Chapter Text
The floorboards are damp with blood and booze. Viktor's breathing hitches, and after a coughing fit, he comes into consciousness. The lacerations to his hands and ankles burn with moonshine. It smells better than the bitters, but not by much.
A moment passes of him lying there under the light of the chandelier. He listens and hears nothing. Just his heartbeat. Pained breathing. The glass turning to dust as he rolls onto his side. The creak of a floorboard as he sits against the cabinets, looking up at the shelf. Half the moonshine has fallen. Their last shipment.
'You aren't right about most things.'
A breath leaves him. He slumps his shoulders. Weak. Tired. Old.
'Why do you hate it when she cries?'
His memory flashes to a distant winter's evening. The fireplace is dim. The baby swaddled in the crib whines for warmth. They have no more wood.
'Why do you hate that she loves you?'
He can picture it clearly now. A matchstick, burning his fingers, held up to a letter. The matchstick burns out. The letter doesn't catch. He hasn't the will to light another.
'Why do you think she will abandon you?'
A pen on paper, writing a promise. A signature. A stamp. A mailbox.
Returned to sender.
'Why do you think you deserve to die?'
Screams. Artillery. Gunfire. Gore.
An unanswered call for a medic.
'No,' the voice amplifies. 'Why do you think you deserve to die alone?'
He thinks. He finds nothing.
'Are you dead, now? Do you see Heaven? Do you see Hell?'
"Earth is Hell," he mutters, rubbing his head. His cap is on the ground, soaked.
'Hell is hell, you idiot,' Ivy's voice. 'Why don't you ever listen?'
No.
A road. A horse. A honeymoon.
The wind in his beard. The joyous bleating of an infant. A toddler. A daughter.
Horns. Shovels. Mud. Trenches.
Hell. War.
Suffering.
'Elsa.'
He blinks. His daughter's voice.
'Mitzi. Ivy.'
He rests his head on the cabinet, looks up, and closes his eyes.
'Do they deserve to die alone?'
He puts his hands to the ground and tries to stand.
'Do they not deserve you?'
His knees buckle, and he sinks, tumbling to his back. "Ow! Shit!"
'Will you not help them?'
A throbbing pain in his leg suggests a pulled muscle.
'Will they fall with you?'
"Shut up," he whispers, lip quivering, gripping his calf.
'No,' the voice growls, filling his mind. 'You will listen. You are dead. You are as alone now as you ever will be.'
The tears pool on the floorboards for him to count.
'Are you man or boy?' His voice. Coarse. Strong.
"A man," he replies, wiping his nose.
'You talk. Loudly. Nobody understand you.'
"Y-yes?"
'Why? Why talk, if they don't understand? Why try at all? Why bother, why be in pain, why suffer? Why go through Hell?'
"I..." he swallows. "I love them."
'A crush?'
He shakes his head in earnest. "I don't know."
'So, listen,' the voice fades. A door opens. Footsteps on stone. 'Understand. Talk. All at once. Like man, ty zasraný pako.'
The footsteps crescendo. Now on wood. Closer. Closer.
A shadow. A girl.
Ivy.
She crosses her arms, opens her mouth with a furious scowl, then hesitates, reexamining the situation. "Are you hurt, Viktor?"
He scoffs. Then shrugs. Then nods. "Leg."
She comes forward, wide-eyed and pale, looking at all the ruined goods. She wears the same clothes from a few hours ago. Her face is washed and her hair styled differently, a single short braid down her back. "Give me your hand."
He does, and although it might be from his own weakness, her grip feels particularly strong. She pulls. He shouts. They re-situate; she lifts him up from his armpits. He finds a bearing and stands, leaning on the counter, tears falling down his face. "It... it hurts..."
She purses her lips, then turns and runs off. "Hold on... stay there."
A few moments pass. He stretches, and the pain shoots up his body, this time thankfully more manageable.
Ivy comes back, holding a mop. "There's two of these, right?"
He nods.
She breaks it over her knee just above the spools of cloth. "Use this."
Viktor frowns. She places the stick in his hand, unenthused. "Toughen up."
It's not so bad. He takes a step, bracing for the left leg. The pain lessens little by little as he moves.
"We need to clean this up before we open," Ivy's worried gaze falls to the glass. "Are you cut? Did you sleep on that?!"
"I couldn't stand," he reminds, moving past her, out of the bar. "We need gloves."
"Oh," a beat. She refocuses. "That's a good idea. I'll find a broom."
First, she sops up as much residual moisture as she can, donning gloves and the severed mophead. It fills half a bucket, though three or four's worth fell, easily. Viktor assures her they won't notice a stain. He's dropped worse.
The Slav, still bruised and bleeding slightly, sweeps up the glass. Ivy takes out the bottles they had on display before and puts them back up. Thankfully, they look similar enough to be indistinguishable, if one only looks from the stools. The taste is surely different. Viktor hopes there are no customers today.
It takes an hour, but feels like just a few minutes.
Ivy looks up at him plainly as they stand face-to-face. Wordless. Idle. He cranes his neck and returns the gesture.
Silence. A silence which they both fully understand, irrespective of their mother tongue.
She helps him up the stairs, guides him home under the fading moonlight, and sits on his couch, battling off intrusive thoughts as he showers and dresses in the bathroom.
He takes her arm with one hand and grips the cane with the other, heading back to the speakeasy. He insists on wearing his cap, even though it’s damp.
"Are you bald, Viktor? Is that why?"
"...tell no one," his tone is deathly serious. Too serious.
She giggles.
He laughs a little, too.