Blood

Within ten minutes I’m standing on the Fionn’s doorstep, waiting for someone to answer the door.

Reid’s already gone. I think he said that him and the boys were going to do groceries, then he was going to drop off Fletch—who lives about half way to Ristahill—and then he and Mattie would come and get me.

And that would be a rather long wait if Justin or Tim—or both—decided they didn’t want me to see Mallory. Lord, if I was Tim I wouldn’t want my son to see me either…did that make any sense? Likely not.

I don’t think I’ve made too much sense since Reid told me that Mallory was hurt, and I don’t really get why. I mean, I like Mallory well enough, I think. He’s kind enough, fuck, he went out of his way to keep me from dying. But…well, I dunno. I don’t think I really care about him, except then I have to think about chasing after him at the pub, how I just kind of shut down when I thought he’d died and how I wouldn’t let Reid tell me otherwise once I decided to come here.

The wooden door in front of me pulls inwards, and Justin pushes out the screen door.

“Lorna,” he says, both quizzically and with disapproval. “Can I help you?”

I pull at the sleeve of my jacket without really thinking about it and look up at Justin. “I’d like to see your brother, if I could.”

Justin frowns, but he seems to smile as well, which I don’t think is possible. I think I mentioned that I’m not thinking straight. “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea.”

“Is he alright?” I say, unable to keep both the alarm and sharpness out of my voice.

Justin shrugs. “In his own way. I just don’t really think that you—”

I scowl. “Should be around him. How lovely.”

He frowns again and looks me over in a different way than he normally has. “He doesn’t need the likes of you toying with him. Especially not now.”

Toying with him?

“The likes of me? Toying…I just want to see him, Justin. Please,” I try to sound polite, but I don’t have much practice at it, so I still end up sounding like myself.

He looks me over again, and then shrugs. “If he’ll see you.”

His frown stays in place as he holds the screen door open for me to follow him, and then closes the actual door behind me. “Down here,” he says.

It’s a cold feeling house, even though I think the temperature’s about the same as it normally is in my house. It just doesn’t feel warm.

I’m totally surrounded by gray walls and pale ceilings hung with pale lights. I don’t like it, but it doesn’t matter if I like it or not. I’m not here to judge the Fionn’s home.

I follow Justin down a hall to the left of the door, slightly remembering when I was here after I got lost. If I’m right, this way leads to their kitchen.

But Justin stops about halfway down at a closed door. He knocks once and then pushes it open. Justin says something I don’t catch before he steps back again, and holds the door open, motioning for me to go in.

The room I step into is dimmer than the hall had been, so it takes my eyes a minute to adjust. In that amount of time, the door pushes mostly closed behind me and Mallory says, “Uh, hi.”

“Hi,” I say.

He’s lying on a bed parallel to the far wall, which really isn’t that far, with his knees pulled up and his head straight.

There’s something plastic wrapped around his neck and attached to both his head and his chest. His closest arm’s in a cast.

I walk forward and sit on the floor beside his bed. He watches me, but not how someone normally would. He has to look out of the corner of his eye, which really couldn’t be overly comfortable.

“Sorry,” he says.

“What?”

“It’s just kind of odd, isn’t it? To have to sit and just kind of look at me?”

I shrug.

“If I could just get this fucking cast off. Then I’d have two hands. Could take off this damn brace…” he trails off. “You wouldn’t be willing to help me with that, eh?”

“What?”

He smiles, not how I’ve seen him smile before, but almost wicked. “There’s a knife, in the top drawer of the dresser behind me. Just books and a knife. You wouldn’t happen to be willing to—”

I glance at the dresser. “You know, I think this is exactly why your brother didn’t want to let me in.”

Mallory laughs. “Did he not? Yeah, I suppose that among some…other reasons.”

I stand and walk across to the dresser. It’s a dark dresser, some kind of wood carved into four drawers.

“Like what?” I ask as I pull the top drawer open.

“Uh, you wouldn’t want to know. It’s in a leather sheath, I think.”

And he’s right. Inside the drawer are at least two dozen books, some with hard covers and more with soft. I don’t recognise any of them, but I also don’t really read, at all. They all look kind of old. The books have funny titles, too. 1984, The Lord of the Flies, The Hobbit and another few that all have the same funny mark along the spine, along with another dozen others at least.

In a little gap on the right side is a knife in a leather case. The blade’s got to be about five inches long.

I retrieve the knife and slide the drawer closed.

It’s pretty, I think as I walk back towards where I’d been sitting. There’s all sorts of things carved into it. Cattle and horses, vines and flowers, but then there is also water and wind and a forest entwined into it all. It’s a weird thing to think, but I don’t really know what else I should be thinking about, if that makes any sense.

“Do you want me to take it out?” I ask once I’m sitting at Mallory’s side once again.

“Please.”

There’s a clasp that I undo to be able to slide the blade out by the handle.

I offer it to him, hilt first.

He frowns, probably thinking as he takes it. “Oh, thank you.”

“Do you want help?”

“Uh, I dunno. I’m afraid you’ll slice my arm up,” he says, both like he’s serious and like he’s laughing.

I scowl. “I will not. Just give me back the knife.”

He still looks skeptical and unwilling.

“For fuck’s sake, Mallory! I’ve cut a cast before.”

“Have you?” He asks as he reluctantly passes over the blade.

“Mh-hm,” I say. “I need your wrist.”

He doesn’t look so sure, but instead of arguing, he holds out his right arm. “Keep in mind I’m right-handed.”

I give him a look that I’m not sure he’ll see with the way he has to lie. “Mallory do you want the cast off or not?”

“Have at ’er,” he says.

I find it odd the way he’s been talking. It’s not how I’m used to him talking. But maybe this is what he’s like, when he’s himself. I honestly think I like him better this way, aside from all the casts and braces and such, that is.

I press the flat of the blade against his hand so that just the tip is inside the cast. Either Mallory’s been working on getting it loose or the doctor did a shitty job.

“When have you had to cut off a cast?” he asks as I start to cut away at the plaster.

“Uh, I’ve done it twice for my brother.”

He winces as I cut away at more of the cast. “Hold still,” I mutter.

“Sorry. That’d be Reid?”

I frown as I pull away at more of the cast. It’s a good knife. “Uh, yeah. Fuck, I think he’s broken every bone in his bloody body at least twice.”

I think Mallory smiles, but I can’t tell since I’m more focused on his arm. “Hm, I think I have, as well.”

I’m already half way through with his cast, but Mallory still tries to pull his arm away when I pull at the plaster in a place it doesn’t want to break.

“Ow,” he mutters.

“Quit it! I’m almost done.”

He doesn’t voice any other complaint or anything else until I’m through with the cast.

Mallory laughs and flexes his fingers once his arm’s free. “Fuck, I could kiss you,” he laughs, and then sobers a little. “If I could actually move, I guess.”

I feel my stomach twist when he says the first part, even though it was just a remark and it didn’t mean anything.

“Thank you.”

I shrug.

“Oh, you can take of your jacket if you’d like,” he says, as though he hadn’t realised I was wearing one until now.

I shrug off my jacket, which I think Mallory watches me do, since I can feel his eyes, and it seems weird. I’m not used to boys—or anyone—caring that I’m taking off my jacket, unless it’s wet or something, ’cause my uncle Simon gets pretty pissed if you don’t take off your snowy jacket when you enter the Fletcher’s house.

I think about the Fletchers, my family, for a moment—mostly Fletch, and his name, which ends with me asking, “Do you like your name?”

Mallory’s still smiling, but in the same way Fletch does when he’s confused. Christ, I never thought that I’d be able to compare Mallory Fionn to Fletch.

“Uh, no. Not really, why?” he really smiles, now. “What? Do you not like my name?”

I smile, too, and then I rest my hand on his, which he’s put back at his side, without really thinking that I should.

“I like your name fine. Just, is there something you’d rather be called?”

He kind of jerks one shoulder, as though he means to shrug but can’t. “Uh, I dunno. I get Mal from my brother and a couple others. It’s better than Mallory, I guess. I haven’t the slightest idea why my father thought it was a good name for a son. I mean, I’m sure it’d suit a girl, but—”

“It suits you fine,” I say, just because it does. He’s a weird bloke, and it’s a weird name. And neither he nor his name is unpleasant in any way…unlike me. At least my name’s kind of nice.

He looks like he wants to say something, but instead he glances kind of towards me and down, probably at our hands. I try not to notice that his fingers have slipped between mine, somehow. “Why are you holding my hand?”

I had thought that I would flush scarlet, but I don’t. Thank God. Instead, I smile. “Ah, isn’t there something about holding your friend’s hand when they’re hurt?”

He smiles faintly. “Are we friends, then?”

“Well I’d think so.”

“Alright.”

There’s at least five minutes that we’re just kind of there like that, and it doesn’t feel uncomfortable that neither of us are speaking, it actually feels kind of normal.

And then Mallory pulls his hand away. He looks old again, even though he claims to only be seventeen.

“I don’t think you should be my friend,” he says.

I frown and pull my own hand into my lap, scowling. “Alright,” I say in a bitter voice. I hadn’t meant to sound like that.

“No. Lorna. I just, I’m not exactly interesting, and I think I’d cause you more trouble than it’s worth.”

Fucking liar. “Sure.”

He hesitates, saying something but not at the same time. “I promise, I just, I don’t want you to get hurt, and, well…lots of things get hurt around me,” he glances at the discarded cast.

“What? Don’t think I can handle myself?” I ask.

He’s not making any sense.

I hate it when people do that. When they make excuses instead of just saying they don’t like you.

“It’s not that, I just. The Good Folk…they have a tendency to…and you have your brothers.”

Oh, I think. But I’m still angry. “Mallory you don’t have to like me. I think I’ve said that before. Just grow a pair and say it!”

“But I do like you. I really like you.”

Oh.

“Okay.”

He just lays there for a moment, staring at the ceiling. “I just talked myself in a circle.”

I laugh a little. “Yeah, you did.”

He laughs, too. “Fuck.”

I look at him with my head tilted. “I didn’t think you were like this.”

“Like what?”

I shrug. “I dunno. Happy?”

He laughs again. “Yeah, I guess I’m a little stir-crazy. I think I’ve read every book in this room half a dozen times, and there isn’t much else I can do. Sorry.”

“Don’t apologise.”

He looks down the length of the room, where there’s a window at the foot and then another bed against the opposite wall. The blinds are mostly closed on the window, which is likely why it’s so dark.

“Do you and Justin both sleep in here?”

He frowns. “Uh, yeah.”

I look around. “And how does that work?”

He smiles a little, crookedly. “Well, I spend a lot of time in the attic.”

“Uh, can I ask you something?” I ask. And then realise that it was a question.

But Mallory doesn’t point that out. “Uh, sure.”

“Has Justin slept with Sarah?”

Mallory frowns. “Uh, George’s Sarah?”

If you could call her that. “Yeah.”

“Uh, I hadn’t thought you’d ask something like that.”

I frown. “So, yes?”

Mallory sighs, which makes me remember that he might never walk again, and I’m asking about my brother’s wife. God.

“Uh, yeah. I think...no, yes, he has.”

I nod, since I figured that. I should apologize, but instead…

“Do you know…since her and George got married?”

He frowns, “Lorna, I don’t think that’s fair.”

“I suppose not, sorry,” I mutter, shaking my head. “You’re probably tired. I should—”

He laughs. “Tired? I have never been less tired in my life. Spirits, I might have fucking smothered myself if you hadn’t come by. You have no idea how bored I am.”

I think of the shelf full of books in my room. I don’t think anyone’s read them in at least a decade. My mam might have read them at some point in time, before me and Reid.

“So, do you like reading, then?”

“Uh, yeah,” he says in a strange voice.

Shit, I really shouldn’t talk to people.

“Uh, sorry. I just, I have some books at home. And I don’t read, so I have no idea what they’d be about, but…I could bring them over, if you’d like,” I say.

“Yeah?” he asks hopefully.

“Yeah. I mean, I think my Mam was the last person to read any of them. It’s not like anyone would miss them.”

“Are you sure?”

I tilt my head a little. “No, Mallory, I just wanted to be an ass. Yes, I’m sure.”

“Thanks.” He looks back up at the ceiling.

There’s a moment where Mallory looks like he’s thinking about something, the way that boys seem to, just staring into nothing. But his pupils slide back downwards so that he can look at me.

“Do you think I’ll get better?”

I frown. “I…dunno. I’m not exactly a doctor.”

“I know that,” he says irritably. “Nobody seems to think that I will.”

He looks back up at the ceiling.

“Well, do you think you will?”

“Yes.”

I smile, although I think I’m forcing it. “Then you will. I thought I’d get better, and I did.”

He laughs. “I did that.”

I glance around the room, and then brush my hand against Mallory’s again. “Exactly.”

The door opens behind me and Justin pokes his head in.

“You’re still here?” he asks, stepping inside and closing the door behind himself.

Maybe it’s because I don’t like him, but I want to yell at him. Where else would I be?

At home, idiot, I think.

“I don’t know how to answer that,” I say.

Justin tilts his head. “Fair enough,” he says to me, and then to Mallory, “do you need anything?”

Mallory waves him away…with his right arm.

“What happened to your cast?” Justin asks angrily.

Mallory regards his arm as though seeing it for the first time. “Huh. It’s not there! It must have fallen off.”

“Mallory!” Justin says, scolding, it’s the same tone I use with my brothers…and my cousins…and my dad.

But Mallory just rolls his eyes. “It’s not even broken.”

“So you’re a doctor, now?”

He sticks his arm in the air with his middle finger raised. “There, see? Straight as can be.”

I glance back at Justin, covering a smile with my hand. He doesn’t exactly look impressed.

A door slams somewhere.

“Hello?” asks my brother’s voice from somewhere.

Justin opens the door again and leaves, likely to chase after my brother’s voice.

“Sorry,” Mallory mutters. “I suppose that was immature.”

I look back at him with a smile. “Probably. But I’m not terribly mature, either.”

“I’ve noticed.”

I give him a look that I don’t really know what I want to say with, something like a smirk. “You know, I didn’t think you had a spine.”

“Oh, I have one, it just isn’t very useful right now, or so the doctor claims…” he mutters.

“No, I mean. I thought you were a wimp.”

Mallory frowns a little. “Okay.”

I shake my head, “But I don’t anymore.”

“Okay,” he says, quite a bit brighter. “Um, about those books,”

I glance back at the doorway, thinking of Reid.

“Uh, tomorrow. Can I bring them then?” I ask.

“I’ll be here,” he says, and then begins to mutter, “Right here, actually.”

“Alright,” I say and grab my jacket. “I’ll see you then.”

Mallory doesn’t say anything, but he does look at me. I don’t get what it means…probably doesn’t mean anything.

“Lorna?” Reid calls.

I glance at Mallory for little more than a second, then get up to find my brother.