Page 83 of Only the Small Bones
“Malcolm!” Asher screamed, reaching for me. I scrambled up and ran for him, but Declan stopped me, shoving me to the floor. He stepped into the hall, taking Asher from the other guy.
“Please, no,” Asher begged them. “Malcolm!” Fear locked my body in place.
“Let him go! No!” I charged for the door, but it slammed shut before I got to it. “No!” I yelled again, banging my fists against the steel and yanking on the handle. “Asher! Asher!” I punched and kicked at the door until my hands and feet ached. What had I done?
I screamed until my voice gave out, until it burned and the taste of blood hit the back of my tongue. Then I backed into a corner and sank to the floor, crying for all the days I hadn’t before because I’d had to be strong for Asher. I cried for all the pain he must have been going through, all the fear he had to have been experiencing. I cried because I was alone in a dark room. I cried because I was just a boy, and I wanted to go home.
Malcolm
The sun rose and set for three whole days before the door opened again. I was hungry, thirsty, and filthy. Most of all, I felt broken.
“Jesus fucking Christ. Get him hosed down and clean this room. And feed him! There’s flies in here for fuck’s sake. Are you telling me I can’t leave you two in charge when I go off to handle fucking business?” The suited man in the sunglasses was back. Declan and the other guard listened to his tirade with their heads lowered to the floor.
I didn’t understand what he meant byleavingthem in charge, but then I remembered the helipad I’d seen when we first got on the ship, and the sound of a helicopter in the sky a little while ago. I thought I was hearing things that weren’t there. I felt delirious enough for it to be true.
“A-Asher,” I croaked from my dirty corner. My eyes were crusty and dry. I’d cried all the tears my body contained.
“Who?” the suited man said to me as the guards worked on clearing the dried food that had spilled days ago. I swallowed, trying to moisten my throat so I could answer him, but then he circled the room, looking around.
“Where’s the boy?” he shouted, his rage making me curl in on myself. “I said, where’s the fucking boy?!”
The two guards looked at each other, and my heart pounded so hard I thought it might burst through my chest. I held my hand there just in case.
“You’ve already cost us two packages,” the suited man said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “If you tell me we’ve lost another one, I will kill you both right here and now.”
“It wasn’t our fault,” Declan said, the cut on his cheek still healing. “They were sick. You know there’s something going around on the ship.”
The suited man stepped in close to Declan, grabbing him by the throat and asking in a low, scary voice, “Where. Is. He?”
It was the other guard who spoke up. “He’s in the room that the lost packages were in.”
I tried to stand, tried to beg them to take me to him, but I fell on my butt again.
“Why is he in there?”
“Because this one attacked me,” Declan sneered, jabbing a finger at me.
“You were attacked by a scrawny kid?” He poked the cut on Declan’s cheek, making him hiss, then shoved him away. “Get him a new room. This one needs to be sealed off.” He pressed the back of his hand to his nose.
“The o-only other available room is yours,” Declan said.
The man turned back to him, the room suddenly going cold. “Give him yours then. You seem to forget the main objective is to get them from point A to point Balive. I won’t protect you from the repercussions of your actions. That goes for the both of you. Someone will have to answer for this, and mark my words, it won’t be me.”
Once the scary man left, they grabbed me by the arms and hauled me on deck to hose me off. The force of the cold water was too strong for my weak body, and the direct sunlight too bright for my eyes. I ended up naked and curled onto my side with my hands shielding my face while I spluttered and shivered.
Afterward, I was handed a towel and taken below deck again. My new room had a small bathroom and a bed twice the size of my twin bed at home. A tray with something steaming in a bowl waited on a small table under the porthole. I began to panic when I looked around and didn’t see Asher.
“Where is he?” I asked just as the door closed and locked. I jerked the handle, but it was pointless.
It took four attempts to get dressed in the clothes they’d left on the bed. Everything felt too heavy for me to lift, even my limbs.
I sat at the table, bouncing my knee, trying to sip at the hot soup. My body wanted the food, but my heart and my mind were too broken to cooperate.
“No,” I whispered when a voice in my head told me to go to sleep and never wake up. Instead, I dragged myself to a corner, slid to the floor and rested my head on my knees.
The door opened a while later and the man in the suit ushered Asher in.
“Asher!” I cried out, stumbling to my feet. His skin looked gray, his eyes sunken in.
