I’ve never really done this sort of thing before – I don’t talk about myself much to anyone outside of those I consider family, and even then it’s not as much and maybe it ought to be.
Some things, I just don’t have words for. Some things I can think of no way to properly conceive to a person – I get too tied up on language or how it might come across before I speak it, so I never say it.
I tried explaining this to Emma when we first started dating. She had a loose idea that it might be related to whatever I did for the Bratva (which she only learned I worked for thanks to Timur). She gifted me with this journal – it’s a nice one, leather bound, something meant to be kept. She told me that if I couldn’t find how to express it, to just try and write it, and see if I could do some self-therapy that way.
I don’t know that I like this idea, but I am going to try it. At the moment the only plus I can see is that it won’t be online – no one can hack it that way. But, I am off topic. I don’t know where to start, save maybe for the beginning? Yes, let’s try that.
I was born in Moscow, Russia on May 20th, 1987 (making me a Taurus), given the name of my grandfather, with my father’s name as secondary. We were still soviets – the union wouldn’t collapse until I was four. My father’s name was Viktor, and he worked as a Torpedo – for the Bratva in Russia, though after the collapse my father was working with the Pakhan to come over to the United States. My little sister, Katya, had just been born and he did not want to raise his family in Russia – he didn’t want us to grow up like he or my mother had. By the time I was seven, arrangements had been made and we were to travel with a group of other Russians. He didn’t know for sure where we would end up until he got the plane tickets, and we learned we would be flying to Boston. From there, we would would head to our new home – someplace chosen for us, that would end up being in the “Little Russia” section of the city.
I had little to do other than read on the trip, and I was not interested in helping my mother with Katya – though I did if my father asked. He was someone I looked up to, though at the time I didn’t really understand what it was that he did for a living, though I had met some of his co-workers before. Roughly a twelve hour trip, with an eight hour time difference at least. It wreaked havoc on me, my body was confused for a long time.
We got set up at our home, and my father resumed work right away, not wanting to disappoint his new boss. It was left up to Karina, my mother, to see to it that I went to school. School was something difficult for me at first, until I found others who also spoke Russian and could help me with my English. School was how I met and became friends with Timur. I don’t know that I would call us the best of friends right away, but I would venture to say that we were good friends.
Six months after moving, my parents and sister were killed by a drunk driver while I was at school. I had no idea until one of my father’s co-workers came to pick me up and told me what had happened. I didn’t know how to process the information, my mother, my four-year-old sister, and my father – my hero – we gone, just like that. I was taken to meet with my Dad’s boss, who expressed his condolences to me, and informed me that my parents had made certain legal arrangements to accommodate myself and my sister, should something happen to them.
My father had wanted his closest friend, Casey Beckford, to take us in. While the Pakhan thought this was a fantastic idea, he explained that Casey was often busy. I liked the idea just fine myself, as I liked Casey, but at my disappointed look at the news Casey wouldn’t be able to take care of me, the Pakhan explained that he would bring my grandmother over from Russia to take care of me. I remember being surprised, because I had thought that I didn’t have any other relatives. I didn’t complain, though. It meant I could stay where I was, and not be shuffled about in foster care.
Since it would take time to bring Babushka over, I asked Timur to see if his family would let me stay there so that I would not be alone. Being the generous family they are, they agreed, and let me stay for a few days while moving arrangements for her were made and she came over. She was very nice to me, though I didn’t feel much of a connection to her at first, or see much of a resemblance, as far as that goes.
I would learn later that although he couldn’t take care of me as far as a legal sense went, Casey was going to help me in other ways. He taught me almost everything I know about my father’s line of work – other things I picked up along the way. It was his way, he said, of helping my father, now that he was gone. While he did not replace my father, Casey became like a second father to me, someone I strove to emulate. Then, like my father before him, after eight years he was gone. I was sixteen and alone, no one but Babushka to take care of me, though she would pass away a couple of months later of a stroke.
I opted for emancipation rather than foster care, and the Bratva helped me in this endeavor, as well as falsify records of my employment for one of their companies. The estate was sold, and I moved into my apartment, on my own.
But soon, I would meet Mia.