𝐚𝐥𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐲 𝐠𝐨𝐧𝐞; eugene roe ✔

PART THIRTEEN

My eyes fell with my heart, to the stone tiles of the outdoor staircase. They curled around the cliffside, past the ramp which lead to the bank. Eugene had followed them and taken a seat on the penultimate step, the last one covered in the advancing and receding shore. Lost in my thoughts, I was more than half-way closer to him, descending the stairs.

"Cannot sleep?"

He had heard me approach him but still shuddered at my voice, glancing over his shoulder. "N-No."

I hadn't really recognised his accent up until this point and stayed quiet for a while.

"Is it the..."

Almost immediately he nodded. "I, uh..."

I waited patiently.

"Not really. Not yet, at least. But I can feel it coming. 's why I'm out here." He swallowed hard. "Didn't want to break any of your grandmother's things."

"It was not being used." I tried to jest.

"Could you, uh, go inside, Valentina?"

I furrowed my brows, confused by his request.

"I don't want to hurt you. Again."

I released a long breath I had been holding, "I don't think I can do that, Eugene."

"Why not?" He smiled but not out of amusement, more displeasure.

I didn't know how to propell my thoughts. He took my hesitation as speculation, that I may be thinking something unreasonable.

"I," I started before he had the chance to. "I don't think loneliness is what you want."

"What do you think I want?"

"I don't know," I muttered. "But I think if you're left here, to your thoughts and their unfriendliness, no good can come out of that."

He sunk his head into his knees, crossing his arms around his shins, "You know a lot more about it than I do."

"Why don't you talk to me about it?"

"I-I can't." Eugene snapped back. "I've told you - I can't think. My mind is filled with this cloud - I can't see through it."

I sucked in an inhale, startled by the show of anger, "Forgive me, I overstepped."

"No, no you didn't." He sank further into himself. "I just, I can feel something coming and that means I can't feel anything else."

I pressed my skirt to my hamstrings as I sat down, the cold of the stone steps sending a shrill up to my neck.

"Once I found Teo here. Like this."

"Yeah?"

I nodded, despite the fact he couldn't see me. "He... we had just returned from a ball thrown by the officers. Members of the führer's finest. It wasn't the best of evenings. So he came here."

"What happened?"

"Do you really want to know?"

His head shifted slightly, a gesture of agreement.

"His name was Herr Dietrich. He was in charge of intelligence operations or something similar." I moved my knees closer together, the breeze not providing any comfort. "He bought Teo a drink and then a few more. Later, he invited him upstairs to a study, supposedly. To look at books. Instead, Teo was taken to a bed chamber and met this sweet girl, Maria,"

I focused further along the lake, to a set of headlights curling around a mountain.

Eugene looked up, "Why did you stop?"