Chapter 10 — When the World Was Simpler

I scrubbed my hands until they started to bleed again, but still couldn’t seem to get the woman’s blood off them. Even with my own blood flowing, I couldn’t tell which bits had belonged to her and which drops came from me. So, I just kept scrubbing and scrubbing, until my knuckles screamed and my hands throbbed.

Stop it! I shouted to myself.

The bar of soap fell from my fingers, and I gripped the edge of the sink as tightly as I could. More blood slipped from my knuckles, letting me know that I’d just made it worse. I hadn’t erased the memory of hurting that woman, nor had I absolved myself of guilt. I’d just managed to hurt my hands.

My breathing felt too tight, so I closed the toilet and sat down on it. My mind threw images at me. Mostly of that woman hitting the ground and laying there lifelessly. Kier said her heart still beat, and I trusted him. Maybe I shouldn’t have, considering how little his aunt liked me, but I did. He had done everything he could to keep me alive when he could have left me to rot.

If I trust him so much, then why won’t I listen to him about the woman? The thought stopped all my others. My mind had been reeling since I’d stumbled from that alley and back to the SUV. Why didn’t I listen to him? I knew that everything he said had been true. That woman would’ve hurt me, possibly much worse than I hurt her. The man could’ve done anything to me, if he had overpowered me.

Yet, I still couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d done something horribly wrong. Not just wrong, but unforgivable.

From out of nowhere, the image of my father popped into my head. I pictured him standing over me, lifting an end table over his head. My ribs ached when I thought of it. My father had managed to break two of them when he threw that at me. We’d ended up in the hospital together, locked in all night because the sun went down before they finished with us. He claimed that I got into a car accident with my friends. I’d been too much of a coward to argue.

The image stuck in my head. He had looked so cold as he lifted that thing up. Colder still when he came back a few hours later to find me on the ground, barely breathing. It had hurt so bad. Much worse than I thought it would’ve. And breathing just made it ache more, so I tried not to do that.

And I wondered what my face looked like when I beat up that woman. Had my eyes been that cold? Did I look annoyed when she finally hit the ground? What parts of me came from my father and what parts my mother?

I stared down at my hands and the blood that still leaked from my knuckles. Tears sprang to my eyes, and I couldn’t argue with myself anymore.

Someone knocked on the door, and I lifted my head. “Yeah?”

“You okay in there?” Kier asked.

I checked the little clock above the door and saw that I’d been in the bathroom for almost an hour, trying to scrub away what I’d done. “Um, yeah. I’m fine. I’ll be out in a minute.”

“Are you sure?” Kier asked, his voice sounding like a low growl.

“I’m sure,” I said.

He walked away, and once his shadow disappeared from under the door, I stood up again. When I looked at myself in the mirror, I took note of all the features I shared with my mother. Almost all of them, thankfully. The blue eyes came from Dad, and those I could ignore. I’d gotten used to not staring at myself in the mirror. Meeting my own eyes had become too hard at some point.

I scrubbed my hands one more time, and then wrapped my knuckles with some gauze and disinfectant. They stung like a bitch, but I figured that I deserved it. Once I finished with that, I put the first-aid kit back into the cabinet and stepped away from the sink. The bathroom looked so cheery around me, and the orange on the walls made my hair look very blue.

Breathing out a sigh, I turned and left the bathroom. No more wondering if I would turn out like my father. No more gnawing on my own anxiety. I’d done too much of that already, and I could tell that Kier’s aunt didn’t like me. She would convince him to get rid of me eventually, which meant that I had to figure something out. I didn’t feel like I could go back to the shelter, because that woman would be there. She would probably try to hurt me the next time we crossed paths. What shelter could I go to? The homeless shelter probably had the same kind of psychos lurking around. My house sounded worse than Hell itself. The police…

I might not have had another option. Every time I thought of that, though, the memory of being a little girl came back. My mother had tried to get Dad arrested, and they hadn’t believed her when she said that he hurt us. Then, after she died, I tried to tell them that she didn’t want me to live with him. The cops didn’t want to hear it. They just wanted to get me out of their hair. Even with me begging them the entire ride, they still dropped me off at my father’s house.

If they hadn’t been willing to listen to a small girl, what would make them listen to me now? Would it even be worth the attempt?

I found Kier in the kitchen. He walked around the small space, doing something with the stove. When I stepped inside, he glanced over his shoulder at me. Those dark eyes shot down to my hands, and I resisted the urge to hide them behind my back. Like I’d done something wrong.

“How do they feel?” he asked, turning back to the stove. His voice sounded gruffer than normal, so I had to assume that the talk with his aunt hadn’t gone well.

“Not too bad,” I said, walking over to the kitchen table again. I slid into the same seat as before and rested my busted hands on the surface. The gauze stood out starkly against the brown table, and I noted that some blood had already started to leak through. My stomach rolled.

Kier moved over to a cabinet and opened it up. I saw different kinds of mugs in there, all shaped like animals. She had cat mugs, mouse mugs, owl mugs. Seeing them lifted my spirits, and I smiled. “Those are cute,” I said.

Kier glanced at them but didn’t say anything.

A minute later, he brought two cups over. He handed me the one shaped like a cat head. I peered into the thing and saw hot chocolate with enough marshmallows to worry me. I took a sip, and the deep flavor of the chocolate combined with the sweet marshmallow turned out to be perfect. “Thank you,” I said.

Kier nodded.

The two of us sat at the table, drinking the hot chocolate in silence. I finished mine first, because my stomach had been turned to ice. The warmth of the drink helped thaw me out, and the sugar felt good too. When I finished my mug, I went over to the sink and rinsed it out. “What are we going to do from here?” I asked.

“Not sure. We’ll get some sleep first and talk about our options in the morning.” He rose up from the table and rinsed his own cup out. “There’s a guest room down the hall. You can have it. I’ll sleep on the couch.”

I looked at the small piece of furniture, and tried picturing Kier on it. His arms and legs would dangle over the sides. “I don’t think that’s going to work out.”

“It’ll be fine,” Kier said.

“It doesn’t make sense for you to take the couch,” I finally told him. “Why don’t you take the bed, and I’ll sleep on the couch.”

His face tightened, and he crossed his arms over his chest.

“What?”

I watched as his face grew tighter and tighter, until he looked ready to punch something. I didn’t worry that it’d be me, just because Kier hadn’t done anything threatening toward me. Well… not since I first woke up in his basement, at least. I didn’t think that he would hurt me. Maybe that made me foolish, but who cared.

“I don’t trust my aunt,” he said.

I blinked. “You think she would hurt me?”

Kier rubbed the back of his head, making his short hair stick up oddly. “I’m not sure. I don’t think she would kill you, or even hurt you that badly. I just…” He trailed off and kept that tight expression on his face.

“We can both stay in the guest room, I suppose,” I said. “If that would make you feel better. There’s just no way that you’re going to fit on that couch, and quite frankly, I don’t think we should try.”

Kier sighed. “Fine. C’mon.”

We walked down a short, narrow hallway that didn’t have any lights. Someone had blown out all the candles, which meant the apartment only had two small windows in the living room for light. Windows that also had curtains over them. Pictures dotted the hallway, but I couldn’t tell of what.

The guest bedroom had been painted yellow. Even in the dim lighting of the nightstand lamp, it looked too bright. It had a queen bed with a brown comforter on it, and I shuffled my feet, looking around. “Your aunt really likes the fall, huh?”

Kier snorted. “You have no idea.”

He walked over to the bed and laid down on the floor between it and the door. “Get some sleep, Whilda. We’ll figure out everything else in the morning.”

I thought about arguing with him, saying that the bed could fit us both. It couldn’t though. Not with Kier’s size. I’d be squished over to the side, and probably end up falling off the mattress. I also didn’t think he would let me take the floor. I set my bag down on the end table and climbed onto the mattress. “Do you mind if I flip off the light.”

“Go for it,” Kier said.

I turned it off, leaving me in the pitch-black room, with a guy I barely knew on the floor next to the bed. I laid down, and marveled that I’d been away from my house less than a week and probably lived the exact kind of life my father would’ve assumed.

Just go to sleep. Stop beating yourself up and get some sleep. There are a thousand things that you can worry over in the morning. A thousand ways that you can fail and fuck people over. Just get some sleep, and rest well knowing that you can’t hurt anyone with your eyes closed. Sleep.

It sounded like the best option.

***

I woke up alone. Kier had turned the nightstand light on, so that I would be able to see, I assumed. In response, I’d thrown a pillow over my head. When my face got smashed against the mattress, making it hard to breathe, I got out of bed to find that he had vanished.

Waking up in strange places, by myself, had started to get old.

The first thing I did was check my bag. Some part of me thought that maybe Brook had gone through my things, to see if I had anything she could use against me. I didn’t, thankfully. When I saw that my books hadn’t been touched, guilt poked at my chest. I intruded on her family, and then acted like she had become a two-bit spy?

I left the bedroom, and heard someone in the shower, and someone else moved around the kitchen.

Hoping for the best, I headed for the kitchen… and found Brook there. I concealed my disappointment before she turned around. The woman eyed me with clear contempt, but I’d gotten used to that kind of thing from my father.

“Please, sit down,” Brook said, her voice sounding cold.

I wandered into the kitchen and sat down at the table. Brook turned back to the stove and put some more sausage in a pan. She didn’t turn around to look at me before speaking. “I’ve done some research on humans while you were sleeping. I found something that said your kind don’t let children under the age of eighteen raise other children. Unless they are theirs biologically, which makes no sense. It must be weird for you, that Kier raises his siblings when I’m around to watch them.”

Actually, so much had happened, I hadn’t thought of it. “I assume that your laws are different from ours.”

“They are,” Brook agreed, nodding. “We are much more interested in getting our young to adulthood than humans are, it seems. Everything about your laws is so complicated. And this for a country that does take good care of its children. I can’t imagine what it would be like in another country, with less means to survive than America.”

I shifted around in my seat.

“Would you like some coffee?” Brook asked.

“Um… no thanks,” I said. I didn’t want to trust this woman until Kier got into the room. It felt selfish of me, but what if she tried something?

Brook smiled at me from over her shoulder. “Do you know what Kier did to his parents, Whilda?”

“Yes,” I said, because I felt like she challenged me. I also felt like if I failed this challenge, then I’d live to regret it.

The woman’s eyebrows lifted, surprise on her face. “Oh, I see. One of the kids told you about that?”

“No,” I said. “He told me.”

Now she turned around completely to stare at me, the spatula dangling from her fingers, almost forgotten. “Did he?”

I nodded.

Brook turned back to the stove. The smell of cooking sausage filled the room, and my stomach let out a grumble. I’d barely eaten the day before, and my body wanted me to fix that by stuffing my face. I shifted in my seat, trying to look less hungry somehow.

“Did he tell you why he raises the children, and I don’t?”

“No,” I said.

Brook nodded and went silent. I filled the silence by picking at the gauze around my hands until it peeled off. My knuckles looked better, but they had a ways to go. I threw the mess out while Brook continued to cook.

“If you want something to drink, there’s orange juice in the fridge. I haven’t even opened the bottle yet.”

My cheeks heated, but I went to get a glass anyway.

“My sister and I were never close,” Brook said. “Oceania and I… we didn’t get along. I always thought she could try to be nicer, and she thought that I was a doormat. When she met her husband, I breathed a sigh of relief that someone would take care of her. I also thought that maybe, maybe, she would learn to be a little softer. More forgiving. I took care of the kids once a month, when their parents wanted to go on a date. So, once a month for fourteen years. I watched the kids roughly one hundred and sixty-eight times. During all those times that I watched them, I never noticed anything wrong. Kier never said anything. Neither did Ash or Clementine. Aiden was too little to think like that, and Amber… I never really got to watch her. It all happened so fast after her birth. But yes. One hundred and sixty-eight times.”

I swallowed, shuffling back over to the table.

“I thought that all my dreams for my sister had come true. She found a man that loved her and had children that she cared for. You have to be soft with a child, so I thought that she had finally figured it out. She finally became the woman she should’ve been.” Brook paused to move the sausage over to a plate. She brought that to the table and set it down. Then she went and put bread in the toaster and started to crack eggs into a pan.

I wondered if I should’ve said anything, but my throat felt tight, closed down. I didn’t know what to do.

“When I learned what happened, it shocked me. Kier wasn’t even the one to call, but his boss did. The Authorities let me know what happened with the children and my sister and brother-in-law. It stunned me so much…” Brook shook her head. “You see, if I had noticed something strange happening with the kids, then I could have challenged my sister and her husband. I’d have custody of all five children, and they would be safe with me. Instead, I didn’t notice anything, and that means I’ve lost all parental right over them. I’m not a fit parent.” Brook punctuated her words by tapping the spatula against the side of the pan.

Her tension radiated through the air and seemed to punch me in the stomach. I shifted around in my seat and hoped that Kier would get there soon.

“If I ever find myself a mate,” Brook said. “And if we want to have children, then I’ll have to prove myself. The Authorities will be watching, to make sure that I can care for the children. And I don’t blame them for keeping an eye on me. I’ve failed once. I failed spectacularly. Not only them, but my sister, my nieces and nephews. And I won’t fail a second time.”

I looked down at the table. “You want me to leave?”

Brook turned around, and those dark eyes seemed to burn right through me. “I don’t trust you. I don’t know what you’ve done in your life, but I know that you can hurt these kids. Yes. I want you to leave.”

Tears sprang to my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. “I don’t know where to go,” I said.

Brook scooped the eggs onto one plate and set it down in front of me. “Go home.”

“What?” I asked.

“You should go home and leave my nephew alone. What right do you have to drag other people into your problems? You don’t belong in this world, Whilda. You are a human, and you will only make our lives more difficult. Go home to your father. I’m sure that whatever he did, he’s sorry for it. Go home and live the life you were meant to have.”

She turned away from me and went back to the stove.

I stared down at the plate in front of me, with the eggs over easy staring back at me. They had just the right amount of pepper on them. Too bad my stomach had twisted around, and I didn’t want anything to do with that plate anymore. I felt like I floated outside of my body.

“Would you say that to Clementine?” I asked.

“What?” Brook asked.

“What if Kier hadn’t beaten his father? What if Ash couldn’t do it, either? What if Clementine had to live in that household, and she knew that she couldn’t win? So, she ran. She ran, trying to save herself, but only found more trouble. She came across a human family that showed mercy on her. They listened to her stories about how her father had treated her, how he tried to kill her, and instead of throwing her to the wolves, they offered her shelter. They tried to get her somewhere safe, only to find that safety didn’t exist. Then some relative, some person who didn’t understand, told Clementine that she had to leave, because she’s nothing but a burden. Nothing but a little curse that will fall upon that household… because she’s not like them. She’s a Nightmare, and they only bring trouble. What would you think of that family, that threw Clementine out, because they could? Because they had power over her. Would you think they were the good guys, doing the right thing?”

Brook continued to stare at me, those eyes filling with irritation. “It’s different.”

“How?”

“Humans would kill Clementine,” Brook said.

“Kier said that any other Nightmare would’ve killed me,” I countered. “Ever since he found me, I’ve been listening to Nightmares talk about how unfair the human system is to their young. How they don’t care about us, and how we’re just left for dead. But here I am, sitting at your table. A human kid, and you’re telling me to walk back into a house with a man that’s beaten me more times than I can count. A man who’s thrown things at me, screamed at me, told me that I was worthless, that I’d grow up to be a whore, a man that’s made me too scared to eat, to leave the house, to come home. A man that’s tried to kill me. How are you any better than us right now?”

Silence stretched, and the eggs on the stove started to burn. The acrid scent filled the kitchen, driving into my nose.

Breathing in, I said, “You want me to leave? Fine, I’m gone. Not because of you, but because I really don’t want anything bad to happen to Kier or the kids. They’ve done nothing but help me, and I refuse to let that turn bad. I don’t’ want them to be punished because they didn’t want to see something bad happen to me. But I also want you to know that you have done exactly what every human that you hate has done. You turned me away.”

Brook turned around and removed the eggs from the stove. She tossed them into the trash, and then stood there, staring down at the mess.

“No,” Kier said, from behind us.

I turned around to find him glaring at his aunt. Unlike her stare, his looked cold. It chilled me right down to the bone, and I wanted to wrap my arms around myself as protection.

Kier came into the kitchen, his heavy feet clunking against the tiled floors. “We’ll figure something out, but fuck this. Brook, she isn’t going back to that house. How dare you even suggest it after what we talked about this morning. You don’t get to make decisions like this, just because you’re trying to make up for the way that you failed us.”

She flinched.

“I’m not playing this game,” Kier said. “The one where I have to fight you at every turn.”

“I don’t want you to get in trouble,” I said.

Kier turned back to me, and that fierce gaze froze me in my seat. I tried not to flinch away from it and might’ve failed. “Don’t even. I don’t care right now, and the kids have all agreed to let you stay with us. I’ve already risked myself to make sure you get somewhere safe. I’m not going to throw that away just because my aunt thinks that she knows best.”

Brook shook her head. “You can’t keep her forever.”

“The fuck I can’t,” Kier said.

I blinked in surprise, looking at him.

“If that’s what it takes to get her somewhere safe, then the fuck I can’t,” Kier continued. “And you can just shut up about it.” Kier threw himself into one of the seats and took my plate from me. He dumped a bunch of sausage on the side and started to eat. Stating as clearly as he could, that this conversation had ended.