“What are you talking about?”
“First, Ivan, now Bo,” she said, as she rounded the corner.
“They all have bruises from time to time,” Travis said.
“Yes, but not like these. They’re getting worse. Something is going on, and I’m going to find out what it is.” Within seconds, Blaire was banging on Marko’s door.
After receiving no response, she entered without permission. Marko was on the phone, and he glared at her before returning to his conversation. Blaire signaled to Travis to come into the room, which he did, closing the door behind him. Marko finished his call and placed the phone on the receiver.
“How can I help you?” Marko asked, with unabashed annoyance spicing his tongue.
“Have you seen Bodan’s face?” Blaire wanted to know.
“No, should I have?”
“Yes, you should have,” Blaire snapped. “Someone hit him, maybe one of your workers.”
She caught a glimpse of Travis, alarm marked clearly across his face.
“Did he say that?” Marko asked.
“You know very well he didn’t say that,” Blaire shot back.
“Did he communicate to you in any way that he was hit by a worker?” Marko rephrased his question.
“He said that it was not a student.” Travis managed to overcome his discomfort and chime in with that information. Despite the fact that his statement helped her case, Blaire was infuriated by the fact that Travis seemed downright impartial.
“…but he did not say that it was a worker.” Marko seemed too composed for someone who was in charge of the welfare of helpless children.
“No, he did not specifically say that it was a worker. But what I want to know is what you plan to do about it?” Blaire asked.
“What is there to do? He was probably playing with one of the other students and things went too far. It happens all the time,” Marko explained.
“Bull! What about Ivan’s bruises? I’ve noticed the small injuries and bruises to several of the children, and up to now I have marked them down as accidental, but Bo’s face is no accident.”
Marko adjusted in his seat. “Did the same worker hit you?”
Momentarily, Blaire had forgotten that her left eye looked like hammer-tenderized beef.
“I ran into a door.”
“See there, accidents do happen, don’t they?”
Blaire rolled her eyes, pushed passed Travis and stormed out of the office.
“Blaire, wait,” Travis called. She was already halfway down the hall but stopped sharply.
“You didn’t even back me up in there! You have seen the bruises on the children, you know you have.”
“Yes, but they always say that they fell or that they were playing around or something else…what can I do about that?” Travis was sweating profusely now. “Bo didn’t say that one of the caregivers hit him. If he would have communicated to you that an adult had done this, I would have been all over it, but he didn’t.”
Blaire turned and spotted Bo going into the hall bathroom.
“Bo,” she called, walking toward the boy.
“Sweetie, can you tell me what happened to your face?”
“Did a worker do this to you?” she asked. Blaire took his hand, and she could feel him begin to tremble.
“Was it Ms. Vesna?”
The boy offered no response.
“Ms. Hannah?”
“Blaire,” Travis interjected.
The boy shook his head from side to side.
“Was it…Anya?”
“Blaire, stop.” Travis’ face looked contorted and pale.
“I need you to tell me what is going on here. Give me a clue, Bo. Tell me something…anything.”
Bo did not move his body, but his eyes began to wander to the left as if trying to find something. Slowly, they traveled up the wall to one of the hanging black and white photographs, a picture that had hung in the halls of St. Sebastian for as long as anyone could remember. It was one of the pictures that Blaire saw on her first day in the facility. In the photograph, a curly-haired woman stood along the seashore with children. Blaire lifted herself from the floor until she was eye to eye with the strange woman in the picture and able to see every detail of her face. She seemed so real that Blaire could almost feel the woman’s hot, moist breath on her.
Blaire looked back down at Bo, who was now looking at the floor, shuddering hard. Blaire and Travis watched in shock as the groin area of his pants darkened with liquid flowing into the front of his pants and down the legs, out onto the floor into a pungent yellow puddle.
“C’mon, partner. Let’s go to the bathroom and get you cleaned up. Then we’ll get some ice on that face,” Travis said, taking Bo’s hand and leading him away.
Blaire looked back to the smirking woman in the photograph.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
Blaire’s classes passed quickly that day, and she was glad when they were finally over. She and Travis had promised to take the children outside for playtime after classes, as they had been warned that snow would be coming any day now. As soon as the children reached the backyard, they broke out running in laughter and squawks of gleeful fit. Pulling two pool chairs out unto the lawn, Blaire and Travis sat and watched the children play.
The two had spoken little over the past few days, and Blaire felt as if she should say something. “I’m sorry about the other day. I just lost it when I saw Bo’s face. After everything that these children have already been through, the thought of them having to suffer any additional abuse is just unbearable.”
“I understand,” Travis told her in calm words that disguised his freighted emotions. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Sure.”
“Who raised you after your parents died?”
A memory of her mother flashed into her head, the woman in the flames. It mixed with the memories Blaire had of hitting the icy river water that other horrible day, and she could feel nausea creeping up on her. Blaire pushed the recollections away to refocus on the sight of Andre and Bodan digging for worms.
“My uncle, Eddie, and his wife, Bella.”
“Are they still around? I haven’t heard you speak much about them,”
“Yes. They’re around, but I don’t talk to them often,” Blaire admitted as she had been ignoring theirs as well as her attorney’s attempts at contact lately.
Travis looked at her for the first time during the conversation, and she felt compelled to speak.
“My uncle and his wife never really wanted children. Well, they did but...”
“But what?”
“They wanted children of their own when they first got married. When they were unable to conceive after many tries, my uncle’s wife swore it was due to a curse put upon her when she was only a girl. She just assumed that they would never have children. When I came along, she was convinced that it was all wrong because they were not to have children, and they all of sudden had one, one that was the sole survivor of a horrible accident.”
“A curse?” Travis asked.
You can’t escape the curse! Blaire could still hear her aunt yelling at her in one of her fits of rage. She’s part of the curse, Eddie. This is wrong, this is all wrong!
“They’re not bad people. They treated me decently and, as long as my aunt was properly medicated, it was a peaceful existence. They never really warmed to me, though my parent’s money made it easy for them to accept me if nothing else.”
“Since you never talk about them, I thought that they were completely wicked or something,” said Travis.
“No, but I almost wish they were…for people to be wicked to you, they at least have to pay attention to you. You have something, even if it is only wicked “godparents.” But indifference, I think, is the most effective destroyer.”
Travis thought for a minute and spoke, “I had my parents all of my life, and I believed they were great. Now I know how drastically things can change in an instant, and it may se
em odd considering my age, but I feel like an orphan.”
Blaire felt a heaviness begin to dissipate from her chest. “Once my parents died, there was not one person on the face of the planet that loved me, and when I realized that, I knew what it was like to be an orphan. Your parents love you, Travis, and they are just trying to sort out their feelings.”
A dam broke in Blaire, as she revealed the emotions that made one vulnerable. It was embarrassing, but freeing and intimate like lowering one’s blouse to reveal a hideous scar.
“You’re not an orphan. My parents died many years ago, and there is still not one person on the face of the planet that truly loves me. I’m the orphan.”
“That’s not true,” he said as he placed his hand on top of hers.
Blaire bit into the cupcake that Natalka made for her. The girl was watching, so Blaire could hardly stomach the thought of her dislike of sweets crushing the girl’s healthy emotional outlet. Dense chocolate cake flesh crumbled in Blaire’s mouth. The moist treat seemed to expand in her throat, making it hard to swallow along with its thick rich icing that almost caused her to gag. Blaire always told people that she just didn’t like sweets, but that was not exactly true. As a child she loved them, but after her parents died, those sumptuous treats just didn’t taste as sweet. Eating them made her feel like a carefree child again, and that feeling became sickening to her because those days were gone now, just dust and ashes. The sweets just a painful remnant of a happy past that had long ago come to an end.
“Delicious, I’m gonna save the rest for later,” Blaire said, as she wrapped the other half of the cupcake in a napkin. She went to the sink and began washing the after dinner dishes with Natalka’s help.
“Goodnight,” Travis said, brushing past them with two cupcakes in hand.
Blaire watched Travis disappear out of the kitchen.
“How was your day today?” Blaire asked the girl. Natalka’s eyes had deepening dark circles around them, which Blaire could not help but notice.
“Good,” Natalka responded with little enthusiasm. This girl had transformed from the one Blaire had met in her early days at St. Sebastian. Rocking was now part of Natalka’s daily routine, and there was little that Blaire could do about it. She was sure that baking was the only thing that kept them from losing Natalka altogether.
“The chocolate chip cookies that you made last week were fantastic. Maybe you can make some for the party, what do you think?” Blaire asked.
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Do you want to make another kind?”
“I won’t make any at all. I won’t be here for your party. My father is coming to get me.”
“The same day as the party?”
“Yes, my father says that I am better, and he is coming for me,” Natalka explained in an earnest tone.
“Oh,” Blaire responded, knowing that no one was coming, just as no one had come the day before or the day before that, because her parents did not want her anymore and everyone knew it.
Previously, Marko informed Travis that Natalka engaged in this delusion that her parents were coming for her about once a year. Blaire noted the increase in frequency, and it worried her. “That’s too bad. When did you talk to your father?”
“A few days ago, he sent me a letter,” Natalka informed her.
Another lie. Anya told Blaire that when Natalka first came to St. Sebastian, she had written her father numerous letters. After so many, he finally wrote back, but not to Natalka. He wrote to Marko demanding that they stop her from writing them any more letters.
They finished washing the dishes in silence.
Blaire looked out the window and the night seemed darker than ever.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
Travis was waiting at Blaire’s classroom door when she dismissed the children. He looked tired.
“Can we talk about Natalka?” he asked.
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“She’s not doing well. She’s rocking regularly and becoming extremely distant. Have you noticed?”
“Yes, but didn’t we expect this? Didn’t we think there was a chance that her mental capacity would decline?” Blaire asked.
“Yes, but this seems like more than a decline in mental capacity. There’s something more. I just don’t know what it is. Marko said that there were other files on the children—personal files.”
“You think Marko is hiding something?”
“I don’t know. He may not be hiding anything, and it could be something that he doesn’t even realize is there.”
“I’m open to suggestions.”
“We need to see those files.”
“All right,” Blaire said with a sigh.
“I have an appointment with Sergey, so I have to get back to my office. His pain is getting worse, and Andre’s too. We need more potent painkillers. The over-the-counter stuff that I’ve been giving them has barely taken the edge off.”
“We’ll think of something.” Blaire walked Travis to the door where she saw Latif working on one of the electrical sockets in the hallway.
“Hey,” Latif said, coming over to greet her.
“Hey,” she responded.
“I might be able to help you out.”
“What do you mean?” Blaire asked, abruptly lifting herself from the doorframe. Latif ushered Blaire into her classroom and closed the door behind them.
“You need painkillers, no?” he asked.
“You can get medicines?”
“My cousin works in a hospital in Kerchaviv, and he gets stuff.”
“Is it legal?” she asked, and Latif responded with a mocking expression that made her realize the ridiculousness of her question instantly, of course, it wasn’t.
That evening Blaire sat on one of the windowsills in the game room watching Anya and Travis play cards with the children.
“Mommy, mommy take me home, far away from the unknown. Pick me up and fly away into the light of another day. Rescue me from the halls of the haunted, the desperate, the evil, unloved, and unwanted,” Blaire whispered.
“Where did you hear that?” Vesna’s whip of a voice startled Blaire, who hardly realized that she herself was whispering the rhyme.
She looked at Vesna who was on her knees scrubbing a stain out of the couch. “I heard one of the children saying it,” Blaire revealed.
“Who?” Vesna pressed.
“Ivan,” Blaire said, immediately regretting her admission. Vesna’s eyes scanned the room before they found Ivan and glowered at him vengefully.
“I’ve never heard him say that before,” Vesna snapped.
“Have you heard it before?”
“Yes, I heard it here when I was a little girl and you should not be repeating it.”
“You lived here when you were a child?” Blaire asked.
“No! My mother worked here when I was a child. It was something the children of St. Sebastian used to say.”
“Where did it come from?”
“One of the workers wrote it, a strange man. Everyone from Slokivka was strange. He made up that rhyme for one of the little boys, who thought that the same mother who brought him here was one day coming to pick him up. It made the boy feel better.”
“That rhyme made a child feel better?” Blaire’s face expressed her bewilderment.
“The rhyme didn’t start off that dark, but over the years words were transformed here and there, and it became what it is now, but the point is that you should not be saying it!”
“Why not?”
“You just shouldn’t!” Vesna did her best to keep her voice down.
“How would Ivan know that rhyme?”
“He wouldn’t! Whatever it is that you are trying to do, I suggest you stop it,” Vesna warned, plunging her sponge back into her bucket forcefully as she got up and started toward the door.
“Vesna,” Blaire called to the small but powerful woman, who turned to face her with a scowl.
“Whatever happened to the bo
y? Did anyone ever come?” Blaire asked with an orphic curiosity. Appearing infuriated by the ridiculous question, Vesna stepped forward only inches from Blaire and answered in a whisper.
“No one ever came for the boy. He died here. They all died here,” she said before turning and walking out of the room. Blaire looked to Ivan who was staring at her as if he could hear every word of their conversation from across the room.
The same bright vision of blood splattering across the rotted wooden railings of the baby crib shot through Blaire, and she was plunged back in time to that moment on the roof when he grabbed her hand.
There’s something in the basement.
Blaire peered at Ivan who had turned slightly, back to the window. His lips did not move, but she heard him as clearly as if he were shouting.
Late that night after St. Sebastian had long been asleep, Blaire and Travis found themselves in the kitchen having a clandestine meeting. Blaire crunched potato chips while Travis finished an entire cupcake in two huge bites. The slumbering monster of a building was completely quiet except for the buzzing of the large, hanging rectangular lights that gave an ominous glow.
“I can’t believe I just did that,” Travis said, as he licked strawberry frosting from his fingertips.
“You’ll work it off, I’m sure.” Blaire pushed the last chip into her mouth. “Today, I was talking to Vesna about the history of St. Sebastian, and she made a strange comment, something to the effect of—they all died here.”
“Who all died here?” Travis asked.
Blaire shrugged and said, “I think she was talking about the children who have lived here in the past.”
“Well, they are orphans, so I would image that they do die here,” Travis said.
“No, they don’t die here. Those who can survive on their own are released at eighteen, and the ones who can’t go into the world are sent to an adult facility.”
“Maybe she meant more like metaphorically, you know? They all die here…” he said in what Blaire was assuming was his spooky voice, which sounded oddly similar to his regular voice.
The Unwanted (Black Water Tales Book 2) Page 15
