That night, I spent what felt like the longest time on algebra. When I finished the last assignment, I checked the answers in the back of the textbook and breathed a sigh of relief. My back ached from the long minutes over the notebook, and I stretched over the chair, enjoying the crackle of my joints. The dim light of the desk lamp illuminated the spine of the history textbook, in which I still had to catch up on three entire sections. Fortunately, the night was still deep.
I pulled the textbook from the stack and, cross-referencing Dasha's messages—she had diligently sent me lists of homework for every day I spent in the hospital—I began skimming the text, trying to imagine the events while deliberately skipping the cruelty, so as not to ruin my mood.
By morning, algebra, history, Russian, and English were done. If it weren't for the alarm on my smartphone, I wouldn't have even realized it was seven a.m. The house was as quiet as if my father were away on duty again, but my heart remembered everything that happened yesterday. Trying to cheer myself up, I clung to the doctor's words that Kostya might wake in the morning. I hoped to hear his voice from the next room, but I only heard my own breathing.
After a quick hot shower, I tried to shake off the last traces of fatigue, but in vain. After drying my hair, I returned to my room and packed my backpack for school. Looking at Dasha's messages, I was ready to scream at how much there still was to do this week. At the very least, I had to prepare a biology report for tomorrow and review a ton of material for the dreaded geometry test. If there was hope to handle biology quickly, the last three years of struggling with geometry had been no picnic.
My grades were crying by the end of the term. I certainly wouldn't fail out of school, but my GPA could clearly drop, which was absolutely unacceptable in the eleventh grade.
Kostya's pleas not to go to the open day now seemed like a perfectly reasonable decision, even if motivated by a completely different reason. If only the university doors opened more often for applicants — I would have skipped it without a second thought. But what if this was my last chance to see the campus with my own eyes? What if there would be no other opportunity to talk to the teachers and hear about the programs I could apply to? The mysterious possibilities beckoned me like a bright light under the dome of a delicate lamp to a reckless moth, and I wanted so badly to give in. To give in to the girl inside who so wanted to go with her friends and taste student life.
The more you forbid yourself something, the more you actually want it. I didn't know what to do, and I had no strength left to make a balanced decision. Having come up with nothing better, I decided to make a wager with fate: if Kostya came to, I wouldn't go anywhere. I'd go to class and then come straight home to dive into geometry prep. But if my father didn't wake up before I left for school…
After hastily eating sandwiches and washing down the last crumbs with milky oolong, I knocked on the locked door of Kostya's room. The door swung open so abruptly that I got scared: Dr. Smirnov moved terrifyingly silently.
"Good morning, Asya," Vladimir looked fresh, as if he had thoroughly enjoyed ten hours of sleep. "I didn't hear you wake up."
"I didn't go to bed. I stayed up all night doing homework," I admitted honestly.
Vladimir nodded understandingly, as if he still remembered what it was like to study.
"The gymnasium program is strong. If it gets too hard, you should talk to your father and, while it's not too late, consider transferring."
I saw only polite condescension in his words. A veiled "you're just foolish" wrapped in a beautiful package, which made me like Vladimir even less—though how could that be possible?
Making an effort not to say everything I had on my tongue, I placed my hands behind my back and dug my nails into my palms. The pain was soothing. It made the unbearable bearable.
"It's fine, I'll catch up quickly. There were no problems until I ended up in the hospital. A couple of sleepless nights won't hurt me much."
"A couple might not hurt, but you'll have to reckon with the wolf inside. He may have his own plans," Vladimir joked, wagging his finger as if the conversation were an amusing show for him, almost a comedic theater performance worth a front-row ticket.
"The wolf inside, by your estimates, might fall asleep soon, right?"
"I don't recall you coming for a new dose of poison. I won't force you to take more, but you understand, we don't have enough data yet."
"My feelings have already dulled."
"It was the same with Olga and Nikita at first. Any recurring manifestations?"
"No," I lied, having decided yesterday not to tell the doctor anything about what happened.
"Alright then. I'll continue observing Olga for a while. With you young ones, it's rather difficult to track changes. As we've found, some nuances with Nikita couldn't be identified, and it's hard to say whether Olga's case is an exception or the rule. Working with you, I have no reference at all," he shook his head. "And we have to consider accelerated metabolism."
"Shouldn't accelerated metabolism eliminate the poison faster?"
"In the classical sense, accelerated metabolism consumes more energy. If you imagine the poison acts like ethanol, the elimination rate would indeed be higher. However, defining what is 'high' is difficult, because you have to consider multiple factors, such as sex, age, predispositions, and chronic conditions. Your pattern with Nikita and Olga was never identical due to physiological differences. You are, at the very least, a different type, and your natural defenses against poison are still poorly studied by me. Frankly, there's no one else to study them—the witches abandoned these ideas long ago. So I have to move almost blindly in this direction and carefully monitor the consequences of Olga's reverse transformation. My wife's case might be an exception, useless for further practice, so I place my hopes on Karimov. I don't rule out that it might eventually result in an unpleasant scenario for you, where werewolves become a key to human life for us, but not vice versa."
"Maria thinks differently. She believes in you very much."
"Your mother is full of enthusiasm, unlike me. I am rather guided by bitter experience and keep joy in check for at least half a year. Magic can't always be repeated twice, and that's the greatest tragedy. Even penicillin, an invention that saved hundreds of thousands of lives, simultaneously killed dozens with antibiotic intolerance."
"So until my condition worsens, there's no need to continue the poison," I summarized, and Vladimir slightly frowned, as if he found the conclusion absurd.
"As a doctor, I would say the exact opposite. We must cyclically reinforce immunity, not stop treatment at the first sign of improvement."
"And how long did you administer the serum to Olga?"
"For a month."
"And for me, you've been giving the vampire poison already…?"
Vladimir understood what I was hinting at and hesitated, though I knew the answer without his confirmation. He had started injecting the poison into my blood at Maria's request right after Halloween, simultaneously testing the witch theory, which meant my 'treatment' month was nearly over.
"About the same."
"There's the answer. So I've had enough injections."
"As you wish. I cannot force you and I don't want to."
I smiled politely, as best I could. He truly couldn't force me to take the poison. Vladimir had another style—he lured potential victims into a trap with sweet words and deceptively gentle speech. A trickster in an angel costume. Even knowing everything from Maria, I stayed cautious simply because the doctor had never been fully honest with me. He played a role he had chosen for himself, with little concern for my approval of his methods.
"Well, I'll get ready for school then."
"Of course. I'll leave the door open. Maybe the sounds of activity in the house will help Konstantin come to."
"Alright," I was about to leave when I suddenly remembered what I wanted to ask. "You'll write to me if Dad comes to, okay?"
"Of course. Don't worry," Vladimir replied lightly and cheerfully, hurrying to take his post as the wooden chair placed by the head of Kostya's bed.
When I was done getting ready and standing in the hallway fastening my jacket, I realized it wasn't very nice to lock the doctor in without a way out of the apartment. I hadn't thought of that yesterday and felt awkward. I hoped Vladimir hadn't noticed and that it caused no inconvenience. I didn't dig through Kostya's things for a second set of keys, leaving my keys on the hook by the door and asking Vladimir to lock behind me. Not that a thief or mischievous teenager could harm a vampire, but it was better to avoid potential incidents.
"Asya?" called the doctor.
I had already opened the door and was about to step out, but I turned at the sound of my name. The doctor studied my face as if searching for something to better understand my state, probing the ground and testing me with words. One who is capable of lying can sense how its scent clings to another. And it seemed that right now Vladimir was trying to find the trace, while I also practiced pretending. Like a mirror, I reflected what I saw in him, just to keep him as far away as possible.
"Yes, doctor?"
"You'll tell me if you notice any changes, won't you?"
"Of course."