Forgive Me by Kateri Stanley (reading strategies book TXT) 📕

as he peered down into her innocent face. They stared at one another, he couldn’t understand the inkling. It was passionate and emotional. The instinct controlled the second his lips touched hers. Her shaky skin tasted like milk and flowers. He breathed her in, his dirty fingers touching her long mane of blonde hair. He pulled her closer, drinking in the moment.

“Why did you do that?” she whispered, recoiling from his kiss.

The boy didn’t respond, he wanted to stare at her. He began to smile. He couldn’t remember the last time he needed the urge to smile, he had nothing in his life to be happy about.

“What’s on your hands?”

His body stiffened, anger quelling inside. He needed her out of the way. A thought told him to crawl up the metal fencing, break her neck and keep moving but it wouldn’t be a decent fight. She’d snap like a cracker under his fingers. Instead, the boy bared his teeth and hissed like a slithering serpent.

The girl stepped back in a jolt and her face contorted into the perfect definition of fear. He watched her scream and retreat back into the warm cabin. Throughout their little conversation, he noticed she kept diverting to his hands. No wonder she'd paid so much attention. They were covered in blood and for once, it wasn’t his own.

Grace Payne was awoken by a throbbing migraine. She didn't know if it was the side effects of the humidity or the rose wine she’d had with dinner. Whatever the source, she was regretting it. The sensation of the ice-cold water was almost pleasurable when it hit her tongue. Her head span a few times after she slugged it down. Grace came out of the bathroom; she saw the barrel chest of her husband rise and fall. She used to call him Bear when they first got together, his size and strength were one of the first things she was attracted to. She still used the nickname occasionally, especially when she enjoyed teasing him. The pain had travelled into her left eyelid and was making up camp in her jaw. She knew she had to get support. If the pain got any worse, she'd be stooped over the toilet chucking her guts, the unfortunate price when her jaw went into overdrive grinding during sleep.

Grace made her way to the kitchen, fishing out her painkillers and swallowed them in one gulp. The wind from outside was spinning the leaves around her patio. Sometimes they’d tap the glass, startling her but this time it wasn't. Instead, a dirty young boy sat in front of the patio door staring in at her.

“Ted! Ted!” she squealed.

The boy came up to the door, his vivid blue eyes burning into hers. His hand shook as he pressed it to the panel. His fingers were caked in blood.

Grace and Ted stood over the boy when he relayed his story. He was speaking far too quickly, so much he was stammering and stumbling over himself. He was crouched in the foetal position on the couch, recounting his words, his eyes darting frantically. His rucksack was lying next to him. Grace zoned in and out as the boy talked about scientists, tests and military operations, she’d completely forgotten about the pain in her head.

This poor guy is obviously delusional or… he’s just escaped from God knows what, Grace thought.

The child was grimy, he seemed exhausted and his hands were bloody. Where had he come from? She didn’t believe the military story; he must’ve run from an abusive family or perhaps a foster care facility. She’d read plenty of horror stories to know that care in the community wasn’t always kind, children had been neglected and tortured in those places.

“Is this yours?” Ted asked, his shotgun clutched in his other hand, pointing the barrel at his stained skin.

“No, no,” the boy whispered, panting under his breath. “Not, not mine. I had to get out, they kept hurting me.”

“Who kept hurting you?”

“People in white coats. Those are the ones I know by name. There were others. With masks and guns guarding. I had to run, or they’d keep me there.” The boy glanced to the gun in Ted’s hand. “Your firearm isn’t loaded.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I know how to shoot one and I know when a shotgun has bullets in it.”

The boy began to reel off different types of guns he’d ‘trained’ with. Grace noted how he spoke like a drill sergeant with academic knowledge rolling off his tongue. It was as if he’d memorised a text book a thousand times over. At this point, Grace was scared. A child creeping around in her back yard, spouting stories with bloody hands and knowledge of licenced and seemingly unclassified armoury was not a good sign. They needed to act quickly.

“What can we do for you, son?” Ted asked, wearily. “Call the police? What about your parents?”

The boy’s head twitched. “No, no calls. No police.”

“Where’s your parents in all of this?” Grace asked. “Why shouldn’t we call the police? Have you done something?”

“I…don’t have any parents. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

Ted sat in front of the boy, his large frame blocking the moonlight from outside. “Son, you can’t have that stuff on your hands from nothing. Just tell us what happened.”

The boy shrunk in fear, his mouth drooping sadly. “I killed a deer. They made me. I just wanted them to stop.”

Stop what? His words got her heart pumping. The boy had trudged on about being drowned, slapped, electrocuted and stabbed. Grace knew children made things up for attention, especially the fucked-up ones. Poor thing, an ugly duckling nobody wanted. She didn’t want the boy sitting on her couch, his clothes were covered in foliage. She understood Ted’s hesitation, but they couldn’t leave him outside with a wave of their hands. He wasn’t a squirrel or a bird. He was a child, maybe eight or nine years old, he was tall for a kid, Grace couldn’t be sure