Earthrumbler

Chapter Eleven: Breaking Through

In my condition, Lyn forced me to stay in the bed for days more. Occasionally, something would trigger a memory. The necklace I wore was the first thing that I noticed. My fingertips brushed the small clock face and wondered who had given it to me.

A boy curled his fingers around the necklace. “I have to be off soon.” He pressed his forehead to mine. “I’ll write you as often as I can.”

“I’ll do my best to reply.” I closed my eyes. His skin was smooth against mine, the light brush of his fingertips and of his lips, gentle.

The scars on my chest ached at every moment. My fingers trailed along it and recognized the familiar patterns. “Letters,” I realized. “Someone scarred a word into my chest.” I tried to remember my letters. “It’d be easier if I could see them.”

“How’re yah doin’, Lila?” Abraham came in with a plate of food for me.

I twisted toward the mirror. “I’m fine. Could you help me sit up? I wanted to take a closer look at the scars. Do they look like letters? They feel like letters.”

“Letters? Yah’ve my apologies, love, but I can’t read.” He hooked his hands under my armpits and propped me up. When I slumped over, he bolstered me with his hand. “Careful there, darlin’.” When he saw my face scrunched in confusion, he asked, “Do yah know yer letters?”

I clenched my fists. “This is impossible! I give up.” My voice sounded young. I threw a book across a room saturated with books, a library.

“Hey! Careful with that. Now, come here, girl. Let me teach you a thing or two. Do you know your letters?” When I recited them, he continued, “Good. Now, that’s the order that they go in, in the dictionary. So, which one is that?”

I nodded. I struggled to read the letters backwards. When I could, my heart dropped in my chest. “Bastard.”

His voice sharpened. “Watch yer mouth, young woman.”

My mouth went dry. “That’s what it says…across my chest. Why would someone carve that…burn that…on my skin? Do you think I was someone horrible? Why else would anyone want to do this to me?”

“Ah, love, I can’t say. Yah seem like a lost doe to me. But, by the looks of it, someone whipped yah all over yer body, then dumped yah in the middle of the ocean. Clearly, someone wanted yah to suffer.” He eased me back on top the pillow. “Eat up. If it means anything, I don’t find yah to be a bastard t’all.”

I bit into the fish. My stomach turned over. “Thanks. You’d, ah, if I remember…you’d bring me to shore, right, Abraham?”

He bit his lip. “We’ll have to see, Lila. Yah rest up.” He pulled the plate from my hands. “I hate fish.” He handed me a bowl of soft rice. He walked over to the window in the room and slid the fish back into the ocean. “The cuts don’t hurt too bad, do they?”

Hoping to escape the hammock, I shook my head and ate silently.

The next few days brought another blur. My injuries would pain me with every movement. I slept often and awoke frequently, sobbing as the wounds burned and stung.

Lyn offered me little comfort, but dressed the cuts when I became feverish. She slathered a viscous gel across my chest, my back, and my calves. Tightly, she wrapped each area in gauze before buttoning the shirt over me and tucking me under the quilts. “Abraham, I’ll not have her die of the ooze. She’s our only chance.”

“Don’t worry so much, Lyn. The girl is tough as iron. Her body isn’t givin’ in just yet. When she was last aware enough, she was talkin’ like she was already healed.”