“Living like that at any age is horrific, but as a kid… it swallowed me. Devoured and ripped into me. Being terrified of the dark and having no way to get any light.” She pauses. “It wasn’t a great time. Then it began to change. My brain altered. I guess from so much isolation, but my brain personified it. It started talking to me. It warped into something that brought me comfort. Lewis couldn’t always be there with me, and I suppose it was a self-preservation thing.
“It brought me solace in a place where no such thing existed. The pitch-black didn’t seem so bad, after I realised every time light flooded that cell, it always meant pain. It always meant something that would leave a scar. The darkness never did that. Sure, it was scary, but it can’t actually hurt you. It’s not a tangible thing. It never left a single scar on my body. Or my heart.”
Jesus Christ. What am I supposed to say to that? I had no idea her life was… like that. Even seeing her in that state when I picked her up. I just couldn’t have imagined.
“Would you ever get them covered up?” I stupidly ask. “Tattoo over them? So you don’t have to look at them.”
“No,” she says with earnest.
“Why?” It can’t be good for her to be constantly reminded of that shit.
“So I never forget.”
I look out to the horizon, painted in the pinks and purples of a new day, mulling this over. I believe I know that feeling better than anyone. I stay silent for too long, scrambling for the right words to say to her and distracted by my own drifting thoughts, because she adds, “So yeah, I guess sometimes I think it’s Lewis, because he never hurt me either.”
I run a hand down my face while I dabble with my next words. She’s tried more than once to talk about our brothers, to attempt to share her grief with me, perhaps bond over it. I always shut her down. I don’t mind talking about Max, I just can’t talk about him dying.
She interjects my growing anxiety over starting a new subject by doing it herself. “Did he look like you? I’ve seen the pictures on the mantelpiece and around the house, but you both look a lot younger.”
I nod. “We had the same eyes, hair and skinny build. Dad was so mad neither of his sons inherited the bulky Blackwood genes. Max didn’t get the height though; he never made it past six feet.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah. Think that was why he was so short-tempered.”
My attempt at humour earns me a small, sharp exhale.
“Lewis was tall. I think about your height. It’s funny how our parents seem so huge when we’re kids, but Lewis overtook Dad at sixteen. Then Dad didn’t seem so big.” She pauses. “Lewis was big. But that’s because he trained so hard. The Valor genes aren’t blessed like that. Lewis refused to look as puny as Dad. He trained like a beast. At least I thought he did until I saw Alfie and Fiz in the gym.”
I exhale sharply through my nose, light amusement in it as my nerves seem to settle. “They’re pretty intense in that place.”
“I don’t see you in there often.”
“I’m in there a lot. Just before you wake up.”
“Why so early?”
I twiddle my nose piercing. “Me and sleep have never had a great relationship.”
“Why?”
I shrug one shoulder. “Just never have.”
The car fills with silence again and I want to slap my forehead. This is the most I’ve talked to her, most I’ve talked about Max in a while too. I can’t quell this need to keep talking.
Elodie shared something with me tonight, maybe I can do the same for her.
I take a deep breath. “You know, it was Max’s idea to kill criminals.”
Her body shifts as she looks at me. I keep my eyes on the road. “Really? So you killed random people before that?”
I purse my lips. “Yes. Until Max, our family killed random people, no matter the background. It was Max who demanded we change it. When he got old enough to join the job, he refused to kill just anyone. He had more of a moral compass than Dad, who wasn’t best pleased.”
“It’s hard to believe the guy I’ve met is the soulless, evil killer.”
I lick my teeth. “Yeah. Dad’s not what he makes out to be, that’s for sure. It caused a big problem between us. It was much harder to get hold of specific people, much less actually find out who deserved to die.”
“How did your brother convince your dad?”
