Ashes of the Innocent
The throb in Emily’s left hand pulsed like a slow, cruel drum. She blinked, her large dark eyes adjusting to the dusty gloom of the attic, Jacob’s soft snores a fragile rhythm beside her. Outside the tiny window, the world was still a deep, suffocating dark.
Her hand screamed. She bit down on her sleeve, muffling the quiet sobs that threatened to escape. Noise meant trouble. Trouble meant pain. And she was so, so tired of pain.
She needed the medicine. The one Jacob held hostage, one pill a day, no more. It made her head fuzzy and sick, but it made the pain go away. She shook Jacob, a gentle nudge at first, then harder. "Jacob... you need'a wake up..." she whispered, her voice a reedy plea. He stirred, a low grunt, then finally, his eyes fluttered open.
“I need my medicine…” she repeated, the tears tracing paths on her dirt-smudged cheeks. He saw them, and that was enough. Jacob, her quiet protector, rose from the mattress, moving with practiced ease to the small hole in the wall where their secrets lay hidden. He returned with the tiny white pill, dropping it into her open mouth. The bitterness was fleeting, quickly replaced by a comforting fuzziness that spread through her limbs, dulling the relentless ache.
“Sleep, I know bubba,” she murmured, and Jacob sighed, nestling close. In the haze of the medicine, with Jacob a warm weight beside her, Emily drifted back to sleep, the pain temporarily banished.
