The Outsiders

The Outsiders: Chapter Thirty-Four

Khristopher De Caldwick

Iron was absolute, but the silver of the dagger that laid in my hand was eternal.

With every step I took, I calculated the next. For every breath I took, I enumerated the next. Silence was always one of my talents. Besides crying, talking, laughing, and grieving, I was always silent. My wants, my needs: I was silent with others when it came to them.

I wanted a good life. One with Soum. One where I had no fear of losing the people I loved. Yet I failed to realize I was never meant to have any of that. I was destined to destroy, to kill, to fall victim to my own carelessness. What I hoped was merely a dream, and I should've stayed silent with my woes. If I had just done what I was told, I would have saved everyone this heartache: this war, this pain, these tears.

            Soum would have lived a lively life with his family, finding himself a partner that had morals. A smart, kind, optimistic human. Someone Soum could love; someone Soum could've loved. Ocmjai would have stayed with their pack and their people. Living happily with their friends, catching lizards and all types of things. Sonia wouldn't have known me. She should've known me. Toasheh would smile everyday with her wife without me in the picture.

             The people who lost their lives — if i knew them or not — would be alive until their death came from old age. It was true was Sonia said. I was selfish. I was conceited. I only helped others to help myself.

              I was Khristopher.

"Are you a child? Why must you cry so loudly. Face it, Khristopher, you have nothing left."

Promatteo's voice resonated through the heigh ceilings of the hollow hallways. Following the husk of his voice and the buzz of the naves of his sound, I met the facade of my bedchamber.

            "So, I take it you are here to surrender?"

            Standing my ground with the dagger in my hand, I only stared into his beady red eyes. Reminiscent of all I had done, I could only sigh. As the last of my humanity spilled from my eyes, I smiled.

             "I'm sorry, F-Father. I should h-have just listened. You were right."

"See, was it that hard to admit?"

Ptomatteo's voice was monotonous, only shifting higher when he saw the dagger in my hand. Shaking his head, he walked up to me, reaching out for my face. Sickly and sweet, he brushed my tears from my eyes. What I thought was an act of love as a child was actually corrupted by Promatteo's will. What I saw as care, was actually naivety. Holding back the urge to hurl any life left in me, I only stood, statued amid the source of my woes.

Staring at my bedchamber door, I could hardly see my reflection through the enraged details in the mahogany. But alas, there was I, staring into my own eyes. My hair laid differently on my face, falling in stiff and lifeless curves that ended just above my ear. Unruly, uneven, I could only stare at the small ringlet that somehow remained intact. The same curl I twirled in my fingertips; the same curl that Soum liked. The curl that remained amid the unruly tide of the waves of my hair.

The pain that pooled in my hands told me what to do with the last of my mortality. Though I knew not what was to come, I knew it would be better than the present I stood over. Forever will I be imbedded in the hurt I caused, for I will forever fall, fumbling into the realization that I was what the reflection showed. That I was Khristopher.