Page 29 of The Ecstasy of Sin
I'm sitting next to my mother’s hospice bed, her skeletal hand in mine as her once beautiful blue eyes stare out at nothing—a fog settling over the muted colour.
The ghost of death is looking out from the hull of a human being I love so ferociously.
She’s cold. Socold, and her mouth is agape—every muscle in her body gone lax after she took her final, deep breath.
I'm haunted by the sight of her… hollow and empty, a shell of who she used to be; my warm, loving mother. My caretaker, my best friend, and my own personal librarian. The sole reason I’m a bookworm, a mirror of my mother’s love of literature.
The cold hand resting lifelessly in mine was once warm and gentle, always bringing me a new book every time I finished the previous one she gifted me.
Now, it holds nothing. It is capable of nothing. I am becoming nothing, too.
My father’s broken sob steals me from my misery, drawing my empathetic gaze towards him. His face is drenched in the evidence of his grief, glistening trails of tears cascading ruthlessly down both of his cheeks.
I startle when a scream pours out of him, and tremble violently as his agony slams into me like a derailed freight train, destroying what little is left of me.
The bitterness of the loss is thick on his tongue as the sound dissipates, and several nurses gather near the door. Tears gather in the eyes of the oldest nurse, my mom’s main attendant over the last few weeks, but I can’t stand seeing them. Not right now.
I turn my attention back to Dad, but he isn’t looking at me as he stands up. For what feels like the longest minute of my life, he stares down at Mom, rage and despair written all over him like the world’s saddest story that I never wanted toread.
He turns away, and I stare at his back as he leaves the room. Leaves Mom, and leaves me. He is a ghost now, too. His soul left him when my Mom took her final breath.
I’ve lost everything, and there is nothing here to anchor myself to.
When the memory leaves me, I'm wiping at my face to dry the wet pathways of tears it left behind. Glancing around, I find myself outside with no memory of how I got here. It’s pitch back, and I don’t recognize what part of the city I’m in.
I blink away the remnants of my tears, craning my head to look up along the towering heights of one of the oldest churches in Toronto. Something I instantly recognize, thankfully.
St. Augustine’s Cathedral looms high overhead, Gothic and grand, its towering spires piercing the stormy night sky. Dim lights from inside the church cast shadows across the intricate stained-glass windows—panels of saints and demons bathed in vibrant colour.
The rain has started to fall in cold, scattered drops, and I tilt my head back, transfixed by the art.
A voice startles me.
“I said, do you have any spare change?”
I turn towards the sound, searching the darkness. A man steps out from a cluttered corner of the alleyway. He’s homeless, too. There are black garbage bags behind him in a broken shopping cart, with his large, tattered pack stacked on top.
I shake my head, flinching as heavy rain drops land on my forehead. “I’m sorry, sir. I have nothing. I’m homeless, too.”
It’s not a lie. As of this afternoon, I don’t have a single penny to my name. Sometimes I have a small stash of granola bars in my pack, but I don’t even have that right now. If I did, I would definitely share them with anyone who asked.
He stumbles towards me, and I take a step back. His movements are erratic, his face contorted in an expression of lunacy. My heart begins to race as the panic hits me.
“I’ll just take your backpack, then.”
Shit.
CHAPTER 9
Wren
Myinstinctsarescreaming,alarms of warning blaring through my central nervous system.
I take a step away from him and turn to run, but his hand reaches out and wraps around my wrist, yanking me toward him.
I stumble on my feet, the flat soles of my shoes sliding on the wet concrete. The rain begins to fall in earnest, turning the smooth cement beneath us into a slippery mess.
The stranger reaches for my backpack, trying to tug it away from my body. If he takes it from me, he might as well kill me. It contains the medication I need to keep my migraines at bay, and without those, I’ll spiral into my own personal hell of sickness and suffering.
