"Stood on the cliffside
Screaming "Give me a reason"
Your faithless love's the only hoax
I believe in
Don't want no other shade of blue
But you
No other sadness in the world would do
You know I left a part of me back in New York
You knew the hero died, so what's the movie for?
You knew it still hurts underneath my scars
From when they pulled me apart
You knew the password, so I let you in the door
You knew you won, so what's the point of keeping score?
You knew it still hurts underneath my scars
From when they pulled me apart
But what you did was just as dark
Darling, this was just as hard
As when they pulled me apart"
-Hoax, Taylor Swift
Katya drew like a woman possessed. She wouldn't let anyone look at any of her drawings, claiming they weren't any good with an embarrassed sort of flush to her cheeks that you hated to admit you found strangely endearing.
You allowed her one more day of sitting in bed before you inspected the granulating scar tissue that had begun to form in her bullet wound and you declared it was time for her to start getting up and moving.
"Movement is medicine, Katya," you said gravely, helping her tug an old Eastman Conservatory sweatshirt of Monet's over her head. You were still careful with her shoulder, though it was out of the sling. It still pained her, and you were overly cautious as you rotated the joint to slip her arms through the sleeves.
"I'm still crippled," she moaned, wincing as her splinted hand caught in the sleeve. You scoffed, carefully working the cuff around the splint.
It pained you to see her fingers in the splint, knowing that they would have been better off with surgery. You had told Katya she would likely not retain full range of motion in her fingers, that they would always feel slightly stiff, and that she would have been better off with surgery. The guilt ate at you, that you hadn't been able to fix them completely, and Katya must have seen it on your face, for she snapped at you to stop being such a self-sacrificing dolt, and that she was lucky to be alive, and that besides, it wasn't her dominant hand, anyway.
"Don't be such a baby," you said, squatting and carefully slipping her feet into a pair of Monet's old sneakers. Katya's feet were smaller than yours, and you didn't want her clomping around in a pair of shoes that were too big and having her injure her ankle further.
Katya let her head drop back on the pillow, huffing in mock outrage. You ignored her, slipping an arm under her back and helping her up into a sitting position. She hissed a breath through gritted teeth as her stomach muscles clenched, and you made sure she had her feet under her before you looped your arms under hers and helped her slowly to her feet.
She was much more steady than you had expected, even with the sprained ankle. She gripped your hand as you led her on a couple rotations of the living room and kitchen.
Monet was on the couch, and she grinned and offered praise and encouragements as Katya shuffled around, giving her a thumbs up. Bob just watched from her spot at the kitchen table, face carefully blank.
"Are you driving with me to work later today?" She asked, and you started, remembering that you had been scheduled to meet with two of your students today.
You nodded. "If that's okay." Bob just stared at Katya, who had begun to sweat and who looked like she was visibly in pain, her hand pressed to her side. You began to make your way back to your room, murmuring praise in Katya's ear the whole time at how well she had done.
She was pale and sweaty as you helped her back into bed, her breathing picking up and her good hand clenching at the blankets. You double checked that none of her wounds had reopened before you put a couple books on the nightstand for her and picked out a cream colored sweater and slacks, taking them into the bathroom to change.
You felt weird having to change in the bathroom in your own home. It wasn't like Katya didn't know every inch of your body inside and out, but you still wanted to keep some of your dignity.
The two of you walked a very fine line by forced proximity. There were so many words unsaid between the two of you, but neither of you seemed willing to be the first to shatter the fragile truce you had established between you.
You slept in the bed next to her at night, only because you were unwilling to make her sleep out on the couch with her still-healing shoulder, as that was a recipe for musculoskeletal disaster. You were very careful not to touch, keeping a pillow between you if only because you didn't want to accidentally shove at her shoulder in the middle of the night and hurt her.
But she was so warm. Katya had always been so warm, and you hadn't realized how cold you were at night without her space heater of a body in the bed next to you. Sometimes, you would wake before she did, with your head buried in the pillow between you and your fingers curled around hers, as if they had unconsciously sought each other out in the night like magnets.
You supposed you missed having the full force of Katya's affections turned on you like the sun. She wasn't cold, now, but there was a wall up between you, and you both felt it.
Maybe it had just been something to be loved by someone who reviled all else. It had made you feel special, wanted. You had grown comfortable in each others' orbit, and now you felt that pull towards Katya like the tides, like gravity, just how you always had.
But you had made each other into gods, and when you make someone into a God, it's difficult to control what kind of god they eventually become. Katya had worshipped you, but you just wanted mutual understanding, not supplication.
You were at an impasse. You weren't willing to push her away until she had healed, and she was not physically able to push you away until she could take care of herself. So you held each other at arms' length, being cordial, friendly, but not warm. Nowhere near the raging bonfire it had been before.
The weight of the words unsaid still hung between you, like an anvil ready to drop at any minute. You had let go of your anger, but you still felt that echo of fear that had haunted you for weeks after that final day.
You left Katya alone after making her swear on pain of death to call you if anything happened, and to promise not to try to get up by herself. You had sent Ivan a text letting him know you were leaving her alone, and he promised to stop by to check on her, something that eased your anxieties a little.
You still couldn't help being fidgety in the car on the way to the school, drawing irritated looks from Bob, and when you finally sat down with your two students, you couldn't keep the nervous energy from making your leg shake continuously.
They were good kids. They spoke English shockingly well, and they were polite, if a bit reserved. They were learning about the cardiovascular system, and as you spread out the charts and illustrations on the desk and began to try to explain the flow of blood through the heart from the body through the vena cava, through the right atrium and ventricle, to the lungs to become oxygenated, then back through the left side of the heart through the aorta to pump oxygenated blood to the rest of the body.
You gave them blank diagrams of the heart and had them draw the flow of blood, had them explain it back to you as if they were teaching it to you, and watched that spark light in their eyes as they finally felt like they understood. You had brought your stethoscope, and you let them use it to listen to their own hearts as you pointed out where they could hear each valve opening and closing, watched their faces light up as they listened to the Lub-dub, Lub-dub of their life's blood pumping through the organ under their hands. You sent them on their way with homework, blank diagrams to be filled out and short answer questions about the flow of blood through the body.
Your next set of students were studying microbiology, and you helped them write out definitions for the major types of microbes and explained the differences and similarities. You gave them examples of each and told a few gross anecdotes of your own experiences with fungal infections or antibiotic-resistant superbugs, which seemed to fascinate them.
It was nice. You felt that warm glow in your chest that you got from helping people, from being useful in a way that was as beneficial for you as it was for the person you were helping. You did love science, had always been good at it, and to use your intelligence to help these kids was a gift you hadn't even recognized when Bob had handed you the opportunity.
You missed using your brain in that way, missed having to make those connections and think critically. You had stretched those muscles when you had helped bring Katya back from the dead, and you hadn't realized how much you missed using that part of your brain.
You felt like you were walking on air as you followed Bob back to her car at the end of the evening, talking her ear off about how nice the students had been, and how great it was to get back into the material that had fascinated you in school, and wasn't it such a gift to be able to mold the minds of tomorrow. Bob just smiled indulgently and graciously listened to you rattle on without complaint.
Bob stopped on the way home to pick up a takeaway, and the fragrant scent of curry filled the car and made you realize how ravenous you were. You helped her carry the bags up into the apartment, leaving her to set everything out as you traipsed towards your bedroom, intending to make Katya come out and eat at the table.
You heard her voice through the half-open door, and you frowned, slowing, your hand pausing on the doorknob. You couldn't see anyone else in the room, and Katya was speaking in French, of all things, her husky voice purring through the soft flow of the syllables and making something twist low in your gut.
A woman's voice you didn't recognize was responding to her in French as well, though it was slightly more cautious, the syllables a little more halting, and the sound tinny and pixelated-sounding as if it was coming through her phone's speaker. You didn't mean to eavesdrop - it wasn't as if you could understand anything they were saying anyway - but you were hesitant to interrupt her.
Katya said something that had the same teasing tone she'd used so often on you, to get a rise out of you and make you blush, and there was a barking squawk of cawing laughter through the phone, and then the woman was saying, in English this time, "You cunt! Don't fuck with me like that when you know my French isn't good enough yet to tell you about yourself!"
You pushed the door open carefully, leaning against the doorframe. Katya was sitting up in bed, her whole face alight with the kind of carefree, delighted smile you hadn't seen on her in a long time as she looked down at her phone. Your heart ached to see it, and you couldn't help the smile that spread across your own lips.
"Well, that's why we practice, isn't it, Trixie?" She said, affecting a wide-eyed, patronizing sort of smile, her tone condescending and reminiscent of someone who is explaining something very basic to a young child.
There was another offended scream of laughter, and Katya looked up at you, her smile growing slightly softer around the edges, her eyes wrinkling at the corners.
"Oh, just in time. Trixie, I want to introduce you to my very own Nurse Ratched."
She beckoned you over to her side, just as Trixie scoffed, "Oh, sure, you're very Cuckoo's Nest. Which one are you, the repressed homosexual, or the one with the lobotomy?"
You couldn't help but bark a laugh of your own at this as you perched on the edge of the bed next to Katya, very aware of the warmth of her body next to yours as you peered down at the phone screen.
Trixie wasn't anything like you'd imagined. She was sitting at a computer in a very chic and cultivated-looking office that was all decorated in shades of baby pink and gold. Her hair was white blonde and teased high, curling over her shoulders and down her back, and she was wearing a shocking amount of graphic eyeliner and more blush than you had ever seen on a real life human.
She caught sight of you and smiled, waving. "I'm so happy to meet you," you said warmly, meaning it. "I've heard a lot about you."
Katya scoffed. "Don't inflate her ego any more, please," she said. "She's already insufferable enough as it is."
Trixie just flicked her hair off her shoulder. "No, go on," she said with a wicked grin. "Tell me about how amazing I am. That old bitch is nothing but mean to me."
She tilted her head, though, taking you in. "I mean, I'm happy to meet you, too. I've been wanting to meet the bartender who's saved Katya's life on multiple occasions, now. Can you maybe just let her go next time, and save us all the trouble? I think she's well past her prime, and it's really kinder to just put an end to her suffering."
Katya let out that smoker's wheeze of a laugh, wiggling as much as she was able.
Trixie was interesting. On the surface, she was all pink frills and blonde hair and glitter but underneath she was acerbic, dry, and sarcastic. You liked her immediately.
"I'm still debating whether or not to put a pillow over her face and smother her in her sleep," you joked, and Trixie cackled, while Katya looked affronted.
"I will not stand for this," she said, in mock outrage. "You beasts. You absolute heathens. Have you no pity for a poor suffering wretch?" She batted her eyelashes, waving her splinted fingers in front of the camera.
You and Trixie both scoffed at the same time. "Yeah, I think a pillow over the face should do it," said Trixie, then she looked a bit aghast. "And honestly, I'm shocked at how long you've held out, what with her lovely and charming habits of howling and barking like a dog in her sleep and drooling directly onto you."
Katya cackled, and you felt your stomach swoop with something like jealousy, trying not to let it play across your face.
"So," you said, pointing between the two of them. "I have to ask. You guys never-"
You were cut off by loud, exaggerated gagging noises coming through the phone speaker. Katya gave you a slightly knowing look, as if she could see right through you, and heat rose in your cheeks.
"Trixie would never debase herself like that," she said, her nose in the air.
"Yeah, difficult as she is to resist, what with her Crypt Keeper hands and her smoker breath and the five different textures of skin we're working with on her back alone," Trixie started after she was done gagging, sending Katya into peals of laughter, "I would never stoop so low."
You laughed, too, a weight easing from your shoulders. Though her words were sharp, you could hear the undertone of affection in them. Trixie studied you shrewdly, though, a look that reminded you eerily of Bob. You thought they would probably get along famously.
"You can do so much better than fucking Beelzebub over here, girl. Why are you fucking around with the actual Babadook?"
Katya immediately launched into a tirade about the classification of demons and the seven demon lords and why she was "more of a Satanus sun, Belphegor moon, Asmodeus rising, actually," but you had tuned her out.
What were you doing? The glow of excitement from your tutoring job had begun to wear off, and seeing Katya this happy again had made you simultaneously relieved and uncomfortable in a way you couldn't explain.
You thought you were probably past due for a conversation. Just rip that band-aid off, girl.
You smiled down at the screen, digging your fingers into your slacks, palms suddenly sweaty. Katya was wrapping up, and Trixie was looking at your expectantly.
"I have to go," you said. "We just picked up dinner. It was really nice to meet you, Trixie. Thank you for calling and giving her someone else to talk to, she's driving me up the wall." You gave Trixie a sympathetic, grimacing sort of smile that you knew didn't reach your eyes.
Whether Trixie could detect the false bravado you were putting on or not, she didn't let on. You had a feeling she was more astute than she let on, though. She bid you goodbye, and you stood, wiping your sweaty palms on your pants.
"Katya, I'll just bring your food in here so you don't have to get off the phone," you said, not wanting to make her cut off her conversation with her friend. She looked up at you and smiled. It caught you off guard. It was one of those soft, lingering smiles she had reserved only for you, once upon a time. You hadn't seen it in a while.
"Thank you," she said softly, before you turned, heart pounding. You heard her slipping back into French as you closed the door, Trixie making a frustrated, bratty sort of noise in protest.
You knew, then, why you had suddenly become so uncomfortable.
Seeing Katya laugh and talk with her friend, seeing her give you that soft smile...it had pulled off that mask you'd placed over her in your mind, that box you'd compartmentalized her into.
She wasn't a dying patient, anymore. She wasn't just someone who needed help. She was Katya.
She was the person who had flirted so outrageously with you at work, who had bought you thousands of dollars worth of nonsense and told you you deserved the world in the palm of your hand. She was the person who had held you through a panic attack in Paris, who had seen the ugly insides of you and stuck around anyway.
She was the person who had held a knife to your throat and told you you were a little fly caught in her spider's web. She was the person who had broken the little scraps of your heart that were left.
You gnawed at your lip as you brought the takeaway box into your room and set it on the side table, deliberately avoiding Katya's gaze. You felt her eyes on you as you walked out, though, burning into the back of your head as she continued talking to Trixie in French.
Meatball had hopped up onto her lap and Trixie was cooing over him through the screen, and he was staring at the screen through narrowed, suspicious-looking eyes as if deciding whether he wanted to swat at it or not.
You closed the door behind you, taking your takeout box to the couch to sit between Bob and Monet and eat.
If you seemed a little quieter than normal, they had the good graces not to comment on it. Monet kept up a constant stream of chatter about the show you were watching - you had moved on from Peaky Blinders and were now rewatching Criminal Minds from the beginning, and Monet was very thoroughly describing the things she would do to Shemar Moore if she had him alone in a room for ten minutes.
You wrinkled your nose, privately thinking that Morgan was a meathead and Prentiss was a little more your speed, but not wanting to rain on Monet's parade.
You heard Katya's wheezing laughter through the door, and Bob looked over at you.
"I'm glad she has someone to talk to."
You couldn't hide the surprise that must have shown in your face, and Bob noticed it, her brows furrowing. "I don't hate her," she said primly. "I'm not a complete monster. Obviously she's been through a lot. And everyone deserves a Bob to talk to when they're going through it."
You smiled at her, not even having the heart to mock her.
"You're exactly right, Roberta, as always."
"...because the people I most strive to please do me the worst injuries." - Sappho, from Come Close
Author's Note: Satanus: wrath, Belphegor: sloth, Asmodeus: lust. Just in case you were wondering, which you probably are not.
This is probably the most we'll see of Tritzie, I just thought Katya deserved to lean on her friends just as much as reader does.
Thank you for all your lovely comments and support. It means so much to me.