Page 7 of Sinners Atone
No, it doesn’t feel better. It feels worse than dying.
Rule six,my father warns from the treeline:the most successful villains aren’t the ones who have nothing to lose, but who havenobodyto lose.
He didn’t just speak that one into existence, he beat it into me with the hard crack of his belt during the summer my balls dropped and I realized blood rushed to my dick every time a pretty girl walked past in a tight dress.
Not that it mattered, of course. Just because I looked, doesn’t mean they were brave enough to look back. And even if they were, they never looked at me like this girl is gazing at me now.
She regards me with this wide-eyed concern, as though she’s seeing the worst of humanity for the first time and is certain she can fix it. Not an ounce of reservation or fear swims in those ocean-blue eyes. Judging by how she’s sitting on top of me, touching me,there’s none in her brain either.
Annoyance darkens my edges. She shouldn’t be out here, at this hour, looking like…that. She’s an angel with broken wings, and I couldn’t count on both blood-stained hands the number of men I know who would snatch her off these streets in half a heartbeat.
“What are you doing out here?” I grunt, rolling my head away from her touch and eyeing the contents of her Mary Poppin’s bag. There’s a lone flip-flop, a jumbo pack of crackers, and enough lip glosses to stock a beauty store.
“Saving your life, what else?” she replies flippantly, checking her cell for signal again.
My annoyance burns hotter at her smart-ass answer. “Do you stop and chat to every strange man you meet on a dark road?”
“When they’re bleeding like a waterfall, sure.”
“Well, you shouldn’t.”
Her gaze falls to mine, sparkling with amusement. “But aren’t you glad I did?”
I study the smugness puckering her lips, and disbelief trickles through me. “You realize I’m going to die, right?”
She tuts. “Well, you will with that attitude.”
I let out a frustrated groan. Great. Not only does she not understand the concept of personal safety and personal space, but to top it all off, she’s a fucking optimist.
When The Middle began, I soon developed a hatred for all the positivity in the world because I’d seen what the dark side of it looked like. My brothers were oblivious, happy kids, and it never seemed fair they got to wake up every morning and laughover breakfast while I’d spent the night before in Hell’s seventh circle.
I’d tried to show them the dark side too. I’d bring home roadkill with the hope the corpses would haunt their nightmares, and hold their heads underwater until they grew limp, just so they, too, knew what dying felt like.
And when that didn’t work, I started carving the dark side into the church doors instead.
Looking up at this girl now, I’m overcome with the same childlike spite I had back then. I want to shake the light out of her. To peg her eyes open and force her to watch my life flash before them too, if only to make her realize the world isn’t all sunshine and rainbows and she shouldn’t walk around late at night in it.
But I couldn’t shake her even if I tried. My arms and legs are growing heavier and melting into the earth.
As though she feels me dissolving beneath her, she rests a light hand on my chest.
“Don’t worry, it’s nearly dawn.”
“So?”
“So, a car will pass by soon.” She cranes her neck and squints down the long stretch of road ahead. “You’re going to be fine, we just need to get you to the hospital.”
“Yeah. A couple of stitches and a lollipop, and I’ll be right as rain.”
“That’s the spirit.”
Christ. I really must be the number one player on God’s shit list.
We linger in stiff silence for a while, only my wheezing breaths and her little puffs of impatience polluting the air.
She keeps glancing down the road. Then she tugs at the hem of her dress and shifts her weight on me. As she reaches up to smooth down her bangs, she stiffens. Slowly, she turns over herhand and inspects it under the light, as if seeing it for the first time. Then her gaze falls to her coat, dress, legs.
Blood. It’s everywhere. Soaking into all her pink, dripping from the tips of her wings, staining her the same shade of black as my soul.
