Page 32 of The Air He Breathes (Elements 1)

I walked out of the room and returned with a glass of water. “Here, drink up.”

She reached for the glass, but her hand landed against my forearm, and she left it there as she studied my tattoos. “They’re all children’s books.” Her fingernail traced Charlotte’s Web. “Your son’s favorites?”

I nodded.

“How old are you?” she asked.

“Thirty-three. You?”

“Twenty-eight. And how old was your son when he…?”

“Eight,” I said coldly as her lips turned down.

“That’s not fair. Life isn’t fair.”

“Nobody ever said it was.”

“Yeah…but we still all hope it is.” She kept her eyes on the tattoos, traveling up to Katniss Everdeen’s bow and arrow. “Sometimes I hear you, you know. Sometimes I hear you shouting in your sleep at night.”

“Sometimes I hear you cry.”

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“Yes.”

“Everyone in town expects me to be the same girl I was before Steven died. But I don’t know how to be that girl anymore. Death changes things.”

“It chan

ges everything.”

“I’m sorry I called you a monster.”

“It’s okay.”

“How? How is that okay?”

“Because that’s how death changed me, it made me a monster.”

She pulled me closer, making me kneel in front of her. Her fingers ran through my hair, and she stared deep into my eyes. “You’re probably going to be mean to me again tomorrow, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“I thought so.”

“But I won’t mean it.”

“I thought that, too.” Her finger ran against my cheek. “You’re beautiful. You’re a beautiful, broken kind of monster.”

My finger grazed against her bruised face. “Does it hurt?”

“I’ve felt worse pain.”

“I’m so sorry, Elizabeth.”

“My friends call me Liz, but you made it pretty clear that we are not friends.”

“I don’t know how to be a friend anymore,” I whispered.