29. 29 – Stasi – ten years ago #2
I catch the words on my tongue. If I do that, then I might break down. And he would fight. He’d get Silas, and Kit, and they would speak to their father, and my mother might follow through on her threat.
I don’t want anything to happen to them because of me.
I swallow, biting back the agony as I head to my room. Silas and Kit both knock on my door in the hours that follow, but I sit silently, my back against the door and my cheeks damp as they call my name in soft, worried voices.
But they leave. And eventually, the house grows quiet.
Slowly, I get dressed, slipping on the green checked dress I wore on my first day here and sliding my feet into black shoes.
When I open the wardrobe, I grab the small holdall I came with.
I don’t have much that I want to take with me. Most of what I had was paid for by William, and it doesn’t feel right. But there’s a few things that I can’t leave behind.
Branches from the orchard, whittled by Rafe into little makeshift animals that look nothing like what they’re supposed to be.
Stones from the stream that Kit and I found one day while paddling.
And letters, from Silas. Letters that he slips under my door, on the days when we don’t get to talk in the hall.
I grab a few more basics before I creep out, my throat tight as I move down the hall.
Past their bedrooms. Past my mother’s room. I can hear footsteps inside, and I speed up, slipping into the last room at the very end and glancing around as I flick the light on.
I’m not supposed to be in here. It feels wrong, but my mother was very clear.
I glance at the photographs tucked into the mirror on the dressing table.
At the smiling, dark-haired woman, soft and pretty and beaming, tucked beneath a grinning William.
Two babies are cradled carefully in her arms, William holding a small boy with blue eyes.
He’s staring down at his little brothers, his eyes wide.
The image swims, and I look away.
I’m doing it for them , I tell her silently. I’m sorry.
I’m so sorry.
It’s the only thing that could possibly drive me to pull open the delicate drawers of the dressing table. Rows and rows of jewelry greet me, just as my mother said. Slowly, I reach in, grabbing a set of glistening bracelets and dropping them into my bag.
Then the necklaces. The rings.
With each clink, the guilt consumes me, piece by piece. My hands shake violently, and it spreads across my body until I have to sit or I’m going to fall.
I try to breathe, curled over on the carpeted floor of their mother’s dressing room. A sacred space, one that none of them will enter. Only William, sometimes, when he thinks nobody is watching.
And I’m here. Desecrating it.
I blink back tears. Tears of rage, of frustration.
I can’t do this.
I tip out the contents of my bag in a rush, opening the drawers as I try to remember what goes where. I glance up, to the woman in the photo.
She’s not having it, I promise her silently. I won’t let her have a single thing. I’ll find a way.
My mother has more than enough, without this .
I’ll put it all back. And then I’m going straight to Silas. He can help, he’s older, he’ll speak to William—
“Anastasia?”
For a moment, I think I’m imagining it. Then my whole body turns cold.
Slowly, I twist my head towards the doorway.
“Silas.”
My voice is a whisper as his eyes sweep over me. As he sees the contents of my bag, scattered all over the floor.
“I was – I was coming to find you.” My voice falters as he steps inside, his movements slow as he walks up to where I’m kneeling. “My mother, Silas, she wants to leave. She wants me to go, and she’s threatening to say things – about your father, you, the twins. Please—,”
Silas turns, and I fall silent at the look on his face.
The dawning realization. The hurt. And then the fury.
“This is my mother’s jewelry.” His voice is low, pained, as he picks up an emerald bracelet, rubbing his fingers across the stones, and it stabs me all the harder. “What are you doing with it, Anastasia?”
My sob breaks free. “I wasn’t going to – I was putting it back, Silas. I swear to you – please . You have to speak to your father—,”
“Why?” His voice is a whip, rising in the small space. I shrink back as the anger pours from his mouth in savage words. “Because you’re a thieving little whore?”
“What? No .” I shake my head, frantic. “No, I swear. Silas, please listen to me—,”
But he’s not listening. I cry out as he grips my arm, hard, lifting me from the floor.
“Shut up,” he hisses. His face looks pale. “I don’t want Rafe and Kit to hear. You understand?”
Biting my tongue hard, I nod quickly. He pulls me from the room, and I crane my head to the things scattered across the floor. “My things—,”
“Leave them,” he mutters. “You won’t need them.”
My heart jumps as he almost pushes me down the stairs, still holding me tightly. “You’ll help me? I’m so sorry – she told me she was going to come after you—,”
But he cuts off my words as we reach the main doors. A hand slaps over my mouth, and I inhale sharply against his skin.
“I trusted you,” he says quietly. “I trusted you with my family . I told you not to hurt them, Anastasia. You promised me.”
His voice hardens, and I shake my head beneath his grip.
“You’re leaving now,” he whispers. “And I never want to see your lying, thieving face again. You are as ugly on the inside as you are on the out, and I despise you. People like you deserve everything bad to happen to them.”
He rips his hand away, and points. I stare blindly, reeling from his words. “Go. Now. Before I call the police.”
“I don’t want to go.” My voice is a whimper as I reach for him, but he pushes me back. “Please, Silas. Please. Don’t make me go with her. I don’t want to leave you.”
“ Liar !”
It’s a roar, and I flinch away from his anger. He follows me, grabbing my arm again and yanking me out of the doors, towards the cab where my mother waits with a bored expression.
“Take her,” he spits out, pushing me towards her. “Our lives will be far, far better without your poison in it. Both of you.”
My mother yawns, before she opens the door and slides inside. “So dramatic.”
I stare at Silas. He doesn’t meet my eye, but he crosses his arms. He’s not going to let me back inside. “My things—,”
“You brought nothing with you,” he says coldly. “And you’ll leave with nothing.”
No. This is all wrong.
“Not those things,” I sob. “Silas—.”
“Get in the car,” he says quietly, “Or I will make you.”
A hand grips my wrist. “Stop making a show of yourself,” my mother hisses. Her nails dig into my skin, and I make a pained sound.
Silas’s eyes dip down. Just for a moment, I see him waver. But then his face hardens again.
“Goodbye, Anastasia,” he says coldly. “You were entertaining enough, I suppose. A little dull, truth be told. It won’t be long before we forget that you ever existed. Perhaps you’ll have more luck with your next target.”
“You don’t mean that,” I say hoarsely, staring at him.
But he doesn’t respond.
He turns his back, and then my mother is dragging me into the car, telling the agog driver to pull off as I sob, wrapping my arms around myself.
As the car pulls away, taking me far away from Oakbourne Manor.
And far away from them.