Page 107 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

‘Gimme full sentences,’ Troy tells him one day when they’re eating together. Riley is eating an apple. Troy drinks his coffee, eats eggs with sausages. ‘No more broken words. You’re seven now.’

Riley frowns, staring down. ‘Outside n-never… give.’

Troy sighs. ‘In a fuckin’ sentence, Riley.’

‘The outside… you said maybe,’ Riley says, trying to make his words longer by adding other words, ‘never came… t-to me.’

‘Try harder.’

‘I want outside.’

‘No outside for you. Read your books.’

Riley wants to tell Troy that those books are inside him now. He swallowed them, consumed every word. He wants to ask for new ones. More paper. More crayons. He wants to beg just to let the sunlight touch his face in the mornings. Summer is scalding when it’s inside, no breeze, no air, no sky.

But Troy is done.

He gets up to leave.

‘Be good,’ he tells Riley, already talking to someone else.

Riley is good.

Good means quiet.

Still.

No mess.

Invisible.

Riley is good, but it’s getting him nowhere.

✴

The first time he sees a girl, he’s eight years old.

Hiding behind the banister of the ground floor, watching from the shadows, Riley hears her voice before he sees her. For the first time in his life, he finds beauty in speech. She doesn’t speak like Troy or anyone else.

Her tone is soft yet strong.

Her accent is strange.

She’s older than Riley but much younger than Troy.

Her nails are painted silver.

Her hair is red.

‘You must let me see him.’

‘Just because you show up here making demands,’ Troy counters, towering over the young woman, ‘does not mean I’m obliged to take it any more seriously than I did when you sent your deluded letters.’

‘He’s not yours. You could never care for him the way we can.’

‘Who is we, little girl?’

‘His family.’