a sequel/prequel/something-quel to respice post te, and contains spoilers for it. you should probably read that first.
CONTENT WARNING: contains multiple forms of domestic abuse, including non-explicit incest and child-on-child sexual abuse. this is probably the darkest and most potentially triggering thing I've written since Colours of a Stone. please, please, please be safe.
You're not supposed to remember things that happen while you're drunk but Tolys does. It's blurry but he remembers Ivan's tongue warm-thick in his mouth, tasting like more vodka, and cold hands sliding up under his shirt, tugging at his belt. He remembers how fuzzy his head was but that didn't change how wrong it felt, something was wrong.
"Wait—" he slurred, and the air dry and cold on his bare chest, and his legs so heavy so he couldn't move away—"wait, Vanya, I don't want to—"
"Shh," said Ivan. His face was a splotch of colours and his hands cold all over. "Of course you want to, darling."
He was fourteen then. Ivan was the first boyfriend he'd ever had.
.
She's at her sister's house when they hear. Irina's mouth sets into a hard, thin line and she tells Natalya bluntly that their brother is dead and she needs to go back home tomorrow.
"Were his brains showing?" Tasha asks. Irina looks at her face and doesn't seem to know what to think, what to say.
"He was strangled," she says quietly. "So no."
Tasha looks at her pancakes.
"I hated him," she whispers, and bursts into tears.
.
Tolys wakes up with a pounding headache, a sticky mouth, and an aching back. He pulls himself upright and lets the blankets fall, dipping his head to examine the hickeys that litter his collarbone and stomach. There's a large bruise on one hip, from being held down to the bed. It stings a little, but he knows better than to complain. Anyway, it's not like Ivan meant to hurt him.
He has to climb over his boyfriend to get out of the bed, and then he can't find his jeans so he settles for boxers and Ivan's least favourite t-shirt. It's so big it slips down over his shoulders—no, that's wrong, Ivan's not big because big means fat and he's definitely, emphatically not that, it's just that Tolys is small: small and thin, with a long, plain face and mousey hair and a tendency to twitch when people move too suddenly.
He's eighteen now, and Ivan is perfect. He has to be, to have stayed with Tolys this long. It's not like Tolys is good-looking, or smart, not enough for anyone else to want him.
Ivan likes to remind him of this.
(There are times Tolys wishes he could ask some pointed questions about what exactly constitutes perfection but it's not good, to do it when Ivan's touching him. When Ivan's telling him how much he loves him.)
We don't need anyone else, do we, darling?
Tolys doesn't really have much choice but to say yes.
.
Irina drags her to therapy and for months she sits on the pleather couch and plays quietly in the sandbox. Her therapist's name is Emma and she's very nice. Asks gentle questions and doesn't yell at her for not answering.
She's too old, she thinks, to be playing in the sandbox. Ivan would have told her that. So she shoves her hands in and feels the grittiness under her nails like gloves.
Emma writes something on her notepad.
"Vanya didn't let me get my pretty hands dirty," says Natalya. It's the first information she's ever volunteered about him.
.
"You're never here anymore! You let me take care of everything—"
Tolys claps his hands over his ears and hurries out the front door, his sister's voice rising to an angry screech behind him.
Ivan's expecting him. He can't be late.
Ivan gets so angry when he's late.
.
Natasha is making toast in the kitchen when Tolys comes in, Ivan's shirt slipping off his black-and-blue shoulder and the hem whispering against his thighs. She doesn't say anything to him, but he flashes her a quick, encouraging smile.
"Any grapefruit?" he asks quietly. She nods at the fridge. It's the most communication they're allowed to have, these days. He fetches his grapefruit and a knife and vanishes back into Ivan's room.
.
Tolys was fifteen when Ivan struck him first. He'd interrupted while Ivan was talking to him.
By the time he was sixteen he'd learned not to make that mistake.
.
Natalya doesn't even remember the first time her brother touched her. She does remember that when she was nine she asked him if she could tell their parents, because her stomach always felt icky when they were playing and she didn't think that was right, she thought maybe something was wrong. Ivan looked at her for a very long time and then grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to the window. His bedroom was on the second floor. She remembers, with absurd clarity, the rosebush under the window. There were two roses on it, one barely unfurling, one still tight and green.
"If you ever tell anyone about our games," he told her quietly, "I'll throw you out. Your head will split open and your brains will splatter all over the sidewalk. Do you know what a brain looks like, Nata?"
She cried while he unbuttoned her dress. She doesn't cry anymore.
.
"I'm sorry," she whispers, alone in her bed one night. It's almost winter, the snow still freezing drizzle. There's amber lamplight splashed on the asphalt, and she can hear Ivan pacing his room on the other side of the wall.
It's not your fault.
"I should have screamed. I should have tried to stop him. I just stood there and let him—"
She has her hands pressed to her mouth, trying to stifle the hiccups. Ivan will hear her, if she cries.
It's okay, Tasha. I don't blame you.
The white face has no nose, no eyes, just green-ringed pits gouged under its lank hair. Its fingers are cold and comforting on her arm.
She's certain Ivan knows she saw. She's terrible at hiding things from him.
.
Tolys fidgets in the passenger seat. Behind him, he can hear Tasha's breathing.
"We need to talk," says Ivan cheerfully, turning into an alleyway and braking. "About this morning."
"Vanya—"
Ivan grabs his arm and smiles at him. It's the smile with the hard edges, the one that means you've disobeyed me and I'm disappointed.
"Didn't I tell you," he says, "to leave my sister alone?"
"I wasn't—"
"Didn't I tell you not to talk to her?"
"Yes but—"
"But what, Tolys?"
"I thought—"
It feels like there's a band constricting around Tolys's chest. He stares wide-eyed into Ivan's stoney face.
"Vanya, Vanya please," Tasha's begging—
.
—she remembers the rosebush, in absurd clarity, and do you know what a brain looks like Nata?
"It's not his fault, Vanya, I asked him to look at it, he wasn't hurting me, I—"
"I'll deal with you later, little sister. Tolys knew he wasn't supposed to touch you."
His voice is full of that terrifying, implacable cheerfulness.
"Ivan please—"
.
"They're kind of grey," says Natalya. "All squishy like jello. There were bits of bone all over. They were curved. Like when you break a bowl."
Emma puts her clipboard down and comes over and folds her into her arms.
(Natalya is seventeen and the fact that Ivan is dead doesn't change anything he's done.)
.
Ivan kisses him before he ties the gag on.
"I love you very much, darling. I'm sorry you couldn't be good enough for me."
Tolys thinks of his mother and of his siblings and he can see Tasha frozen by the side of the road (you make any noise and you're next) and he fights. But Ivan is big, bigger than him. Trusses his arms and legs like a pig ready for slaughter and climbs back into the car and the asphalt is rough on Tolys's arms and he hears the engine start and Tasha's choked cry and then a crunch that doesn't sound like gravel as the weight settles on his chest.
I hate you, Tolys finally lets himself think. I hate you I hate you I hate you
He dies thinking it.