I need you like a heart needs a beat (Dainen x Luxury)

Chapter 45 'Running from Myself'

   Dainen is at the Moscow Russian Mafia building and he walks out his office that once belonged to Abagor Golobev four and a half years ago. People that pass by Dainen bow to him and Dainen nods his head a little. The Russian Mafia looks almost just like when Dainen was kidnapped there. The same furniture, carpet, wall paint, and home-like decorations. Dainen even left family pictures of the Golobev family on the walls for memories. Then, of course, Dainen put a family portrait of him, Luxury, and baby Alek on his wall in his office.

The framed picture of Dainen in the chair and the boys, Ace, Luxury, and Sophia around him from when they were in Korea is on his desk. Dainen even had pictures of Vlad's family he put up in Vlad's office at the Russian Mafia building to surprise him, which made Vlad really happy. There was only a few pictures of Vlad's family he could find that was in good shape, but it still made Vlad happy since he hasn't seen their faces since they were killed.

When Dainen walks in his office at the Russian Mafia, sometimes he forgets he's not a seventeen year old boy captured by Abagor anymore. Sometimes, he'll walk in his office and he sees Abagor sitting at the desk staring at him. Dainen left Ace's bedroom and his home part of the Mafia building where the Golobev family stayed alone. Everything in Ace's old room is the same as Ace left it, and Dainen won't let anyone in there.

Dainen stands in the hallway and stares at the white painted door that leads to Ace's old room he grew up in. Dainen slowly puts his shaky hand up to the doorknob, but stops before touching it.

He hasn't been in there since Ace took him in there to hide from Abagor, and Ace was trying to help him escape the Mafia for the 58th time. That was when Dainen was seventeen and Ace was sixteen. Eleven whole years ago...

Dainen leans against the hall wall across from Ace's old room door and slides his back down to the floor with a deep sigh, sitting down. Dainen stares at the plain looking door and closes his eyes while remembering his old friend.

"Sometimes it's hard to think you're really never coming back, Ace." Dainen says, still with his eyes closed. "Sometimes... I'll walk in the garden outside the Mafia building your mother planted, and I expect to see you smelling the red and white roses your mother loved."

Dainen opens his eyes and looks down at the floor while talking out loud.

"I think all the time about you when I come to Russia to work, and that's why I try not to come here very much. I get into my thoughts and I can't help but think... 'I could have saved you.' I pass by your door everytime I come here, even if it's on the opposite side of the building I'm going to."

Dainen puts his hand on his head and laughs softly at himself.

"I don't know why I'm even over here talking to you. You're probably not even listening or you're just thinking I'm being foolish for trying to talk to a dead person. I'd go to your headstone in the graveyard to talk to you, but I just can't bring myself to go there. I haven't been since your funeral... Sorry, Aleksander... I'm not the best friend, am I?"

Dainen looks at Ace's old bedroom door and imagines Ace sitting with his back against the door, staring at him.

"I try to think you're still alive and I just can't see you for a while like when V and I left Russia. when we couldn't contact you for a few years... I try and forget you're really gone, but when I come here, I remember..." Dainen tells the hallucination of Ace in front of him. "I know if I go in your room, that it will seem even more real that you're gone. It'll really mean you aren't ever coming back..."

It's quiet until a voice comes into Dainen's mind.

"Then just don't go in my room."

Dainen stares at the figure of Ace in front of him.