Valery Turkin

The evening turned out to be lousy. No worse than usual—just the same as all the recent ones. Instead of showdowns, there were gatherings, training sessions, someone's words falling on deaf ears. Now my thoughts were limited to only one person. You.

At first he coped: he hung around in the gym until midnight, finding new ways home so as not to pass by the familiar entrance.

Turbo walked home, not looking around. Hands in his pockets, eyes fixed on the pavement, steps heavy. And then he stopped. His legs swung around, and he found himself at your front door.

He stood, looking at the dark windows. Something was rising inside him that he couldn't explain. Not anger. Not hunger. Something worse—pulling, sticky, like a strange hand on his throat.

He was thinking about you. Again. Just like he had yesterday, a week ago, when he first saw you at the disco. You stood to the side and looked at everyone as if you knew something about them that they didn't know about themselves.

He was angry with himself. For not being able to get your face out of his head. For searching for you in the crowd. For making up excuses to be near you. It was weak. And Turbo didn't forgive weakness. And then he came up with an explanation. A witch.

If you don't let go, you're holding on. If you're holding on, there's a force he can't resist. He really can't... He can't.

He finished his cigarette, tossed the butt aside, and walked toward the flowerbed. His movements were sharp and angry—as if he weren't picking flowers, but snatching them away. Daisies. Small, crooked, with dirt on their roots. He looked at them and couldn't understand why he was doing this.

The front door creaked. He stood up and stood by your door. For a long time. Too long for a man who never doubted. Then he knocked—shortly, sharply.

You opened it, glancing at it as if you knew he would come.

• What do you need?

“I was just passing by,” he muttered.

"Is that all?" you smiled.

"Here," he said irritably. He thrust the flowers into your hands, sharply, as if getting rid of evidence.