I Am Djinn: Your Wish Is My Desire by Joshua Miller

Author:Joshua Miller [Miller, Joshua]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-07-18T23:00:00+00:00

It’s midnight. A fireworks display erupts from the skylight window of Quinton’s parent’s attic. He and Bruce welcome the New Year lying beside each other, looking out at the crackling explosions.

‘Two thousand and seven,’ says Quinton. ‘Almost two years together. Properly together. Where does the time go?’

‘I don’t know,’ replies Bruce, sitting from the bed.

‘It’s nice to be free to be ourselves.’

‘Yeah, until we go back.’

A half-empty bottle of sleeping pills and an unopened envelope are on the bedside table. Bruce unscrews the lid of the sleeping pills and takes one out.

‘Are you still having nightmares?’ Quinton asks, as another firework bangs.

‘When I sleep, yes,’ says Bruce, popping the pill in his mouth and swallowing without water.

‘Perhaps you should reach out to them for closure.’

‘No.’

‘My psychology lecturer says-’

‘No.’

‘But if you-’

‘No.’

‘Okay.’

Bruce goes to the map of the world poster hanging on the far side of the attic. It’s one of those maps that you scratch off where you’ve been. He picked it up at a yard sale a few weeks after he left home. The states of Illinois and Florida have been revealed.

‘I thought we’d have done more, you know,’ says Bruce, moving his hand across the map’s surface.

‘Running was never the answer. You and I both know that,’ replies Quinton, joining Bruce.

‘But it would have been fun.’

‘It would have been so much fun.’

‘Are you ready for tomorrow?’

‘No.’

The next day comes as fast as the last left. The sun rises as it always does. And with it brings new mysteries and challenges. Bruce, Quinton, Karen, and Neil, sit around the breakfast table eating homemade blueberry pancakes topped with bacon and maple syrup. The culinary smells take Bruce back to morning trips to IHOP with his dad.

‘Turkey bacon, seriously, hun, turkey bacon,’ says Neil chewing on a rubbery rasher.

‘You’ve got to watch your cholesterol,’ replies Karen, who’s opted for the pancakes. No syrup.

‘I don’t mind it,’ Bruce tells them with a full mouth.

Quinton plays with his meal using a knife and fork to toy the food to one side of the plate and back again as a cat would amuse itself with a dead shrew.

‘Eat up, dear. You’re going to need your strength.’

‘Karen, let the boy be.’

‘Please stop fussing,’ says Quinton. ‘I’m not very hungry.’

‘You don’t have to, you know, go through with it,’ says Bruce.

‘I do.’

Quinton tries to force a bite. The food is tasteless and lacking in pleasure. On a typical day, this would be his favorite meal. Even the turkey bacon he’d find delicious. Not today. Each bite he takes is hard to swallow. Every forkful sits at the top of his throat. He forces it with gulps of water to keep his parents from worrying. It doesn’t.

When he is finished, he excuses himself to get showered. Once he does this, he goes to the wardrobe in his room and picks out a navy suit his mother bought him. It’s too warm for a jacket, so he leaves it hanging as he buttons a white shirt, then secures a set of rose-gold cufflinks with a compass inscribed on the face of each cuff.

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