Roxana

"No. I have to and I have to go now, Christian!" I almost scream on the phone.

"We talked about how important this project is," he answers sternly.

"I don't care. There are other employees. Do you know how many days off I had in two years working for you? None. Do you know how many I am entitled to according to Swiss law? Twenty-five every damn year."

"Roxane, you are not irreplaceable," he threatens low-key.

"Then good luck replacing me," I thunder and hang up.

I fight the urge to cry out of sheer anger and desperation.

"Wir sind gleich da/ We are almost there," Damian says calmly.

He insisted on driving me to the airport after I called him in the middle of the night asking for money for a plane ticket. Not my most glorious moment though the competition is strong. I also had to tell him briefly what was going on and make him swear he would not tell anybody.

Never have I seen someone less judgemental than him in that brief moment. He just said he would be there in half an hour and hung up, for me to find him indeed half an hour later at my door, giving me a thousand Swiss francs in cash and a hug.

"Bist du sicher dass ich nicht mitkommen soll?/ Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?"

"Damian, ich weiß nicht wie ich dir danken soll. Du hast mir mehr als genug geholfen./ Damian, I don't know how to thank you. You helped me more than enough," I say and mean it.

It is not that I would mind him coming, or that it would be a bad idea per se since a one-meter-ninety tall and hundred kilograms heavy Pole would make me feel way more secure than walking in there alone but I don't think Ivan would appreciate the gesture.

"Du bist wie meine Schwester Rox, Familie halt. Und jetzt willst du da allein hingehen und diesen obskuren Typen treffen? Das ist gefährlich./ You are like my sister, Rox, family. And now you want to go there alone to meet that obscure guy? It's dangerous."

"Das ist nicht das Erste Mal. Ich denke nicht dass er mir meh tun wird./ I did that before. I don't think he is going to hurt me."

What I do not know is what he is going to do and I shudder by only thinking.

"Pass nur auf dich auf und wenn was ist, ruf mich an. Ok?/ Just take care, ok? And if you need help, call me."

"Mach ich. Danke, Mann./ Sure thing. Thank you, man."

This was my pretended calm. that runs out as soon as I step onto the plane. On the short flight to Chișinău, I vomit three times. On the taxi drive to our apartment the fourth.

I find Dani in his bedroom. He is not crying but he looks pale and sad. He has always been a brave kid. I hug him and can't help thinking how much he has grown since I saw him last time. He is a few centimeters taller than me which is really strange, because he is my baby brother.

"Mă bucur că ai venit. Mi-a fost dor de tine./ I am happy you came. I missed you... so much."

"Știi că și mie. Ai crescut./ You know I have missed you too. You have grown quite a bit," I say. My voice breaks at the end and I start ugly crying.

I can notice that frightens him so I try to pull myself together for his sake and my own.

"Nu știu cât pot sa stau. O sa merg sa îl recuperez pe tata. A zis Ivan ceva când a venit, mă rog, oamenii lui?/ I am not sure how long I can stay. I will go now to recover dad. Did Ivan say anything when he came, or well his men?"

"La început nu a vrut sa meargă cu ei dar au început să îl lovească. Eu am vrut să îl ajut și atunci i-a fost frică că mă vor lovi și pe mine si a plecat cu ei. Știu că îl vor bate iar.../ At the beginning, he didn't want to leave with them but they started hitting him. I wanted to help and then he got frightened they were going to hurt me too so he gave in and left with them. I know they will beat him... again. "

"Totul o sa fie bine. O sa rezolv totul./ Everything is going to be fine. I am going to solve everything," I say, hugging him again.

I get into a taxi and make my way to Ivan's villa on the outskirts of Chișinău. He is living in a grossly tacky building with marble columns at the entrance. I guess he saw the Parthenon on TV and said he wanted something similar in his backyard. Well, de gustibus non est disputandum, in other words, what do I care?

I see he is expecting me when the taxi parks in front of the gate of his so-called estate.

One of his men is telling me to go inside and he waits for me at the door with a weird smile on his ugly face.

Ivan is in his late forties, balding, not very tall, and has a prominent belly hanging over his pants. A few gold chains dangle at his neck, made visible by his white shirt with far too many open buttons that help you have a look at his hairy chest.

"Роксана Чебан, давно не виделись, любовь моя./ Roxana Ceban, long time no see, my love," he says, placing his hands on my shoulders.

I shudder and move away.

"Убери от меня руки. Где мой отец?/ Get your hands off me. Where is my father?" I reply in Russian not even trying to hide any of my emotions.

My mom was half Russian and in Moldova, we are taught in school. But since she died, I rarely used it though, maybe because it reminds me of her,  and it's a bit rusty.

"I wouldn't act so rude if I were you, girl," he spits and frowns at me.

"Where is he? And why is he here?"

"Come in." He gestures to me to enter.

I am hesitant but there is nothing else I can do except to comply.

"We have been waiting for you. Right, Dimitrie?" he says getting towards my father who is tied to a chair barely breathing. He has cuts, bruises, and burns all over his body and is shaking.

I can't hold back a whimper when I see him and hurry to kneel down and take his bloody hand into mine.

"Tati, sunt aici. Ce s-a întâmplat?/ Daddy, I am here. What happened?"

"N...nu...pierdut...furat.../ Not...lost...stolen," he says with tremendous effort choking on his words.

"Why is he here? Again!" I turn to Ivan and ask stretching every word.

I am so angry I forget how frightened I am.

"If you want the rest of your money right now you only need saying. You can have it in one week and I don't want to see you ever again. You hear me?"

"If you can gather a million and six thousand euros in a week I will gladly comply."

My face probably turns blech white because I feel like fainting.

"What are you talking about?" I mutter.

"Dimitrie lost again some cash in my casino. This time he wanted to go really big. And well unsurprisingly... he lost. Now, Roxana, you already know what that means. He either pays or he ... disappears. I have great hopes in you. Last time our deal went marvelously well."

"One... million..." I say faintly, barely paying attention to him.

My brain is dead and on overdrive at the same time. One part tries to comprehend the situation, to find a solution, the other one just wants to disappear. I can barely look at any of them.

"I took the liberty to make some calculations. I think ten years is the time I am willing to give you, that would make a monthly payment of approximately eight thousand a month."

"Eight... thousand," I say trying hard to comprehend. It is unlikely I will ever find a job to pay me that much and I also need to live out of something.

"I... I can't. It's too much."

"Well, it's that or his life and I will need an initial down payment of ten thousand till let's say, the end of next month. Can we seal the deal?" he asks, with his bead-like eyes fixed on me.

I think I never wanted to die so badly like in this brief moment. Christ in heaven, I have to pull my shit together but I lack the strength.

Kneeling in front of my father, I take his hand into mine once again.

"De ce?/ Why?"

He is crying and my already broken heart is aching. Why, for fucks sake? We were almost done. We could have been so happy.

"T...iubesc...t.ne...s... Dani/ I ...love...y...ou a...Dani."

Love? The fuck you do! I feel like screaming. If you loved us you wouldn't have done this.

"Do you accept or not?"

"What if I don't?" I ask but feel nauseous. Am I capable of letting my own father die?

"Yeah well then he ... disappears but I cannot guarantee that the sins of the father don't get inherited by the daughter... or son. So what do you decide? I don't have the whole day."

"O... okay" I mutter looking at my dad. I have no idea how but it will buy me some time.

"Well let's seal the deal then," he says and pulls the sleeve of my t-shirt up.

Ivan is marking debt on skin. One line is a hundred thousand. Last time I got only half a line that I can easily justify as an accident but now there will be ten bloody lines on my forearm.

"Can...can you at least make them higher up? Like on the shoulder," I say between tears.

"Of course, for ten more thousand, or well let's say five because I like you."

I nod. Right after, the sleeve is torn and the skin on my shoulder is adorned with ten parallel cuts. I try not to make a sound and bite my tongue, lips and the inside of my cheeks while tears fall over my face like rivers of fire. In the back, my father whimpers too and I feel again that death would be better than the life I am living.

The blood from the cuts reaches my fingers when the man that does them finishes. I hope his blade was clean. I need a tetanus injection; This strangely practical thought seeps into my mind in this very odd situation. 

"Ok, untie him now. I want to go home," I say standing up from the ground.

"No. After I get the sixteen thousand delivered I will do that. Until then, daddy stays with us. And I have changed my mind, two weeks should be time enough to gather that."

"No. I want him to leave now with me," I insist.

"You live under the impression that you are making the rules here. Not sure where you got that from."

I look again at dad; he is in a horrible state. I don't know if he will survive two weeks without medical care. For me to get that money I need to get to Switzerland and ask for a loan at the bank. It's not a big sum but they still need some time to approve it. That if I am not jobless; that will be an additional problem.

"I will find a way," I say and hug him before I turn to leave.

I march to the front door trying as hard as possible to not look back. Tears are still falling down my face and blood is trickling down the fingertips of my right arm.

"Ah, Roxana. You should put on some weight; I don't like very skinny girls," he says. I see him winking when I turn my head before exiting the gate.

At least I didn't have to sleep with him. Lucky me I am too skinny for his taste now.

I need a plan, a fast and good one.