After the Storm (Norman Ray Emma)

Lovely

She looked very tired and shaken, but it was Emma. 

"You guys came!"

"Of course we did," Norman yelled to her. We ran to her as tears formed in her eyes. Emma didn't deserve this, after all, she's done so much already for everyone.  I hugged her tight, along with Norman. We're both relieved this is over so quickly.

"Let's go home, Emma,"

"I hated being here," she told us. 

"Well, don't worry anymore. Once we get home we'll all make sure nothing like this happens again. 

"Right," she backed away from us and approached Zazie, grabbing his hand. 

"Hey Zazie," She smiled at him. He responded happily, glad to see her. She kissed the top of his in a friendly manner, small things like this cheered him up at times.

--

Quickly I looked back to the home and remembered Lethabo, I didn't say anything to the boys when I began walking back over to him. I need to check up on him, now that Norman and Ray are here what will think of him? Lethabo doesn't want to eat me anymore and I'm all he has left. Before I could reach the door, however, the demon boy was already making his way out, staring directly at the sight of his deceased parents.  

It reminds me of when I first saw Conny dead in the back of a truck. We are far too young to see such horrid things. In fact, no one should be seeing things like that. Tears filled his eyes, he looked over to me and made his way over to me. 

"Mercy?" he yelled out. 

"Lethabo," I mumbled. 

"Mercy!" he screamed this time as he ran towards me. 

From behind me, I heard a gun being loaded and cocked. They were going to shoot him. He's only a child. 

"Emma come back over here, quickly!" I hear Norman tell me. I look over my shoulder at him for a brief moment but don't respond. 

Lethabo ran into me, squeezing me tight and hugging me. 

"I don't want to die," 

He must've heard the gun too because he hid from Norman with the gun. 

"Emma, shove him off of you!"

My back still turned to them, "No," I mumbled. My mind is racing with things I can say to where they won't kill him. Maybe they won't let him stay with us in the big tree, but maybe he's got other family members he can go to. 

"Emma!" 

I don't reply this time, Lethabo does for me. 

"No, go away! You killed Mama and Papa! I'll never forgive you monsters!" 

"You're a demon, you eat my family all the time! Who's the real monster?" 

That's the thing, it's normal for demons. Lethabo is a child so he won't know any better. 

"But you're the food, you were born on a farm so that means you're food!" 

I can see where he's coming from, but we think the same. He wouldn't want to be eaten so why would we? 

"You're wrong, now get away from Emma, she isn't your food!"

"She isn't my food, I'm not going to eat her. I care about her and she cares about me! And her name is Mercy!"

"Emma isn't your pet, and she doesn't care about you. The moment you get hungry you'll eat her right up,"

"She does care about me, you don't know a thing. Right, Me- Emma?" He called me Emma. 

He's probably realized now it's better if he calls me that, maybe he doesn't think of me as a pet now. 

Yet, what am I supposed to say now? I do care about him, he's right. But I also care about Norman and Ray. If I turn to them and say I do care about him, they'll hate me forever. If I turn against Lethabo and say I don't, he'll die. He'll die a horrible death right here, feeling betrayed and empty. Yes I know he's a demon but he's also a child. What kind of person would I be if I did that to him?

I realize how long I've been quiet. 

"Emma?" Lethabo asks me quietly. "You do care about me, right? I didn't mean it when I called you those names, I'm sorry. I won't eat you, you're not a pet either. You're like an older sister," the more he spoke, the more he cried, the tighter he would hug me, burying his face into me. 

Norman, Ray, and Zazie may be enraged at me for comforting him like this. I feel horrible, I love those boys but I'm going to get scolded for sure now. This isn't fair, it's one of the other. Of course, I care about Norman and Ray way more than him, I love them in fact. How can they see a child in a horrible mental state like this and still insist on killing it? Because they don't see him that way, they see a man-eating demon who wants to eat me too. I wish there was some sort of way I could fix this all, change the demons so they don't degenerate if they don't eat us. 

'Mujica and Sonju?'  They don't eat humans as far as they've told us. 

-

"You can't kill him," I hesitantly tell them.

I see Norman grow almost too angered by this. 

"Emma, don't be like this! He's lying, and he's going to eat you! How could you possibly be saying that?" his tone wasn't nice at all, he was full-on yelling at me. Lethabo walks away from me eyeballing something on the ground nearby. I realize I dropped the gun.  

He picked it up and brushed the snow off of it. 

"Don't do what I think you're about to do," I tell him, but he ignores me. 

One gun pointed at Norman, and Norman's gun pointed at Lethabo. 

But Norman doesn't hesitate.

POP POP POP

Once again I flinch at the sudden noise, and when I open my eyes that poor boy is gone. This didn't have to happen. Norman probably hates me, I don't know about Ray though, he's stayed mostly quiet. 

The two of them make their way to me. I don't know what's going to be said to me now. 

Nothing is said to me anyway, just Norman pulling me into a hug. 

"We're going home now,"

I give him no response, and I don't hug him back. Ray comes over to kiss the top of my head. 

"It'll be okay. You don't have anything to worry about," He tells me.