Band-Aids page 2
1003 Words
--,and as soon as I managed to turn the corner, I leaned against the wall. I tried to calm the pounding of my heart, to steady my breathing. What had I done?
I tried to contain them at all costs, but I had never been good at hiding my emotions. I still felt the imprint of his fingers, as if it were seared into my skin. I could still feel it... "You shouldn't have left like that," a voice sounded behind me. In the end, it was Rigel who was weaving the story, he was the spider. My eyes quickly located him, leaning against the corner. His venomous charm was infectious. He was infectious. "So, for you, this is just a game?" I exclaimed, trembling. "Just a game?" "You've done it all, moth," he replied, tilting his head. "Is this how you expect to gain their approval? By lying?" "Stay away from me," I said as I retreated, shivering, increasing the distance between us. His black eyes were abysses, exerting a power over me that I couldn't define. They frightened me. Rigel lowered his chin, observing my reaction with an impenetrable gaze. "This is our relationship," he murmured with a cutting voice. "You have to leave me alone!" I exclaimed, trembling. I poured all my false harshness onto him, and then a shadow, whose meaning I couldn't discern, crossed his eyes. "If Anna and Norman were to see... if they were to see... if they were to see that you despise me to such an extent... that you keep avoiding me... that things aren't as perfect as they think... they might change their minds, don't you think?" I looked at him in astonishment; it was as if he had read my thoughts. I felt terribly exposed. Rigel knew me well, he sensed my simple soul, that genuine spirit that he had always lacked. I just wanted a chance, but if they found out the truth, if they saw that we couldn't live together... they might send us back. Or maybe just one of us. And doubt seized me, devouring my thoughts.
thoughts: which one of us would they prefer? I tried to deny it to myself, but it was in vain. As if I hadn't noticed how Norman and Anna looked at him with adoration. Or the beautiful piano in the living room, polished with incredible care. As if I didn't know that he was always the chosen one. I pressed myself against the wall. "Stay away from me," I wanted to shout at him, but doubt shattered me and my heart started racing. "I'll be good," echoed in my throat. "I'll be good, I'll be good..." I didn't want to go back to those four walls, to remember the echoes of screams and to feel trapped again. I needed those smiles, those looks that had chosen me for once. I couldn't go back, I couldn't, no, no, no... "One day, they will understand who you really are," I said, looking at the floor, with a thread of a voice. "Oh, really?" he inquired, unable to suppress a hint of amusement in his voice. "And who am I?" I clenched my fists and looked up, adopting a lucid reproachful expression. With a feeling of animosity that made me tremble, I looked him directly in the eyes and harshly retorted, "You are the maker of tears." There was a long silence. Rigel threw his head back and burst into laughter. That laughter caressed his shoulders with terrifying ease, and then I knew that he had understood. He laughed at me, the maker of tears, with his malevolent lips and gleaming teeth, and that sound continued to resonate as I walked away down the hallway. And even when I locked myself in my room, alone, with all those walls and bricks that kept me away from him. And once there, the memories began to flow...
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"Adeline, have you been crying?" Her blonde head stood out against the cracks in the plaster. She was huddled in the back, small and hunched, as she always did when she was sad. "No," she replied, but her eyes were still red. "Don't lie to me, or the maker of tears will take you," I warned. She hugged her legs with her little arms. "They only tell us that to scare us," she whispered. "You don't believe it?" I murmured. In Grave, we all believed it was true. Adeline gave me an uneasy look, and I realized that she was no exception. She was only two years older than me and was like a big sister to me, but there are certain things that always frighten you. "Today at school, I told a boy," she confided, "but he's not here with us. He told a lie, and I said to him, 'You can't lie to the maker of tears.' But he didn't understand. He had never heard of it. But he knows something similar... He calls it 'the bogeyman'." I stared at her, not understanding. We had both been in Grave since we were very young, and I was sure she didn't understand it either. "And does this bogeyman... make you cry? Does it make you lose hope?" I asked. "No... but he says it's scary. And he takes you with him. It's terrifying." I thought about the things that scared me. And a dark basement came to mind. I thought about the things that terrified me. And "Her" came to mind. Then I understood. "Her" was my bogeyman, Adeline's bogeyman, and the bogeyman for many of us. But if it was a child who said it, a child who wasn't in Grave...
"There are so many bogeymen," she said. "But there's only one maker of tears."
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I had always believed in stories. I had always hoped to live one. And now... I was inside one. I walked among its pages, traveled down paper paths. But the ink stained everything. I had ended up in the wrong story.
- Writer
