Nothing hurts.
It’s OK. Don’t cry, Avery.
‘S-s-stop.’ Avery puts one hand to Sam’s face, holding him, holding him tighter than anyone ever has. ‘I n-n-need you. Sammy! You c-c-can’t …’ His voice breaks.
‘Avery.’ Sam’s fist curls in Avery’s shirt. The alley is quiet. Vin is gone. ‘It’s not bad.’
‘No, no, no, Sammy.’ Avery tucks his chin over Sam’s head, rocking violently now. His hands flap and spin and jerk, desperate to put pressure on Sam’s stomach, desperate to move. His stims get tangled when he’s upset.
Sam is so very good at making people upset.
‘Stay awake, Sammy.’ Avery looks over his shoulder and screams for help down the alley.
No one hears. No one comes.
Sam tries to cough but it hurts too much. The pain is here, finally. He’s cold. He has turned to ice in Avery’s arms and he’s afraid if Avery holds him any tighter he’ll shatter. He wants to say this is nice, how Avery’s hugging him – but when he opens his mouth, he starts to cry.
‘I’ll buy you a house, Sammy.’ Avery pushes hair out of Sam’s eyes, smearing blood over Sam’s cheeks. ‘I’ll buy you a hundred houses. I swear, I’ll do a-a-a-anything. I’ll go – I’ll go get help.’
Sam’s fingers claw Avery’s shirt. ‘Don’t leave.’
But Avery’s already letting go. Curving Sam’s body into a ball as he lays him down.
‘I’ll be back in just a second.’ Avery’s voice is hoarse. ‘I’ll – I’ll be back.’
His feet pound the alley, his screams for help already hitting the walls.
Then it’s quiet.
Sam tries to put the pieces of himself together. Tries, with cotton and screws and wishes. But doesn’t he deserve this?
He pushes fingers to his stomach and his breath goes out in a wet, short gasp. His ribs folds inwards as everything inside him shudders.
The boy turns invisible.
As he should be.
They try to pry his fingers open.
He’s too weak to stop them.
But if they take it away, the threads will snap and he won’t be able to get back up.
‘No, wait!’ Avery’s voice is panicked, words tripping over themselves. ‘Don’t take it. You’ll break him if you take it.’
‘OK, son, calm down. We’ve got this. We’re doing what’s best for your brother.’
Avery’s words catch between a scream and a roar, ‘Then don’t take it off him. He needs it! Listen to me, listen, just—’
They leave Sam’s fingers alone.
‘What’s he holding anyway?’
‘A key. Can you go see how the cop’s doing with the brother? We might have to sedate him.’
Sam’s lips part, but he can’t dig words out of his pockets to arrange them in a pleasing display for people to understand.
They need to understand the key.
If lost, please return to the De Laineys.
Sammy is fourteen and full of broken pieces.
Rain slicks down his face, plasters his thin T-shirt to knobbly, shivering shoulders as he stands in front of Aunt Karen’s house in the dark. He’s been here for a long time.
If he goes in, she’ll call the cops.
After what he did to those boys at school.
Her car is in the driveway and the TV flashes behind half-closed curtains. The thin smell of tuna bake curls out of the cracked windows and he thinks he hears crying.
Or maybe that’s the wind.
Or maybe that’s him.
He knots frozen fingers around his shoulders and shuts his eyes tight tight tight. If he wishes hard enough, time will stop and fold backwards and he won’t run across the schoolyard to the group of jeering kids and throw them aside till he sees his brother. Being smashed to pieces.
Blood and broken bone and hollowed-out eyes.
And the screaming.
Two seconds later and a teacher would have been there, would have saved them.
But Sammy didn’t wait and he beat that boy unconscious because how could he how could he how could he let his brother get hurt?
When they catch Sammy, they’ll take him away. Prison. He deserves it. He always goes too far.
He’ll die in prison.
He’ll die without Avery.
He tells himself, a thousand times a day, that he exists for Avery, to keep him safe and hug him and calm him down and love him. Avery can’t exist without Sammy—
or is it the other way
around?
Mud squelches under his shoes as he slowly crosses the yard. He ducks until he’s below the window of the bedroom they share. He taps on the glass, but the rain thunders so loud how could anyone hear?
The curtain rips back and Avery’s there, eyes melting pools.
‘C-c-can you get my jumper?’ Sammy whispers.
The curtain falls and there’s a brief scuffling. Sammy turns to the front door just as it crashes open and Avery tumbles out followed by a string of shouts from Aunt Karen.
‘If Sammy’s there, I’m calling the cops!’ she shouts. ‘Come back inside, Avery. Right now. You’ll get your cast wet. Avery? Avery!’
Avery shoots across the lawn, Sammy’s favourite yellow jacket in his hands. He has an oversized jumper on to hide how lumpy one arm is – the cast on his broken arm. Sammy expects the jacket to be tossed at him while Avery spins into frantic tears.
But Avery slams into him in a desperate hug and buries his face against his brother.
‘Sammy.’ It’s a sob.
‘Hey.’ Sam clutches him, a drowning boy. ‘Hey – h-hey, you’ll get your cast wet. You should go back inside.’ He feels the fever raging on Avery’s clammy skin and the bright, unfocused look in his eyes from the pain. He’s only just out of hospital.
‘Are you coming in?’ Rain sticks Avery’s fine hair to his cheeks.
‘I can’t.’ Sam glances desperately at the door. Has she called the cops already? ‘I don’t – I can’t go to jail, I just can’t. I’m going to … I’m running away.’
‘OK,’ Avery says. ‘OK. I’m coming too.’
Sammy pulls away and grabs Avery’s face, not forcing eye contact because he knows Avery hates that, just holding him tight so he knows these next words are serious. ‘I won’t have anywhere to live. Or sleep. Or eat. I’ll … I’ll steal. I’ll steal houses. It’ll be different every day, and uncomfortable and – everything you hate, OK?’ He’s crying now. Tears and rain. ‘You can’t do this with me.’