Chapter 6 Mischa
Each of my brothers are deep in contemplation, having silenced them one by one by my giddy obsession. Anatoly is the last to concede that I need to pursue this white-hot love.
“Fight it!” he begs.
“I can’t!” I say.
“Fuck!” Anatoly yells, and kicks a chair across the empty restaurant. “We need you in New York, we are under the gun, literally!”
“I just need the Christmas break. I’ll work every day for the next year, I promise.”
“I don’t even know if we’re allowed to date guys,” Grigor shakes his head. “It’s never come up. I’m guessing we’re not.”
“He’s a public figure,” Anatoly says. You gotta let this go, or else we gotta tell Sivishni and you don’t want that...”
“I don’t care!”
“Chili Pepper,” Maxim reasons, “Look at his eyes.”
Anatoly looks in my face and inspects my pupils.
“Wow, his eyes are as big as plates,” he frowns. “He’s on something?”
Demitri shakes his head. “No, but he may be in some sort of mania. Lemon, are you taking your medication?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe you are taking too much? How do you feel right now? Good?”
“No, not at all,” I say. “I can’t stop smiling, and feeling bubbly, but I am also in excruciating pain.”
“Look,” Maxim says.
He grabs my forearm, pinching my skin as hard as he can, twisting it while rubbing against his finger until it becomes a hot burning sensation. I watch indifferently, making no effort to stop him or have any reaction to the pain, which seems perfectly tolerable.
“Pain?” he asks.
“Oh yes,” I nod. “My heart hurts. What if he never feels the same way? But it’s not like you have to be gay to want to fuck me, right? I mean who would throw the sexiest man alive out of their bed?”
“I mean, it’s pretty gay,” Dimitri says.
“God help us,” Aleksandr looks at the others. “He thinks he’s the sexiest man alive.”
Maxim laughs. “He’s just in love.”
Anatoly frowns at me. “But your bedroom has been an orgy since the day you discovered your dick. How are you going to give all that up?”
“My dick is now reserved for Austen.”
“That’s that then,” Konstantin says. “His fate is sealed. These things can’t be helped.”
“Goddamn it,” Anatoly sighs.
Dimitri looks around the room. “Lemon, I’m sorry if this is a little hard to swallow. We all really thought Anatoly was the one who would go full gay. I’ve just lost a hundred dollars.”
The joke lands in the middle of a silent room and nobody laughs, because it is so true.
“You need to come up with twenty grand a month,” Gregor says. “You get ten from your speciality. I always supposed you got the other ten from fucking rich ladies, and maybe rich old men too, correct?”
“I’ll figure something out.”
“It’s maybe time we all started taking care of Sofie,” Konstantin says, and everyone looks at him quizzically. “Or I could.”
What a strange thing for Konstantin, usually the strong and silent type, to say. My stomach lurches, thinking he has more than just a soft spot for my little, teenage sister. He looks around and we all fucking know he has admitted something big.
“I’ve got it,” I say firmly, and stare him down.
Ah shit I’m going to have to kill Konstantin and I’ve never killed anyone and I bet he’s killed a bunch of people I bet he’ll see me coming a mile away oh this is gonna be stressful I can’t think about this bullshit right now it will just make me spiral...
Arkady clears his throat, and breaks the uncomfortable silence.
“Lemon’s carrying twice as much as us,” he says. “I’ll chip in a few grand, if it means he can pursue true love.”
Maxim barely knows where to look. “Of course.”
“Or Lemon could just be a little patient, go to New York and help some more there,” Gregor says. “He’d make a lot of money...”
I tune everyone out as my thoughts get louder.
“I can’t wait much longer. Austen lives out of town,” I say to myself. “I gotta go drive past his house.”
“You mean his mansion?” Gregor raises an eyebrow.
“On his private estate? How are you going to drive past it? You gonna bust through the gates? Casually roll through the private driveway with a pair of dark glasses? Ask him all nonchalant ‘what brings you here?’ Lemon, I don’t think he’ll assume it’s a coincidence. ”
“Yeah,” I say. “Maybe not.”
“This boy,” Anatoly winces, “this fucking little rich brat, already told you that he’s not interested in you, and likely men in general, and for some reason that doesn’t signal that you are going to get hurt?”
Maxim nods. “And what about when he finds out you’re a street kid, a refugee, and... well... all the other things?”
“I’m not expecting this to work out,” I say. “I tried avoiding him and now it’s the pig and the python. I have to swallow every delicious bite of him until my hunger is finally satisfied.”
Dimitri shakes his head. “His snake is going nowhere near your mouth and therefore you will never be satisfied.”
“I can be very persuasive.”
“I don’t know who to feel sorry for, him or you,” Anatoly says.
“Don’t be too persuasive,” Gregor tells me.
I am offended. “I’m not desperate, or like that.”
Anatoly nods. “Not desperate; not usually, but now you’re acting like you haven’t bedded half of America.”
“It’s like I’ve never felt desire till now.”
“For a straight boy?” Arkady asks.
“WE GOTTA START A BETTING POOL!” Dimitri exclaims, and claps his hands together.
“I’m sure he’s straight,” Anatoly scowls. “I’m putting twenty on it.”
Maxim considers it. “Lemon has conquered many straight men. That Dylan guy is still questioning his sexuality. I’ll go one hundred he falls for you.”
I shrug. “I think the best I can hope for is a holiday tryst.”
Arkady smiles at me. “So put your money where your mouth wants to be.”
“Holiday?” Ivan turns from staring out the window.
“He’s doing one of the college travel abroad programs, the fuzzy-duck study ones. Like the bullshit one Arkady wanted to do in Italy about Renaissance art? Austen’s going on the Australian cave-painting one where everyone goes clubbing in Sydney.”
“It was worth a credit,” Arkady insists.
Gregor and Ivan share a conspiratorial grin.
“Tour group?” Gregor asks.
“Yeah. Australia. Can I go?”
“How many people?”
“Over thirty kids, one or two chaperones.”
“Thirty five?”
I nod.
He looks to Maxim, who hides the hint of a smile.
“You can go.” Ivan says. “And I’m in for two hundred, because I believe in you. Make him fall in love.”
“That’s unfair,” Arkady whinges.
“What’s the catch?” I ask.
Ivan shrugs. “I suppose this is a silver lining. Funny thing about package tours, they wrap all the suitcases together in plastic and stick them on a forklift straight to the plane. No conveyor belt through the x-ray for the old ladies heading to Malaga.”
“And whose bag is whose anyway?” Gregor continues. “Point the finger at the other thirty kids and slip back into the crowd.”
“You want me to smuggle something?”
“We need to get your gorgeous product to the Romanians. You can have your little holiday while Nicolai and Aleksandr are away, but after that, we need you focused.”
“What do you want me to do?” I ask.
“Nothing. Maxim’s the donkey but it’s a big trade and he’ll probably need the support.”
“I’ll do it,” I beam. “Kismet.”
“For the love of God,” Anatoly rolls his eyes. “Please stop saying that.”