Read Online Kursed by Lindsay Smith - Free Book Online Page A

as soon as I returned during that first break in studies, as soon as I saw three new families crammed into our old family home, I knew.”
    I cup one of his knees—so wiry and lean—with my hand. He startles at first, but then eases into my touch. “I’m so sorry, Andrei. It’s not your fault.” My mouth tastes like ash; it’s hard to speak. “There’s nothing you could have done.”
    â€œMaybe not then. Now, though…”
    Leaves crunch in the distance, and we both sit up straight as if pulled up by string. Andrei shuts his eyes. I hold my breath, lungs aching, every cell in me leaning forward and eager to bolt.
    Andrei exhales, opens his eyes, and shakes his head. “Only a deer.”
    I slump forward with a weary grin. “I’m sorry … it’s just…”
    â€œA long day,” Andrei says.
    A long life. The past four years—between the war, catching the attention of the NKVD with my research, and everything else … But no matter how I study and dissect it, I can’t fight that primitive instinct in me. Fight or flight. Self-preservation. My ability seems to be an extension of that—a glimpse of the future designed to help me survive at all costs.
    â€œWhat were they like?” I ask Andrei, trying to shake my mind off of the rumination. “Your parents, your sister. You said something about musicians, right?”
    â€œAh.” He reddens, a deep shade of gray in the moonlight. “You remember.”
    I smile in spite of myself. “Music was important in our family, too.” Don’t look back, Antonina. Never look back. I keep the smile fixed in place, pinning it there like a tailor.
    â€œMy parents played for the local opera house, back before the Revolution. Before it was declared too bourgeois—that music was for the masses, the people. I suppose the Party thought that meant performances should be for everyone, but there was no budget for that. So soon enough, they were performing for no one. Except for my sister and me.”
    â€œAnd your sister?” I ask.
    Andrei rubs at the stubble along his jaw. “She was—well, she’s the reason I became interested in developmental psychology. She’d always had cognitive difficulties.” He slips into the jargon of our specialty; I recognize the tactic well. Distance yourself from the truth with cool clinical labels, with case studies and experiments conducted in the safe remove of a laboratory. “Brilliant in many ways, challenged in others. I thought maybe if I knew more about it, I could help her more. If she wished it. But now…”
    He doesn’t have to finish. I know this story well. Now they are on the far side of Russia, in a resettlement village, or worse. Hard labor, the sort designed to burn off every ounce of bourgeois softness and convert it to fuel for the Revolution, for the spread of Russia’s glory, for just another five-year plan.
    â€œBut—but your gift.” I tilt my head. “Do you ever use it? To—to check on them. To see what’s happened, or know that they’re okay—”
    â€œNo.” The word falls like a gavel. “No. I refuse.”
    â€œWhy not?” I ask. “If I could, if I could know that—”
    â€œI can’t.” Andrei shakes his head, again and again. “It’s not possible.”
    There’s something too tight in his expression, throbbing like a headache. I can’t place it. “What do you mean?”
    â€œBecause I’ve forgotten what they look like.”
    Something in his tone makes it clear to me that he chose to forget. “I’m afraid that if I look at them again … I won’t ever want to stop.”
    My hand falls away from his knee, from this all too familiar sentiment, and I grip my shins tight. I’m not the only one who refuses to look back.
    The air crackles, static, anxious; for a