Cora Bloom’s Retribution
Alla Krasnova
Illustrator Виктория Короткова
© Alla Krasnova, 2025
© Виктория Короткова, illustrations, 2025
ISBN 978-5-0067-1539-4
Created with Ridero smart publishing system
Prologue
I can’t remember how many times I’ve rehearsed this scene: walking up to his castle, then walking in, then walking towards him. I don’t remember, how many times I ran this scene through my brain, in the same brain that… However, more on that later.
I imagined myself approaching it so many times that the scene started to exist on its own, as if it was already living in the future. A hundred times I went up to him and said: «So we met»,» and then came retribution. In my imagination (thank you for leaving me at least this), everythingе was exactly like that. Now that I’m standing outside this castle, my senses are a little blunted. If someone had seen me from the outside, they probably wouldn’t have realized that I was burning with a desire for retribution, because I probably looked unperturbed. My desire for retribution was so compressed in me that I looked like an impenetrable rock, because I was an ordinary young woman, Cora Bloom, who was once treacherously robbed of the right to control her life…
The first chapter
I remember that day as if it were yesterday. On that first day in June, I finished work rather late, because I was performing with the band «Krofft». I was working as a backup singer, and our band was invited to perform at a small party in a closed club. I worked very hard that day, although I can hardly stand noisy parties in night clubs where there is a large crowd of drunk people.
Initially, I wanted to be a solo singer, but I also enjoyed working on backing vocals in the band «Krofft». Along the way, I worked on my new album as an author and performer, and also – as a receptionist, because I had to live on something. Of course, I was exhausted. But that day had exhausted me so much that I forgot to change and went straight home in my stage dress. It was long, floor-length, silver in color, with open shoulders and a large slit almost to the waist.
The only way I knew I hadn’t changed in the car was when a man passed by and looked at me with a strange grin. Honestly, I didn’t care. The only thing that bothered me was that I forgot to take off the large silver earrings that pulled my ears. I thought I’d drive to the traffic light and take them off.
This first day of summer was not hot, and by the evening it was even colderе. The city lights and the smooth motion of the car usually calmed me down, but that night I just wanted to go home so I could fall on my bed and go to sleep. I was too lazy to change my clothes, and in a way I was glad to be alone, because I wouldn’t have to talk to anyone at home. As I drove in the car, my new song, written to break up with my boyfriend Artem, whom I once considered the love of my life, was spinning in my head.
When I started writing this song, weе were still dating, and when we broke up, I decided that I would definitely finish it as a sign of our love, as a parting gift to him and myself too. I finished it in my head, and all I had to do was record it in the recording studio, so that I could consider it a fait accompli in my biography.
Artyom and I haven’t had much contact in recent months. We broke up, however, because of my creativity, or rather my busy schedule, where he was not the first number. He just didn’t like that I was never around. We argued on this ground, then looked for compromises. I tried to solve this problem, but there were only twenty-four hours in the day, and there was no room for Artyom there either dayеor night. I suffered, but when he left, I was relieved. I felt that he was offended with me. In a way, I wanted to earn his forgiveness with a new song.
The last thing I remember from that road, or rather – , that life of mine, is how I stopped at a traffic light, then took off my earrings. There was my big bright red bag on the seat next to me, and I reached for it to put my earrings in it. I thought I was distracted from the road for a second, and it was enough to divide my life into before and after. I didn’t remember anything else.
I was later told at the hospital that there were several ambulances and police cars. My car was soft-boiled because a black Jeep crashed into it at full speed. I didn’t remember the Jeep or the driver who was driving it. When I opened my eyes in the hospital bed, this melody was playing in my head, this new song that I wrote for my ex, but I didn’t know that along with this melody, I would say goodbye not only to the man I loved, but also to my entire past life.
At the hospital, I was told that I was miraculously alive, that in such a collision, no one survives. I was told that when the police arrived, looking at my car, squeezed into an accordion, the police asked: TheГде труп? corpseshould have been me. Somehow, miraculously, all the airbags in my car went off that day, so I was still alive. I was told that the driver of the black Jeep died on the spot from injuries.
At the hospital, I was constantly told that I was very lucky and that I should be glad that I was still alive. But I didn’t react to the words. If earlier I hadboth an incentive and motivation to live to the fullest, I had ambitions, but after the accident I realized that not only my body, but also my life had fallen into disrepair. I couldn’t feel my right arm, it was just dangling from the side. I didn’t understand how you could perform and play guitar, pick up music without your right hand. I didn’t want to be pitied on stage, it was too humiliating for me. It was the end, all my plans were ruined at the moment of collisionandI. In the hospital, I just lay there and stared at the ceiling, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t get out of bed, I didn’t have the strength. My speech was slow – either because of the medication I was being given or because of a traumatic brain injury, and my head was bandaged.
No one visited me, there was simply no one to visit. I broke up with my boyfriendе, and I’ve never had a relationship with seven before. I didn’t want to think about being looked for at work, partly blaming them for what had happened, because I worked too hard for them. This frenzied work schedule was driving me crazy, even though I signed up for it myself.
Now I didn’t have a job, and I had nowhere to go back to, because my rented apartment wouldn’t have been empty for so long. The owner of the apartment was previously dissatisfied with the fact that music sounds in her apartment at night, which neighbors complained to her about. So I’m sure she was relieved that I didn’t come back, and now the apartment can be rented out to more disciplined people who won’t sing at night and play the guitar. In the hospital where I was lying, there were no mirrors, I didn’t have a phone, it was taken away. All the staff were dressed in greenish clothing, although I had previously thought that doctors went exclusively in white. From the hallway, I heard one of the nurses on the phone say that she wouldеbe coming home soon. That last word shot right through me, and it did what the Jeep that rammed my car didn’t. The word «home» just killed me mentally, because now I had nowhere to go back to. The only thing that saved, me was that when I tried to recall events from my past life, I realized that I didn’t remember much. At the time, I thought it was for the best.
Periodically, I thought I didn’t want to see people at all. So I didn’t even ask when I would be released from this hospital, or if I would be released at all. In case I was desperate – , there were bars on the windows. But this was an excessive measure, because I didn’t even have the strength to go to the window. I didn’t know what I looked like, I didn’t feel the time, and I was kind of glad that no one from my old life reminded me of themselves, as if they didn’t exist at all, so, I didn’t lose anything.
It was in this state that I met him. I remember the day I saw him. It was an ordinary, unremarkable day, blending in with the previous days spent in the hospital. If I had been told that I had spent a year in the hospital, I would have easily believed it, but in fact, at that time, I had spent almost two weeks there. I didn’t know what time of day it was, whether it was evening or morning, or what day of the week it was, I didn’t care,