I haven't written in a long time; I'm deeply sorry. Things have been stressful. My writing probably sucks because I haven't practised in a while.
I also haven't forgotten about my other story, but I'm trying to work up the motivation to continue with it. I'm pathetic, I know. Throw tomatoes at me. I hate being a freshman. /dies
"Mommy?"
"Yes?"
"I saw a dead man on the street."
"Oh? Were you scared?"
Ivan didn't reply. He leaped over a mound of snow and squeezed his sister's hand. "When are we getting out of this place? I don't like it much. There's so much blood."
"I don't know, sweetie. Where is your sister?" Yekaterina stopped and looked back. Ivan blinked his large violet eyes.
"Did you lose her?"
"This is bad. Oh dear. She could be killed. All that gunfire. . ."
"I can go get her!"
Before Yekaterina could stop her younger brother, he had dashed off. Desperately, she called for him, but he did not return.
Ivan's feet ached from running, but he had to find his sister. She was the youngest after all; hadn't he sworn to protect her after big sister passed away? Big men looked down their hooked noses at him, making him feel smaller than he already was. The boy's fingers trembled. He scooped up snow and tossed it over his shoulder.
"Nat! Nat! Where are you?"
His voice became lost in the wind. As he was searching, he became aware of a strange aroma. Oddly attracted to the scent, he ventured in the direction of an old antique shop. People milled about, paying him no mind. Then he saw it. A man—half buried in snow lay near the entrance to the shop.
"Excuse me?" Ivan poked the individual. No movement.
A bizarre smile etched across his face. Then he noticed something else. Blood trickled from a gash in the man's stomach. Gunfire. He could hear his sister calling him in the distance. Without thinking, almost instinctively, he dipped his hands into the wound. Sticky threads of blood clung to his fingers. He tilted his head and stuffed his fist into his mouth.
"What is that kid doing?"
Ivan looked up in time to see a man pushing his startled wife away from the scene. Several people had stopped to watch, but vanished as soon as the boy's eyes passed over them all. The Russian extracted something heavy from the wound. He wasn't sure what it was, but it was moist and bloodied—appealing in the most horrifying way. He chewed it a bit, savoring the sweet and tangy flavor. He rolled the man over, only to have more indescribable objects fall from the gash. Giggling, he stooped to feast some more, but someone grabbed his arm.
"Ivan!"
"Mommy!"
"Ivan! I've been looking for you everywhere! Don't go running off without my. . ."
"What's wrong?" Ivan tugged at her now limp hand.
"Were you eating that man?"
"Huh?"
"Were you eating that man?" Yekaterina bristled in rage.
"Yes, but I was hungry! I haven't eaten for so long!"
"I never want to catch you eating another human being ever again! Ever!"
With that being said, she snatched Ivan's hand and stormed through the crowd that had gathered. Over her shoulder, Natalya batted her lashes at her older brother.
When the three arrived back at home, Yekaterina made Ivan wash his hands right away.
"Where did you find Nat?" Ivan asked as he departed from the front room.
"Never mind that. Just wash up and go to bed."
"No supper?"
"No supper."
By now, Natalya had clambered onto the table. "Mommy, mommy! I found bread!"
"No, don't!" Yekaterina brushed her hands on her apron and charged for the table. She slapped the mold-encrusted slice from her sister's hand. Who knows where that had been? Probably nibbled by all sorts of creatures. Rats specifically terrified her.
Ivan emerged from the bathroom. Yekaterina sighed and wiped blood from his cheek using the edge of her apron. She licked her finger and scrubbed at the spot until his cheek glowed pink.
"I'll read you two a story and then you can go to sleep, alright?" Yekaterina tucked her siblings into the small bed they all inhabited and picked up a dusty children's book from the corner of the room. They were too poor to afford new books, so Yekaterina often found herself reading the same tale over and over again. Luckily, they were kids and the same story opened up a new plot every time.
"Lucky Bear and Friends," Yekaterina began, turning to the first page.
"Mommy! Nat fell asleep! Shall I hit her so she can listen too?"
"No. Let her sleep. She's tired. You can listen if you want."
"Okay."
Halfway through the story, Yekaterina realized that her brother wasn't listening. His breathing had grown shallow; his eyes glazed as though he had just witnessed a murder.
"Ivan?"
The boy looked up, startled. He shook his head and wrinkled up his nose.
"Ivan! Are you alright? Does your head hurt?"
Yekaterina climbed up on the bed and set him in her lap. "Easy now. It's just a headache."
Ivan's eyes widened and turned an odd shade of scarlet. "Shut up."
"Don't talk to me that way! Since when have you become so ungrateful? In the corner, now!"
"What about the hand?"
"What hand? What are you talking about?"
"The shadowy one in the corner. I don't want him to get me. I see what he does to everyone. He squeezes the breath out of you by closing his fingers around your neck. Then he laps your blood with his fingers. There are tiny holes which allow him to absorb it and. . ."
Yekaterina shook her head. It was almost as though he was dreaming with his eyes open. She cuddled him and stroked his soft hair. It smelled of dirt and blood, but she didn't care. She was here for him. No demons would possess him any longer. But she failed to realize the seriousness of her brother's hallucinations.
He pushed himself away from her, scratching her throat in the process and scrambling to the other side of the bed. A noise vibrated in his head. The sound of a nonexistent television buzzing and that of a thousand people talking at once. Opposing statements. They told him to run away. To stay. To eat poison. To hit his sister.
Tears ran down his cheeks. "Mommy! Mommy! Make them go away! Who are they? Is it you?" He looked up.
"Yes, you ungrateful brat! It's me! Shut up and drink your blood so I can watch you die the way you would if you drank bleach."
Her face became distorted in his mind. Something was very wrong. Nothing like this had ever happened before. Nothing so out of place. He covered his ears and whined.
"Ivan!" Yekaterina hugged him tight. She slowly became normal. The tears stopped. Ivan giggled and threw his arms around her neck.
"Oh mommy! You're okay! You told me to drink my own blood, but I was going to anyway. See?" Ivan sunk his teeth into his skin and attempted to rip off a chunk of his flesh.
"Stop that! What is wrong with. . ." Yekaterina sighed. She would have to consult a doctor in the morning. Or a psychiatrist. She wasn't educated enough to tell the difference. But something was better than nothing.
In the morning, Ivan awoke to a funny feeling. The feeling he was being watched. He opened his eyes and saw a woman looking down at him. Horn-rimmed glasses sat upon her nose giving her an almost hawk-like appearance. Ivan backed away from the eerie stranger.
"Relax, sweetie. It's the psychiatrist. She's here to check you out. I brought a doctor as well. Just in case." Yekaterina motioned towards another individual, standing with a clipboard pressed against his chest.
"Can you tell me any of your symptoms from last night? What you saw, felt, heard?" The lady lifted his chin with the tip of her pencil. Ivan felt a growl in his throat erupt into a full-blown bark.
"Stay away from me! I know you're here to hurt me! Mommy?" Ivan looked up at his sister. She hushed him and told him to keep still for the psychiatrist.
"Well," Ivan folded his arms across his chest. "I heard things. Voices, I think. Mostly men and women with deep voices telling me to do weird things. Horrible things like stab. . .people."
The psychiatrist looked alarmed. Her face had grown ashen as though she had just discovered he had returned from the dead.
She stood up and whispered something to the doctor. Then she placed a hand on Yekaterina's shoulder and told her something. The look on his sister's face made him want to cry.
"Mommy! What's wrong? And what's Schizo whats-it-called?"
"Schizophrenia, my dear child," the doctor corrected. For the first time, Ivan noticed how menacing he looked. His hair was dark, his eyes a deep brown. His build was quite scary too. Suddenly, everyone seemed evil. Ivan whimpered.
"What's that?"
"A mental disorder. It appears you also suffer from Bipolar disorder, Pyromania, and. . .Antisocial Personality disorder."
Ivan frowned. "What's so bad about that?"
The doctor conversed with Yekaterina. "Does he really enjoy setting things on fire?"
"Yes. Ever since he burned down the school building, I haven't the nerve to send him anywhere else."
"Jesus." The doctor looked sick.
After the two had left, Yekaterina stooped down to talk to her brother. "I want you to get your motives straight. No eating humans, no threatening your sister, no setting things on fire. . ."
"I don't do any of those things!" Ivan protested, his tiny fists curling into small balls of fury.
"Look, I don't want to ever have this conversation with you again. You know better."
"Mommy. . ."
"I'm not your mommy. I'm your sister. It's time you wrapped your head around that concept. Get used to it. "Mommy" won't be there to reprimand you when you're in jail for some horrible crime."
The boy's face blanched. Never before had his sister spoken to him like that. Was she sick? Had a monster run off with her mind somewhere, somehow? All of it seemed irrational, but fear made him think in a funny way. He touched her knee.
Her face twisted. "Ivan, darling."
She scooped him up. Ivan clung to her, his nails unintentionally digging into her shoulders. He wanted to tell her that he was sorry, that he couldn't understand what was going on, but words didn't seem appropriate at the time. For now, all he wanted was to melt in her arms and forget the doctors and the war and the world.
"Let's go for a walk, Ivan. Shall we?"
'Till then!
Don't judge my fascination with cannibalism please. Good lord, this sucks. xD