The Silent Shadow || marvel

13- eliminate the youth

"Ow, that hurts!" Svetlana whined as she attempted to wriggle out of her father's grip.

James sat sideways in the driver's seat while Lana had her back against the middle console and faced the window in the passenger's seat. Her father was attempting to braid her short hair, but it proved to be a challenge due to its length.

Svetlana seemed to do anything besides stop fidgeting and moving around, which only made it more difficult and painful for the both of them.

"Why do you think it's hurting Lana, take an easy guess," James replied, only slightly irritated with the girl.

Svetlana replied in a series of incoherent Russian words that were washed out by her mumbling breath.

"What was that? English please."

"Because I am moving," Svet grumbled begrudgingly.

"Bingo! We got a winner here." He sarcastically praised as he finished off the first braid after what seemed like a dozen failed trials. " There we got one down."

"What a relief," Svetlana said in a monotonous voice.

"Yeah, yeah, you and me both."

The two had spent weeks in the small car together now. It was easy to say they had begun to get sick of each other.

Svetlana hated getting her hair braided almost as much as she hated what they fed her in Sokovia. Usually, James wouldn't even try to braid it as he knew the tantrum it would cause but it began to be necessary.

Over the years her hair had become wavier and more unruly than it was when she was a toddler. Because of its lack of cleanliness, it started to knot and tangle. If James didn't take care of it, it would start to look like a wild bird nest.

Lana was less than happy. Even when she was given the choice between two hairstyles, she tried to talk her way out of it before she even picked it.

Eventually, they settled on pigtail braids because she would look sorta bald with one long braid in the back.

As a grumpy Svet sat in the seat mercilessly squirming, her mind began to take a detour from her thoughts of HYDRA and bees.

"Papa I have a question." Svetlana started as she swatted her father's hand for the accidental scratching of her scalp.

"Sorry," James mumbled simultaneously as Svetlana. " 'Course you do, well I might have an answer, shoot."

That was a mistake on his part.

Before he could register what was happening, Svetlana surged from his grip and took hold of her notebook from the floor. They had stolen it two days ago on their second convenience store trip total.

"Svetlana!" James scolded.

"You told me I could ask my question, my questions in here." She shrugged innocently.

James simply sighed, he didn't have enough energy to argue with the child who always needed to be correct. 

"What's your question then." He said with an annoyed sigh.

Svet happily opened her notebook and flipped to the page where she had written down all her inquiries.

The page was titled 'Svetlana's Silly Questions' in purple glitter gel pen with all different types of flower doodles around it.

The entire page was written in Russian. It wasn't that Svet couldn't write in English- she was actually decently fluent, it was that she just simply preferred it.

Svetlana was an inciteful child, she longed to know many things and always seemed to have questions about everything, even if they made no sense at all.