Page 41 of Reckoning

I climb over the wall, sinking down low behind a bush. When she was back at the hotel I used to sit there for hours, silently waiting, not that I expected to get a glimpse of her, not that I ever did. But it felt good to know she was there, she was in the same building as me. That if necessary, it would take very little to reach out my hand and just take her.

I clench my fists. Not in anger but in frustration.

It’s been a year. A year of watching. A year of doing nothing. I’ve seen as she’s slowly come back to herself, I’ve witnessed her gradual recovery, but she never seems to get beyond a certain point. It’s as if something is holding her back.

She doesn’t smile – at least not properly. She doesn’t laugh. She’s still in so many ways like a statue, a robot, pretending to be human.

Christ, what I wouldn’t give to just touch her. To just once, reach out and show her that this world is not the fucked up place she believes it to be.

A shadow moves. A flicker in what I know is the kitchen. I see her face - pale, drawn. She even tiptoes in her own house, like she’s scared of making noise and disturbing the dust.

“Sofia,”

I murmur her name. Not loudly. But it’s enough. Just seeing her is enough. My dick comes to life, I groan, palming my jeans, reminding myself of all the promises I made, all those ridiculous things I agreed with her brother.

He thinks she’s still too broken, too damaged.

He thinks she needs to be boxed up and kept safe but when I look at Sofia that’s not what I see. I don’t see someone fragile, I see someone fierce, someone deadly, she just hasn’t realised her power yet. She just hasn’t had a chance to experience it. To taste it.

If I had my way I’d be the one to show her, I’d be the one to teach her.

She moves, walking from the kitchen through to the living room. I follow her, stalking through the bushes, keeping to the shadows, making sure she doesn’t spot me.

Apparently neither of us are going to get much sleep tonight, but while I’m content to stay here, she looks torn, upset, just not in a good space. She pulls a book out, starts flicking through the pages like she can’t focus and then she flat out launches it across the room.

My lips curl. Something about the way she is, the way she acts, she’s so fucking perfect. Like a little dragon that’s only just learning how to breathe fire.

I sink down, settling in, making myself comfortable. It’s a cold night but I’ll happily freeze to death if it means I get to stay watching her.

She grabs a new book. I guess this one is better because she doesn’t toss it, instead she pulls the blanket around and hunkers down.

It feels like a date. Like our two souls have arranged this.

She’s there, reading away, waiting until the terrors that woke her subside, waiting until the darkness fades and the sun comes up.

And I’m here, waiting too.

Soon, she’ll be ready. Soon, I will carry her away. It’s just not tonight. Tonight, I have to be content to just watch.

Sofia

The needle slides into my vein.

I grit my teeth, clenching my other fist, trying to stay relaxed. They tell me to look away but I find it more reassuring to watch as my blood starts to flush out, as it fills the little plastic tube so merrily. Maybe it’s seeing the proof that I’m still alive.

It never gets easier. I don’t know if it’s meant to. If this is something normal people in this situation just accept as part of life.

And then the needle comes out. I think that’s the part I hate the most – the feeling of that metal coming back out, the way my body seems to tense more, as if it’s preparing for the hit, preparing for the effects of some disgusting drug that’s going to hijack my system.

I have to remind myself that that’s not what today’s about. This isn’t about losing control, this is about keeping it, supposedly anyway.

“All done.” The nurse smiles brightly. Too damn brightly.

She pushes a blob of cotton pad against the tiny wound and then tapes it up.

“It might bruise a bit but it’ll go down in a few days.”

I nod as though I don’t know that fact. As though I haven’t been jabbed, and injected so many times I’m surprised my veins haven’t actually collapsed.