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“Your back is burnt pretty badly,” he mumbles, leaning over me.
I groan with the pain. I don’t answer. I can’t. I’m dying.
My body surrenders to the darkness, my soul unravelling stitch by stitch. I’m barely hanging onto life when another voice enters the peacefulness. It’s foreign, sharp, cruel. Much older than the boy.
“Leave her. We need to go. Now!”
The disgust in his voice jars me, and despite the comforting coolness of death, my eyes flutter open. I see shiny black shoes beneath smart grey trousers walk away across the grass, the man’s body outlined in flames as though he’s the very devil himself returning to Hell. Then I realise it isn’t Hell that’s burning but my home, my Mama.
“Mama,” I croak.
“Fuck! Fuck!” the boy says. He’s still with me, he hasn’t left. He drops down beside me, swiping away a wet tendril of hair that clings to my cheek. “I thought you were dead.”
“I’m not?”
“No, you’re not,” he replies, a smile on his lips. “You’re stubborn.”
“Who are you?” I croak, as he caresses my cheek gently. Nothing seems to hurt anymore. I feel only bliss. Like I’m floating. Is it his touch making me feel this way? Maybe I’m already dead and he’s a figment of my imagination. My eyelids feel heavy, darkness is just out of reach, but I refuse to succumb this time. I want to know who he is. It seems important somehow. “Who are you?”
“I’m nobody. I wasn’t here. You won’t remember me when you wake up.”
“Because I’m dying?”
“Maybe.” He pauses, cupping my cheek, then he leans over and presses his lips against my ear. “If you survive,don’tremember me.”
Sirens ring in the distance, help is coming. “That’s impossible,” I reply, blinking at him as he pulls back. “How can I forget the boy who has eyes so green they’re like the fields of Heaven themselves? You’re beautiful.”
And he is, he’s the most beautiful boy I’ve ever seen.
“I’m not beautiful. I’m far from beautiful. Inside I’m rotten to the core.”
“Are you wearing a mask then?” I ask, my words tumbling out. I don’t know why I say that, I just do.
“Perhaps I should…” he responds solemnly.
“No, you’re an angel...” I say, my voice weak. He is an angel. He must be. He saved me.
The boy shakes his head, sadness creeping into his eyes as a single, solitary tear slides down his cheek. “No, I’m not an angel. My name is Leon. I’m the boy who killed your Mama.”
