38
NAT
The evening drags on forever. Time doesn’t move fast here; today it crawls even slower.
I know why. Rashel does too. The twins, I don’t think so.
Or they’re playing dumb, which they do beautifully.
Sometimes I can’t tell if Vega is naive or a calculating bitch with everything measured down to the last inch.
I don’t know if this is what she wanted to happen or if she really thought we were going to walk her to a fucking police station to file a report and that’s that.
I’ve got a lukewarm glass of water and a napkin I’ve rolled into little pellets—my handiwork, a nervous person’s modern art.
My phone sits there facedown, on airplane mode, in case I get the urge to check notifications that don’t exist. My stomach growls and I pretend not to hear it. Professionalism, sure.
Irina doesn’t bark orders; she fires off short questions, no extra pressure. She doesn’t ask for weird details, just the ones that matter.
"Do you remember what day of the week it usually was?"
"What cameras did they use?"
"Which door made noise?"
"What phrase did they repeat?"
Her voice is low, steady. Clean pauses. Not a word too many. If there were an anxiety meter, it would drop a point every time she opens her mouth. I’m jealous. When I talk, the meter jumps at least two bars.
Vega does better describing than giving opinions.
Her voice shakes less if she sticks to brands, colors, schedules.
She trips when she has to say whether something felt right or wrong.
She drops her gaze, breathes through her nose, lets out one sentence, then another, and goes back to the concrete.
I get it; you ask me "What did you feel?
" and I blow a fuse. Give me data and I’ll make you a numbered list.
Under the table, Alaska’s leg is jittering like castanets. Above it she keeps a tough-girl face, reined in. It only half works, but she’s trying. Her thumbnail is wrecked; she bites it, lets go, bites it again. Every so often she breathes out and looks at the ceiling.
Irina doesn’t leave them alone. She holds their gaze, gives space when needed, and covers a hand with her own without making a scene.
I’ve seen her make men cry who don’t cry even at funerals.
Tonight she slows the tempo for two girls who grew up shoved around, with no one to protect them.
Not a single corny word, not an extra touch.
Exactly what they need. I wish I could take a page from her book half as well.
Rashel gives me a little kick. I don’t look; I know it’s her way of saying "breathe.
" I nod with zero subtlety. My back is knotted and my head stuck on repeat.
I think about the station, the report they tried to file, the door opening and closing, the tired cop who looked at them without seeing them.
I get pissed, calm down, get pissed again.
"Do you remember the first time you heard that phrase?" Irina asks without raising her voice.
Vega dips her chin in a nod. Starting costs her. She gathers air and voice and answers softly. Her fingers dance on the glass; the ice hitting it makes that ting that puts my nerves on edge.
I stare at the water ring on the table, round and perfect, and tell myself it’s going to settle, that Irina will listen to Rashel. Me and my dollar-store hope. I remember who Irina is and laugh to myself: of course she’s going to make a mess of it.
I want to smooth Alaska’s hair with my palm, hook my fingers around her wrist to say "I’m here," pull her onto my lap and shut the world off. I don’t. We don’t. We hold back. We say it all with our eyes: I’ve got you, breathe.
Rashel talks with the calm of a therapist she isn’t, but could be.
Short words, no babying, she calibrates her tone.
"If you don’t remember something, it’s okay—sometimes the body remembers better than the head.
" "It’s not your fault." "If it comes out in pieces, good; if not, also good. We don’t push here. "
She explains in a low voice what memory does when it’s forced to learn what it shouldn’t: it dims things, leaves blanks, scrambles the order. Both of them listen. Vega’s eyes are locked on a point only she can see. At first Alaska doesn’t even blink. At some point I catch myself listening too.
The table swaps out dishes without us noticing.
A server appears and disappears without a sound.
He leaves warm bread, cut fruit, soup with some weird leaf floating in it that nobody touches.
A while passes, then another while, then three.
Full songs, laughter from another table, the bathroom door sticking and letting out a groan.
When our throats finally unclench a little, we order and actually eat: nothing off the grill, something warm and inoffensive. White rice, a plain omelet, cream soup.
Alaska drinks the vodka straight. No water, no ice, no lemon.
Neat. My stomach turns watching her, and at the same time it calms me that she does it without hiding, without showing off.
Good—honesty in its purest form. It steadies me to see her drink without theatrics.
Her eyes track the glass like it’s the only real thing on the table.
The air leaves her in a rush, a sigh that doesn’t even make a sound.
I want to snatch the glass away and at the same time slide it closer. My common sense called in sick today.
Vega takes measured sips of water, a slow bite of Spanish omelet.
Obedient to her body and to Sabina from somewhere in the distance.
She breathes before every swallow, counts in her head—I can see it in the pulse at her throat.
She’s tuned to something only she can hear.
No lights, no people, no servers can pull her out of it.
Irina barely touches her drink. She turns it, sniffs it, sets it down.
Rashel clings to her tea. Picks it up, lets it go, picks it up again.
Hours pile up. A little after two they switch to a filler playlist. At three they start stacking barstools on the bar next to ours.
The door lets a hallway chill seep in. I check my watch, my phone, then Irina.
Bad idea: I get dizzy just trying to keep up with her pace.
She’s getting ready. She never stops coordinating.
Dials numbers, fires off short sentences, collects confirmations that don’t need context.
The club’s half-light stops being comforting.
Staff wearing closing-time faces, glasses making less noise, the music turned way down.
Vega’s been saying for a while she’s tired.
She says it like asking for permission without asking: touches her side, checks the time, repeats, "We’re going now, right?
" Irina hears her and ignores her with a fierce gentleness. She slides a hand over her shoulder, gives her warmth, and that’s that.
"Hang in there," she tells her. "Almost."
And Irina’s "almost" isn’t a five-minute promise. No. It’s a plan, a program, a countdown only she’s running in her head.
It has names, keys, windows, and a map she won’t share.
When her phone buzzes at 4:03 there’s no surprise.
It’s the time she was expecting. She stands before the voice on the other end finishes the sentence.
The only thing she says comes without a verb, just this: "Now. "
Something tightens in me that isn’t fear or pity for those two men.
They’re already damned, even if they’re still breathing.
What steals my breath are the girls: Alaska with vodka in her veins, her laugh erased, her jaw set, hard; Vega sleepy, a new dignity growing across her shoulders.
If Irina hasn’t sent them home, if she hasn’t done the "into the car and straight to bed" gesture, it’s because she wants them to see. To see what’s going to happen.
It’s not a lesson; it’s family. She’s going to do it for them and with them.
This time there’s no JARSI, no alphabet-soup plan, no report, no patience.
No institutional sloth, no ritual of paperwork.
There’s a night that cracked open and two girls who became women too soon.
There’s a boss who, for once, isn’t going to delegate a single fucking thing.
And there’s me, with just enough fear to keep me cold and enough love not to step aside.
Alaska sits up slow, a little drunk, but she doesn’t wobble. She reaches for my elbow. I offer it. Vega smooths her dress. Rashel scoops up her purse with a flick, and Irina is already fully standing, phone pocketed, face like polished stone.
The doorman sees us and opens without asking. The street smells like daybreak and like rain that never quite fell. On the sidewalk, the cars wait like quiet animals.
I don’t ask where. I know. And I also know, with a pressure in my chest reminding me I’m not indestructible, that no matter how much training and how many workshops, tonight brings things you won’t find in the manuals.
Things that leave you different, that test you, that force you to choose and carry it.
There’s no drill. No one’s got our back.
And yeah, my left knee’s trembling a little.
We get in the car. The door shuts. The city feels off: little traffic, lights flipping with nobody waiting, a bar with the TV blaring and four graveyard-shift strays.
Irina doesn’t look back. Neither does Rashel.
Vega rests her forehead on the cold window and draws a circle in the fog with her breath.
Alaska nods off, tired; one hand in her lap and the other finds my fingers.
She threads them through and squeezes. I squeeze back.
I give myself permission for that and for one deep breath, quiet.