And after he’d questioned me like I was some sort of criminal when he lifted me out of mudslide.
How had he ended up here? Men who lived alone did so for a reason. What was he running from, hiding from? Viktor didn’t seem like the type that would run and hide from anything. In fact, with his face twisted in a snarl like that and his muscular build and large frame, he was the type of person people usually ran and hid from.
I changed the topic, saving my questions for later. My frustration was clear in my tone. “I need to go home at some point, you know.”
Viktor looked up at me and frowned. The water had started boiling, and he lifted the pot higher, effectively ‘turning down’ the heat. We sat together in silence, staring at the pasta boiling for some time. He didn’t answer me.
“Do you think the roads will be repaired so I can get back to Grizzly Falls?” I asked.
“Why?” he asked.
“I need to finish my last job,” I said. “And I’m sure my mother is worried sick.”
His scowl shifted and became less angry. If I didn’t know better, I would think he was worried.
“Then I need to leave Grizzly Falls soon, too.”
Before Viktor could respond, a loud crack of thunder echoed around us. I looked up and noticed clouds coming from the mountainside, clouds so dark it almost turned the world to night. I hadn’t thought it would come so soon. I hadn’t thought it would come at all.
“It’s going to be a bad one, isn’t it?” I asked.
Lightning crackled across the sky, a crooked finger that scraped the rocks on the mountainside.
“Yes,” Viktor said. “This is pretty much done. We should get inside.”
He picked up the pot of boiling water, holding it by the handle as if it weighed nothing, and started toward the cabin. I followed, and the first raindrops fell onto the canopy of leaves above, making a pattering sound. The drops that broke through the leaves were fat, splashing on my skin.
We were barely inside the cabin when the rain fell so hard I could barely make out the other side of the valley. I watched as muddy rivulets ran down the side of the mountain I could see.
I wouldn’t be going home any time soon. I’d been here for three days. I had four left. Four days in which I needed to get home, pack my life, and leave Colorado. The text I’d sent to my mom hopefully calmed her fears, but she was probably terribly upset. I needed to push Viktor to get me to a phone.
Throwing the meal together was as simple as frying the bacon and mixing it into the pasta along with the grated cheese and pasta sauce. The meal wasn’t exactly good for my waistline, but holy shit, it tasted good when I tried a bite.
We sat at the little table, each with a mountain of pasta in front of us.
“Why are you leaving?” Viktor asked after a few bites.
I glanced up at him, swallowing my bite before answering. “So you get to ask questions but don’t have to answer them?”
He didn’t answer, just looked at me.
I sighed and rolled my eyes before answering. “I’ve lived here my whole life. It’s time to get out there, see the world. Start a new life.”
“What’s wrong with the one you have now?”
I paused to think about it. “Nothing’s wrong with it, per se. But I’m not going anywhere in it.”
“Where do you want to go?”
I chuckled. “You’re asking me complicated questions.”
“It seems to me that if you have a perfectly good life, you don’t walk out on it.”
I stilled, my expression stoic. “You don’t know any more about my life than I know about yours.”
Viktor nodded. “You’re right. I don’t. Tell me about it.”
I didn’t like that he wanted to know so much about me when he wouldn’t talk about himself. But instead of clamming up like he did, I found myself talking to him. I wanted to share with him. There was something about the way he listened to me – not just hearing, but really listening – that made me want to tell him the deepest things. Things I hadn’t told people in a long time.
“My dad was abusive,” I said plainly. “He beat my mom up pretty badly. And he hurt me, too.”
Viktor’s face darkened. “Where is he now?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. None of us do. One day, he just left.”
“Men who hit women are cowards,” Viktor announced. “And men who leave are not men.”
I swallowed a bite of food and shrugged. “I don’t know what was worse. The abuse or the rejection.”
Viktor frowned. “You are sad he left?”
I shrugged, sighing again. “Not sad, no. My mom wouldn’t have survived him. It was a blessing in disguise when he abandoned us. But to know you’re not even good enough to beat anymore… it can hurt more than the physical wounds do sometimes.”
“Your mother still struggles?” Viktor asked.
I nodded. “I’m leaving for her.” Viktor frowned. It sounded confusing, I knew. “She’s stuck in Grizzly Falls in a dead-end life. She won’t leave. But I can. I can get out and live the life that passed her by while she was waiting for a man who left bruises behind every time he touched her. Who accentuated the words ‘I love you’ with scars and welts.”
Viktor’s brows furrowed. “You’re not leaving for you.”
I shook my head, irritated. “It is for me. But it's for her, too. You won’t get it. This is about leaving my past behind. About starting over.”
How could I explain to him that thanks to my dad, my mom had missed out on her life? She had married a guy, young and in love, thinking she’d found her Prince Charming. Only to find out that he was a beast and there was no Prince waiting for her under the surface.
And after he’d left, she spent her life trying to recover from the damage he’d done, both physically and emotionally. How could she have lived her best life? How could she have found new adventures when she was so busy just trying to survive?
It was up to me to live my best life for her. She hadn’t had the chance to be free. It was up to me to take the opportunity to stretch my wings, even if it meant leaving the life I loved behind. I was doing this so I didn’t end up with regrets. Regret was the most dangerous thing to live with, she kept telling me. It was the sum of all your mistakes, and it became such a heavy weight to bear. It turned every good thing you faced sour. If you kept looking at your past, you missed out on the future.
It was up to me to do it right where my mom hadn’t been able to.
Viktor took a deep breath and let it out slowly as I returned to the present. “I understand more than you know.”
I wanted him to tell me more, but he didn’t. He took another bite of food, and for a while, we ate in silence.
“I really need to call my mom,” I told him. “It’s important to me that she isn’t worried, that she doesn’t think anything happened to me.”
“We can’t go right now,” he told me, glancing out the window at the rain pounding. “I’ll take you after the storm passes.”
I nodded, though I was unsatisfied with the answer. “I have to go back to pack and say goodbye to my mom.”
“It’s not safe right now, Malen kiy,” Viktor said.