02. picture perfect family

Ohio
1995

🕸

Its been 3 years since I haven't seen my family. I still had hope, barely hanging but I do know that Ill go back to them, but for now, I have to stay with other family. Melina, mama, Alexi, papa, were really supportive of me. They taught me everything I know, they taught me how to speak Russian, combat, and well theres a lot of other stuff.

Papa and I gotten along more than Natasha and Yelena. He treated me like a princess. We would spend time watching tv or laugh about something in Russian about mama.

Natasha, Yelena and I were close. We always protected each other, had each others backs. We did everything together, color, play outside, did some gymnastics in the backyard. When we got older, Natasha became worried, worried about me and Yelena. She would promise not to leave us.

"Race ya!" Yelena smiles as she runs out the house. I dropped my book and ran after her.

"Im gonna catch you!" We played tag, running around the big yard. Yelena got tired and I pushed her on the swing. I climbed up and did the monkey bars. I hung upside down and she laughs.

"Mommy's right, you do look like monkey!" I laughed and watched Natasha come in. She whistle and then Yelena and then I finished it off. It was our secret code, our language we made up. Yelena did a back bend and I jumped off the bars, flipped and landed on my feet and did the same with my sisters. We laughed. "We're all upside down."

"And I bet you're gonna fall down first." Natasha spat.

"No, you will." Yelena tried to clap back.

"Natasha's right, you're gonna be the first to fall." I hummed back. "You're face is turning red, you cant hold it for much longer." I started to pick on my younger sister. Natasha and I did funny faces to her, Yelena laughed and finally fell.

"Told you you'd fall down first!" Nat and I stood up and ran from Yelena as she tried to catch us. We started to yell 'told you so!' To her as she tried to catch one of us. Yelena trips, we both stopped and looked back at her. She held her knee and we ran back to her.

"Mommy!" Yelena screams. I held her knee, examining it, Natasha held her back until mama came. Mama comes, squatting down to check on Yelena.

"What happened?" I moved out of her way and stood up. Yelena goes and hugs mom and stays there, in her arms.

"She tripped." I helped Natasha stand up.

"She fell on her knee."

"Oh, you bump your knee?" Mama asks her with her sweetest voice. Yelena nods and dugs her head into her chest. Natasha and I looked back at them and headed to the playground. I climbed up the monkey bars and Natasha joined. We hung upside down and held hands. "Pain only makes you stronger." Mama looks at us and Natasha climbs down and I flipped off. "You're going to hurt yourself if you keep doing that." She places her thumb under my chin.

"I always land on my feet, thats why you and papa take me to gymnastics." I did a cartwheel. Mama smiles and pulls me to her side with Yelena on the other.

"Look! Forest stars!" Yelena points at the lighting bugs.

"Yeah. You know what? Those are actually part of the lampyridae family." Mama was the smart one. She taught us everything, to bugs all to scientific stuff. "And the glow, the glow that you see, that comes from a chemical reaction called..." we let go of mama and got a closer look. "Bioluminescence." She whispers to Yelena. "Come on, time for dinner." She takes my hand and drags me into the house. I plopped on the couch and watched tv as Yelena and Natasha helped with dinner. "Devon." I hummed. Mama puts her head on my shoulder. "Wanna come help us?"

"Im okay." She huffs.

"Okay, but you're washing the dishes tonight, you little Tasmanian devil." She ruffles up my hair and kisses my cheek. I continued to watch the tv until papa came. "Dads home!" I jumped off the couch and jumped on dads back as he walked in.

"Dad!" I smiled. He spins me around and puts me down.

"How are you my little spider monkey?" I giggled as he bop my nose. He always had a nickname for me, spider monkey, bunny, my little dove... "here." He pulls out a kit kat bar. "Dont tell anyone." We pinky swore and I ran off to eat it before dinner. I clapped my hands to join them for dinner.

"Did you wash your hands?" Mama puts her hands on her hips, knowing me. I ran to the sink and ran back to the table, sitting next to Natasha, grabbing food to eat. "I got you apple juice." She placed my cup down.

"Thank you mom!" I gulped it down and ate. Natasha elbows me, saying to slow down. I rolled my eyes and ate slower. I noticed that dad was nervous, he paced around us, looking out the window.

"Everything okay?" Mom told him. All he did was sigh. "How was everyones day?"

"Johnny try to ask me out today, but I slapped him and-"i went on and Yelena talked over me. Mom and dad got up from the table and hid behind the wall. Something was up. I stopped talking and ate. Natasha and I looked at each other and knew that it was bad. Yelena went on about the fireflies. They came back and sat down.

"Girls..." dad coughs. "You remember when I told you that one day we would have that big adventure?" I dropped my fork and looked at him. "Today is the day."

"Yay!" Yelena cheers. No. We're leaving.

"Alright, lets go!" Dad gets up from the table with Yelena and we looked at mom.

"Im sorry." Mom looks down at us and gets up. I sighed and followed to pack things, meaning my shoes, which I couldn't find and the stuffed bunny papa gave me. Even though I was 9, I still need it.

"Dad?" I watched him get the gun. I helped him pick up the bullets from the floor. "Am I going home?" He looks at me, placing his hand on my cheek.

"We'll talk about it in the car." He moves past me, I followed him into the garage.

"Am I? Its been 3 years."

"I said, in the car." I hopped in, no shoes, no backpack filled with nonsense, nothing but a bunny and a picture of us five. Later, we all got in the car and drove away. I was scared, so I held Natashas hand. She looks at me but I didn't. I watched as we drove past our friends houses, school, everything we knew was about to be a distant memory.

"Where are we going?"

"Home."

"Mommy, you're silly, we just left home." Yelena kicks her feet. Mom and dad dropped their heads as a police car drove past us. "I want my song." Dad puts the cassette tape in and turned up the volume. "Bye, bye, miss American pie drove my chevy to the levee but the levee was dry them good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye singing this'll be the day that I die." She sang along, more like mumbled. I kept looking at through the mirror, dad shakes his head. I wasn't going back home. I knew it. It was all a lie. But I have Natasha and Yelena.

We pulled up to a abandoned airport place and hop off the car. We hurried and moved everything. I helped Yelena into the small plane and then Natasha. Mom started the plane. Dad was outside.

"Why isn't dad in the plane?"

"He's coming." He throws the tank out of our way and directed mom to move in. I held Yelena tight and Natasha did the same. Police showed up and dad started shooting at them. We screamed as they were shooting at us. I felt a hot piercing pain on my ear. I screamed and covered Yelena.

"You're bleeding!" They shot my ear.

"Stay down Yelena!" They shot again and this time, they got mom.

"Mom!" We all screamed. She let go of the wheel. Natasha went to the wheel and mom was telling her what to do. She held her wound. I watched dad as he held onto the plane and shot at the police. I closed my eyes and cried, screaming.

We were up in the air and saw that dad was still on the wing. I placed my hand on the window and he did the same. We flew all night, Natasha helped me bandage my ear, i helped mom stop her from bleeding out when we got to Cuba. We raced to mom as they took her away. We held her hand, telling her that she'll be okay.

"Get up mommy. Pain only makes you stronger, remember?" Yelena cries on her chest. Mom rubbed her thumb on my cheek and held Natashas hand.

"Come on mama." I cried. "I'll listen better. Just get up okay?" I said in Russian. "Ill be a better daughter."

"Forgive me mom." Natasha also said in Russian.

"Never let them take your heart." She croaks out. She was white, paler than before. The soldier pushed us off and took her away. Yelena ran to me and I hugged her as Natasha hugged me.

"Its gonna be okay." We told Yelena.

"Daddy!" Yelena slips out of my grip. She runs to him.

"Yelena!" Natasha and I ran after her. A soldier grabs her and Natasha kicks his arm, me hugging Yelena again, and Natasha pulls out the mans gun and protected us, pointing the gun at the soldiers.

"Dont touch her! I will shoot!" She said in Russian. "Dont touch her! I will kill you all!" Dad comes up.

"Honey. You're gonna need to hand me that gun."

"I dont wanna go back there." She tells him. No. Not there. Anywhere but there. "I wanna stay in Ohio."

"Papa, please." I choked. "I wanna go back home." He kneels down.

"You cant take her. You cant. Shes only six."

"You were even younger." He takes the gun from Natasha, stashing it behind him. "Its okay. Come here." We got closer. "You're gonna be alright." He kisses Yelena. "Do you know why its gonna be alright? Cause my girls are the toughest girls in the world. You're gonna take care of each other, okay? And everything? Everythings gonna be fine." Soldiers came from behind and injected Natasha and Yelena with something that made them pass out.

"No!" I kicked ones arm, dropping the needle and taking his gun. "Papa!" I ran to him. "Dont let them take me away. Please! I want to stay with you! I can be quiet! Ill listen! Ill do anything! I dont want to go." He placed his hand on my cheek, sighing. "Papa, you promised."

"I know my little dove." I felt a pinch on my neck. He injected me with the needle. My eyes struggled to stay open. "But I cant." I droop over him and they took me away, placing me with Yelena and Natasha.

We woke up in a dark room. There was more girls with us, huddling together, crying. The three of us stayed together. The doors opened as a light shined at us. We all screamed. They yanked us from our sisters. The three of us held tight, taking Natasha away from me and Yelena, making me hold onto her. Nat gave us a picture of us and they took her back. The worse was that, that this was just the beginning of my living nightmare.