There had been rumors that he’d been sodomized with an unidentified object, and if it were true, I had hoped more so now than ever, that he had felt the final act touch the tip of his lungs.
I was four at the time. I had no recollection of the grim murders, though, when you grow up in a town as small as Devil’s Peak, it isn’t long before you hear about the women that haunt these concrete walls.
They had been called theunluckyones, the ones that had been doomed into despair. I called bullshit on that though. They weren’t unlucky. They were hunted by a psychopath, had their lives stolen by a monster that had an obvious disdain for women.
Then…and now.
My stomach balls tighter.
I place my case on the ground and take a seat on the dry patch of concrete that’s further back from the murky pool of water. I hang my wrists over my drawn knees, heaving out a weighted sigh, my skull connecting with the carved, gritty rock behind me. The thud that follows echoes loudly, as does the high-pitched static tone of a soulful memory,a vibrant voice.
I pinch my eyes closed, run my trembling hands down the length of my face before reaching for the case. Snatching up my black notebook from the front pocket, along with the red ink pen that lay beside it, I shove it between my teeth and hook myshoulder-length hair behind my ears. My fingers quiver as I flick through the pages until the first blank page appears.
I scribble the words,Severed Veins, at the top, underlining it until the ink barrel pierces the thin, unlined paper. Then, I whisper beneath my breath, “You were never a number.” My pen moves across the paper, my grip stiff. “A bright spirit of wonder.”
The decibels of my voice remain low, anger flicking at the base of my throat. “A soul that should have grown older.” I pause, allowing my gaze to fall to my right, and, extending my trembling palm outward, I touch the tip of my fingers to the fresh blood embedded in dried streams across the gritty shadow of gray that hadn’t yet been washed away.
My heart punches fiercely against my ribs, and my breath burns in my lungs. Shuffling comes from my left, but I don’t remove my hand. “An angel I should have kept closer.”
A zip shoots up my spine when a fist meets my tricep and I fall out of my stupor, finding my best friend at my side. His golden curls hang around his forehead, his icy eyes glossed over. He bites a guitar pick between his teeth and slides the guitar out of the case beside me. It takes him less than a minute to run it through a tune before he jerks his square jaw at the pen and notebook in my hands.
“Show me,” he whispers, though his tone is thick.
I repeat what I have written.
Low, a whisper.
You were never a number
A bright spirit of wonder
A soul that should have grown older
An angel I should have kept closer
Harlen Graves plucks a few harrowing notes, and I shiver when the minor chords deepen the chill seeping through the cracks in my bones.
Was it too soon?
I snap the notebook closed, throwing it down to my left with a deep breath, drawing my knees closer to my chest. Acid burns through my stomach.
I watch Harlen out of the corner of my eye; he has stopped playing. He places the guitar on top of the case. “Rusty was asking about you before I left this morning.” Rusty is Harlen’s father—one of the good ones.He shuffles backward until he’s resting against the concrete, the same way I am. “He made a fuck load of food thinking you were still in your room.” A pause. “He’s worried about you, man. All the?—”
I don’t give him the chance to finish. “I’m fine.”
Harlen nods, then does it again. I know he doesn’t believe me though.
He skates a hand through his hair. “You can lie to me all you want, but you can’t lie to him.” His voice is a shallow rasp.
I pop both thumb knuckles, and pull a breath through my lungs.
Silence hums between us, and when neither of us speaks, I drag my skull across the concrete, my scalp digging into the sharp grain until my searing eyes level with my best friends. Because I knew he wasn’t done yet.
Harlen is chewing on the guitar pick, and he speaks around it, “We know loss, bro, and right now, burying it might…” I begin to register every second word. “Easier…”
Something pinches in my chest, a flame of annoyance sparking. A fist punching.
“Does this look like I’m fucking b-b-burying it?” I stumble over my words, stuttering in my frustration, and yet guiltwhispers, because me and Harlen both knew he wasn’t talking aboutright now, what I was doing here, in this lifeless tunnel.
