“Austin?” I whispered, my face close to his. I could deny all I wanted, but I began to understand what I was experiencing. I was being punished in the worst way.
With a trembling, padded hand, I slipped it over his tiny one as I sat on the chair next to the bed. He was so cold, and if it weren’t for the machine saying otherwise, I would have thought he died hours ago. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I tried,”Austin’s adult voice whispered in my head.
Tears soaked my face as I leaned further into him. “You were just a little kid. This shouldn’t happen to little kids.”
His eyes snapped open, startling me enough that I jumped out of the chair. He stayed still, but the intensity and terror on his face drilled into me as the room and everything in it faded away. The hands on the clock spun so rapidly they lost form, time speeding along. People popped in and out of existence.
Finally, the clock slowed to normal, and I was in another room. The once little boy was a few years older now, his eyes open but not a lot behind them as he lay at an incline, a bit of dried crust along the corners of his cracked lips.
“How’s our patient today?” a middle-aged male doctor asked, looking through the charts. “I feel sorry for you. It’s been three years, you’re still in PVS, and we’re legally obligated to keep you alive.” The doctor’s tone was ice as he checked Austin’s vitals. The child was unresponsive. “Not even the worst people in the world should have to live like this, let alone a child.”
The doctor left the room, and I sat next to Austin, holding his slightly warmer hand again. Though he seemed awake, he wasn’tthere, letting out quiet moans every so often. This was agony.
“I’m so sorry, Austin.”
The child moaned again but continued to stare at the wall.
“Is this really what happened to you, or is this my guilt eating me alive?”
He turned until his eyes locked with mine, and all consciousness seemed to flood into him as he opened his mouth to speak.
Roscoe
This was weird. Don’t remember gettin’ high before going to bed, but as I sat in a pew surrounded by crazy motherfuckers screamin’ nonsense, I started having my doubts. Only the strongest shit would’ve made me comfortable being there. Still, no one seemed to notice a huge werewolf stinkin’ up the place. Then they brought out the snakes…
Why the hell did they have snakes in a church? Wasn’t that like inviting Satan or somethin’?
“‘Scuse me,” I said, clearing my throat as I scooted between the pew down a burgundy carpet. Still no one paid me mind as they hooted and hollered, jumping around while shakingcabasas and banging bead drums. Last time I’d seen something this insane, Darryl and I’d overdid it on the peyote tea in Sedona. That was sure aone-and-doneexperience, especially when we threw up all over each other.
As I neared the doors, a little boy near the altar, probably not more than seven, caught my gaze. He had thick, dark brown hair, neatly combed back while wearin’ his Sunday best. Just a plain white dress shirt with what looked like an oil stain, and a red tie with black slacks and those shiny dress shoes that always sounded squeaky when people would walk in ‘em. He was scared and crying, and I immediately noticed the bruises over his eyes and on his arms.
“The Holy Spirit keeps me safe, so too can it cast out demons of disobedience.”
The kid was shakin’ like a leaf, but he didn’t say nothin’ as the man approached him.
“In the name of the holy spirit, I cast you out.” The back of his hand slammed into the kid’s face, and he fell to the floor without a sound.
“Hey!” I shouted, runnin’ to the stage. I didn’t often get violent, but if I saw a grown man lay his hands on a child, all bets were off.
My fist went through him like he was made of air.
So Iwashigh. Never had a hallucination so real before.
The kid groaned and rubbed his head, and I knelt next to him to pick him up. For some reason, I could touch him. “You okay, kid?”
He shuffled away and wiped the tears from his eyes before looking up at me. “Roscoe?”
With a gasp, I let him go, and the whole room went dark and quiet. The way he said my name gave me chills. It was higher pitched, and he was holding back tears, but that was definitely Cody’s voice.
“No way,” I whispered as another hallucination appeared. I tried pinching myself, and it hurt, but it didn’t do nothin’ to snap me out of this.
Before I could blink, the church disappeared and a run-down mobile home just poofed into existence with me on the front lawn. There was trash everywhere, and the grass was overgrown. A rusted old Thunderbird sat under a big oak tree, its tires flat and windows broken, weeds and vines growin’ out of it. I’d seen neighborhoods like this before, and the kids that grew up in ’em never had good childhood stories.
A man and woman were yellin’ at each other inside the old, run-down home, glass shattering. Bein’ the nosy SOB I was, I couldn’t resist a good domestic disturbance. I’d lived on the streets near a few trailer parks, and it was always entertaining for days—when there weren’t no children involved.
When I opened the door, the smell of meth, weed, and alcohol hit me, really taking me back. The man looked like an older version of Cody, except he was sickly thin with messy long brown hair and a few missin’ front teeth and the rest of the teeth startin’ to rot. The woman had fairer skin and blond hair with bags under her sunken-in eyes. These were hallmark junkies, and just by lookin’ at the yellow tinge in the man’s sclera, he wasn’t long for this world.
