I picked up the book again, feeling the cold weight of the metal-the pages saturated with madness-pressing on me. My fingers nervously fingered the pages, and my gaze picked out every letter, every word, like poison slowly penetrating the blood. I returned to that same "fanfreak", rereading those vile lines over and over again. And with every word, the hatred for the author, for that psycho, Vitaly Ivolginsky, grew like a black cloud, ready to swallow me whole.
Yes, yes, yes! I hated him. I hated him through the lines of his madness. Every word, every description, every detail he left seemed to me an attempt to drag me into this hell he had plunged himself into. I felt his presence, his smell, as if he were here, next to me, sitting and laughing. Laughing at me because I had become his prisoner, part of his game, without even knowing it.
I cursed every page, cursed his sick fantasy, his dirty dreams, his immoral thoughts that he tried to convey to me through these absurd words. He made me believe that I knew him, that I myself had become a part of him, that I was not just a witness to his madness, but also its continuation. Every word from his "fanfreak" made me think of how he sat in his dirty room, in his obscurantist world, and believed that his words and thoughts could revive something living, that they could penetrate someone else's soul and tear it apart as if it were his own.
I burned each letter as if it were a living being that I had to destroy. But instead of destroying it, I felt its words taking over me. The hatred I felt for the Vitaly's turned into rage. I couldn't just read anymore-I wanted to destroy everything, rip out each letter and strangle it so that it could no longer threaten me.
I leafed through the book with trembling hands, trying not to look at the pictures. However, something inside me made me continue. I couldn't tear myself away from this strange feeling that I needed to see everything, to the last, despite the horror that grew with each glance. And then I came across the picture again.
She was the same as the previous ones. The same girl in a brown dress, with brown hair, sitting, standing or just standing in some frozen position. It would seem that there was nothing unusual. But what she was holding in her hands made me literally freeze.
She held a small piece of paper in both hands. It wasn't just a piece of paper, it was something I felt with my whole being. I couldn't figure out what was on it, but something in the girl's gaze and her posture made me not dare to look. A sense of danger, as if something... something unimaginably bad was waiting for me if I looked.
I recoiled, throwing the book aside as if it were a snake I had just grabbed by the tail. My heart was pounding, my breath was ragged. I sat there, stunned, unable to move. I didn't even have the strength to stand up and pick up the book. It seemed to me that the room had become darker, the air heavier, and I was alone in some kind of tormented dream that would not end.
I was afraid to look again. Afraid to see what was written on that piece of paper. I didn't know what it could be, but I had one feeling - something I definitely shouldn't know.
Then I stood up, walked to the window and tried to clear my thoughts. My hand was shaking when I touched the glass. I tried to understand what had happened. But something in me was drawn to return to the book, to pick it up again and turn the page. I felt my anxiety growing, somehow pulling me into this world in which I had not been the master of my thoughts for a long time.
I held the book in my hands, feeling a tremor run through my fingers. My gaze clung to the words that Vitaly Ivolginsky had left, and everything inside me shrank with horror. I couldn't believe what I saw. I was afraid to even breathe, afraid that if I made even the slightest movement, this book would somehow suck me in, capture me, and not let go.
On the piece of paper the girl in the picture was holding was a huge, ugly, screaming message. The words weren't just text. They were like a knife stabbing into me.
"ASIA VIEIRA, I LOVE YOU!" these words were written with such terrible persistence, with such manic desire, that I felt a cold wave of fear roll over me.
I froze, unsure what to do. Every word on that page seemed to be burned into my brain. I could tell this was crazy, that this was a psychopath I shouldn't argue with, but… but this text was personal. It was something that didn't belong to me, that shouldn't be in my life. And it spoke directly to my wife.
I closed my eyes, trying to exhale, but everything inside me was seething. I imagined Vitaly Ivolginsky, that freak, standing there writing these lines, and my heart sank with rage. If he were nearby, I wouldn't be able to hold back. I would kill him.
I turned the page and found that the book continued. But I didn't want to read. Everything I saw was about this mania, this monstrous distortion of feelings for my wife. I put the book down, deciding that I couldn't look at it anymore. But that didn't mean I forgot what I had just seen.
The feeling filled me, took over completely. I felt my thoughts starting to get confused, and fear was taking over me again. I couldn't trust my eyes anymore. Everything I knew up until that moment was now in question. And I no longer knew what would happen next.
I sat there, holding the book in my hands, trying to comprehend what was happening. My thoughts were all jumbled up in my head, and with every glance at the pages I felt an unimaginable anger and anxiety overflowing within me. I literally felt like every word on those pages was burning out of my mind, leaving only emptiness, hatred, and fear. At that moment, I felt like I would tear the book apart. I wanted to just destroy it, throw it away, and forget that I ever picked it up.
I could hardly contain myself. Because part of me understood: the book was not written by Vitaly Ivolginsky. It was not him. It was an anonymous psychologist. A psychologist who, despite all his efforts, could not pull his patient out of the abyss of madness, could not give him freedom. This "anonymous" was not to blame for Ivolginsky's abominations, was not responsible for his mental state. But… how then could I come to terms with the fact that I had to read these lines, descriptions that turned my understanding of everything that was happening upside down?
I felt a crushing weight growing inside me. The book became a link between what I knew and what I didn't want to know. Everything I saw, all those horrible details, all the strange events that formed in people's heads, it was like an unimaginable nightmare from which I could not wake up.
But I knew that if I kept reading, if I kept absorbing this information, I would never be able to shake it off. I found myself lost in my thoughts over and over again, wondering who could have described this sick man like that and why. Why did this psychologist, anonymous, decide to make these horrible notes? Why did he keep me on the edge of reality and madness for so long?
I sat, clutching the book tightly in my hands, and my heart beat anxiously, like a hammer that drives into iron. I wanted to tear it, rip it to pieces, get rid of it all. These words, these terrible, tormenting words, did not give me peace. I felt how hatred for Ivolginsky, and along with it for this anonymous psychologist, overwhelmed me, like a rage that was impossible to control.
Every word, every detail, they screamed out an unbearable truth, shocking and tearing apart my perception of reality. At that moment, I truly wanted nothing more than to get rid of this nest of horror, this book that held me captive.
My hands were shaking, I felt the book losing its shape, the pages giving in to the pressure. Everything inside me screamed: tear it up! Don't let this enter your world, don't let these horrors exist in your mind! But... I couldn't. I couldn't, because I knew that if I tore the book, I would not only tear it up, I would tear up the reality itself that would not leave me alone. I would tear up my world, because I would never be able to return to what had been before.
I couldn't hold back any longer. The pain that was gnawing at me with every page of this book became unbearable. Each paragraph was like a nail being driven into my soul. I sat there, clutching the book in my hands, and two feelings were fighting inside me: rage and madness. I couldn't look at these pictures, these words, these terrible messages any longer.
And then, finally, I couldn't stand it. I tore out the page with the picture. On it was the same girl who had been haunting me throughout the book. In her hands was a piece of paper. And on it, like an ulcer, was written:
"Asia Vieira, I love you!"
I didn't think anymore. I just grabbed the page and greedily, as if it could rid me of the nightmare, I began to tear it into pieces. I heard the pages cracking, how they made a soft crunch, how the words disappeared in my hands, how they flew into the air, dissolving.
Each piece of paper, each torn word, felt like a release. But once I did, I realized that I no longer had a book in my hands, just a handful of small, torn pieces. I felt a slight emptiness, as if by tearing this part, I had lost something important. And in that moment, anxiety overtook me. What if this page was not just part of a nightmare? What if this was the final key to understanding what was happening?
I wanted to burn these pieces. To destroy them completely, to make them disappear, but there was no lighter. In the hospital room where I found myself, there was no fire, no way to destroy these last traces. I threw the torn pieces on the floor, but even this act did not bring me relief. Now that the paper was torn, there was only the restless air and the dull feeling that something was gone from me forever.
I couldn't stop. I tore the paper, tore it with such fury that each piece seemed to me the embodiment of pain and humiliation. Inside, I was screaming. My inner voice was bursting with rage, with hatred. Vitaly Ivolginsky… this psycho, this maniac, he defiled my wife! DISHONORED HER! He used her name, her image, as a toy for his perverted fantasy. He was alien to her, alien to me, alien to everything I knew and loved about her. I couldn't understand how he could do this. Why her? Why did she become the target of his abnormal attraction?
"YOU INSULTED MY WIFE! YOU DISHONORED HER IN FRONT OF EVERYONE!" I screamed in my head, yelled, and this made me feel even worse.
Every time I tried to imagine this man, this freak, writing her name on paper, I felt like her dignity, her identity, all of it had been ripped away from her. She didn't deserve it. Not at all. And I couldn't just accept it.
I tore, tore so hard that my hands started to bleed, clinging to the paper without noticing the pain. The text he had written was more than just words to me. It was an attack. An attack on my wife, on her honor. I couldn't stop, I couldn't let go of this hatred. But despite everything I had done to the paper, there was no relief inside me. The feeling of emptiness didn't go away. On the contrary, it grew stronger.
I sat there, surrounded by scraps of paper, torn text, pieces of torn words. My hands were shaking, my heart was pounding so hard it felt like it was about to burst out of my chest. An ocean of rage was raging inside me, and I could no longer hold back this torrent. I got up from the bed, my face distorted with pain and anger, and without thinking, without reflecting, I screamed, my voice breaking with rage:
"Vitaly Ivolginsky, come out, you creature, I'll kill you!"
My scream echoed in the empty hospital room, but no one answered. Only silence, oppressive, suffocating, like a heavy blanket. I knew that this man was gone, that he had long since left this world. He had hanged himself, leaving behind only a shadow of his sick fantasies, but in my head he lived on. He continued to exist there, in these papers, in these words that his hands had once written.
I grabbed the remains of the page again, squeezing it in my hands as if it could somehow destroy the very essence of this man. But nothing changed. Vitaly Ivolginsky, like a phantom, continued to haunt me, and his presence in my life remained.
I sank back onto the bed, my heart still pounding in my chest. I wanted to kill him, but he was just a shadow. A shadow I had created for myself.
I sat in the darkness, shaking, trying to cope with the inner chaos, when suddenly something moved in front of me. At that moment, it seemed to me that I was going crazy again, that this was a continuation of the nightmare, but no... it was reality.
Under the table, almost unnoticed, he appeared. Vitaly Ivolginsky. Crouched like a rat, he sat, surrounded by shadow, and made sounds that sounded more like a squeak than human speech. He did not look me in the eye - instead, his gaze was focused on something invisible, somewhere in the void. I realized: he was like an animal that had lost all human features.
He was exactly as I had imagined. His fat body, as if covered in fat, took up all the space, his greasy hair was matted together, and the huge glasses he wore seemed too big for his face. He was not a man - he was a monster. His teeth were like stones, they stank of rot, and his body gave off such a smell that I wanted to go up to him and strangle him, just to get rid of this nightmare.
I froze. My heart sank. He was still sitting under the table, as if waiting for something, like an animal in a cage, not daring to come out into the light.
And then he began to make sounds, more like that very squeak that I heard in my nightmares. It seemed that this sound was coming not from him, but directly from the world itself, from its depths. This was not just a man, but a creation of horror, created by me, my thoughts and fears.
He suddenly slid closer, and I, unable to restrain myself any longer, rushed forward. But instead of colliding with him, I fell to the floor, finding myself again in the darkness, where his face - all distorted and vile - continued to be before me like an irresistible shadow.
"You're here after all..." I whispered, but there was no answer, only another squeak, like from a dying animal.
I rose to my feet, clenching my fists. The words were stuck in my throat, but the rage was raging inside me. This horror, this man, or whatever it had once been, should not exist.
I couldn't hold back any longer. All those weeks of torment, all the thoughts that had tormented me in the hospital ward, suddenly burst out. I was no longer a man, but an animal, ready to destroy everything that had once seemed alive. And here he was - Vitaly Ivolginsky, this monster who had poisoned my life, now sitting under the table, hunched over like a small creature.
My hands were clenched into fists, and my heart was pounding. I didn't remember how I got to the table. My legs were light with fear and rage, and the hospital slippers, strangely soft and quiet, could not hide what I was about to do.
I kicked him. Hard. He didn't move, but he still made that same sound, a squeak like a grinding noise that almost made me gag. I kicked him again. And again. And again.
At that moment, I felt like I was exploding. My eyes were dark with rage, and all the words I was trying to hold back were spilling out. I screamed, not caring if anyone could hear me, not caring about the pain in my chest.
"What, creature, do you think I won't find you? Do you think you've forgotten everything? You're a nobody! You don't belong here, you don't belong on this earth! You're not even a human being, you're a cesspool, a dirty animal! Why haven't you died when you should have?"
He didn't answer. He just kept squeaking, like a rat hiding in a corner. He was weak, helpless, and I enjoyed it. Every movement, every twitch of his body, was like some kind of justification for my rage. He was guilty. He was always guilty.
"You still dared to write to her! You dared... You..." I continued to scream, but the words no longer made sense. All these sick thoughts that I had been carrying for so long were bursting out.
I had never felt like that moment. I was furious, and there was nothing that could stop me. I wanted him to feel every blow, every word, every emotion I carried inside me. He was my nightmare, and now that nightmare had to go away.
I kicked him non-stop, not stopping for a second. Every word that came out of my throat was like a blow, every insult like a hissing iron that I thrust into his body. He only curled up even more, clenched like a wild rat, but I couldn't stop. He wasn't a person to me, he was just a disgusting shadow haunting me, and I had to tear him out of my world.
"Did you think that anyone would feel sorry for you, freak?" I screamed, continuing to kick him. "You are not a man, you are a nobody! Even if she saw all this - the songs, the letters, the pictures... She would tear you apart too! She would kick you like me, because you, Vitaly Ivolginsky, are the most disgusting person in the world! You disgraced her, you poisoned her life, and you still dared to believe that you would get away with it!"
His squeaks grew quieter, as if he was trying to disappear, as if he hoped I would forget everything. But I didn't. I will never forget what he did. I remembered every word he said, every line he said, every song he wrote about her, about my Asia. I saw her face in my mind, how she would look at it, and I even imagined how she would hit him, like I did now, without mercy.
"You ruined everything, you idiot! You could have just disappeared, but you kept writing, drawing, trashing her name! You didn't even understand that she would never be yours, that you were just a black spot in her past that she had erased long ago! You're a freak! You're no good! You're a sick creature!" I continued, unable to stop, I was so torn apart by anger.
He stopped beeping. He just sat there, under the table, in a pose like an animal that I could watch forever. But I knew I had to stop. I knew I couldn't lose what little human control I had.
I was already screaming, unable to contain everything that was building up inside me. My screams echoed in the empty hospital room, and the air around me was filled with rage, pain, and helpless hatred. I couldn't hold back any longer.
"Do you hear me, Ivolginsky?" I continued, my voice became rough, almost inhuman. "You ruined yourself! You chose this path yourself! Did you think that she would ever pay attention to you? She was never yours! You are nothing, you are just dirt that needs to be cleaned out of her life! You destroyed everything!"
I ran to the table again, bent down, and kicked him again. He didn't try to defend himself anymore. He didn't move, he just sat there like a pathetic, disgraced shadow. It wasn't just my outrage, it was an ocean of pain that I couldn't contain anymore. All I wanted was for him to disappear. For nothing to remain that would remind me of this crazy man who had ruined the lives of many, including mine.
"You deserve it!" I screamed, not noticing how my voice had become hoarse and had lost all its strength. "Did you think she would be grateful to you? Did you think she would embrace you for all these letters and paintings? No, Ivolginsky! She hated you! And I hate you too!"
I froze again, looking at his lifeless body. His silence was a victory. But I knew I still couldn't calm down.
I screamed again, furiously, without holding back, and kicked him again, hoping to sate my hatred a little. And at that moment, something inside him must have snapped. He stretched out under the table, his body suddenly strange, motionless, and I heard a disgusting sound - his belly burst, like an overripe fruit, like an old bladder filled with heaviness and pressure.
I jumped back, not expecting it. My gaze fell on his body - it was no longer what I considered a man. I saw something viscous and foul, black and sticky, flowing out of his stomach, spreading across the floor. It was something horrible, something that could not belong to a living being. And probably it did not.
He remained there, under the table, barely moving. His skin had become grey and elongated, and his body seemed to have lost all shape. The stench that now filled the room was unbearable. I felt a cold shiver run down my spine.
I didn't know what to do. All I felt was overwhelming disgust and shock. I didn't know if he had ever been a real person, or if his existence was just part of some delusion that was tormenting me.
But I couldn't stop and dared to look under the table. As soon as my eyes met what was left of Ivolginsky, that vile, hideous mass, a fog immediately rose before my eyes. The stench was unbearable. Inhaling it, I felt my chest tighten, tears prickle in my eyes, but I couldn't look away. What I saw was so disgusting that every muscle in my body protested against me standing and looking at it.
Ivolginsky, if it was him at all, had disintegrated into pieces, his body a lithe, shapeless thing filled with black liquid that was now spilling across the floor. The fabric of his clothes, once dirty and worn, was now falling apart like old rags, under the influence of something I couldn't understand.
There was more than just the smell of decay coming from his body - it was something far worse. It was the smell of destruction, as if every element of his existence had begun to disintegrate into molecules. There was no trace of humanity, no sign of life. Only this disgusting, horrific mess that now occupied the place where a man had once been.
I couldn't breathe. It felt like the walls of the room were closing in around me, like the air was getting heavier, like it was being filled with some dark entity that was trying to suffocate me. I took a step back, almost tripping, and then, unable to bear it any longer, I ran out of the room.
I didn't know what prompted me to look there. Maybe at some point I became curious, or I wanted to finish what I had started. But now I knew - there was no point in prying if there was something hidden behind it that shouldn't be in this world.