Katarina

by Alona Jarden

  The years went by and every time I looked at her, I was amazed to see what a powerful and confident woman I had raised. One that was willing to fulfill her dreams without letting men overshadow her judgment.

  I remembered well how her mother's weakness was the cause of her losing her life. If it wasn’t for the loser she had married, the one who claimed to have been my daughter's father, we would have been a happy family.

  We could have lived together, I could have hugged and kissed her every day. I could have made more and more children with her. But, that loser had some unexplained control over her. A control I couldn’t figure out.

  He couldn’t have been Kate's father even if he’d wanted to. A girl like Kate couldn’t have been born to a loser like him.

  Six months into our arrival in the United States, it was like Katarina had never existed. In her place, it was me and my adopted daughter, Kate.

  Anyone who was interested in the details of her life, received an explanation that she used to call me Uncle Christian, but now she's calling me Daddy because I adopted her from the orphanage and saved her life, waking her up from a very bad dream.

  Even then I didn’t rest on my laurels.

  I continued to sharpen her memory every week of her new life. I made her sit down and flip through the photo album, which was like my Bible for this task, so that memories of the past would never come back to her.

  I’d started making that album, carefully and belovedly, the day she was born. Every time her mother gave me a photograph of her in my arms, I’d assume it was her way of apologizing for promises she never kept, but I never agreed to accept her apology.

  In the letter, which I burned before the police came to my apartment, her mother wrote words that proved how much she wanted to be with me and how trapped she felt in the arms of a man she didn’t love. I almost shed a tear while driving to the police station, trying to remember her exact words and realizing I couldn’t.

  I felt remorse for having destroyed it, because I hoped it would be an anchor for the days when Katarina would overcome Kate. It had been a tool to prove to her that I was her mother's great love and not the idiot I had erased from her memory.

  I parked my car in the disabled parking spot at the entrance to the police station and ran through the door like a mad man. I only cared about revealing the identity of whoever had taken Kate from me and hoped that, by looking into his eyes, I would know if he had hurt her or not.

  I knew very well how to recognize a murderer's gaze because I recognized it every morning, as I looked at my reflection in the mirror.

  All I wanted to do was to look her abductor in the eyes so I could make sure my daughter was still among the living.

  Chapter 29

  Andrew

  I recognized the first police car as it followed me in the rearview mirror. It kept its distance, but not too efficiently, almost like they wanted me to see them. However, the second police car following me was more professional. Still, I spotted it at several intersections, stopping parallel to me.

  At that point, I knew that my time with Katarina in the cabin had run out. The only things left to do was to lead the policemen who followed me around the city and to try to broadcast 'business as usual'.

  I went into a convenience store and purchased milk, bread, and some other supplies that I needed, given the fact I had to spend the evening in my apartment and not with Katarina in the cabin.

  I saw the front bumper of one of the patrol cars as I stood in line at the checkout and hoped that maybe, in a few hours, they would give up and come to the false conclusion that I’d had nothing to do with her abduction.

  I sat back in my car and decided to visit the Starbucks where I still worked. As soon as I’d gotten Officer Swenson's summons to go to the police station, I’d canceled my arrival for the morning shift, a very uncharacteristic act for me. I wanted to apologize and explain myself to the barista of the noon shift who had been called to replace me, even if it was just to stick to the character I had built for myself there.

  "Hello, hello, hello!" I called out as I opened the door and stepped inside.

  "Oh, look what the cat dragged in." John, who was working in my place, frowned at me. "Can you tell us what was so important that I had to work a double shift today in this God damn place?"

  "My freedom," I smiled at him.

  "Your freedom?" The shift supervisor intervened "Is that what you did today? I swear, man… Did you just take the day off?" She waved her finger at me as a warning.

  "No, no," I laughed out loud as they swallowed the bait I laid before them. "I meant that I was called to the police station for questioning and I had to defend my civil freedom."

  "Really? You were called to the station?" she changed her tone.

  "Yes, thanks to you and your big mouth." I looked at some of my co-workers before turning my gaze back to John, my replacement. "As I said, this morning I had to take care of my freedom."

  "So what happened at the station?" the shift supervisor tried to understand why my name was still associated with the searches. "Are you a real suspect in the disappearance of that girl?"

  "I guess I am." I shook my head in disapproval and went behind the bar to make myself a cup of coffee. "It's actually sad, if you think about it."

  "Why is it sad?" John asked.

  "It's sad that they continue to focus their efforts on me, because that means that they have no idea who really took her."

  "Wow, I can’t believe they haven’t found her yet." He sounded surprised. "I'd like to believe that today, in an era where everything is filmed and documented, it would be easier to locate someone who has been kidnapped in broad daylight."

  "I agree." I tried to stick to the act I performed for them, "But seriously, guys. You have to stop saying hallucinatory things to the police. I really have nothing to do with this case and, to my regret, I have nothing to do with this Kate they're looking for."

  "To your regret?" The same guy who’d claimed that I had murdered her, raised a suspicious eyebrow at me. "Why do you say that this is to your regret?"

  "I assume you’ve forgotten how you described the way I stare at her," I chuckled. "You aren’t wrong. I wish I had a relationship with her outside of my working hours but, unfortunately, the connection between us starts and ends here, at Starbucks. "

  "I'm not buying it. Sorry, but I still think you killed her." This time he seemed amused when he claimed I was a murderer and I hoped that I had managed to slightly undermine his firm opinion that I was responsible for Katarina's disappearance.

  For a long time, the topic of conversation changed to other matters. We talked about everything but Katarina, but eventually that stubborn guy brought her back to the table.

  "Well, Andrew, what do you say? Are they going to find her? Will she be alive?"

  "Who?" I pretended not to understand who he was talking about.

  "That girl, Kate."

  "Sure." I nodded, "I'm sure they'll will find her in a few days."

  "Do you also believe that she will be alive? After all, you should know her current situation since..."

  "You have to stop doing that." I exhaled in anger and gave him a chilling look. "It has ceased to be funny, man. It seems that I am the main suspect so far and if you are really so worried about her life, perhaps you should stop shifting suspicion in my direction and enable them to look for her in more beneficial directions."

  "I'll stop saying you killed her when I believe that you didn’t."

  "Seriously, dude. Do you really think that I am able to…"

  "Andrew, there's a police car that’s been watching you from the other side of the street from the moment you came in. If you ask me, there's a reason why their suspicion is focused on you right now, so I stand by my conclusion. I think you killed her."

  I didn’t see the need to continue arguing with him, certainly not when my co-workers responded on my behalf. They told him that he was exaggerating, asked him to shut his mouth and b
egged me not to let him bother me, but their opinions about me and the investigation didn’t interest me at all.

  Unlike them, I knew exactly who’d kidnapped her and where she was. I wasn’t worried about her safety but, on the other hand, I was afraid she would lose her mind when she realized that I wasn’t coming back to the cabin. I wondered how I could contact her to let her know what had happened.

  I returned to my car, but not before I sent a smug smile to the officers sitting in the police car parked not far away from me. I’d hoped they would understand it was pointless to keep following me and back off, just enough to allow me to contact Katarina, even without reaching the cabin, but they didn’t.

  I thought about sending her a bouquet of flowers with few words written on the note, or to send her two trays of pizza without adding anything in the hopes that she would understand I wasn’t going to return to her anytime soon, but I couldn’t do any of that.

  When I finally parked at the entrance to the building where I had rented my cover apartment, I caught the policemen's alert gaze still following me, so I just went in. I couldn’t do anything but enter my empty apartment and keep my distance from the cabin.

  That wasn’t what I had imagined would happen. According to my plan, the police were supposed to knock on my door only after I had finished the process with Katarina. Everything was supposed to be different, and I got angry for having gone beyond the safe route I had defined for us.

  Damn it, I shouldn’t have kissed her. I shouldn’t have done it, but it was still the only thing I wanted to do for the rest of my life.

  I had left the cabin that morning without even saying goodbye. She was so full of questions and demands that, looking back, talking to her was probably the right thing to do. I think the reason I chose psychology for my undergrad was not completely clear to me at the time, but when I enrolled for my master's degree, the reasons were crystal clear.

  I knew that, one day, I would find Katarina and, when that day came, I would have to know how to deal with someone who had had memories implanted in her. I’d been so sure my plan would work, I didn’t even have a backup plan and, as it seemed by that point, things were on their way to going very wrong.

  I will never forget the first time my eyes rested upon her again. She was sitting in a cafe with the monster who had kidnapped her, and she looked so happy. For a split moment, I’d even wondered if it would be right to leave her alone and let her live her life without going in and mixing things up again.

  "...So I told him he was an idiot." While sitting with my back to them at the adjacent table, I managed to hear her completing a story about one of her classmates.

  "I'm sure he earned that title, Kate, but you can’t go around calling anyone who has less intelligence than you an idiot."

  "Why not?" she slightly giggled. "They're too dumb to be offended as it is," she added, and they both went on to talk about other things.

  I did my best to listen in on their conversation. Her arrogant and insolent style of speech hadn’t changed much. Actually, if I had come to know her that day for the first time, I would have probably thought she was an unbearable person. But, since I knew her from way back, I was actually glad to find out she had kept a part of herself and who she was when she was Katarina.

  "What are your plans for the rest of the day, Dad?"

  "Well, right now, I'm going to order a cake and share it with the best daughter in the universe and then go back to our apartment with her."

  "With the cake? Are you cheating on me with a cake?" I hoped she didn’t hear as I laughed at her wit.

  "Oh, my girl," he tried to calm down from a burst of laughter. "It's important that you know how much I love you, cause I do. More than anything else in this world."

  My heart broke when Katarina and her kidnapper left the café, after sharing a cake, with their arms folded, on their way to their happy little lives together.

  The smile on her face caused a large part of my plan to get canceled. I knew then that the fact their relationship was a positive one, would be a terrible obstacle in exposing her to the truth.

  In my investigation, I discovered the cover story he had built for her. He’d kept his first name and had changed his surname. He shortened her name to something more American and catchy, claiming he had taken her from the orphanage after her parents had been cruelly murdered when she was just a baby.

  I found one lie, after another lie, and another lie after that one and so on...

  I expected a smart woman like Katarina could recognize the inaccuracies of her own life story, but I couldn’t expect such a thing from the girl she had been.

  I had to settle for quick glances and brief moments when her eyes would wander toward me, before returning to the cabin she had dreamed of and beginning to expand upon the practical part of my plan, given the fact that she had a happy life with him.

  I wandered uneasily around my cover apartment, but my head was with Katarina at the cabin.

  When my closed door was kicked open and four armed policemen broke through, I wondered what she was doing.

  Their shouts filled the living room and, within a few minutes, I found myself contemplating further steps I could take while sitting in the back seat of a patrol car.

  Once again, I was sitting in the same interrogation room but, this time, Officer Swenson’s evidence was no longer something I could deny. I knew I had to confess and the first thing I did was to direct them to the cabin, so that they would free Katarina from waiting for my return.

  I was no longer a free man, I no longer had time to tell her the end of her life story in the way I’d wished to, and I didn’t know what I could do to acquit myself from her kidnapping. But all that hadn’t mattered. I knew I couldn’t avoid the blame at that moment. I had no choice but to provide the police with her whereabouts.

  Officer Swenson wrote the directions I gave her in her notebook and I hoped that the connection I’d managed to develop with Katarina would be enough for her to tell the cops that she'd stayed there with me willingly.

  All I could do was hope, and I did just that.

  Chapter 30

  Kate

  I wanted so much to understand what had happened that day in the kitchen, but at the same time, I didn’t want to know any more.

  Perhaps, if I had gone into the process with Andrew after a bitter life of poverty and suffering, I would have been more willing to accept a different reality. One in which I had been abducted. But, I had lived a good life.

  When I think about my childhood I was happy, content, I had everything I needed or wanted and, the truth was, my state of mind had only gotten worse the day he’d put me in the trunk of his car.

  At that time, I didn’t even know if what I’d revealed was true or not. If my father had been a murderer, I wanted to believe I would have recognized some warning signs throughout the years… wouldn’t I have?

  I sat at the cabin and remembered specific occasions in my childhood when I had exaggerated my mischievousness, and a smile stretched on my face when his reasonable reactions came to mind. I remembered the numerous arguments he’d had with the school principal and the way he’d managed himself in front of large crowds at the parents' meetings when he’d become passionate. Thus, I reached the only conclusion that seemed right.

  In spite of the damning memories that had resurfaced in my mind, I knew who my father was and he was not a man with anger issues.

  I wanted Andrew back, or maybe what I actually wanted was to go back in time and change my walking path so that I would have never met him that day. I wanted to change my choice and to ride home on public transport and I wanted to close my eyes again and wake up in my own bed, next to my father, whom I admired and loved.

  All I wanted was to stop wondering if he had done terrible things and to go on seeing him as an angel who had saved me from a horrible life in an orphanage in Costa Rica. But, as Andrew had already said and was right to say so, I could no longer go back.

 
; My fears and doubts were starting to firm up in my mind. I knew that when this experience came to its end, I would have to sit with my father and have a long conversation, so that I could understand if the pictures he’d shown me were true or false.

  I thought about him a lot during my first few days in the cabin. I hadn’t been worried about my safety, but I had feared for his health.

  At first, I’d asked Andrew to allow me to send him a sign of life, but he’d refused. He’d promised that if, down the road, after we took a few more steps into his plan, I still wished to do so, he would agree. But, the moment the memories had started to come back, I’d agreed that it would be better to break away from my life and to give a real opportunity for the process Andrew had designed especially for me to succeed.

  Hours went by and still Andrew didn’t return.

  I almost convinced myself that everything was all right. I poured myself some whiskey, added ice cubes, and after the foul liquid burned my throat, I opened the refrigerator door and added half a can of Coke Zero to the glass, reminding myself of Andrew's ability to sweeten even the most difficult situations.

  I sat down on the porch rocker and a strange feeling overwhelmed me. For some reason, I felt that I had always been there and that Andrew's absence was simply unnatural.

  "Damn it, Andrew, where are you?" I asked the forest and received no response.

  The liquid I was drinking ran out and so did my ability to keep on being optimistic in the face of the situation.

  I went back into the cabin and had no choice but to accept the fact that Andrew wasn’t coming back.

  The tears running down my cheeks were replaced with wonderings that pulled me back to the parquet floor of my room and to the sketches. I consciously decided not to dive directly into the big questions so, instead, I slid the drawing pencils onto the white paper sheet and drew the main structure of the apartment I had grown up in.