Page 103 of Misery
I add one more element—a thin line of silver, barely visible unless you know to look for it.
Hope. Maybe. Or delusion.
The belief that somehow this ends without everyone destroyed.
My hands are covered in paint.
Under my nails, between my fingers, up my arms where I pushed my sleeves back.
I probably have it on my face too from pushing my hair back.
I look like I've been in a beautiful war.
A knock at my door. Soft. Hesitant.
"Elfe?" Helle's voice. "Mom needs you."
I stand, muscles protesting from sitting on the floor for so long.
The painting stays propped against the wall, still wet, still breathing with fresh trauma.
Later I'll probably destroy it.
Or maybe I'll keep it as evidence of this moment when everything was falling apart but I was still here, still creating, still fighting in the only way I know how.
The kitchen smells like whiskey and fear.
My mother sits at the table, a bandage wrapped around her head like a crown of gauze.
The blood's soaked through in spots, creating abstract patterns that remind me of my painting.
Helle's beside her, bottle of Jameson between them, two glasses already poured and a third waiting.
"How's your head?" I ask, sliding into the chair across from them.
"Hurts," Mom admits. She looks older than she did a week ago. The attack, the worry, the not knowing—it's aged her. "But I've had worse."
That's a lie. We all know it. But no one says a thing.
Helle pushes the third glass toward me. "Figured you could use this."
I take it, grateful.
The whiskey burns going down, cleaner than the paint fumes I've been breathing. "Any word?"
"Nothing," my mother says. "Runes called twenty minutes ago. They're still searching."
"He's alive," I say. Need to say. Need to believe. "Dad's too stubborn to die."
"Too stubborn for his own good," Mom agrees, but there's fondness in it. "Always has been."
We drink in silence for a moment.
Three women bound by blood and trauma, trying to find comfort in alcohol and our company.
"I'm sorry," I finally say. "For what I said. At the bar. I was cruel."
"You were honest," my mother corrects. "There's a difference."
