It was now like a whole new act in that life of theirs, in which the conflict arose in the shape of a family murder, his turn, and the resolution was left for her to define. It hadn't been the turn of the Lieberts anymore, but of the Fortners, and as the capricious girl she was her resolution had moved from fear to anger and from oblivion to revenge. Finally a third act of forgiveness, and all that was left to wonder.
It had been impossible not to bring the topic into one of their first conversations, daring to expect some sort of answer, even if by now nothing that had been told at that time was true anymore, for either of them. He had planned to leave and disappear, she had planned to control and now... nothing made any sense.
Desperate to find an escape to that newfound paranoia, her mind clung obsessively to the idea of forgiveness, what it meant for both of them, and the consequences, if there had to be any.
She finished folding some of her clothes in a hasty manner to leave her bedroom. His door remained closed, the silence, deadly, her footsteps leading towards the first floor. After a glance at the clock, she decided to cook something for lunch, even if she ended up just picking some bread and cheese.
Standing in the kitchen, she was practically toying with her food, cutting the tiniest dices of cheese.
She wanted an answer, a real answer this time, to the question of forgiveness. She deserved to know whether those words had made all of this happen, or on the contrary, he found them amusing even, so out of touch with reality.
She heard his footsteps as she was cleaning the dishes, going down the stairs. And there he was, again, silently positioned by the door, in that same spot where she had stood at the sight of her dead parents. Staring at those corpses that weren't there anymore, that he had never seen.
He was about to attack.
At least that's what the hidden tension in his body suggested to her the few seconds he remained there, frozen, to suddenly change strategies and relax, to the point where he appeared indecisive. She had learned by now to detect the most subtle changes in him, a new skill meant solely as a survival instinct.
Without a word, he decided to approach, to finally sit by the dining table, just a couple of meters away from her, even with the kitchen counter in between.
She wondered how should she even start addressing it, she didn't want to ask out of the blue but either wanted any useless mind games, not when she had no chance to win. She still felt incredibly hurt, and his presence was enough to make her teary, questioning how she hadn't grown a thicker skin by now, after all those months.
It was past lunchtime so she used it as an excuse to break that awkward silence.
"Would you like something to eat? There are some leftovers on the fridge, pasta primavera and..." She managed to keep a casual tone, drying the dishes now.
"No, thanks. I'm not hungry." Fine, let him starve if that's what he wants. Still, she took a deep breath and grabbed an apple from the fruit platter, leaving the kitchen area to approach him.
"Eat." She left it on the table in front of him, as she had done many times before to stop him from starving himself to death, which sometimes seemed his current life goal.
His eyes had followed her in complete silence, probably predicting that course of action. And she predicted his, who grabbed the apple with his left hand. It would take a while before he decided to bite it.
She stood by the table, not knowing what to do, how to escape.
"You can still see them every time you enter this room, it doesn't matter how much time passes." She could see his eyes drifting on those places where their corpses had laid. "You talked about it in therapy. You also said that this no longer felt like a home to you, not in a safe, welcoming way." Only then he slightly raised his head in order to face her, taking the apple between his hands. "It's strange, but I feel the same way, and the corpse I see welcomes me every time I enter, from that sofa," he suddenly turned around, to completely extend his arm and point the couch in front of them, under the window.
What was he talking about? Another dead body?
She looked at him questioning as he focused his attention on the fruit for a few seconds, finally disregarding the idea of keeping himself alive.
Instead, he decided to stand, walking towards that exact place that he had pointed until sitting there.
"They rapidly discovered who we were, yet it wasn't difficult to make up a horrifying story to justify our situation, as the press had handled most of it. Terrorism was a serious threat back in the day and the idea of a political murder was speculated every day on the news regarding the Lieberts case." Sitting in such an artificial position, with his hands perfectly clasped over his lap, she could easily picture that child. "Until their suspicions started shifting towards me." He remained silent but she decided to do the same, knowing he hadn't finished. "I had to stay in this room because they didn't trust me, not wanting me to be close to you unless indispensable. Even if they knew nothing, they could sense that I was the cause."
For an instant, she dared to believe his normal self -whatever was normal in him- was back, but then Johann decided to raise his eyes, a gentle reminder of her never-ending stupidity.
That was the stare of a predator evaluating a prey, nothing else. The same image his victims were probably offered little before their deaths... was she going to meet her end there, like it was meant to be? The murder of the Fortner family, all of them, in that same room.
"What do you mean?"
He still somehow wore the mask and his expression didn't change one bit.
"It's strange to be here again, after so much time. My memories of that time are crystal clear, of every detail of this house and everything I felt, thought, planned." He looked down before going back to her. "The cushions on this sofa used to be blue instead of beige." She wondered what was behind that monologue, whether it was a distraction meant for her, or maybe for himself. He looked at his left side. "I don't remember this lamp either, must be new." He leaned back until his head touched the wall.
And then, the final blow.
"The guest room used to be mine." A part of her knew, always had. That place, right next to her own bedroom, had been a source of extreme uneasiness that had never quite disappeared, only diminished after years and years of reducing that place to a closed door. Because that room was a shameless reminder that there was once another child in the house, the only explanation behind the parallelism between them both, because instead of a wall it seemed a mirror was separating those two.
She hadn't thought much about it until she came back to that house to become Nina Fortner once again, the survivor. And the realization, the absurdity of it all -a bedroom designed for their own killer-, well... it was an unexpected blow to her delicate mental state. And again, the day before, as she casually had offered him the room. Johann had perfectly known. He had said nothing...
... but he might have felt. And he was upset not because of her crying but maybe because of his own.
Because if he had ever said the truth, he had chosen the Fortners also for himself. Johann had wanted to settle down there and he had finally been rejected from that house, that family, because it was either him or her. Had he ever considered getting rid of her instead? Become the Eduard Fortner he was meant to be? He had, his eyes told her so. Even if it had just been an instant. The survival of the fittest. And Johann will always be the fittest.
"Can you... tell me more about that time?" She took a deep breath before choosing the chair he had left behind, where the apple remained forgotten.
He remained silent, lost in his own thoughts.
"There isn't much to say about it. You spent most of the time in bed and so did I, each one dealing with our own painful scars. The Fortners remained surprisingly receptive to my petition and gave us time. Once I recovered I waited for you to get any better, but there was no progress of any sort, your only reaction being anxiety and fear if I ever dared to get close to you. I could only see you during your sleep." Then he smiled, nostalgic in some way and also angered. At himself, the world. And her.
"Then you thought I would never get any better unless you left, and you finally did it."
He offered his stare once more as a punishment.
"I decided to remain receptive to your reaction, which was going to define every one of my own decisions. I thought of the possibility of making peace between us, maybe coming back to some sort of siblings relationship regardless of the damage done. In the best of cases, an agreement."
There was a smirk on her face, even if all she could feel in that instant wasn't the anger, but the guilt... and shame, for being such a cowardly child unable to handle her own twin.
"Do you really think you could have been that successful?" She offered the mockery in her voice as he might be expecting.
"Yes," he ignored her, "if you had handled the situation any less traumatic. Back then I used to underestimate people's reactions to abnormal events, though..." Meaning children witnessing violent murders. "But I would have been able to get your forgiveness back then, I'm completely certain I had the skills. If you had recovered."
"But you gave up... again." She fainted and Johann had finally lost all patience.
"I soon realized I wasn't welcomed here, they grew suspicious of me. Moreover, I eventually discovered they only wanted a girl and our relationship was already a lost cause. So I decided to leave, seem like I left." A pause. "I came back a few weeks later to find the Fortners exhilarated as their new daughter had finally recovered her senses. I considered meeting you but that plan was disregarded the moment I realized you didn't remember one bit of your past, and that included me." He suddenly stood.
Johann was upset, dangerously so. Yet the calmness of his voice was a powerful skill, covering many of their conversations on that blanket of tranquillity that didn't exist on either of them. It helped the conversation to flow more naturally, to finally fall into outbursts of sudden -expected- violence.
And she wanted to understand, more than anything, hoping that logic would drive emotions away like it seemed to happen with him.
"You wanted to stay... didn't you? As in Düsseldorf... even if we were going to eventually part ways, as you were so convinced, you weren't ready by then."
He took some time to answer.
"Is it possible to feel ready to abandon someone?" Touché.
She didn't need any fuel for her guilt, less coming from him.
"You said so... that our relationship was hopeless."
He approached, and his standing position was purposely threatening over her. And effective.
"I was certain you were eventually going to discover my little secret and reject me, still I've never wanted it to happen." He leaned towards her in the slow-motion version of a monster falling upon its prey. Both his arms reached the back of the chair, caging her in between, his eyes becoming the final chain. "But it's not my decision to make, and I wanted you to choose freely whether you wanted me or not."
She knew, it was the moment to stop, back off and leave him to cool down on his own. That was the sane way of dealing with an aggressive Johann and had worked marvelously in past times. But she wasn't in the mood to be rational. Not after all insomnia, the crying and the blood of her parents soaking that same room.
Nina's instincts stroke fast, and with the same synchronized attack her left hand took his arm -breaking that cage- and the right reached the fabric of his sweater, pushing hard enough to allow her to stand and take a step forward in a ruthless and rapid movement, that only worked as he offered no resistance.
He took a couple of steps back, for a moment at risk of tripping, but Nina didn't set him free, enjoying the sensation of overpowering him. Once the initial disadvantage was overcome, she was in full control of the situation, if he ever dared to fight back.
*You can kill me with bare hands, sister. Never forget your physical superiority.* And she forgot, all the time. Or she simply doubted, as the monster standing in front of her had little to do with the weakling that had come to her. Could she really overpower him now or nature would show its most unfair side, making him also stronger? She also considered the chances of him actually knowing how to fight.
No meticulous criminal like him would consider the possibility of losing control over their victims and even as the very last resource, Johann could use some sort of physical violence. He knew and was too controlling and perfectionist to allow himself such vulnerability.
Yet if Johann had known any Aikido she was standing in the perfect position -mune dori-, for him to start a counterattack, her hand on a fist over his chest. She could feel his breathing under the thin fabric, unaltered. He remained impassive while being physically attacked, it seemed, whether through bullets or martial arts. His response to blades would be the same, letting her stab him to death without flinching. Still... it didn't mean he wouldn't take her down along.
"I'm allowed to choose whether I want you... should I be grateful for you considering me an equal? Is that what you mean?" It wasn't, her verbal attack unable to match the physical one.
He lowered his stare, focusing on that fist over him, not moving any other muscle of his body, detached from all her aggressiveness.
"I was just pointing out a fact -that I've never manipulated you into wanting to be with me." It was then when he smiled again, in the same way. "I'll never try to convince you that I know how to develop healthy bonds with others, though, so it's up to you to decide whether I'm actually abusive even when I'm trying to be good." His voice eventually lowered until his last words became nothing more than a whisper.
"You weren't abusive, not with me." Her voice lowered on equal terms, yet certain that at least he had been a fair brother to her until their separation. She finally let him free, taking a step back and trying to regain some perspective with that simple gesture. "Decide whether you want to be left alone or have a sister and a family, because they are contradictory."
"Are they?" How could he offer such stupid answers sometimes was beyond her comprehension.
"Of course!?" She yelled. "What exactly is your conception of a family, Johann? Some people that happen to live in the same house as you, roaming around? Is that why you wanted to stay with me, so I would continue being some sort of decoration in your life?" She really had no idea how to argue with him, contradicting the little information she had for the sake of an emotional reaction she would never trigger. "Is that what you want, remaining alone but surrounded by people?"
And his expression was so blatantly triumphal, even when he might be so annoyed by that clumsiness of her.
"Is it you, sister, who still possesses a childish conception of a family, so ideal and pure. But understand that you were privileged in this little universe the Fortners offered you. Family is also the Lieberts, who adopted you solely on my insistence. Or mother, who didn't hesitate much before giving you to the State Security, to completely forget about us little after. Or me." It was a bad idea. "It is the narcissistic mothers, alcoholic fathers, violent siblings. Monsters hiding in one shape or another."
She knew families weren't perfect, hers was a golden example, but the question was on him.
"Then, why exactly do you want one?" A pool of victims.
His so solemn stare during his speech became a mocking smile. Then he shrugged.
"For whatever I can get from them: status, money, power. Education. A nice place to live. The entertaining company, or maybe just safety." He tilted his head. "Sometimes I even enjoy some of the attention and love." And according to his words, she was the one family that offered him the attention and lifestyle he currently enjoyed.
Her eyes got teary, realizing he wouldn't be respectful just to please her, not one bit while being angry himself.
"That's nothing different from what you get from your followers and admirers... isn't it?"
"No. Monsters follow me, people adopt me."
He was exasperating. He cared so little about the Fortners and she was tortured by that, feeling that they had had to pay with their lives for the little privilege of taking care of her. Would they have invested so much time in a child knowing that hidden fact? Her life wasn't worth both of theirs.
The same had happened with all those who had seen in him a perfect child. Enjoying his presence required a high sacrifice and for some reason, some were willing to pay that price, no matter what. And her? Just following that exact pattern all over again. Of course, he mocked her.
She slowly turned around, not without lying her eyes on the rug and the places where those bodies had lied. Her forgiveness could have stopped him, their deaths.
What if she had simply stared at him that day on the university campus, approach him even? What would have happened? He told her his plan then had been a reconciliation.
What if she had never shot him?
There had been chances for happiness but regardless of which twin was responsible, they had destroyed every single one of them.
"Now it's your turn." He chose a mellow voice then, that send an awful chill down her spine. "What is a family to you?"
How to explain to that psychopath her brother was.
She turned again, to find him closer to her than she had expected. She fought the instinct of making a step back.
"A home, that one is welcomed to." He sustained her deadliest stare like it was nothing. "Safety."
Johann tilted his head then.
"A remedy against solitude and fear?"
"No, they were much more."
"You are right, that oversimplification might come as offensive, and I'm sorry for that." His apology was meant to seem genuine. "You see, I've spent my entire life playing a role within one family or another, but not even once I've felt like belonging, so it's really frustrating. I can't wrap my mind around the idea of what is like to have this."
This family he had destroyed. She gave up.
"Where is this conversation going, Johann?" She got a carefree brother then, which only made her more suspicious.
A smile barely curved his lips.
"But I wonder," he continued, her question ignored, "why you never trusted your parents enough to tell them about your inner turmoil like you did on my hospital bed." His eyes roamed around the walls, picking what seemed random details on the decoration there. "You had once a real family but never quite benefited from it."
"How do you know what I told you...?" She had already asked the same day she found him in her apartment but never obtained a real answer.
His smile then was so apologetic.
"Coma is still a mystery for medicine, especially those cases, like mine, in which it's not artificially induced. You see, there are many studies indicating that comatose patients are aware of their surroundings, and what they are told by their loved ones. I can only speak for myself but I have clear memories of your conversations with me: all you told me about your feelings towards me, your ongoing life." It couldn't be real... "Was it professor Schmidt the one that caused you such dread no, on Constitutional law? And you were so annoyed with the introduction of your thesis, having to rewrite it like a dozen times so close to the deadline..." Subtle as always, his eyes turned sweet for a split second. "It almost seemed like you were begging me to wake up."
She desperately tried to find a logical explanation for him having such information about her. But there was nothing there, no diaries nor fragments of her therapy to explain him having such detailed examples, nor he had any way to know her exact words in that hospital room that she only spoke as they were alone.
"You were just a sweet girl looking for a remedy against that overwhelming solitude. Your intimacy was never exposed and you know your secrets are safe with me." Like anything could ever be safe with him.
Still, she could draw some comfort from those words, the reminder that she had actually talked to him instead of dumping intimate thoughts without censorship. Johann had been present in her mind as a living creature so she never crossed certain lines. It could be considered some sort of consolation.
"I honestly don't understand the sort of relationship you built with the Fortners, being so shallow on terms of communication and yet so emotionally strong." A smirk. "Yet you told me instead what you have never dared to explain to anyone, not your real family, even though you don't consider me anything close, not in the same terms." He approached her then, not talking until he was standing right in front of her. "It's perfectly reasonable you want to understand me as well as possible, for simple safety and self-discovery. Yet you keep throwing information about yourself -that I've never asked for- so recklessly. Do you want me to understand you equally well?"
She frowned, still not seeing the direction of that attack.
"I want our relationship to be even, whatever I get from you, you'll receive from me."
"Didn't you hear me? No relationship is built on equal terms sister, ours less than any other. Make good use of the power you have over me because I'm doing exactly that." He shrugged, considering that topic closed. "I still want to know more about the Fortners. How is it that you ended up going to therapy?"
She had the feeling that this conversation wouldn't end up well. Yet she could do nothing more than follow along, hoping that an argument might ease the tension between them.
"There was an incident." Not particularly interesting. "While having dinner in front of the TV, mother cut herself with the knife. The sofa ended up stained with blood at that picture triggered a panic attack." She looked past him, to that spot that to her childish mind seemed so similar to the Lieberts murder, even if it was just a tiny bit of blood. "Along with the nightmares and... well, I was really stressed all of the time."
"Post-traumatic stress that you never considered as such. And the Fortners knew but preferred to stay silent, seeing their dear daughter suffer but doing little for helping her."
"What are you saying?"
"They knew we were the Liebert twins, that your parents were murdered, your brother missing." He tilted his head. "Without these details, all therapy you received during that time proved useless because no one could identify the source by only hearing about your stress, your nightmares, and your fear of blood." A pause. "The best you got from it was the recommendation to practice sport and your decision of choosing martial arts. You relieved some stress and started feeling safer. That's all you got in a decade of counseling." A grimace. "Such a high price they paid for erasing the not-so-pleasant parts of your."
"What are you implying? That they never truly tried to help me?" He really dared.
"No. I'm sure they offered you a wonderful environment for you to grow up but, I'm left to wonder whether they tried to make you fit their projections of a perfect child instead of actually embracing all of you. It's not such a rare attitude of adoptive parents, though."
He wasn't the only one who had questioned their motivations, even if she had already made peace with that idea, considering the Fortners had underestimated the damage she brought with her in their ignorance. Her decision of choosing the strong girl role didn't help either.
"Do you really think you can come and redesign the idea I have of the Fortners, with whom I've lived for almost a decade?" He had no business on that matter, her silence was never going to be broken.
"No, definitely not. And I wouldn't dare to question their methods, which proved much better for you than any family I attempted to be." He chose a nostalgic smile. "I'm not questioning your own strength either: your success in pursuing a normal life after all that happened, three years on the run, and achieving a stable adulthood with no self-destructive patterns is the ultimate proof."
She forgot for a moment his goals, an irreparable mistake.
"It probably helped, to be used to a normal life..." she smiled. "I just tried to get this back, during the last years..."
"Then why have you invited their killer to their own home?" Johann's attention was definitely perturbed if he had required so much time and chaotic talk to finally reach its goal. He used to show his most surgical precision.
Was there any difference now that he had been for months in her life? It probably didn't, but at the same time his presence in that same home, that room, constituted a completely different sin.
She couldn't stop feeling the Fortners present in her mind, wondering a thousand times what would they think if they discovered that the child they had offered a home to for half a year was the sole responsible for their deaths, the sole cause being that other child. Were they ever expecting him to come back?
Time for her attack.
But one more time Johann was faster. He made a few steps to the very center of the room, standing in the most unnatural position, like a doll.
"Because it's not that easy, it never is. These are just the first steps of the Armageddon you have been designing your entire life. You exist between those realities represented by me and the Fortners, isn't it, sister?" He smiled, gentle, as his words were enough of a weapon for him.
He wasn't finished.
"But at the same time, you have already made a choice, of sorts, long before I became again a variable in that equation, no, Anna? You know exactly what you are, who you are, despite not being able to fully embrace your own free will."
She was trembling.
"I told you..."
"Enough," his interruption was a surprise. "Your answers have always been pathetic excuses. I let it slip because we had more pressing matters to discuss, until now." He shrugged, like apologizing. "Anna, Anna, Anna... I still can't believe it, to pronounce that name loud again. The surname is not important, though, this is not about you choosing the Lieberts over the Fortners, it has never been, but a much simpler choice. Do you want a twin or not?"
If only he could avoid that wicked smile. He looked truly diabolic.
"This is, always has been, about Anna and Nina: the twin sister Anna, the sole child Nina, and thus, about whether I'm allowed to exist... in your life, and outside of it."
It so was, and the bastard was going to enjoy all the attention she was offering him, had offered, and make her pay. Her forgiveness had been a showcase of mercy, of understanding, but ultimately of attention-seeking.
*'Sehen Sie mich! Sehen Sie mich! Das Monstrum in meinem Selbt ist so groß...'*
"You said that you forgive me, that even if we were the only two people left in the whole world, you would forgive me." His head turned slowly, his blue eyes capable of destroying her, feeling... whatever that forgiveness made him, her, feel. "But now I wonder, here in the same room where I destroyed all your chances of happiness, normality, once again. Do you really forgive me?"
And she looked, really looked at that man in front of her like it was the very first time she saw him, and all she could find in that image was herself staring back.
"I forgive you." She said to both twins. "Even if we were the only two people left in the whole world." And he lowered his eyes, the same way he had done three years before.
He didn't move, seconds passed and he remained frozen like a statue and all she wanted is for him to say something, do something. Because even if it came too late her forgiveness had reached him, in Ruhenheim, and so did now.
Finally, he looked at her, and all she realized was the terrible mistake she had made.
"What can you find worth forgiving in me now that you were unable to see in that child?" With the hint of a smile plastered on his lips, he looked up to the place where her bedroom stood on the upper floor. "Because I begged you to forgive me, over and over again, promising anything you considered worth as punishment, my life if necessary." His smile suddenly widened, showing anything but happiness, to disappear after an instant. "In this same house, I begged you, every night as you were asleep, for months, and all you offered me was absolute ignorance, sacrificing reality if by doing so you could also make me disappear."
He did nothing to hide the anger boiling inside him, that his eyes offered mercilessly. Forgiveness might have been a mistake.
"Johann..." She owed him an explanation, if only so.
He wasn't finished, though.
"You argue you were terrified of me, but I wonder... were you really that afraid? You had already witnessed enough of the cruelty of this world by then, known enough monsters. And in all those years I stood beside you, protected you, took care of you and I never did anything to harm you in any way. And you expect me to believe that you were suddenly terrified of me?"
"I told you... why can't you believe me..." Her voice cracked, unable to withstand the attack. She feared neither of them was going to survive that night.
"And that's why you are Anna once again, to amend the error. To offer me the love and forgiveness you weren't able to give me in Düsseldorf, because doing it as Nina wasn't just enough. You are that desperate to go back to that rainy night and just change the course of our lives." He suddenly looked around, like the room became interesting all of a sudden. "And sacrificing the Fortners on the process was just collateral damage." Back to her, his next attack required so. "What would they think seeing you give up the name they offered you to become...? Just the child of your previous foster parents. To share it with some Johann Liebert, who doesn't even exist at all, even before I was able to wake up." He tilted his head again, in such an exaggerated way that tried to mimic a whim.
She would do anything to feel angry, enough to yell at him, kick him or at the very least know that he was wrong but the truth, pathetic as it was, might prove him right. Was she trying to be forgiven by him when she decided to become Anna once again, behind the pathetic excuse of anonymity? How had she been able to betray the Fortners like that?
He drew a slow, contemptuous smile that felt so blatantly triumphant, yet terribly miserable.
She gave up. Simple as it was, burying her face in her hands, crying in front of him again, like a useless child.
"Have you ever wondered where the name Nina comes from, who gave it to you?"
She tried to focus on his voice, if only to stop her pathetic sobbing that neither of them was willing to tolerate.
"I guess the Fortners liked it. We needed new names after all..." She dried her eyes with the back of her hands, trying to forget her obvious red eyes.
"No, I did. I was the one who decided that your new name was going to be Nina." She was expecting a condescending smile behind the fog of tears but instead was welcomed by an apathetic stare, that happened to be much closer to her than she had expected.
"You... you gave me the name Nina?"
He sighed, forgetting all accusations and recovering his most casual attitude, like the conversation minutes ago could be forgotten that easily. "Nina can be used as a short form of Anna. After three years in 511 Kinderheim I had a basic knowledge of Russian and one day when we visited a local library with the Lieberts I started reading you a book in Russian, simply to impress you. The main character was a girl called Nina, and I told you she was secretly an Anna, just like you. That's when you started using the nickname because you liked how it sounded, and I liked to call you that because it made you smile, every time. So yes, Nina was meant to be a gentle reminder of my existence, and a little message for you that said that even if you have become a different person, you never stopped being Anna." He offered her his most miserable stare, either as a punishment for her or liberation for him.
And she forgot how to breathe. She remembered, the illustration on that book in Russian, in black and brown ink, his voice as he was reading aloud, that she found so exotic and at the same time familiar. And the name... Nina. It was true, he had been the first person calling her Nina.
He made a step towards her.
"Do you understand then, how pathetic is your choice of becoming Anna Liebert again? You are never going to change the past, it doesn't matter how hard you try. Becoming Anna means nothing, your acceptance means nothing and your forgiveness, definitely means so little. As I've told you today, you killed me that night, just to leave this puppet agonizing for a lifetime. If you want to show me mercy, to the Fortners, you should kill me, finish what you started instead of cowardly hiding behind guilt and kindness that you just wish you could feel for me." Another smile. "I really don't mind your attempts to fool me, but it's incredibly pathetic to see you suffer for such lies. In that abandoned house in Frankfurt, you opened my eyes and now I'm doing the same for you: stop using me to heal your guilt and instead face what you have really done to me, and put a solution to this mess" them, all of them, "you created."
He had finished so all that was left to offer was silence and a stare that demanded answers.
It was her fault, all of it... him. She let him... her live.
It was her the one to blame, for such cowardness.
She turned a blind eye to a brother in the process of becoming a monster. She hadn't been clueless, never, she just pretended as the world around them was too scary, too dangerous. She needed his sacrifice.
And then she forgot. In the safety of Düsseldorf she forgot all she could about monsters and fear and violence until reality stroke back.
To just pretend and play dumb. Because she was that much of a coward.
She wasn't a child just like he wasn't. They were survivors.
And she knew and she survived, she shoot and she survived.
She forgot and she survived... did she? Or was she pretending again?
Pretending not to be a coward.
She would do anything to be braver, to dare and face and act.
Put an end to it all... him.
Why couldn't she just kill him?
She had to.
His soft hair caressed her fingers as they surrounded her brother's neck, squeezing as her life depended on it. Johann was lying on the ground and she sat over him, pinning him down. His first instinct was to resist her but he rapidly grew motionless, only his firm grip over her wrists pushing her to choke him harder...
Just die...
So she squeezed.
She could feel his strength failing but it didn't matter, the light in those eyes still shone brightly, mocking.
She sank her nails into the skin as if to tear him apart. She just had to be brave.
And she killed.
His body turned completely tense, like a marble statue. She was aware that only his own will let her continue, that he could easily overpower her if he tried.
And she obeyed.
Johann's eyes were still locked on hers, but their focus started drifting away
Eventually, that body felt so pathetically weak under her claws, her jaws. A fragile doll with the sole purpose of being broken, once and for all.
Johann should have never existed, it would have been the best for everyone, including himself.
It wasn't too late...
... her grip turned even firmer. The body under her was overpowered by spasms and his own strength, will, started to fail. His hands slid over her wrists, her forearms... to finally drop, motionless.
She kept squeezing, seconds, minutes... maybe hours.
His eyes barely contained any sparkle of life as they closed, maybe for the last time. And in that last gleam of life, she understood.
And just like that, the spell was broken. What was she doing?
She let his neck free, and his eyes opened immediately. Losing all self-control his mouth opened, gasping for air, life, with the most agonizing sound she had ever heard. His chest went up and down several times, coughing, while his eyes could barely hide the excruciating pain he might be experiencing.
She moved away, overwhelmed. How had she been able to dream she was capable of killing him? How could he make her believe that?
Once free, his first reaction was to sit up, offering her an intense stare that seemed almost cautious. She had surely caught him off guard, not expecting that level of violence after her meaningless threat.
She would have liked to be able to smile, to prove to him that she could be that monstrous. But she was as far away as possible from enjoying his pain, to not be afraid after attempting to kill a monster to let him free at the last minute... of actually attempting to kill.
Yet he did nothing. He seemed fine, his breathing eventually went back to normal. And he was conscious, his eyes mocking her and what was much worse, extremely amused. And teary.
And so profoundly disappointed.
"You arrogant bastard..." she started. "I love you, and I have always loved you. And I wish it wasn't the case. My life would be so much easier if I could sacrifice you at once... stop you from existing in any corner of my mind, dreams, because it would be... the mourning would be much easier..." she turned around to the corpses surrounding them in another time and identity, to go back to him. "And it doesn't help one bit that you really know how to play the perfect brother, so I can remember how much also I owe you... even my name is yours." She gently set aside the flocks of hair from his face, now covered by tears and sweat, to let him see her. "I've needed all these years to accept it, years of seeing you in a hospital bed to wish you were just back to life again. And I hoped that you would be able to crash all my fantasies the moment you appeared back in my life but no, you had to stab me again by being talkative, reasonable and painfully honest. Real. I still love you, somehow, and that's why I want you, because, despite the abhorrent creature you have become, you are right now a better brother than you have ever been to me, finally offering me the intimacy you have denied me our whole lives. I prefer what you are, right now, than that child you think I idealize so much. You are better now, to me, you are..."
She could see them, those tears that finally dared to leave his eyes, silently crying, while his expression had frozen in that rictus of the pain she didn't stop causing, either to his body or his soul.
He hadn't moved one bit yet, only his eyes followed her.
"I have never needed your love, less when you might not be able to feel any. Instead, there are other things you can offer but you never let me ask you for anything in exchange. My love and trust for your honesty and trust. That sounds like a good deal to me."
He kept staring silently. The agitation of his body didn't match the coldness of those eyes that denied her any answer. Once again he would remain out of reach.
What was she expecting? She had failed once more.
She dared to look at him one final time to immediately turn around, decided to leave the room. Only when she had reached the corridor she heard him laugh, in such a cheerful way that slowly shifted, to amusement, desperation, misery to finally transform into the most deranged groan, pure fury.
Her heart skipped a beat as her hand looked for support on the railing of the stairs. There was nothing in this world that she wanted more than run, escape as far as possible from this ever-lasting nightmare that was both their lives, yet her feet were glued to the ground, fearing at the same time that escape, wondering if there really was such thing as freedom.
Maybe Johann was right, and that her quest for happiness was doomed to fail, maybe it would be smarter to give up, like him.
She finally moved, following the steps to the upper floor.