Page 4 of Fractured Remains


Font Size:  

I’m not stupid. I know Callie’s not alright, not really. But after everything that girl has been through, if she wants to live in a fantasyland, who am I to blame her? I just join her whenever I can.

Sounds stupid doesn’t it, that at the age of twenty I’m a naive and innocent contract killer, who’s about to become a murderer, for real. The other kills don’t count; it’s just a day job. Well, I mostly work night shifts, but you know what I mean. My brothers and I were inducted by a secret organisation called The Order of the Snaidhm just before we hit our teenage years. Within The Order we’re known as the three musketeers. We’ve worked hard to become the best at what we do: killing and information extraction. By any means necessary.

Am I a monster? Absolutely not. Do I do monstrous things? Sure. Do I enjoy it? I hesitate as I ask myself that question. I take pride in a job well done. But do I enjoy it? Probably not. Until now. I’m about to enjoy what we do a little too much. Although I could argue that what we’re planning isn’t a job. It’s a necessity.

And yes, I am going to enjoy every single second of it. And if that makes me a monster after all? Well, it looks like I’m just going to have to embrace my new role and own it.

“Tex-mex?” a sleepy, confused voice calls from the next room as I enter our flat. Callie. Only she gets away with the nickname. And I’d still take that over my actual name, Texas, any day. Stupid bloody hippy parents deciding to name me after where I was conceived. It’s sickening. Though of course Callie thinks it’s hilarious, or cute, or something.

“I’m here, cariño,” I call back to her as I appear in the doorway to her room. It’s not really her room, it’s mine, but we swapped after we got her back home. Most nights she sleeps with me or East anyway. She rarely wants to be alone. She won’t even enter her old room.

I wish we had the resources to be able to move to a different place, but until this...plan is complete, we can’t. We don’t do badly in our line of work, but we have to do more work for The Order than we can do paid jobs. And we used up all of our favours just locating Callie. To find her kidnappers we’re on our own.

After we’ve found them we will need to disappear quickly, but we’ve not explained that to Callie yet. She doesn’t know about our roles or our jobs, isn’t aware of our revenge plan. We need to keep her in the dark – protected – for as long as possible. Because the only way out of The Order is in a box, and we don’t have enough funds to buy our protection.

I take a look at Callie’s beautiful, haunted face, and the desperate need to shield her surfaces as usual in the form of a white-hot rage. I force it down with a smile. My anger would terrify her, even though it’s not directed at her. She wouldn't understand that though. She beats herself up so bad, we have to work extra hard to erase her burdens.

I’m relieved that she doesn’t seem to have woken up while we were out. She wouldn’t be this calm if she’d woken unexpectedly to find us all gone. She doesn’t look too bad, so she must have slept well. The permanent black bags under her huge brown doe eyes look a little less prominent. Her soft chestnut hair is a little less lank. She’s not woken up screaming or covered in a cold sweat, so I’ll take that as a win today. We celebrate the little things in this house these days.

“How was your nap, cariño?” I ask her. I already know the answer, if I suspected she’d had a bad sleep, I would never pose the question. She gives me a sleepy innocent smile before responding.

“Good, thank you.” Her smile slips, and she pauses. “I should stop sleeping during the day. It stops me from sleeping at night.”

“Sleep’s sleep. You don’t have to work to anyone’s timetable,” I tell her on autopilot. We have this conversation daily. “What would you like to do this afternoon?”

“Can we…do you mind…” she hesitates.

The changes in Callie have been the hardest thing to live with. She used to be such a vivacious person. Sure, she was shy to the outside world, but not around us. We’ve been best friends since childhood and she was the epicentre of our group. I’ve loved her for as long as I’ve understood what love was. The others have too, I’m sure. It’s hard to know someone your whole life and to fall so completely in love with them, then have them ripped from you and the unthinkable happen to them.

The Callie we found and brought home was not the girl we lost. And while I still love her – I always will, no matter what – I can’t help but long for the day when I see a spark of the old Callie shining through. Sometimes I think I see it, but it’s just Memory playing her tricks on me. She’s an even bigger bitch than Karma.

“Cariño, we can do anything you want. You know that. I’m at your complete disposal. Use me.” I smile, throwing my arms wide. She giggles, and it’s the most perfect sound I’ve ever heard. Until I get my Callie back, I devote my waking hours to bringing smiles to my girl’s face.

“I was wondering if we could maybe go for a walk.”

This floors me, but I recover quickly.

“Absolutely,” I tell her. “Would you like a shower first?” I hate that she can no longer face baths, they used to be her favourite. Just another thing stolen from her. But this – actually wanting to go outside for the first time in months – is a real breakthrough. I don’t want to make too much of a fuss and overwhelm her, but inside I’m celebrating hard.

“Yes please.” She smiles. “Will you watch me?”

I swallow the lump in my throat down at her innocent words. She needs someone to stand guard in the bathroom while she showers because our bathroom doesn’t have windows and it’s a really small space. She doesn’t mean for me to watch her, watch her.

“Always, cariño.” I hold out my hand for her, and when she puts hers into mine I tug her to her feet. I deliberately pull too hard and she flies up into my arms, squealing with a simple childlike joy. I spin her around in my arms, kiss her temple and carry her through to the bathroom. She’s far too light, thin, fragile. Too everything.

“I’ll be right outside,” I tell her.

As I stand outside the door, which she keeps open a crack, I contemplate messaging the others to tell them about the wanting to walk breakthrough, but I decide against it. I try to tell myself it’s because I don’t really believe we’ll make it out of the house, but in truth, it’s because I don’t want them to race back and join us. This is our moment. I don’t want to share it. I’ve been sharing Callie with them both all our lives.

I listen carefully as Callie surprises me for the second time today; she’s humming in the shower. She always used to sing and dance around the flat, despite how small the space is, but she’s not so much as uttered a single bar since she came back. Today though, she’s humming a song she used to sing all the time.

Why today? What’s shifted? Changed? Don’t get me wrong, I’m ecstatic, but I want to know what’s brought this on so that I can bottle it and recreate her bubbly, light joy every day. It almost sounds like my girl could be in the shower.

“That was amazing!” Callie beams from behind me, causing me to jump. I spin, clutching my chest with a comical expression on my face.

“Don’t do that! You scared me half to death!”

She laughs, happy with her prank. Behind her the shower is still running, which explains how she managed to catch me out. “Sneaky,” I tease, wagging my finger at her.

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
Articles you may like