#sirkos

It’s become a fact of life for Ea: grass grows, birds fly, and her father hates her, as much as her brothers attempt to convince her of otherwise. (Or at least, they used to. But what’s energy spent on a lost cause? A waste, that’s what.)

She tried to keep to herself tonight, but he’d found her, like he does on all the nights he needs someone to take his anger out on. Unpaid bills, one too many poor hands at the card tables, the ache and grime from work in the mines—all of it spells the kind of evening Ea makes it her mission to not be home for. 

But she’d had to come home. Her luck had run out, as it always does. There isn’t a place her anywhere else tonight, and the rain earlier that evening had made the notion of camping out in the bed of her little truck (Anton’s, really—her oldest brother was generous once, before he’d deemed her unworthy of his time) too stupid of an idea even for her.

The rain is gone now, its absence carving an exit for her, an escape from the shouting and shoving. She won’t rise to the bait when Peter calls her good for nothing, brands her the family whore yet again with an air of finality that rattles her more than she’ll ever let him see.

She doesn’t take the truck. Instead, she walks, pretending she has no destination in mind. This is not an emergency; there’s nothing she needs rescuing from, not enough reason to disturb Alexei and his mother at this hour.  

And yet despite the hour, there’s still the sound of footsteps behind her as she sits on the hood of the car in the front drive, fingers clutching a cigarette like a lifeline.