Page 153 of Monstrous Urges

“MILOS!” he roars. “MILOS!!”

I want to call to him, but part of me is still frozen. I blink, still in shock as I watch Milos yank a pistol out of his waistband and then step out from behind the pole.

“Stay right there,” Milos grunts, leveling the gun at Drazen and lifting the remote detonator high. “You know what this is.”

“Yeah,” Drazen spits, not lowering the rifle as he snarls. “I know what that is.”

His fierce gaze flicks from Milos to me, staying there for a moment. I can feel my heart thudding as I lock eyes with him, my psyche thawing from its icy plunge slightly before he rips his eyes back to Milos.

“What are you doing, Milos,” he rasps.

“You were my brother!” Milos yells at him.

“I still am!” Drazen screams back.

Milos’ fingers clench and unclench around the stock of his gun.

“Blood for blood, Drazen,” he chokes. “Remember? That’s what we always said to each other those nights we were on watch, up in a ruined church steeple or an office building with a sniper rifle and binoculars.”

“That was war, Milos,” Drazen hisses.

“LIFE is war!” Milos fires back.

“We were fucking kids!” Drazen snaps. “We had no business?—”

“We’re not kids anymore, my friend.”

“Friend?” Drazen snarls incredulously. “You call yourself my friend with my wife tied up behind you, in danger that you fucking put her in yourself?!”

“She’s not your wife!!”

The words echo through the night like a slap.

Something snaps in my head. An ice-covered river breaking. A door splintering. A wall collapsing.

They’ll never separate us, Annika.

They’re going to.

No. I won’t let them.

You have to. You have to let me go. I’m the one that must do this.

Please. Don’t leave me.

I’ll never leave you. You’re my sister.

Your invisible friend.

I think I have to go.

I love you, Annika. I won’t leave you there.

I know you won’t. I love you, Tatjana.

When my eyes snap open, and reality comes crashing back into me like a truck, something claws into my heart.

A truth I’ve always known, but never remembered.