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It was eerie to know Mom’s blood had rubbed off of me and onto her.
Seeing the mammoth of a man being so gentle suddenly had my mind drifting back…
I pulled the curtain to the side. “Uncle Liam.”
He was rinsing the cloth, leaving a blood ring in the sink. “Yeah?”
My stomach rolled at the sight and what I was realizing. “He held her like you.”
Gaining concern, Liam’s head tilted as his head drew back. “What do ya mean?”
I gestured to the fondness he was adoring Everleigh with. “He cared for her. He wasn’t going to hurt her.” I couldn’t believe I was just now seeing the truth. “In fact, he was gentle with her.”
Liam’s face paled as he stared at me… “Fuck.”
Chapter six
Daring Strangers
Elle
For me, being in shock was like being submersed in water. Still in the bed where I had been laid, I wasn’t struggling to breathe—the only thing my body could remember to do—but all sounds were completely muffled. Yes, it was like being under water and only wanting to look up, hoping to find a way to rise back to the surface. I stared at the ceiling above me, the paper leaves Mammy and I had creatively taped there. The paper, so simple to some, was my anchor—all I had to focus on to stay alive.
For as long as I could remember, that little bedroom had always been occupied by two. Now there was only one soul present. The foreign and isolating sensation was… horrific. My spirit was clueless as to how I would carry on without my pillar, the warmth that shielded me from the monster living right outside my door.
Eejit-Da eventually returned that night, finding me exactly as he had left me in the bed, with eyes that had forgotten how to blink, my trembling out of control. The paper leaves above were now a moving array of greens and browns. An array of memories and unknown futures.
Suddenly, a heap of blankets covered me. The weight faintly reminded me of how my arm was in anguish, but I was far more mesmerized by the stirring leaves above me. The sight was morphing into a false reality, appearing so real. Leaves now blew in a wind that simply didn’t exist in the bedroom. Maybe the false wind was my mind’s way of giving me an escape.
Maybe the pretend wind was an omen.
The next thing I can remember is a set of headlights briefly shining over my beautiful leaves on the ceiling…
Until this day, I had never been in the presence of another human, besides my mammy and Eejit-Da. The leaves stilled in an instant when I finally realized there was a stranger standing right next to my bed.
My eyes never moved from staring above, but I sensed him and saw his figure out of the corner of my sight. My whole body had locked up like a stiff board, unwilling to bend.
“She’s in shock,” said the stranger.
Frozen in so my layers of disbelief, I was on the edge of death. As he began to slowly pull back the upper part of my blankets, I moaned. I wanted this person to get away from me. My Eejit-Da had just been a part of my mother’s death. I had no clue as to how dangerous this stranger could be.
No more words were shared, or questions asked, before I felt a prick to my arm. Only a few seconds passed before my eyes slid shut and the leaves disappeared.
Being drugged was a much-needed mercy.
I don’t know how many hours passed, or what exactly was done to me while I slept, but I dreamt of countless stars in a black sky. I was beneath them, in awe of the balance of darkness and piercing light. Soon they began to move at a slow but intriguing pace. Then they merged, conforming into two large stars. Those two stars soon transformed into the most beautiful set of grey eyes that became all I could see.
They were all I wanted to see, because of what Mammy had said they would offer: trust.
Those eyes, looking like windows showing a beautiful view of light grey snow, became smaller, until I saw they belonged to a little boy with straight blond hair. His bangs almost covered the snowy greys I craved to see more of. Behind him, was a tree with large branches. It reminded me of the tree I had drawn and created in my bedroom. But his tree was… alive. Tangible, yet untouchable. The green leaves blew in the night as if he was standing in a storm.
No.
He was the storm.
Remarkably, I was pulled into his world.
Standing about ten feet in front of him, under the tree, I felt wet leaves under my feet. Just like the ones Mammy had laid in outside. Yet, here with the little boy who looked to be around ten, there was no rain to dampen them.
