Blood

“Lorna?” asks my twin’s voice.

I look towards the closed door of Mallory’s bedroom. I’m pretty sure I’ve been in here for hours, although I’m not sure since there’s no clock.

Reid pushes the door open, letting in a stream of light and a bit of noise, nowhere near as much as there had been a while ago.

“I have a favour to ask,” he says, making to close the door before realising the light’s off so that would make it dark in here. I’ve been lying in Mallory’s bed for a while, not for any reason other than I’m tired. “Why’s it so dark in here?”

I pull myself up, which makes my brother look at me. I don’t think he’d realised where I was until now. “I was trying to sleep,” I say, and then remember the first thing Reid had said. “What kind of favour?”

Reid makes a face, maybe because I’m in a boy’s bed. Stupid of him, though. It’s not like the boy’s here too. “Do you remember Lily Drummond? She’s not feeling too well, so I wanted to drive her home—”

By not feeling too well, he means she’s drank more than she can handle. “To her home or our home?” I ask.

Reid makes an entirely different face, one that means he doesn’t like me doubting his nonexistent virtue. Yet he’s allowed to be upset by the idea of me being in Mallory’s bed. Fucking hypocrite.

“So you want me to stay here?” I ask. “Well, I suppose if Mallory will have me.”

I grin in a cruel kind of way.

Reid rolls his eyes. I wonder if he can see my smile. “George says he’ll take you home.”

He can’t be serious. “Oh, well that sounds lovely,” I say.

“Lorna, please,” Reid says.

I frown at him. “You are such a fucking hypocrite!” I say, rather angrily actually. I hate it how he does this. Like, it’s perfectly fine if he goes off and fucks whoever he can get drunk enough yet the idea of me having a bloke that’s mine is just plain mad.

“I am not.”

I laugh incredulously. “Oh, you’re not? Jesus, Reid, the face you made when you saw me in Mallory’s bed! He’s not even here and yet you looked so ruddy disgusted, like I was committing some moral sin, but if you want to leave me somewhere I never wanted to be to fuck a drunk girl, that’s perfectly fine! How is that not hypocritical?”

He sighs, looking quite sad. “Please?”

I shake my head, trying to calm myself at least some and say, “When is George leaving?”

Reid tries to conceal a smile, although quite poorly. “Soon. Really soon.”

“Reid.”

He hesitates. “Soon…ish?”

“Fuck it,” I mutter and flick my hand in a gesture telling Reid to leave.

“Thank you,” he says, almost pathetic in how excited he sounds.

The door clicks shut, pushing away the light from the rest of the house.

I lay back down, trying to avoid thinking about the fact that I’m going to have to drive in Reid’s truck again at some point in time. God, life would be so much easier if my brother wanted to be a priest. Or if he just didn’t like girls. That would work, too.

I look around the room again. Earlier, I’d basically gone through everything in it other than Mallory’s clothes since that felt like it would be a weird thing to do. It’s kind of weird that there’s only one bed in here now when there used to be two, which seems a far more obvious indicator that Justin Fionn is dead than the funeral party going on outside this door.

I don’t know, I kind of feel shitty for going through Mallory’s stuff, but he did tell me to try and entertain myself, right? Something like that? I didn’t find anything to do just that, although I did find a fiddle, a small army of books and a case of beer. I was kind of tempted to take one of the beers, except I don’t like them. I don’t even know why I wanted one. Most of them were empty, anyway.

I close my eyes. I feel so tired it’s unbelievable. So it’s not surprising that at some point in time I fall asleep.

I know that I’m asleep because I’m ten years old again, running through a twilight lit forest.

It’s amazing how many times I can have this same dream and still be just as terrified by it. Hell, I even know I’m dreaming, but that doesn’t stop me from hurting when I fall and cut my foot on a rock, nor does it keep me from screaming when a root starts to snake up my leg…

“Lorna?” asks a groggy voice to my left.

I try to get away from the Wood Dwellers, but I run into a wall. I start to panic before I realise that I’m not in Wanderer’s Wood. That I’m in Mallory’s bed...with him beside me.

Was he here when I fell asleep? No. No, I don’t think so.

“Uh, my head,” Mallory mutters, pushing the heels of his hands into his eyes.

He’s still fully dressed, as am I, except my skirt has rode up to the top of my thighs.

I try to pull it down without making it obvious that it’s like that.

“Shit,” Mallory says, laughing and sitting up. He looks at me. “I didn’t mean to get into bed with you. Spirits, I really should quit drinking.”

I shrug. “It’s your bed.”

He tilts his head. “What difference does that make?”

“Don’t worry about it, Mal. I don’t mind,” I say since I don’t. I realise that if Mallory’s here then almost everyone has to have left.

“What time is it?” I ask, looking towards the door. There’s still a sliver of light coming in from under it.

Mallory shakes his head. “I dunno, late. George is still here, I think. Him and a couple others. Well, at least they were….” He trails off, probably wondering how long he’s been asleep for.

I don’t really care if George has left or not, other than the fact that Reid’ll be angry with me if I stay here. So what if he’s angry, though? I mean, Dad will already be in bed so he won’t know as long as I get up early enough…and find a way back to the house.

I look back at Mallory, who’s also looking at me. His pale eyes seem to glow in the dark.

“You look like shit,” I say.

He laughs slightly, looking down at himself. “I feel like shit.”

There’s laughter somewhere else in the house, which makes me feel slightly better about the odds of George still being here.

Mallory looks down at me, his head tilted. “Are you alright?”

I feel myself make a bit of a face. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because you seemed a bit panicked when you woke up,” he hesitates. “You’re sure it’s alright that I’m here?”

I feel like rolling my eyes but I don’t since I think that would hurt Mallory and oddly enough I don’t like hurting him. “I was just having a nightmare,” I say.

“What about?” he asks.

There’s an insult about to leave my mouth on impulse, which I stop. I don’t even know why I had wanted to insult him. Maybe it’s because I’m still a little afraid of him. That doesn’t sound right, though.

I lie anyway and say, “I don’t remember.”

Mal nods, looking away from me and around the room. He looks like he’s going to get up and then doesn’t.

“Sorry,” he mutters, although I don’t know what he’s sorry for.

I’m going to ask, except the door swings open before I have the chance. Light pours in, outlining my eldest brother.

“Hey, if you’re ready to head out—” George starts, and then stops once his eyes focus on me. He looks from me to Mallory and then shakes his head, likely in disgust.

“I’ll be in the car,” he mutters in a tight voice before slamming the door shut.

For a second, I just sit there, processing what he meant and then Mallory’s across the room and I realise that George thought we had sex.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” Mallory says, pacing.

“For what?”

He looks at me, genuinely distressed, which makes me angry. It shouldn’t matter what George bloody thinks.

“I shouldn’t have—or, I dunno, I just—”

“Yeah. I get it,” I sneer, getting up as well.

“I’m sorry,” Mallory says again. He walks up beside me, almost touching my arm and then maybe thinking better of it. Fucking coward.

“I heard you.”

I grab my jacket off the floor and step into my boots. I can’t believe I was in bed with a fucking murderous alkie. What the hell is wrong with me?

I pull open the door and then go to slam it shut but Mallory grabs it. I cringe a little because I know that I’d hurt him.

He touches my wrist with his fingertips and I turn. He’s squinting to the point where his eyes are almost shut. I hate that he looks like he’s in pain.

“I’m sorry,” I say, melting a bit. I feel like a moron.

Mallory smiles, although it’s forced. He looks like he’s going to say something stupid about already saying that, but instead says, “I know.”

“I should go,” I say.

He nods and then kisses me lightly. It startles me a little, since it seems a bit out of character, and then I remember that he’s drunk.

I consider saying something but don’t. Instead I just turn around and leave.

It’s snowing outside. Dark, too. I see the headlights of George’s car and go to it, getting in without saying a word. He pulls out of the lane the same way.

After about ten minutes of driving we make it to Kappamor, where George decides he’s done holding his tongue.

“Lorna, he’s a murderer! How can you not understand that?”

I look at my brother, surprised out of near sleep. “What?”

“Christ, he killed his own brother!”

I open my mouth to say something, I don’t know what, but George continues before I can.

“Do you not get that? Because if you do and you still want to fuck him then there’s something so, so wrong with you, Lorna,” he says it in a way that makes it sound like he’s genuinely worried for my sanity.

“I mean, at Justin’s funeral. His funeral, Lorna!”

“I heard you the first time,” I mutter.

George continues on. “You slept with a murderer at a funeral! Please, tell me how you can let yourself do that?”

I sneer at him. “I don’t know, George. How did you let yourself sleep with your brother’s girlfriend?”

He shakes his head, which makes me slightly nervous since he’s driving in a small snow storm.

“Why do you always have to bring that up? It’s nothing near the same!”

I laugh bitterly. “Yeah, you’re right. Mallory’s not cheating on anybody!”

George looks at me with his eyes squinted, again, I feel a flash of panic. I can imagine the car going off the road and dying. Jesus, George might be one of the last people I would want to die with.

“He’s a murderer!”

“He is not a murderer!” I say, and then remember where this argument started. “And I didn’t sleep with him.”

George shakes his head again, focusing on the road as he takes the rough corner. I brace myself against the door to avoid hitting my head off the window.

“Lorna, he killed his only brother. He killed my only brother!” His voice breaks.

“Oh, you’re only brother. George you have two brothers,” and then I decide to say something stupid. “Or is it that you can only recognise people like yourself as your family.”

“People like me?” he asks with a frigid politeness that I didn’t think he knew how to pull off.

“Whores,” I say.

George gives me a furious look. “Sarah is not a whore,” he says through gritted teeth.

“Please.”

“She ain’t!”

I roll my eyes. “George, she was with Reid when you got engaged.”

“Me and Sarah love each other.”

“Tsk. The only thing Sarah loves about you is how fucking stupid you are.”

I see George’s knuckles go white from gripping the steering wheel so hard.

I decide to be mean since I’m sick of George getting to act like he’s never done a thing wrong in his life while I’m some kind of hell-bitch.

“And it’s so sad since you don’t even realise what a moron you are,” I say. “I mean, how do you not know that your wife is fucking your best mate?”

“He’s dead, Lorna!” George cries, as though I didn’t know. As though I didn’t see Justin Fionn’s corpse, his blood. Of course, George doesn’t know that. George doesn’t know anything.

“I fucking know he’s dead! That doesn’t change the fact that he used to have sex with your whore!”

George has sped up, whether consciously or not. Maybe I should have held my tongue.

Except then I realise that we’re only a couple minutes away from the house now.

“Stop calling her that,” George says quietly.

I roll my eyes yet again. “Why? It’s what she is.”

I jerk forward as George slams on the brakes. There’s a terrible screeching noise and I feel my heart leap into my throat.

I’m going to die, I think, waiting for the car to slide off the road or flip.

But by some act of God it doesn’t do either.

“Are you trying to kill us?” I scream at my brother, but he’s already out of the car.

I blink, trying to figure out what the hell he’s doing when my door opens.

I barely have time to look before George grabs me and pulls me out of the car.

He slams me against the back door, squeezing my throat.

I can’t breathe.

George is yelling at me, although through the panic and whatever else may be going on I don’t hear him, all I can see is his face contorted in anger.

George, I try to say, except no sound comes out.

I gasp for air, but I can’t get any, so I try to hit my brother but it doesn’t do anything.

All I can see is his face in front of me, except that’s starting to go fuzzy.

Please. George.

I can’t hear anything. I can’t see anything. And it hurts. Jesus, it hurts.

Everything is black.