Page 346 of Eternal
Kat shifts to press her forehead against mine. “You’re not there anymore.”
“I know,” I say, voice rising for the first time, brittle and wild. “I know I’m not. But it doesn’t matter. My head doesn’t care. It’s still there. I try to sleep and I see it. I smell it. I feel that floor under me. I am there. I’m always there.”
Viktor rises slowly, finally, and sits beside me on the couch. One of his arms comes around my back, pulling me between them both now, Kat on one side, Vik on the other.
“You don’t have to be strong for us,” he says quietly. “You don’t have to keep bleeding alone.”
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I whisper. “I don’t know if I can finish any of this. I thought I could. I had this whole plan. Find the truth. Burn it all down. Get revenge.But…”
I bite the inside of my cheek to stop the shaking.
“I hear stories like hers and I fall apart. I start imagining every girl that didn’t get out. Every kid like me who never even got seen. It’s too much. It hurts so badI…I can’t breathe sometimes. I don’t want to go back there, but I can’t move forward either. I feel stuck between that house and the grave.”
Kat pulls me tighter into her chest. “Then don’t do it alone. Please, Azra. You don’t have to anymore.”
“I don’t know how to stop,” I say. “The revenge. The killing. The remembering. I feel like if I stop I’ll shatter.”
“You won’t,” Viktor says. “We’ll catch you.”
“What if you can’t?Vik…I swear I feel like... like I was born to break. And if I stop breaking, there won’t be anything left.”
Viktor’s hand moves gently to the back of my head. “We don’t mind carrying brokenyou.”
Kat presses a kiss to my temple, her voice soft. “You’re not alone anymore. You were never meant to be.”
I start crying, quietly, the way I used to when I was small and locked in that basement. No sound, only tears that fall and fall and never seem to stop.
But now I’m not alone.
Kat holds my hand.
Viktor holds my back.
I don’t know if I can finish this.
But maybe I don’t have to do it alone.
The crying fades, not all at once, but in slow waves. I breathe through it, let it pass, let it settle in the space between us.
Kat runs her fingers gently through my hair one last time, then stands.
“I’ll make us something,” she says softly. “Visha, you wait for me.”
I almost smile.Almost.
She disappears into the kitchen, bare feet quiet on the wood floor.
I know what she’s making before I even hear the rustle of the cereal box.
She always made it when we were kids, plain yogurt, honey, whatever cereal was in the cupboard. Even when the cupboards were nearly empty, she’d always find a way to mix something together.
We’d eat it on the floor, knees touching, pretending we were fine.
I still eat it now. Every morning. Even when I don’t taste it.
Viktor doesn’t speak right away, he simply rests his arm along the back behind me, fingers brushing my shoulder.
Then, slowly, he leans in and wraps both arms around me, pulling me close, like he used to when I’d scrape my knees or wake up screaming from the cellar when I came back here years ago.
