Pink Walls

Day Four [Part I]

"I really have no idea what I'm saying right now."

The two-hour pill was just making it's inevitable journey down into the pit of my gut when Daniel joined me on the balcony.

I gulped down a mouthful of water to help it along then turned to face him, my eyebrow already raised in question. He said nothing and came to stand beside me. He was wearing a shirt now—light blue, long sleeves, with 'Good Morning' punctuated by an image of the rising sun stamped across the chest—I wasn't.

Despite the cool wind, I was warm enough to ignore the need for one. Besides, putting on a shirt seemed to be more trouble than it was worth, especially if it was just going to get stained by my bloodied bandages.

"Couldn't sleep too?" I asked after the silence had stretched on for too long, and he nodded.

He had his pinned away from his face now and the moonlight made his skin glow. He looked better out here than he did inside but his bruises stood out painfully like a reminder of my carelessness.

Your uselessness, Kayden. Don't mix them up.

Danny also seemed on edge, which was understandable.

After today, no one would be able to kill him anymore. The thought of running Italy's underground was a lot more overwhelming than not dying.

Even if he survived all the assassination attempts, he wouldn't leave the city the same nineteen year old he started off as.

"These three days have felt so much like a dream," he said.

"A lot has happened," I admitted and took a sip out of the bottle in my hand.

Until today, water had never tasted so good. I would have gone for coffee but I wasn't sure how it would affect whatever medication I was currently on—whatever it was, it was doing a pretty good job at making me forget everything I had been worrying about hours ago.

I felt like I could take on an army but that was what worried me, being unnecessarily reckless because the signals my brain sent me were being interrupted. There was no point in being able to fight if I couldn't tell when my body had had enough.

"I can't believe it'll all be over today," he replied after a while.

Not for the people who died because of you, I thought but didn't dwell on it long enough to ponder about the number of casualties that had been caused by my own interference. Daniel had enough self-awareness to know the consequences of what he had done, and I wasn't one to rub salt into open wounds.

"You'll be off to Italy to claim your throne in no time, Danny."

"You're that confident, uh?"

"I've only ever failed a mission once." I shrugged, not surprised that nothing hurt.

The sort of numbness I felt was suspiciously euphoric, but I knew better than to think too hard about the ingredients of the cocktails Ron cooked up.

She kept the recipes close to her chest and always cut me off before I got hooked on the pain meds. The withdrawal was always agonizing to work through, but if I had gotten back from shattered bones without them, I could do just as well do the same for a few scrapes and bruises.

"Which mission was that?"

"You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to," he added almost immediately and I shook my head.

I had my own share of sob stories, but this wasn't one of them.

"I had just started out. Was your age," I started, thinking back to that fateful day. "It was just a normal run: drop a package, exchange it for money. But that day I got caught in the middle of a gang war. The other party double crossed us while another gang dropped by for a shoot out. I lost the package and I lost the money."