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“Then I’m her brother! Her cousin, I mean! Please let me talk to her!” I said with deliberate friendliness. I was determined to try anything that might get me in touch with Inna.
“And how can you prove you’re her cousin?”
“How is a cousin supposed to prove it? He can’t. You’ll just have to take my word for it!”
“Sorry, then! Against the rules!” The woman seemed ready to argue, then thought better of it and returned to her newspaper, making it clear she would ignore anything else I said.
I understood and went outside to look for another way. An idea soon came.
“Hey! Come over here!” I quietly called to a girl who looked about my age, trying to make sure only she heard.
She noticed me, approached the fence, and discreetly indicated where I should move. Then she turned her back, as though she’d simply decided to stand in the shade. I copied her.
“What do you want?” she asked briskly, turning her head a little to the left so she could hear better.
“A new girl was brought here recently. I want to talk to her, but they won’t let me in. Could you get her?” I asked, trying not to look at the person I was talking to. I must have looked ridiculous.
“Oh, the quiet one! She won’t come out. She’s sitting in there in a trance. Nobody’s touched her yet. We haven’t even put her through the initiation. We understand. We’re not animals…”
“What initiation?”
“You’ll find out later, if she wants to tell you!” the girl said with a nasty laugh that left me speechless.
This wasn’t going to end well. I had to do something. Meanwhile, a staff member began lining the children up to count them and take them inside.
“Could you… tell her I’ll come back at the same time tomorrow? Maybe she’ll come out…” I said as I saw the girl getting ready to leave.
“I could. What’s in it for me?” she asked, turning to face me, secrecy forgotten as she looked me up and down appraisingly.
I patted my pockets and realized I had nothing to offer but money.
“Here!” I said, holding out ten rubles.
She took them quickly and pocketed them, still watching me.
“Is that all?”
“I’ve got another five!” I said. Her hand immediately reached for them.
I had to hand them over.
“Okay. Come back tomorrow, same time. We’ll see what we can do. No promises!” she said, running to join the others. The group was already assembled and waiting only for her.
I nodded and headed home. Once I was around the corner, I checked my pockets. I’d given her every last ruble of my bus fare. I had to walk back.
Bargaining
The next day, I got permission to leave my last class and arrived about twenty minutes early. Inna wasn’t among the children in the yard. I was beginning to think she wouldn’t want to come out when yesterday’s acquaintance spotted me and took up her position by the fence.
“I talked to her. She’ll come out!” the girl said briskly, waiting for my reaction.
“Great. Thank you!” I was delighted, then immediately at a loss. What would I say to her? Ask how she was? That much was obvious. I just had to avoid saying something stupid.
“What do you mean, thank you? Pay up!”
“But I paid you yesterday!”
“That was for talking to her. Results cost extra. So does getting her permission to come out!” she said with a smirk.
Since I had no other options, I held a ten-ruble note between the bars. She took it without looking. A professional, clearly. She pocketed it, turned, and silently held out her hand for the remaining five. I put the money into it, and she vanished, leaving me to worry. I even began to think I’d been scammed. But ten minutes later, I saw a familiar figure, and the doubts disappeared.
“Hi. How are you?” I said, looking at Inna.
She no longer stared through me as she had at the fire. But her face was so exhausted that I could barely recognize the Inna I’d known only days before.
“Hi… It couldn’t be worse… Get me out of here…” she said, bursting into tears.
Her eyes were swollen, tears running down her cheeks again. She reached through the bars. I took her hands. We couldn’t get any closer. The fence was in the way.
“Are they hitting you?” I asked. I desperately wanted her to say no.
“Not yet. I think they’ve given me time to recover, but I can feel something awful is going to happen. I’ve heard their ‘welcome’ leaves girls with scars. Sometimes worse…” Inna said, stumbling over her words and sobbing.
Her words chilled me. Only days before, I hadn’t known how to tell her I loved her. Now I had to work out how to get her out of here.
“I’ll think of something, I promise. Just hold on! Is there anything I can bring you? Anything I can do?” I asked. Just then, the staff member began calling the children together. Inna had to go.
She only looked at me before following the others. Clothes, food, notebooks: I could bring any of those. But that wasn’t what she’d asked for.
All the way home, I went through the options. I hadn’t managed to persuade the woman at the entrance. I had no money left. And who could I have bribed anyway? By the time I got home, I had two ideas, one worse than the other.
First I thought of helping her run away. But where would we live? How would Inna take her exams? She couldn’t hide forever. That left the second option: ask my parents to take her in. I knew almost nothing about guardianship or adoption, but I understood that we needed adults. My parents were planning to leave their own son behind, but I hoped to find words that would make them at least try to help.
I called Mom and Dad and asked them to get home as soon as they could. By evening we were sitting at the table, and I decided to get straight to it.
“Mom, Dad, I need to talk to you. Just hear me out.” I gripped the edge of the table. “I know you want a divorce. Have wanted one for years. And that you’re going to leave me the apartment and move away. I heard you talking. It hurt, but that’s not what this is about. I have a friend. Inna. You probably heard about the family who died in that fire? That was her family. She’s in a children’s home now. They’re threatening her there. She’s begging me to get her out. I want her to live here. Adopt her, become her guardians. I don’t know what you call it. Just help. The two of us can live here, and you can move away. I’ll never ask you for anything else.”
Mom looked at Dad. I waited for objections, but neither spoke. That was harder than if they’d started arguing right away.
“Andrey, listen. That’s a very serious step. It’s not an easy thing to do…” Mom said. Silence fell again.
Dad still hadn’t said a word. Mom stared at the table. I didn’t know which had shocked them more: my request, or the fact that I’d heard them discussing the divorce.
“I understand! But I’ve hardly ever asked you for anything! I’ve never been a problem or made your lives hell doing stupid things! What I’m asking matters to me. To Inna. If she stays there, they could ruin her life. And if you do nothing, you could ruin mine. I’ve been through a lot lately. I just want some kind of ending that isn’t completely awful. Give me a chance. Give us a chance!”
“Maybe it’s not as bad as all that? As an orphan, she’d be entitled to housing later…” Mom stopped herself. “That’s not what I mean. We can’t decide everything in one evening.”
“What matters more? An apartment sometime in the future, or what they’ll do to her now?” I looked at Dad, hoping at least he would understand.
“First of all, not adoption,” Dad finally said. “At your age, it would probably be guardianship. And you don’t arrange that in a day either. We’d have to find out what’s involved.”
“Then find out! You know people. Call someone. Ask how we could bring her here, at least for now. I’m not asking you to break the law. And… you promised to help me with money. Give us a lump sum. We’ll be careful with it. Then we’ll find jobs. You won’t have to worry about sending me money every month. You were going to move out and start new lives anyway…”
“We’ve already filed for divorce!” Mom said, staring at the floor in shame.
That shook me a little, but I had to keep going.
“Do you even understand what you’re proposing?” Dad attempted a smile. “We’d be responsible, but you’d be living on your own.”
Mom was thinking. That seemed like a good sign.
“I understand. But we won’t fall apart. Please. Help us now, and we’ll manage from there.” I looked from Mom back to Dad. “At least we’d have a chance.”
Dad gave a tired smile. Another pause followed.
“We’re not promising you anything. We need to think carefully about what can be done,” he said slowly, looking at Mom.
Mom looked at me, then at Dad, and gave an almost imperceptible nod. I couldn’t tell whether she’d agreed to my plan or merely to discussing it.
“I believe in you!” I said, and went outside, leaving my parents alone. I knew they had plenty to talk about.
Inna hadn’t been online for two days, so there was nothing for me on social media. I decided to walk around the neighborhood and visit places I hadn’t seen for a long time. The river I’d never shown her. Nature. Fresh air.
I got back close to midnight. My parents were asleep. I made my way to my room in the dark, then lay in bed for a long time, unable to sleep.
A Change for the Better
In the morning, my alarm woke me. I could stay in bed a little longer. We had PE first, and the teacher had promised to overlook absences if we were preparing for exams. What was strange was that Mom hadn’t come to wake me. She usually checked my room regardless of the schedule.
Two towels were missing from the bathroom. I looked in the washing machine. Empty. I ate the breakfast Mom had left in the kitchen and drank the cold tea. While dressing, I noticed more space in the closet. There were no sheets on my parents’ bed. Were they doing laundry? I had no time to investigate. I was already running late for second period.
On the way, I tried to think about the odd things I’d noticed in the apartment, but couldn’t concentrate. Thoughts of Inna and the conversation with my parents kept breaking in, refusing to leave me alone.
After school, I went back to the children’s home to tell Inna about our conversation. The girl I knew met me at the fence. I handed over my bus money. She pocketed it and leaned closer.
“Your lady won’t be available today!” she said, keeping up her act.
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