Submitting

Schrödinger

I have always wondered if it's better to be sad for a reason or to be sad without any reason.

When I lived with Liza, I was happy. Peaceful. Content. She made me feel normal and laugh at things which were not funny at all. Yet somehow I would find myself being sad sometimes. I couldn't find a particular reason why but the heaviness that used to  possess my body made it difficult to do even the basic necessities of life. Some days they were easier to handle and some days they suffocated enough to make me knock myself out with sleeping pills just because the reality was too undesirable.

I just didn't want to live.

Now that I have a reason, I know that things can be always worse this way as well. Not being able to literally move or have those basic necessities snatched away without any consent. The comparison between both seemed hard still. Because like the former...

I just don't want to live.

Ivan sat on the toilet seat with his leg crossed over, and his hand clasped together on his knee. Staring with an unbothered gaze at my dishevelled and bathing self as I sat in the tub with my robe still on. It wasn't much of a shield against anybody's prying eyes but better than my naked form which was my only other option.

I should've, could've denied having a bath, but the scalding warmth felt too good against my sore body to pass it off. It also happened to be the only reason why I let Ivan be in the bathroom so that he could help me get out just like he helped me get in.

"I don't know if you really know what you say sometimes. Or if you are too narcissistic to have empathy and understanding." I closed my eyes and let my head lean against the rim of the claw foot tub while trying too hard to not lose my cool.

"Oh Rosie, I should be the one saying that! Though in your defence you only get to see  what you are shown. You see, when I lost the bet to him, I had to be his butler and do anything and everything he asks me to do. Those were the conditions without which he wouldn't have played this game at all. That boy is one hard nut to crack and have fun with haha!" A laugh of ridicule echoed in the steamy bathroom as the scent of vanilla from the clear water in the tub whispered in the air.

I was kind of delighted when he brought up that topic about their sick game again as I couldn't get as much information from him before as I wanted to.

"Being a butler meant doing whatever he asked me to do which by default meant that I had to make sure you tried nothing extra with that little feisty spark of yours. It was my duty to keep an eye on you and of course be a slave of his and do the chores of the house, but the main task was you! So guess what the angry old master did when he found out about your surprise experiment? He punished me as well." My eyes shot open and I looked at him. Properly and keenly this time.

He didn't have a black eye, nor any visible cuts. No visible bandages or any physical harm at all that caught my eye. He looked his jolly self except...a little pale. His fingers looked unnaturally white and his once well-fitted butler's suit sat loosely on his form.

"How long have I been asleep?" To me, it felt that all the madness happened a few minutes ago, and I was knocked out for just a  mere few seconds as the pain all too alive coursed through my body like electric.

"Two weeks." A small frown folded on his forehead as he stared at a tile, lost in memory. It took no effort from me to bring him back as he looked up at me with linear lips and said the obvious. "You shouldn't have done what you did."

As if I didn't know that already.

"What would you have done if you were in my place?" I clenched my teeth in anger, as hard as my jaw could suffer the aching pain.  I would have rather not have this conversation at all and just take some rest instead or rather be unconscious again. The naivety both of them practiced to the insanity of this whole situation was infuriating.

"How about nothing? I haven't seen him asking you to do anything at all. You're the one who gets all menstrual moody and acts impulsively. Your anxiety is not good for your health. Oh! I also propose meditation. Trust me, the people preaching that shit are not joking." I couldn't believe this man and at the same time I had to agree with him.

The fact that Dimitri did never ask anything from me was faultless. I know that he perhaps knew me from a very young age without me having any idea about him and that our families might have known each other somehow, but that's about it. He never talks much but just stares and looms almost everywhere I go. But what did he want from me?

"Where is Liza?" The question I had suppressed in me was finally heard by the person who I wanted the answers from most. Dimitri obviously wouldn't, but I was hoping that all the twisted relationship between the brothers would somehow make it work in my favour to make Ivan solve the missing puzzle.

He smiled a coy smile.

"What did you say? I'm sorry two weeks without any edible food and only liquids is making it hard for me to function. Oh, and no alcohol. I would've done better  otherwise."

"Have you heard of the theory of Schrödinger's cat?" He didn't wait for my answer as he replied a little too excitedly. " Erwin Schrödinger was an Austrian physicist who was quite the jolly little fella that came up with a thought experiment to propose a criticism to another quantum theory. He created a hypothetical situation in which a cat placed inside a closed container with a hammer, a Geiger counter, a minimal radioactive material and poison. The amount of radioactive material was minuscule enough that it only had a fifty-fifty shot of being detected over the course of an hour. If the Geiger counter detected any radiation it would make the hammer smash the bottle of poison and thus killing the cat, and it is quite impossible to know the outcome of the cat unless someone open the container and observed the situation. So until then the cat is somehow alive and dead at the same time. Now unless it is a zombie it isn't possible is it poor Rosie?"

He smiled slowly, his teeth glinting in the dim bathroom light.

"W-what is that supposed to mean?" Tears streamed down my cheeks as I sat up, grabbed the edge of the tub and tried to move closer to him. The pain long forgotten as the heavy ache on my heart took over. I couldn't breathe or couldn't feel the need to as I begged him with my eyes to not leave me in the dark like the way he had because it was not very pretty there.

His cold spidery fingers reached out and wiped away the feverish tears away from my cheeks.

"Awh, poor Rosie I've given you enough hints. It's practically in front of you." His fingers slid down to my chin and guided it closer to his face until he was just a breath away. His eyes scanning my face while the smile on his lips didn't flinch the slightest when he guided my vision to the mirror on the sink facing him. His finger on the other hand pointing to the same.