Page 6 of Mafia and Scars

And the force of it makes my whole body stagger backward and tumble to the hard ground.

A gasp echoes around me.

“Shut up, you little brat,” he snarls. “You should be grateful we’re even bothering with you!”

My cheek burns with a brutal sting as a metallic tang of blood seeps into my mouth. My head pounds. My palms are bleeding from where they scraped against the rough ground. And my hip aches from where I landed on it as I fell. I want to say something else, but the words are lodged in my throat like thorns.

I get up slowly. Gennady grabs me by my arm. I stumble as he shoves me into the car. The other two girls follow. The door slams shut behind us, the locks clicking into place with an ominous sound.

And all I hear is the thundering of my pulse in my ears.

The engine roars to life.

Sometime later, the car stops, and a large imposing building in the heart of the city stretches before us.

And I begin to understand.

The men aren’t taking us fora treat.

The car door is yanked open. My stomach churns violently.

We climb out. With a shove, we’re forced to move forward and into the building.

And the cold, dank walls close in around me.

Suffocating me with their sinister secrets.

AGE 13

I found out that the men who came to the orphanage that day worked for the government.

They were looking for girls to train.

To test.

And to do other things to.

First, they took us to a training facility every day for two weeks, a place that smelled of industrial chemicals and antiseptic—and of fear.

They raged at us if we didn’t follow their commands quickly enough.

Ranted at us until we were too tired to even think.

Andpunishedus in unspeakable ways if we didn’t meet their standard...

They abused every part of our bodies and minds. Then at the end of those two weeks, they decided which of us met the standard. Which of us had potential.And it was for more than just skating.

I was one of the girls they selected. They took me out of the orphanage and brought me to this Moscow facility where I now live and train under their strict regime for figure skaters. I’m told every day what an honor it is that I’ve been selected for this opportunity. How it’s my duty to do this to repay the government for footing the bill for bringing me up in the orphanage.

I look down at the ice skates on my feet. They pinch like metal claws, too small by at least a size, maybe two. The leather has wornthin where my ankles press against it, and I can feel the deep ache starting in my toes—the same ache that keeps me awake at night. We don’t get new ones very often.When we deserve them, Coach Anya always says, though I’ve never been quite sure what that means.

The music for my routine begins, and I stand ready to skate out onto the ice and move through my routine. For the sixteenth time this session. My legs feel strange today. Lighter somehow, like they might float away from under me if I’m not careful.

I take a deep breath and push forward, only to skid to a stop as I spot a man slide onto the bench beside my usual coach.

I immediately recognize him. It’s Gennady. My heart plummets into my stomach.

He was the man who savagely slapped me that first day. He’s the strictest of all the coaches. He isn’t here very often because he’s a senior coach and works across the whole of Russia apparently. He’s ex-military, or so the rumors say, and it shows in the way he commands the rink and screams at us whenever he’s here.