37. Mara
37
MARA
“ I ’m arriving at the Chrysler building now,” I say down the line, assuming Mrs. Lichard is calling me to make sure I made it across town safely. She’s a worrywart. It is one of the things I love about her the most. That, and how madly she adores Tillie.
I smile down the camera when Mrs. Lichard twists her phone to show Tillie sitting on a knitted blanket, watching Home and Away .
“It’s not my favorite Australian show, but it makes her happy, so I put up with the injustice.” A doorbell rings, and Mrs. Lichard’s face lights up. “That will be the roast.”
“You ordered roast for dinner?” I ask, my voice rife with suspicion.
That would cost a fortune, and Mrs. Lichard is on a pension. She can’t afford takeout.
She pffts me like my shock isn’t warranted. “No.” A touch of heat graces her rheumy cheeks when she admits, “I sent the ingredients to Mr. Gordon from 4A and ordered him to make us a roast for dinner.”
The redness of my cheeks is more from memories of how Mr. Gordon cornered Mrs. Lichard under mistletoe last Christmas than the unbelievable heat in the servants’ elevator I’ve just entered.
It’s super stuffy tonight, and not all the heat is from remembrance of the last time I rode this elevator. Most of it is worry.
I haven’t stopped replaying my conversation with Riley through my head on repeat since I left home. That was almost two hours ago since I had to take four different bus lines to get here.
The bus schedules were designed for nine-to-five workers, which is ridiculous considering people who work those hours generally have their own mode of transport. Adding that to the fact Darius wasn’t stationed where he usually is when I leave my building has catapulted my panic.
Something is wrong—very wrong.
I tune back into my conversation when Mrs. Lichard says, “You shouldn’t have brought so much, Mara. I won’t need to go shopping for a year.”
I stare at her, dumbfounded. Barring the bulk rice, flour, and pasta we divide from the food wholesaler one block from Wilfred’s boutique, I haven’t been grocery shopping yet. The list is on my refrigerator, waiting for the day Chef stops overcooking.
When I say that to Mrs. Lichard, shock leaps onto her face. “But… it’s all here… Months of supplies were delivered an hour ago.”
She spins her phone again, and I gasp. Her little kitchen is overrun with pantry food, condiments, and enough fresh produce to last her until next Christmas.
I’ve never seen so much food.
I stagger back when she discloses, “Your kitchen is just as brimming. Tillie thought it was Christmas when she helped me take it inside.” Since my shock can’t be dismissed, she asks, “If it wasn’t you, who was it?”
I swallow the brick in my throat before flinging my eyes to the apartment I’m approaching. “I think I know who it might have been.”
I would sound more confident if I weren’t so lost.
Why would Ark organize groceries when I’m reasonably sure he ordered Chef to overcook on the days I work?
My pride wouldn’t allow me to ask Chef directly if my theory was true, but Chef is blunter than his favorite knives. When I dropped hints about my assumption, he told me it is impolite to question someone’s generosity, and that doing so was an insult to both the gift giver and the cook.
“Oh…” Mrs. Lichard’s reply is way too lusty for my liking. It makes my gills a little green. “Tillie is right. Ark is perfect for you. Perhaps she is right about Mr. Gordan as well.” Stealing my chance to reply, she shouts at Mr. Gordan that she’s coming before she tells me to message her before I leave so she can make sure I’ve gotten home safely.
I promise her I will before ending our call and storing my phone.
After a quick breather, I knock on the service entrance of Ark’s living room and impatiently wait.
Mercifully, I’m not left hanging for long.
Regretfully, the person who answers isn’t who I am expecting.
“Ms. Malenkov,” Fyodor greets, his gaze stony and cold. “I was just about to contact you.” He waves his hand across his body, inviting me in. “Please, come in.”
My legs are already wobbly, but their shakes worsen when my entrance into the living room announces there are more bodies than exits.
The person I’m seeking, though, is nowhere to be seen.
After smiling a greeting to Mrs. Whitten and Val, and struggling to hold back the snarl I’d give anything to issue Ark’s mother, I sit on the chair Fyodor gestures at. I trust Val enough to know she’d never place me in danger. I can’t issue the same guarantee for the other three.
I’m on the verge of being sick, but since I am desperate for answers, I fight to speak through the clump of vomit in my throat. “Is Ark okay?”
“Yes,” Fyodor answers, immediately halving my angst. “He’s fine.”
“You, however,” Mrs. Whitten joins in, “are balancing on a very thin wire, young lady.”
Her anger shocks me… until I recall how stringent she is about the rules.
I once cherished her nonfraternization policy.
Now, I loathe it.
“I had no s-sexual contact with Ark?—”
“You will address him as Mr. Orlov or not at all.”
I grit my teeth before shifting my eyes to the person snapping at me like my cat shit in her prize-winning garden.
Even if Ark’s confessions didn’t disclose her as a monster, I’d still declare with utmost certainty that Mrs. Orlov is a bully. She looks down at those she believes are below her and will stomp on people beside her for an inch more leverage.
“No, I will not refer to him by that name.” Orlov is Ark’s abuser’s surname. He didn’t change it when he was legally old enough to do so because he didn’t want Riley to be the only one lumped with the name of her abuser.
Even having his blood didn’t stop her father from hurting her.
It was the same for me.
Mrs. Orlov gasps, shocked and appalled by the sternness of my tone, before she seeks assistance from Fyodor. “Are you going to allow her to speak to me in such a manner? Do something, Fyodor!”
He looks torn. I understand why. I thought he was Ark’s employee, not his mother’s.
After a quick breather, Fyodor says, “We are all here for the same reason. Arkadiy’s well-being.”
Everyone nods, agreeing with him, except Mrs. Orlov. “He wouldn’t be guzzling whiskey as if it were water if this wretched witch hadn’t brainwashed him.”
“Nora, please,” Fyodor retaliates before I can. “If you can’t be quiet, you will need to leave.”
Mrs. Orlov’s face lines with anger as words are spat from her hard-lined mouth. “I’m not going anywhere.” Her eyes are back on me, narrowed and glaring. “Unlike you.”
Another tense stretch of silence passes before Fyodor breaks it. “I was requested this afternoon to organize you a severance package.”
My eyes widen to the size of saucers. “By wh-whom?”
He continues as if I didn’t speak. “The package is extremely generous. You will receive full wages for the term of your contract and an additional twenty-five percent for any leave you may have accrued during your contract period.”
Before I can get over my shock that I’m being offered two years’ worth of salary for two weeks’ worth of work, Mrs. Orlov’s whispered snarl steals my focus. “Veronika suggested he fuck her out of his system, not pay for the disservice. This is absurd.”
I agree with her, but Val will never allow personal feelings to enter a business discussion. “As Mara previously stated, any association between her and Mr. Orlov was after her employment contract with Chrysler Holdings had ended. If her new contract did not include a nonfraternization policy, she is well within her rights to refuse the severance package on offer and seek legal counsel before progressing further with negotiations.”
“I don’t want Ark’s money,” I add on, “so I deny the offer of s-severance.”
“Regretfully,” Fyodor starts, his tone more respectful, “your contract had a nonfraternization policy for both you and your employer.”
“Then she retains her right to seek legal guidance for a breach in contract by both parties.”
Val flashes me an apologetic grin when Mrs. Orlov takes her wave of the white flag in the wrong manner. “I knew it. You don’t want my son. You want his money!”
I shake my head, but she surges forward with her plans to derail me with a viciousness everyone is shocked about.
She slaps me.
“Nora!” Fyodor shouts when she gets up in my face and screams, “If it isn’t true, if you truly care for him, sign the severance package, then leave without causing a scene. Let him live his life how he wants!”
As I nurse my stinging cheek, I say, “This isn’t the life he wants. He told me so only yesterday.”
My fight loses steam when the last person I thought would go against my relationship with Ark sides with the opposition. “It’s what he wants, Mara.” Rafael enters the living room, looking tired and withdrawn. “He told me so himself this morning.”
My heart is breaking, but I try to save face. “Then he will have no trouble telling me the s-same.”
After removing the knife Nora stabbed into my stomach by ordering for her to be removed from Ark’s apartment, he twists it back in deep. “He doesn’t want to see you.” His eyes plead with me to listen as he steps closer, blocking out the frantic thrusts of Ark’s mother as she tries to free herself from the security guard’s grip with his broad frame. “Sign the contract. Don’t let pride prevent you from providing the life your daughter deserves.”
“N-no. I refuse.”
“Please,” he pleads, his words barely a whisper. “He won’t survive this without knowing you’re okay, Mara. He needs you to do this for him. He needs you to save him.”
His words make no sense. How can pushing me away help Ark? But the sheer actuality he delivers them with spears an arrow into my heart so effectively I nod before I fully understand what I am doing.
“Okay. I’ll sign it.”