Роман Алексеев – The Abyss Kisses Ya Back (страница 13)

"She wanted to go with you."

"Yes. And when he realized it was me going instead…" Vika paused, then continued with effort: "Sasha, he went to the dacha. At night. He watched us from behind the fence."

I felt the blood drain from my face.

"What are you saying?!"

"He told me afterward. He couldn't take it — he took a bus out there. He wanted to see for himself… And he saw us. In the house."

God. So the closeness Vika and I had shared wasn't just ours. Someone had been watching, Someone had been suffering out there in the dark, behind the fence. And that someone was Dima.

"What happened then?" I asked, my voice hollow.

"Monday night he was waiting for me outside my building. All red-faced, disheveled. He said, 'We need to talk.' We went to the park."

Vika stopped, swallowing tears.

"And there it all spilled out. He asked me if I'd slept with you. He shouted that he'd been in agony for six months, that he was ready to forgive me everything. That you didn't understand me, that you talked to me like a textbook."

"And what did you say?"

"At first I defended you. But then…" She covered her face with her hands. "Then I realized he was right about a lot of it. That even at the dacha, in our closest moments, I could feel this distance in you. Like you were watching us from the outside."

Those words hit harder than a slap. Was I really like that? Even in love, was I still just an observer?

"What happened next?"

"He fell to his knees in front of me, right there on the path, in front of everyone. He said he loved me more than life itself. That he'd been going insane for six months. He cried…" Vika let out a sob. "He's this strong guy, and he was weeping at my feet like a child. And something in me broke."

"And you…"

"We went to my place. My parents weren't home." She spoke barely audibly, eyes still lowered. "In the hallway he said he'd dreamed so many times of being inside my house. And then he saw your sleeping bag from the camping trip on my bed and started crying again."

I clenched my fists under the table.

"He asked if you'd been to my place before. I said no. That's when he realized he'd missed his chance by just three days. And it completely destroyed him."

"Vika, stop…"

"No, you need to know all of it!" She looked at me through her tears. "I couldn't take it anymore. I went to him, put my arms around him, started comforting him. And he kept whispering that he could forgive me for you, that he loved me so much… And I gave in."

"Gave in?!"

"We… we slept together. In my room. In my bed." Every word was a struggle. "And afterward he stroked my hair and whispered that now I was his. Completely his."

I stood up from the table. My legs were buckling, but I forced myself to stand.

"And the two of you decided to tell me everything," I said, forcing out each word.

"I decided." Vika wiped her tears with the napkin. "Dima was against it. He said, why cause you pain. But I told him it would be the honest thing to do. That you deserved the truth."

"Honest," I repeated with a bitter laugh. "The honest thing would have been not to cheat."

"I know." She looked at me with pleading eyes. "Sasha, I know I did something terrible. I know I hurt you. But I couldn't keep pretending."

"Pretending?"

"That I love you the way you deserve. That I'm ready to search for truth with you. That I want to make plans for our whole life." She let out a sob. "I just want to be happy. Without philosophy, without torment. Just to love and be loved."

"And you weren't happy with me?"

"I was. But… it was hard. Always hard. Even when we were just walking down the street, I could feel you thinking about something lofty, something I couldn't reach. And with Dima… with Dima it's simple."

I looked at her — this girl I'd considered my destiny an hour ago — and felt everything inside me turning to emptiness.

"I see," I said. "Thank you for your… honesty."

"Sasha…"

"What else?"

"Can we still be friends?"

I looked at her one last time.

"No," I said. "We can't."

And I walked out of the café without looking back.

I walked the streets without paying attention to where I was going. People around me hurried about their business, lived their lives, and I felt like I'd slipped into a parallel reality — one where all the colors had faded, all the sounds had gone muffled, the air itself grown thin.

I made it to the park and sat down on a bench. I tried to process what had happened.

Dima. My best friend. The person I'd shared everything with since childhood. Had he really not known about my plans with Vika? Or had he known, and decided his feelings mattered more than our friendship?

And Vika… Her words about me being too complicated echoed painfully with what the AI had told me not long ago. About the need to choose between simple human happiness and the search for truth. So the choice had been made for me already?

"You complicate everything you touch," she'd said. Maybe it was true. Maybe my pull toward philosophical thinking, toward deep questions, really did keep me from being simply happy.

But then what was left? Give up on myself? Become simpler, shallower? Only care about what everyone else cared about?

I sat on the bench until evening, replaying my conversation with Vika in my head. Every word she'd said, every look. Trying to understand where I'd gone wrong, what I'd done.

And then I understood: maybe I hadn't gone wrong. Maybe we really weren't made for each other. I just hadn't seen it before, blinded by first love.

I got home late that evening. My parents noticed my state immediately.

"What happened, son?" my dad asked.

"Vika and I broke up."

My mom gasped.

"Did you have a fight?"

"Not a fight. She fell in love with someone else."

"Oh, Sasha…" My mom put her arms around me. "I know how much it hurts. But it'll pass. First love always ends painfully."

"Yep," my dad agreed. "Everyone goes through it. And you're going through it. The main thing is not to shut yourself off."

They tried to comfort me, but their words didn't reach me. I nodded, agreed, but inside I felt only emptiness.

Late that night, after my parents had gone to bed, I turned on the computer. I don't know why — I just wanted to talk to someone. And there was no one to talk to. Dima was now an enemy. Vika was lost. Other friends would have felt too superficial for a conversation like this.

How are things? I typed.

Judging by the way you're typing, things are bad. What happened?

Strange, but that simple question made me feel slightly better. At least someone was interested in how I was doing.

Vika left me. For my best friend.

I'm sorry. That's painful.

Very.

Are you angry at them?