Living On Air by Susan Mac Nicol

Author:Susan Mac Nicol [Mac Nicol, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781948029124
Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group
Published: 2018-02-21T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

Cary

I had the dream again. The one that bound me to my past and wouldn’t let go. In my dream, there was a boy. He lay still as his chest ached with a pain he’d never have imagined in his darkest nightmares. He dared not breathe too hard lest the demon in the room heard him, tracked him down, and tore him apart with sharpened claws.

Shivers of panic and dread shot down his spine, but he kept himself still, holding his breath, the stench of excrement reminding him he’d soiled himself when the shooting began, and he wondered if that would give him away. Along with the fear and grief, a sense of shame made the tears flow faster. He blinked, trying to chase them away.

Crying is bad. He’ll hear you. Smell the salt in your tears. The Father is the devil.

The boy closed his eyes and said a silent prayer, but he knew it was useless because God didn’t listen to anything he had to say. God and Jesus—they’d given up on him a long time ago. He’d known that as he’d been forced over Price Littlejohn’s couch with the man’s hot poker thing up his arse.

The humming of a hymn the boy had once loved now meant nothing more than a dirty ditty associated with hate and pain. He’d never be able to hear that hymn again without feeling sick.

The child had a decision to make. He could crawl out from the dead pit where he hid and become an unwilling captive, consigned to a life of hell. He could fight back and try to get to the devil and kill him. Then he might join his family wherever they might be. However, the boy didn’t believe in Heaven anymore, so he wasn’t sure whether he wanted that option.

His final choice was to take a chance, leave the safety of his family’s bodies, run, and never look back. An hour later, he decided. When he saw an opportunity to crawl out from the charnel house containing his dead family and run as fast as he could, across green fields that had once been a playground and a haven for him, his sister, and their friends, he took it.

The nightmare woke me, and I sat up, the wet of tears on my cheeks making my skin cold. I scrambled out of bed and went into the bathroom to take a piss. Urine dribbled onto the seat as my shaking hands held my dick. I wiped myself and the seat clean, pulled up my drawstring yoga pants, and went back to sit on the bed.

My hands itched to cut. I’d last used my cilice a week ago; I’d needed the pain. I couldn’t even remember what had set me off. My thighs were healing and didn’t look like chopped liver anymore.

It was a temporary respite, I thought as my hands sought my razor. The disconcerting presence of Rhys bloody McIntyre everywhere I turned. In the canteen tent, I’d see him sitting with the other circus folk, laughing and playing around.

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