Page 37 of Burn

What the fuck is she doing here?

The loudspeaker sounds again. My father’s voice is monotone when he says, “It’s Thursday, September 12th. The cafeteria is serving meatloaf and crickets. Red is the color of blasphemy.”

I look around at the people scrambling through the halls. No one pays the loudspeaker any attention, and Cally, still ahead of me, continues his trance-like march. I shake my head, trying to clear the fog. Without warning, Cally stops and spins to face me. The voice that comes out of him isn’t his own, and despite the shrill alarms, I hear it clear as day, “You have a bright and promising future that I’d be remiss to destroy.”

Cally slowly lifts his hands, palms up, and when I look at them, blood spills over the edges, pooling on the floor between us. I move forward, reaching for my friend, but before I can touch him, he spins, continuing down the hall. A commotion to the left pulls my attention away; there’s a group of guards in the TV room. I look back toward Cally, but he’s gone, as is the blood on the floor. I search for him a moment longer, peering over the madness, but he’s nowhere, so I turn to the left and walk slowly into the TV room.

The guardsmove in slow motion. They’re celebrating. Their faces display their delight as they hoot and holler, but this room is eerily silent. Even the alarms don’t reach this place. I slide in next to one of the guards, Burgess. When he senses my presence, he turns to face me. His voice is calm and deliberate when he says, “I don’t bite.” I must look confused because he continues, “You sleep like the fuckin’ dead.” With that, he holds out a muffin. I reach out, taking it from him, but the second it touches my hand, it turns to sand, slipping through my fingers. I slide my fingers together against the grit of the sand, but the sand is ants, hundreds of them, and they crawl up my hand and onto my arms.

Burgess huffs a laugh, but his face remains neutral as he says, “You’ve got a problem, Liberty.”

He turns back to the group, suddenly silent and cheering again. From here, I can’t see what’s happening, so I push past Burgess, past the other guards. I’m no longer in the TV room. I’m in the yard. I spin around and come face to face with Nash. With what’s left of Nash. If it weren’t for the tattoos, I wouldn’t recognize him. His face is swollen and purple. Blood drips from his eyes, nose, and mouth.

We stand completely still, staring at each other.

He doesn’t blink.

He doesn’t breathe.

His mouth is closed, and his jaw is angled all wrong.

I know it’s completely illogical when I hear him say, “You gonna eat that?”

My gaze drops to my hand, which holds a hockey puck. I shake my head and hold it out for him. His head angles to one side before he leans forward, his mouth opening to reveal rows of shattered teeth, and takes a bite out of the puck.

My mouth falls open in horror, and the judge next to me sounds displeased when he says, “You know, Mr. Liberty, it’s rare that I have a case that disappoints me to this extent.” I pry my eyes away from Nash to look at him. His massive white wings look like they’ve been dippedin blood. The edges of the feathers are a deep ruby red color, and the drip, drip, drip of the blood onto the tarmac echoes throughout the yard.

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

“This one’s a lost cause,” his voice says, despite his mouth staying closed in a straight line.

I look back at Nash, where he stood, and there’s now a pile of folded clothes, a rolled-up poster, and a plate of cafeteria food. The pile is smoking, a stream of white rising into the night sky. I follow it up, and up. The moon is fragmented and broken, and pieces of it rain down toward Earth.

“That’s going to be one hell of a mess to clean up.” The judge sighs.

When I look back at him, the enormous black crow cocks his head to the side and says, “You’ve committed a serious offense, leaving another youth in a fatal condition.” Before I can respond, it spreads its wings, launching itself into the night. I watch as it pecks pieces of the moon from the sky. I watch it until it’s devoured every single piece, and only then do I return my eyes to the pile of items, smoking on the ground.

Nash stands before me. The shadow of a black eye is clear in the moonlight, and dark hair is cut close to the scalp. A warm smile spreads across his face. He laughs, “Thanks, man. I can’t tell you how much I needed that.”

He holds out his hand, as if to shake mine. This might be the cleanest I’ve ever seen him. He’s dressed in jeans and a white t-shirt, and his skin looks full of life. I glance at his hand and the snake tattoo slithers around his arm, shimmering in the moonlight. I slowly reach out and take his hand. His grip is crushing, pain ricochets through my body, and I try to pull myself free, but he’s so much stronger and pulls me toward him. When I crash into his body, the smell of death assaults my senses. Maggots drip out of the fresh wounds on his face, and pieces of his teeth splinter and spray, embedding into my skin as he bellows at me.

“Our father,who art in chaos!” He screams. “Red is the color of blasphemy!” With each word, more pieces of him come apart, and the snakes slither off his skin and onto the tarmac. “A bright future of nothing!”

I manage to wrench myself free from his grip and scramble backward, away from him, but he comes at me, twisted and broken, leaving piece by piece behind.

My back slams into the fence, and I have nowhere else to go. All I can do is watch as he advances, until he’s millimeters away from my face, the stench of decay and rot thick between us, and burns in my throat.

His voice is my mother’s when he whispers, “Youdid this.”

Mischievous

Lex

I’ve been watching him for a few minutes. A sound woke me, and I didn’t immediately recognize what it was. The room is still dark, but daylight pours under the door. I forgot he was even here, and the outline of his enormous frame in the chair next to my bed startled me initially. His breaths are sharp, shallow; it sounds like he’s drowning in air. The ball cap he usually wears is pushed up high on his head, revealing a sweat-covered, furrowed brow.

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