Work Text:
Fading Connections.
Call me Vladimir. It’s not Jacob or anything like that. I spent all 15 years of my life in a city in Nevada. We have three members in our family: my twin brother Vitalik, my mother, and me. Everything was good enough; we were living in a townhouse near a lot of plazas and public schools before my mother decided to buy a house in Texas. I mean, it shouldn’t be that bad, right? Yes, it was. We were in the car for the whole week, I won’t tell you details but trust me, it was total hell. Around 6 in the morning, we finally arrived in Texas. It was still kind of dark but I could see how different it was from Nevada. Texas had a lot of forests and everything was… green, while Nevada had a lot of mountains. When we finally arrived we had to sleep on mattresses. We had to walk 20 minutes to school. We had quite a nice time.
Afterward, my brother asked me, “Hey Volodya, ready for the day? What do you think it will be?”
“Totally we need to make some kind of awkward introduction,” I grinned “Hello my name is Vladimir this is my twin brother Vitaliy we are two in one special!”
“Yeah, but will we find anyone cool at school? What if we become friends with the wrong group of people,” he said.
“Hey chill out, it’s not the worst thing that can happen,” I said “By the way I heard that football is the big deal here”
“ Really? I mean in Nevada everything was more about basketball or soccer while here it feels like football is some kind of religion!” He chuckled. “I already can see the headlines like you know ‘Nevadians Twins Survive Football Insanity’’’.
We both chuckled and entered the school moment we were hit with loud sounds of people. The hallways were full of students. As I stepped inside it felt like Gladiator Arena where I had to survive. We somehow found the way to the office where they asked some students to show us our classes then I glanced at Vitalik and said, “Well good with your class”.
“Yeah, thanks see you at lunchtime then.”
“See ya”
As I and this dude were walking through the halls everyone was rushing to their classes he said that it would be a better idea to use the back stairs or whatever it was called because the main stairs are always busy, this guy was wearing an oversized hoodie, baggy green pants and he looked like grade 7 student to be honest. He showed me the class and explained to me where I could find each class. All classes were fine and to my surprise I got pretty good classes for this semester. After the second period, I went to the cafeteria going through the bright corridors, looking at the poster, and people…. I felt how my stomach was tying up a knot. When I entered the cafeteria I started looking around with the hope that Vitalik already found a spot for us to sit. Finally, I spotted him sitting with a few guys. I can say they looked good. I approached them with a stupid smile and said: “Ay did you leave a spot for me? ”
“Oh hey Vladimir, Of course, take a seat” he gestured to me from the chair beside him.
I sit on the seat next to him while hanging my backpack on the chair. After I set up all of my stuff he introduced me to his new friends, Luke, Hunter, Nathan and I don’t remember anyone else. I was just listening to what they were chatting about when one of the guys I think his name was Mike asked me, “Hey Vlad, Did you already meet Mr. Durnowaty? I think he also speaks Russian”.
“Uh, no I didn’t, I don’t actually know Russian”
“Wait what, but your name is Vladimir,” he said.
“Yeah, but I never learned it”
“Why not?” Another dude pressed and raised eyebrows.
“Well, maybe my mother just thought it would never be useful for me”.
Days were turning into weeks.Time moved faster than I thought and it actually sucked...Vitalik was hanging all of the time with his new friends, not just one or two times a week. But almost everyday, and trust me the way he acted was pissing me and my off so much that I was ready to choke him right where he was standing. I needed to get him hell out of there, he was rotting alive in this group. The more I tried to pull him back, the more he pushed me away. Finally I thought that maybe I’m not right as I think, maybe I’m just making problems for myself out of nowhere but that day when my mom left for her business trip or whatever it is…changed everything not only in my life but in my close and loved ones too. Just let me explain to you what I mean, on one cool,windy Saturday evening, it was the first time that our mother went on a business trip. I mean she also went on business trips back in Nevada but not in Texas. In the first days everything was good enough. Mom left us some frozen food and money so we didn't suffer because of starvation. I was fine with everything, but after some time the feelings were different. I was feeling emptiness and boredom. The house was unusually quiet. Vitaliy just locked his room and was doing some kinda important stuff for the school project, while I was eating my lunch in total isolation. I tried to call him out multiple times but he barely responded with something like; “What do you want from me?”, “I’m busy right now” or just “Leave me alone”. I just couldn’t left it like that, I was so mad at him so I just shouted “Vitalik! Get the hell out of the room!” my voice echoed in the empty hallways of the house. I walked to his door room and started aggressively knocking “Hey! Why are you ignoring me? Can we talk?” There was no answer and I decided to push the door. He was doing something on his computer and annoyance flashed in his eyes. “Making friends is not a crime, Vladimir.” “I’m not saying anything like that, but what about us-” “You are just jealous that I got a lot of good friends while you got absolutely nothing” he stood up and faced me and pushed me out from his room, I didn’t want to do it, I swear. I just couldn’t control my anger. At that moment something snapped inside of me, I wanted him to feel my rage so I showed him really hard that I didn’t even notice that I pushed him down the stairs. At this moment I just couldn’t breathe I was choking with the horror and disbelief. I ran down the stairs, my panic was rising every second as I knelt beside him. He was lying still not blinking his gray-blue eyes were filled with fear as I touched his hand It was really frozen but the house wasn’t cold at all, his face was paler than before. I had crossed the line which I never crossed before. I was left alone with regret, knowing that everything already shattered. Goodnight Vitalik.