'The old man's back outside the magpie.' she said, nonchalant as all teenagers seem to be when they're trying not to sound as afraid as they secretly are. I tried not to sound afraid when I asked if he still had his book of names, the book bound in human skin (we all know it was his wife's - even the police know but they're just as scared as we are and rightfully so).
She said yes. He had the book in his hands, pages wide open as he screamed out random names and wrote them down. She reassured me that he hadn't said our names but it'll only be a matter of time before he does and we go missing like all the others have.
I made sure to tell as many people as possible, only some of them didn't answer. To think he's started so soon after arriving here again, after all these years of peace and silence where the fear of waking up to find your loved ones simply gone had all but faded to a quiet anxiety.
We sleep in the same room now, hooked up to dead man's switches that'll sound a siren to high heavens if it loses track of our heartbeats. We can't stop him from speaking- he'll only vanish and reappear again, we can't run away from our lives and our loves here but we can damned well try to stay together for aa long as possible.
Until the man outside the magpie reads our names from his book and we answer his call.
No comments:
Post a Comment