Nikolai

Loss - Final Part

Splinters of peachy, morning light oozed through the wooden-panel curtains of Nikolai's window. Dust danced away from the orange shards and hid in the far corner of his bedroom. He turned his piggy bank over and let them rattle against the porcelain like the thoughts in his mind. An assortment of ruble and kopek sat in an organization only he could understand; the bills folding over each other and mingling in different piles each time he shifted his position. Although his leg began to lose its feeling, he continued to count aloud, clicking down the volume on his radio the third time it caught him off guard. Nikolai was good at math. It was simple; a language made out of numbers and dashes instead of thirty-three specifically-sounding symbols to memorize. He thought about math like he did water. It has a lot of different theories, but the logic of it was rather simple to comprehend. He just concentrated his attention and kept his eyes open to make the figures clear. Math was the only subject that was ever kind to him.

Two years had passed and Nikolai continued to feel like his occupation as an older brother had not been fulfilled. If every moment he was able to spend time with Alexander was time well-spent, then why did the empty feeling in his heart persist? He often asked himself when the peak of happiness began, and if he would know when he was in it at the present time or if he would realize it in the future. 'Maybe', he thought, 'I'll never experience something like that, but as long as mom and Alexander are around, I think I'll be just fine.' They were why he was raising the money in the first place: to be with his two favorite people in the world.

Nikolai packed his coins and bills into a pile like you would beginning a sandcastle. He just hoped the wave of his sheets wouldn't catch it. He hopped off of his bed and shuffled towards his door. Curling his feet into his shoes, he grabbed the brown-and-purple-knitted scarf hanging off of the doorknob and laced it around his neck. It smelled of soil and remnants of lavender as the wool was brought up against his nose. The scarf wasn't made well, and it made his neck look like it was wearing a dress, but Nikolai didn't complain; it was from home. He twisted the doorknob and took his first steps into the freshly fallen snow.

He arrived at the fourplex his mother, father, and younger brother lived in: a red-and-brown-painted, brick-frame house with gingerbread trim and storm shutters. Actually, it had been converted and restored into four small apartments. Both the home and the downtown area where it resided had seen better days; but old dogwood trees lined the street, and St. Paul's Catholic Church on the corner gave the neighborhood a kind of faded gentility of its own.

The snowflakes had already given him newer, purer freckles. Nikolai pressed the back of the hand against his nose and sniffled, taking a couple deep breaths inward. His movements were traditional, as if he had to cast a spell before entering.

The first that hit him was the stench; so thick and cloying that it seemed to immediately permeate his clothes and his claw its way into his skin. Nikolai's stomach lurched even worse than it usually did. He had adapted to the sweet, grainy scent of beer, but this time, wine seemed to be his father's choice. Dry and oaky, like inhaling paint fumes. The rest of the home was fetid in its own, uniquely pungent, body.

Nikolai turned his direction towards his father. Vyacheslav turned over his pelmeni with his fork, inspecting them as if they were imprinted with newspaper headlines. "What's up?" he spoke casually, gumming the dough and fish of the dumpling. "Where's Alexander and mom?" the freckled boy spoke hastily.

"You're here to see Alexander and mom," he repeated. Nikolai nodded.

"Are you sure?" he asked. Nikolai nodded once more.

"Well," the taller male exhaled, placing his fork next to his bowl as he stood up, "alrighty then."

Almost immediately, Nikolai felt his wrist being pulled taut, and witnessed stars glide over his pupil like pelicans skimming over the ocean.