by Eva K. More
That Beast had caught her gloomy mood surprised her. “It’s just-it’s been more than a week in which I have done nothing but wait for you to tell me it’s over when I don’t even know what is happening outside this cabin anymore. What day is it even?”
“Friday.”
“Most of all, I’m worried about my grandparents. A few years ago, my grandfather had a stroke, and he lost some of his motor activities. His health has been deteriorating ever since then,” Kat said. Then, quietly added, “I’m afraid I won’t see him alive anymore. I’m scared he’ll die never knowing that I’m fine.”
“Little bird…” He pocketed his phone. “I’m sorry,” he said softly, obviously not sure how to proceed with this conversation.
She hugged herself, trying to keep her emotions in check, “I feel so helpless and hopeless. I miss them so much. I just want to tell them that I’m alright.” Angry tears gathered at the corners of her eyes.
Visibly distressed, Beast watched her stand up and begin to pace around the little space in front of the TV, still with her arms around herself. By now, he should have gotten used to seeing her in his sweaters that dwarfed her slender frame.
“I’m sure they know you’re okay,” Beast said.
“How?” She sobbed. “How could they know?”
“Well, you are young. Maybe they think you just need a little break-”
“You don’t know them! They are extremely overprotective of me,” she quickly replied with a broken voice and sat back down on the sofa. “They worry about me not calling them twice a day. Just think about how your mother would react if you disappeared,” her voice was now barely above whispering level as she put her hands in front of her face.
Kat concluded that it wasn’t the wisest thing to say when he stiffened. “I don’t have a mother.”
“I- I’m sorry,” she said, now looking directly into his eyes. If someone knew what it felt to be without a mother, that was her. Even if her Baba made everything in her power to not make her feel like a motherless child, it was inevitable to feel that void.
“She’s been dead for a long time,” he said and turned to look out the window, as if not wanting to see the pity in her eyes.
It wasn’t just his dismissal that hit her hard; it was the fact that she didn’t expect such an answer from him. They did have something in common, after all. How young had he been when his mother died? The image of a silver-eyed, motherless boy filled her mind and constricted her heart. Again, children's laughter came to her memory, as if from a dream.
Forcefully closing her eyes for a moment, Kat tried to regain control of her thoughts. What a mess she had made now, disturbing the peace that had permeated the house the last few days. It was just that she hadn’t thought that anything could faze that mountain of a man.
“Hey,” she began saying quietly, shifting closer to him. She wanted to apologize in some way, so she waited until he turned his head back around. “My mom’s also dead.”
The only visible reaction was Beast’s softening eyes. There was still half a meter of space between them, but it felt like there was so much more than just air.
“She died in a freak accident involving an elevator,” Kat continued, her eyes glazing over as she stared into nothing. “I was tiny then. Too young. Sometimes it bothers me that I almost don’t remember anything about her. But my grandparents have been great; I can’t complain. They are my parents, really.”
He stretched his back and cocked his head to the side. She could see him contemplating something with his calculating gaze before he started talking. “Can’t say if it really was a freak accident, but truthfully my mother had it coming. I’m thankful for the man who raised me.”
“Your father?” Kat probed gently, not wanting to disturb his surprising openness. She wanted to know more about him.
Beast scoffed. “No.”
That was all the answer she got, but it was enough. Enough for her to deduce that he had been somehow let down by both his parents. She didn’t know what it said about that other man that Beast had become part of the mafia, but she could sense that Beast adored him in a sense.
“My father’s never been in the picture either,” Kat said, adding onto their similarities. Still leaning closer, she looked at him with wide eyes. “So, this man then, how would he react if you just vanished?”
In response, Beast just shook his head, his eyes lightening up. “He won’t worry about me.”
Well, there went nothing. Although Kat was interested in his life, she felt that he wouldn’t tell her much anymore.
Sniffling quietly, she let tears slowly fall down her cheeks; all of this situation was more messed up than she initially thought. She just wanted to return to her normal life, or at least to call Baba and Dedo. After a minute, she cried in earnest.
She had overwhelmed Beast with her sudden change in attitude because he seemed suddenly wary and alarmed. It wasn’t in Beast’s nature to be comforting, so she didn’t expect him to crouch down in front of her and put a big hand on her shoulder.
“Please don’t cry, little bird.” His soft-spoken words made her heart constrict even more.
“I’m sorry, I can’t help it,” she sobbed and leaned her head on his shoulder. “I just want to call my grandparents and tell them I’m alright. Why was I so stupid? I screwed everything up by being reckless, and now probably Dedo is worse because of me.”
He tensed before patting her back awkwardly. She fisted the material of his shirt in her hands and buried her head in his neck, allowing herself only a quick whiff of his deliciously earthy smell. Beast put his arms around her and pulled her more firmly into his embrace. The angle was a little awkward with her still sitting on the couch and him crouching on the floor, but because of his tall stature, it worked anyway.
After a while, she moved her head and looked at him with watery eyes. “Please, Beast.” Her voice faltered at the intense look in his eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Beast rasped and held onto her for a minute longer. “I can’t let you-”
With extraordinary strength, Kat pushed Beast away and stood up, once again, catching him off-guard.
“Why do you keep refusing? That’s not fair to them or me,” She said, trying to reason with him one more time.
He didn’t leave her gaze while he slowly stood up. She didn’t care if he had seen her crying at this point, her sadness and frustration overrode any other feelings she might have had, like embarrassment, and she didn’t want to hide it from him.
Facing each other off, the air between them crackled with sparks, ready to ignite and start a fire.
“Are you trying to manipulate me?” he accused her. There was also a subtle note of astonishment in his voice.
“Of course not! I just want you to see reason, to understand me.” Kat told him, grabbing his sweater, desperate for him to understand.
Beasts eyebrows shot up. “And now you’re calling me unreasonable and dumb, even though you want something from me?”
“I didn’t call you dumb, Beast. Please, would you change your mind?”
“No.”
Frustration riding her hard, Kat fisted the hair close to her scalp for a second. “Okay. You know what? Forget I ever asked something of you. All I wanted was to do right by the people I love and who love me back. I know now that you can’t possibly know what that even means.” She said, regretting her last words instantly, but unable to apologize because she wanted to hurt him as much as he was hurting her with his stubbornness. As much as her grandparents were surely hurting. Then, she stood up once again, and left to her room, letting him ponder on her words.
Why couldn’t Beast understand why the well-being of her grandparents was so important to her?
Eying the little kid's backpack she had found in the house, her resolve hardened. The next time he was gone, she would also go and start looking for a neighbor. Surely this wasn’t the only cabin in the woods.
Thankfully, she had found a flashlight in the
house, and she had started collecting snacks from the kitchen in the past few days, so Beast would not get suspicious when a big chunk was missing all of a sudden. Unfortunately, Beast hid her purse once again, but she had found some coins in a drawer in the living room in case she did not find a house but a payphone instead.
They didn’t talk to each other until the next day in the early afternoon. Beast didn’t even enter her room, just knocked on her door and told her he’d be going now, and she should not wait up for him. She felt dread crawling her insides… like she would do that anyway.
canning the area around the house hadn’t helped her decide in which direction she should go. Therefore, Kat chose to follow the narrow road but stay hidden in the trees beside it.
It had taken her only a few minutes to dress and prepare the bed with a few pillows from the living room to look like she was sleeping – in case of Beast coming home to check in on her before she left. Not that she planned on this, but it was a possibility she had to consider. Then she had taken her little green backpack with a cartoon figure printed on it and started walking.
The air was crisp and fresh in the woods. If she could enjoy anything in this situation, then it was the close touch she had with nature at the moment. Sometimes, the dried leaves to her sides rustled, and she watched lizards scurrying away from her. Other times, it was the trees above her that made noises as the birds flew away.
At one point, she could have sworn that she saw a deer run in the distance.
Kat hadn’t found a watch in the house, but she thought that she had walked for about half an hour when the road divided itself into two paths. Scrunching her forehead, she looked at each one for a few minutes.
She could not remember from which side Beast had driven her to the cabin, so she couldn't decide which way to go, as there was the same amount of tire tracks on both of them. The positive thing was that this meant she would find human life no matter where she went. Taking a deep breath, she decided to take the path to her right.
After a while, thirst made itself known, so she fished the small bottle of water from her backpack. Besides the crackers and coins, there wasn’t much else inside; after all, its size was small. Kat walked and walked for an unknown amount of time until she couldn’t follow the road anymore.
The woods became denser, the path more uneven, and it wasn’t an option for her to walk directly on the road, just in case Beast came up in his car. That’s why, despite the dread that invaded her stomach, Kat had to veer farther inside the woods, and a short while later, when the path completely vanished into a mess of stones and sticks and bushes, she wasn’t sure from which direction she had come from.
Fear was slowly becoming prominent in her head, she could feel her heart rate increasing with every step, but she wouldn’t stop. She needed to see her Baba and Dedo.
Although she could not feel its warmth, the sun was still up, so she thought about taking a small break. Even if she was nervous by the fact that she could not find her way back to the cabin, that didn’t disturb her as much as her nearly empty water bottle. Anxiety was wanting to visit her, but she took a couple of deep breaths and tried to have positive thoughts.
She hoped to find a house soon. Surely the people would then show me the way back home, she reasoned.
After eating a pack of crackers, she started walking again with no definitive direction. She got lost inside her mind, memories of her childhood dancing around. There was something at the back of her mind that the more she tried to bring it to the front, the more confused she got. She didn’t remember going hiking or camping with her grandparents, so why would walking in the woods feel familiar?
Children laughing and running through the woods with their arms open as if flying kept repeating incessantly, so much so, that she felt that if she turned, she would see them coming out from behind a bark. With all of this thinking, it took her a while to realize that it wasn’t only the trees blocking the sunshine anymore, but the sun was slowly setting down.
Huh? How long had I’ve been gone? Kat pondered. The sweat that had gathered on her back and beneath her armpits began cooling, chilling her skin. The rising darkness left her feeling warier, and whereas the noises had made her curios and delighted before, they scared her now.
The creatures of the night – foxes, wolves, maybe even wild pigs were not something she wanted to deal with right now, or ever.
Hearing thunder, she felt her heartbeat accelerating once more, the lull that her memories had her under was gone. And when the first lightning brightened up the woods like a torchlight for a second, she conceded that she was lost and nowhere near completing her mission.
Not wanting to stop because of the darkness, Kat finished her last cracker on the move, even beginning to walk faster from the direction she had come from but, was that the right direction?
Unfortunately, she hadn’t thought about taking an umbrella. The hood of Beasts sweatshirt kept her ears warm, but when the rain started to fall, the fabric soaked within minutes because, although the forest kept her shielded for a while, the drops were so massive that they penetrated the trees fast.
“Shoot!” She shouted. I will not cry; I will not cry; she mused. It didn’t matter that she was lost. Have I been going in circles?
Turning to her right, she started running. Her breathing became shallow and she was freezing at this point. Another lightning followed another thunder, the storm now directly above her. She willed her legs to run faster and ignore her soaked clothing, ignore the cold, ignore the wind, ignore the fact that she was lost, and without food.
With a cry, she fell to the muddy ground after stumbling over a fallen tree branch. She could feel the mud and fallen leaves between her fingers; Kat even thought that she felt an insect crawling up her arm. That fall hurt, but she didn’t feel the pain as much as her rising panic.
Struggling to her feet on the slippery ground, she cursed as wet strands of hair hit against her face; the mud on her jeans was now wearing her down too. And to add grievance to everything, her flashlight was slowly giving up on her.
When lightning illuminated a sturdy tree branch that had fallen over, she decided to dive beneath it and hide from the rain. It didn’t appear that it would be stopping soon, and she was drenched to her underwear.
Great, Kat sarcastically thought once she sat down on the cold ground. It was more than a simple chill she felt in her bones now- she was freezing, probably freezing to death if her heavy trembling was any indication.
Well, it appears that I won’t die at the hands of the mafia after all, but because of my own stupidity.
It had been vital to reach her grandparents. That hadn’t been stupid. The idiotic thing had been not listening to them in the first place, all in ode to her liberty.
Letting the thin ray of light from her flashlight shine as far as it could, she began to rock back and forth, an almost forgotten song coming to the front of her mind.
“Pust' begut niuklyuzhye, Peshechodui po luzham, A voda -- po asphal'tu rekoy. I niyasna prochozhim, V etam den' nipogozhi, Pochimu ya visyoli takoy…” she sang. Her voice could barely be heard beneath the rumble of the storm, but she could almost swear that a smooth male voice was accompanying her.
Would Beast already be back from whatever he was doing? Would he look into my room? Would he find me missing? She thought. Oh god, that thunder!
Her voice grew louder as she continued to sing: “Ya igrayu na garmoshke, U prochozhich na vidu... K sazhelyenyu, den' razhden'ya, Tol'ko raz v godu.”
Kat closed her eyes and tried to imagine that she was inside her grandparents' room, cocooned between them after being awake because of a nightmare. Instead, her mind brought out a different image.
There were thunder and a lot of rain sounding in the background. A little girl found herself sitting in front of the fireplace, hugging her toy dragon firmly to her small body, scared.
“It’s ok; the storm will pass soon.” She heard behind her, and when she turned around, s
he noticed four male legs standing close by, one pair from another child, and the other belonging to an adult.
“You look like a scared little bird,” she heard the boy say.
“I’m not, I’m a dragon.” She replied while she grabbed the blanket that was next to her and walked to the couch, getting upon it with a lot of effort and lying down. “Papa, sing.” She said to the standing adult, still unable to see more than just his legs.
“Of course, little one,” he answered as he sat next to her and took her on his arms. “Pust' begut niuklyuzhye, Peshechodui po luzham, A voda -- po asphal'tu rekoy. I niyasna prochozhim, V etam den' nipo-”
Was there something moving in front of her? Kat automatically opened her eyes, the sound of a strange movement – something different than the storm - getting her out of her reminiscence. But what was that? She didn’t remember ever experiencing that. Her active imagination, linked with the cold, was taking control of her mind, making her mix fantasy with reality, although, with her fingers numb, she couldn’t find enough strength in her to care.
Then, she saw something bright, a light shining in her direction, and only seconds after, somebody kneeled in front of her.
Her flashlight illuminated his silhouette, reflected in his mask. Dazed, Kat blinked. “Beast!” Her voice was barely a whisper. “You’ve come…” Beast didn’t say anything as he reached for her.
When did I lose all control of my body? She thought as he lifted her into his arms, the rain falling now directly into her face – not that she cared.
Beast cursed. “You’re soaking wet and too cold,” he said, holding her tighter against his chest.
The forest around them was roaring as he stalked across the muddy ground with her, but she had heard each of his words clearly. His rumble was unique that way.
“But I’m not cold,” she said. Huh, even though her teeth were chattering, she really didn’t feel cold anymore. She felt nothing, really, except for Beast’s shoulders tensing.
