Brighter Than the Sun - Darynda Jones Page 0,2

smile on his face is a scary thing. He flirts with the nurse. She laughs and ducks her head. He pats my arm with his sandpaper hands and calls me Alexander. Then he gives my arm a tight squeeze as if I don’t know what the fuck “Alexander” means.

Eyes down. Mouth shut.

My first thought is for my sister, Kim. She’s not my real sister but definitely the next best thing. She’s all I have, and Earl knows it.

“You took quite a spill,” the nurse says.

I don’t say anything. I just nod.

“I’m Gillian.” She checks my bandages. “Goodness.” She pulls back in surprise. “Almost healed. How on earth is that—?” She stops and fixes her expression. “That’s amazing. I bet you’ll be able to go home soon.”

I nod again and wince at the longing she feels for me. She wants a kid. A boy just like me. Sweet. Polite. Respectful. She has no idea what I am. How filthy I am. How bad. I feel sorry for her.

“You ready to go home, sport?” Earl asks me.

He ruffles my hair. My fucking hair like I’m a two-year-old. Heat wells inside me. Burns my skin. I bite down and nod like the good little bitch I am. His words. Little bitch. I just happen to agree with them.

Gillian laughs. Her eyes sparkle when she looks at me. I turn away. She needs to save that for someone a little more deserving.

“It could be a few more days, unfortunately,” she says. “We still don’t know what’s causing those seizures. But I bet you’ll be out of here in no time.”

Earl’s anger peaks to a new high.

“You have some interesting markings on you,” she says. She wants to look. To see them again. To examine them more closely.

I don’t encourage her. Earl doesn’t like it when people notice them. My birthmarks. The curves and lines that cover much of my shoulders and back. They were really light when I was a kid. Barely noticeable. They’re getting darker, though, and the shapes have started showing up in my dreams. Like they mean something. Like they lead somewhere. Probably into darkness.

Earl nods. “Been there since he was born,” he says, like he would know.

“Well, I’ll let the doctor know he’s awake.” Her smile is innocent like sunlight on a flower.

A man comes in, a custodian, as she writes on the chart. He glances at her, grabs the trash, wipes down the counters in the bathroom, and glances again. I look at him hard. Then I look back at Gillian. Then back at him.

His name is Donald. He has oily brown hair and thick glasses, and he is going to stab her to death in a few weeks. He wants her to go out with him. She’s nice. Nobody is nice to him. But when she tells him she only wants to be friends, he’s furious. Calls her a tease. Calls her a slut. He’s waited so long for her. Hoped for so long. If he can’t have her, no one will.

I close my eyes. Try unsuccessfully to block out the scene that unfolds inside my head. A scene I can envision only because he is going to hell as a result of it, and I can see the thing that brands people for hell. That first horrible act they commit that sets their fate. I know the names of everyone going to hell, and I know if a person is going there the minute we meet, whether the person has committed the sin yet or not.

Hell is not a good place. I’ve seen that in my dreams, too. In my nightmares. Most of them are about Earl. About his hands and his nails and his teeth. But sometimes I dream about hell. About the fire and the agony and the soldiers. The devil’s army. I see them from on high as they march. As they battle. I command them as though I’ve done it for centuries, and that just can’t be good. There’s only one way I can see such things. I’m bad. I’m evil, because only an evil person would know things about hell.

I want to tell Gillian about Donald, but I can’t. Not with Earl right there. She wouldn’t believe me anyway.

Earl’s anger rises when the nurse tells him it will be a few more days, and I know I’m in even more trouble. But that’s okay. I can still feel the light. It permeates the crust. The outer shell. Sinks deep inside me. He