, but I can still feel his mouth there, and it makes my body warm with longing.

I expected to feel regret along with my humiliation. I mean, I’m the one that kissed him fiercely. He’d just been along for the ride, and I know why I don’t take it back. I
liked
the contact. I can admit that to myself because denying it won’t get me anywhere. I liked it very much.

Since Scarlett’s birth I’ve never been close to someone else. I may have run amuck before then, bouncing from boy to boy to forget the broken home I came from. I was a disaster. Every drug under the sun I’d experimented with. I was dirty and I didn’t mind it, so long as I got to feel the rush that distracted me of thoughts of the revolving door of men in my mother’s life – men that had violated me throughout my childhood and stolen the depth of my innocence. Men I can’t even put a face to because my mind has an uncanny ability to bury that trauma. I sought out the same sort of men and took control over them just to feel like I was getting back at the ones that stripped me of it before. Often I wonder the psychology behind that.

I stopped caring for a long time, but the second Scarlett came into this world I felt responsibility. I couldn’t sit back and watch the same horror touch her life. I knew Mom wouldn’t change for her, she was too far gone to. Meanwhile, there I was at seventeen with a newborn to look after, and Scarlett had been so tiny. She’d been underweight at birth because Mother chose alcohol over food throughout her pregnancy.

I may have been on the wrong path, but I was not entirely lost. The second Scarlett was in my arms, I felt something inside me change. I hadn’t thought of what would happen when Mom gave birth. Never thought how quickly my love for a baby I’d never put aside any thought to would impact me so much. Scarlett was my second chance at life, and I don’t regret a single sacrifice I made in the process of looking after her.

I still cringe when I think of those earlier years. Shoplifting for formula and diapers. Wrapping her in a bedsheet and cradling her in my arms. Losing sleep. Waking up on fumes while she screamed for food. She occupied my every moment and filled it with purpose. She became my entire world overnight while my mother got lost in oblivion.

I haven’t been touched by a man in five years.

God, when I actually think about that, about how long it’s been, I’m in disbelief. It hasn’t felt that long. I can still remember the feel of them on me, inside me, touching me in places that made my stomach turn. It never felt good, or right. Why did I put myself through that? I don’t understand the girl I used to be. I’m deeply ashamed of her.

Five years gone in the blink of an eye, and it’s been like this. A cycle of waking up, working, scraping food together and starting all over again the next day. Sometimes I feel like I’m outside of myself, watching this robot go about her days in the same order. I’ve lost any sense of self. I don’t really know who I am because I have never had the time to figure it out.

Time. That word is lost to me. I’ve never had time to just…live. It makes me kind of bitter and empty.

I hate my mother.

I hate this world.

I hate that I cradle the hundred dollar note to my chest all night because I’m too scared of something happening to it if I close my eyes.

I hate that my bed squeaks when I move, and that the sound of men walking down the hallway just outside my unit makes me nervous and alert.

I hate life. I hate it. I really fucking do.

Most of all, I hate my mother for bringing an innocent soul like Scarlett into this fucked up world. I hate her. I hate her. I feel rage in the rawest form in the centre of my being, and I welcome it because it chases something darker away.

Depression.

Depression would be worse. It would make me stop functioning. It consumed me once, and it had been the roughest couple months of my life. When you’re depressed, the days start bleeding into one another. You lose sense of time. It made me want to stop moving and trying, like the weight of the world was pressed upon my chest and I just wanted it to crush me to death. Depression is a very scary thing, especially when you’re watching the cars on the street and wondering what it would be like to step in front of one. It’s still there, lurking in the shadows, but I refuse to give it light. Scarlett gives me enough purpose to shut the bad away.

When morning comes, I’m barely awake. My eyes ache as I half-watch the sky through the window growing brighter with every passing minute.

I don’t often sleep. The night makes me feel frightened, like the shadows are telling a story my mind understands but I don’t want to relive. I’ve never felt safe here, or anywhere for that matter. It makes closing my eyes an impossible task, because when you’re sleeping anything can happen.

Scarlett stirs next to me, her hand seeking mine. When she finds it, she stops squirming and falls back asleep. I watch her and, god, she looks so content, her hair over part of her face, her mouth parted as she breathes peacefully.

Both our stomachs growl in unison, and I squeeze that hundred dollars in my hand tighter.

Food is coming.

*

I get Scarlett up early so we can dress and walk to the grocery store a block from the apartment building. She’s still tired, and she keeps looking at her shoes as we walk. I know they’re uncomfortable and they’re hurting her, and I’m tempted to buy her new ones with the little money I have. I try to make it work in my head, but I’m not sure it’s possible just yet.

I buy a loaf of bread and a generic version of Nutella for ninety-nine cents. Then we return home and I make two sandwiches. We sit on the couch as we eat over our plates. She’s cuddled against my side, scarfing her food down her throat at a scary rate. I have to tell her to slow down or else she might get sick. It’s happened to me too many times to count, and as hungry as I am, I take small bites and chew slowly.

“Can I have another sandwich?” she asks me when she’s finished.

I make her another.

Then I say fuck it and make myself another one too.

This time she’s much slower, and her lips are coated in hazelnut, causing her to lick around her mouth. She barely gets any of it off, and I laugh at her, using my fingers to wipe away the rest of it. Scarlett is fucking adorable.

After we’ve eaten, we lounge for a bit. She rests her head against my lap and I run my fingers through her hair before making it into one long braid down her back. She likes when I do things to her hair. It makes her run to the bathroom to look at herself in the mirror, a shy smile on her face as she twirls in a circle.

I love her so much.

I stuff my money in my pocket before we leave, not trusting to leave it behind in case Mother returns to clean me out again. I wouldn’t put it past her. I sort of wish she’d do it when I’m at home so I can beat six shades of shit out of her.

I hate her so much.

We leave the unit and I lock the door behind me. Then I knock on Roberta’s door, and before she opens it Scarlett turns to me and hugs me tightly, her arms around my hips, her face pressed against my stomach.

“I’m going to miss you, Alina,” she whispers to me, batting her brown eyes up at me.

I smile down at her, my chest tightening as I hug her back. “I’ll make you something good when I get back, okay?”

She nods and Roberta opens her door, smiling warmly down at Scarlett. “Come on in, child.”

Scarlett goes in and disappears from sight seconds later. Roberta looks at me, her eyes running up and down my frame. “You okay?” she asks. “You came home and practically shoved me out.”

I give her a reassuring smile. “Everything is fine.”

“You got what you wanted?”

“No, but I didn’t walk away with nothing.”

“That’s ominous, Alina,” she says bluntly. “Really damn ominous.”

“I wasn’t trying to be.”

She’s still straight-faced. “Terribly ominous.”

I don’t meet her eye. “Really, everything is fine.”

She’s curious but she’s not nosy. “Alright, you look after yourself.”

I don’t tell her that I’m struggling to. I just say, “I will,” as convincingly as I can. We have small chat, about the weather and other frivolous shit I won’t remember later. Then I hand her Scarlett’s hazelnut spread and loaf of bread right before I leave so Scarlett has something to eat while I’m gone. After all is said and done, I turn around and start my trek to work.

Back to the grind I go.

*

Oksana is a no-show (there was a note on the counter that said ‘b bak l8tah’, which was very helpful) and Ivan has come and gone. I have to handle everything alone. It’s all so very brilliant. I have rainbows coming out of my heart right now.

That’s a fucking lie.

It sucks so much I might as well be feasting on the sweaty ballsacks of a thousand chimps. Because if there’s one thing I learned working at a convenience store in
this
area, it’s how unbelievably weird some people are. During the rush, a dude moves to the front and the first thing he puts down on the counter isn’t the bag of skittles he’s buying, no, it’s his gold tooth he’s just removed from his mouth.

I wish I could say I’m disgusted, but eighteen months on the job has earned me a strong stomach.

“It’s eighteen karats,” he tells me. “Yours for forty dollars. Bargain, yeah?”

I want to ask him if he is seriously trying to sell me his saliva soaked tooth, but judging by the crazy look in his eye, I know he is totally serious.

“I don’t have that kind of money,” I say regretfully.

He’s understanding about it, grabbing the tooth and inserting it back into his mouth before he tells me he’ll try next door. Then he completely abandons the skittles by tossing it on the counter.

I blink. “I thought you were going to buy these.”

“I just wanted to hold them for a while,” he responds before winking at me and slinking out of the store.

I just…sometimes I don’t know how to feel about some things.

Later, I get an old lady that only pays in nickels, unconcerned in the slightest there’s a line-up behind her. In fact, she seems offended when a few people tsk or blow a long breath, and then she takes her sweet old time as if to prove a point. She’s smug about that, and she leaves with her groceries of which she paid twenty dollars in nickels for.

Fuck my fucking life.

A while later, a guy walks in wearing sweats in the summer heat. Now this guy is weirder than the others, and I watch him cautiously, knowing the kind of special weird he is. He paces the store, and I know right off the bat he’s high as a kite. A few minutes later he stops abruptly and asks, “Where’s the hot food?”

“We don’t have any,” I tell him.

He flips out. He swipes at a shelf of magazines and crisps, sending them crashing to the floor in a heap. I sort of just stand there, my frame weary, staring down at all the shit I’m going to have to put away myself because Benji is still MIA and I’m alone to take care of this shithole.

“You need to leave,” I tell him firmly.

“Leave?!” he screeches. “I want my fucking TACOS!”

After he scares a few customers away, I have to take matters into my own hands. I grab the broom and whack him with it. “Get out!” I shout, hitting him in the back of the head with all my strength. He staggers and he’s so out of it I’m surprised he can walk a straight line. I have to hit him again before he stumbles out of the store, stealing a bag of Doritos on his way out, leaving me panting and irritated.

I clean up the mess, and by then it’s mid-morning and I’m not in the mood for anyone’s shit anymore. I have to tell myself to calm down because I’m not even halfway into my shift. No, I’m not even a goddamn quarter of the way into it.

This is going to be a long, long day.

Fuck you, Oksana, you bubble-gum chewing twat.

I’m cleaning up the Slushi machines – yet another thing people take it upon themselves to trash – when the door swings open, the chime in the air signalling a new customer.

I look over my shoulder and I narrow my eyes at the sight of Benji coming through.

“Alina!” he calls, rushing to me with this shit-eating grin on his face.

I step away before he can hug me. “Where the hell have you been?” I growl out.

“Vacation,” he tells me, running his hand through his unkempt black hair. “You should ask for yours.”

“You’re lying. I know about the money you owe to Nikolai.”

His smile fades. “Then why ask me where I’ve been?”

“Because you shouldn’t have left me to care for everything!”

“Alright, alright, I’m sorry. I’m here now. I didn’t think you’d miss me so much.”

“I didn’t miss you,” I retort, collecting the cups strewn all around the machines, all sticky and unused. “I just dealt with some seriously messed up people this morning and I shouldn’t have had to do it alone.”