10.3 Confusion

"I'm going to pay the three thousand euros a month," he finally says.

"Nils, that's crazy! Three thousand euros? Where are you going to find it?" Yomo couldn't contain himself.

"She knows very well that I'm rich! That's why she's asking me for it, and she won't let me go until I give it to her!"

"Your family is rich, not you! It's your parents who are rich!"

"So what? What does it matter to her? My parents or me, it's the same thing!" replied Nils with the same harshness.

"No, it's not the same thing! Are you going to ask your father for the three thousand euros? The same father who made you leave the family house to live on your own because he thinks of you as an embarrassment? Because you were Inja's victim and she forced you into prostitution?"

Yomo couldn't take it anymore. He didn't understand why his friend was so intent on getting involved in a situation far beyond him. Nils tightened his fingers on his arms at the mention of his stormy relationship with his father.

"And what do you want me to do? Live every day in fear that she could hurt you or Jin at any moment? That she can take it out on my loved ones to make me give in? If it's just money, I could always get it somehow, but losing you or my family is something else! Once people are gone, it's too late to regret!" Nils replied in the same tone.

Seeing the tension rise between his two friends, Jin tried to intervene to calm them down. But it was too late. Yomo was aware that Nils' concerns were justified, but he refused to see him submit to this crazy woman at the risk of putting himself in an even more dangerous situation because of his family situation. Even if the chase this afternoon had also made him realise how much closer the danger was to them than he wanted to believe, he refused to accept that his friend should take all the responsibility for the situation on his shoulders. It was far too dangerous!

Nils for his part could no longer bear the idea of seeing his friends and family threatened by his fault, whether he was close to them or not. Even his father, who had disowned him less than a year earlier out of offense at seeing his name sullied by a police investigation and a mafia scandal, Nils was anxious to know that he was threatened by the presence of an entity as unpredictable as the Matron. And even though he knew it was all Inja's fault and not his, he couldn't forgive himself for having been so easily manipulated.

"You told me yourself you would never give in to her blackmail! You told me you knew it'd be useless to give her money as she's too crazy to be reliable! Are you going back on your words? Now that you're facing danger for real, you're losing all your common sense! Do you even listen to you talking ?"

Yomo was enraged. He hated it. He hated the fact that he was yelling at his friend like that, but he hated the way he was acting even more. As if he understood Yomo's anger unconsciously, Nils didn't budge. He answered him, still sitting down on the floor, gripping his arms around his knees.

"I'm a grown-up, Yomo, I can make decisions on my own! If I want to pay her, that's my problem and not yours!"

Yomo started walking around the room like a lion in a cage.

"And what's that going to change? You're going to pay her three thousand euros a month and then what? You think she'll leave us alone? How do you know she won't ask you for more from one day to the next?"

"If I make a deal with her, I can make sure she'll leave us alone! It's a mafia business, if I pay them they'll keep their promises!"

Nils was staring at the tall, dark-haired man who towered over him. Jin tried to come between them but the powder had taken. It was too late. Tempers had flared too much to be calmed with words.

"A business?" said Yomo, who had no control over his anger. "One does not make deals with the devil, Nils! You're losing out on this deal you want to make, can't you see that? All she'll do is take your money and keep threatening you when she wants more!"

Unable to contain himself any longer, Yomo walked up and down the small room more ragingly.

"Protecting your loved ones? And why do you think she sent you a cat head today if not to make you understand that she can kill anyone she wants whenever she wants? That won't change because you'll pay her money every month!"

"Yomo that's enough!" Jin raised his voice, calming the two angry ones down at once. "Go home, I'll take care of Nils. We'll talk about this tomorrow. But for now, you two stop acting like two-year-olds!"

His outburst was followed by a stunned silence. Without another word, Yomo left the room like a storm. Passing through the police officers who were packing up their gear, ready to leave, he quickly made his way out and down the stairs four at a time. He needed to let out the anger that had built up inside him.

He was angry with himself. He couldn't help but loop his discussion with Nils in his mind and tell himself that he had screwed up. But what more could he do? His friend was unreasonable and it was impossible to make him come back to his sense! How could anyone be so stubborn!

Biting his lip, he continued his brisk walk to the metro to go home. Putting his headphones in his ears, he closed his eyes to try to think of something else, but nothing helped. He knew he had done wrong but felt powerless against his friend's bad choices. It was so frustrating!

Letting himself be carried along by the underground train, he tried to clear his mind by letting the steady speed of the machine lull him home. Once there, he would have another problem to deal with: Rau. He sighed. Today was definitely not his day.