Storytelling Part 7

That reminds me, I must keep it hidden. The child cannot see it, cannot know of it, or everything would change. Spoilers. I feel my inside pocket for the masked shape, rest my hand on it for a moment then push it deeper down, away from prying eyes. Just in time.

A slight movement behind me- a tap on the shoulder- catches my attention. Turning, I see the child in the light for the first time. What I see is almost enough to evoke empathy. Almost. Ghostly skin, translucent, dirt-specked; dark grey eyes deep set; feeble cheekbones protrude, casting the face in shadow. My eyes dart away, averting eye-contact. They land on a shard of glass tearing through cloth and flesh, leaving a single river of blood. The child looks up pleadingly; again my eyes shoot away. I scramble behind me for the roll of bandages in the first-aid kit I found. Clutching the bandage tightly around the child’s leg, I place my hand softly under its chin. The glass comes out with a sharp tug. Pulling the bandage tighter still, I tear off a strip and tie the ends double. I try to ignore the spreading scarlet circle underneath. This act of care is ironic if the diary serves me right- which it always does- but necessary.

Storytelling Part 6

Body pumping adrenaline, I stop dead still. What I am seeing cannot be real. Out of the stones at my feet, shaking the dust from every pore, crawls a child. Androgynous; torn fabric worn head to toe. Pleading eyes look up at me from the tiny body, impossible to resist. Instinctively I beckon for the child to follow, but it either doesn’t understand or is too weak to comply, so I cautiously kneel down and wrap my arms around its legs, hauling it up onto my shoulder. Some blank thought, like a forgotten memory, flashes through my mind briefly. Dismissing the moment with a shudder, I continue walking, slowed by the weight of the child; a distant throbbing lingers somewhere within me.

I lower the body through the jagged hole, following it with a sigh of relief. I collapse beside the sleeping child with shared exhaustion.

Waking from a slumber of uncertain length, I stretch my arms wide. Suddenly I hit something soft and panic for an instant, before everything returns to me. The child. The plan. The medicine. The medicine! That’s what I was forgetting, what the lingering feeling was! I have been sleeping in a doctors’ surgery: I should have searched the place for first aid kids, drugs, anything of survival value. Stick to the rules, always. Quickly in, quickly out, nothing more. Except the diary.