Red + Fly

1

Delia would never forget the first time she saw him. The speck against the horizon slowly got more significant and more foreboding. She would never have guessed this pivotal moment would split her life into sections of Pre and post him. It was cold—the wind barreling past, Creeping into the car's crevices. The creaking of the train set an ambiance for how her day would go.

Delia and her mother were living in an open car at the time. One with unreliable doors that had long since rusted away.

His feet crunched the gravel—the ground too cold for snow—the noise was louder than it should have been, As though invisible ice was being snapped underfoot.

It caused Delia to look up from her nestle of blankets. There he stood, a stranger who held up his arms in greeting. "Whoa, there," he said, his words a puff of cloud in the sky. "Let me stay the night, and I'll share what I have with you."

Delia was eleven at the time. She glanced toward her mother. Her mother slept in her corner of the car. She was bundled with her share of the blankets. "We only got this car in the whole world. Nothing else."

The man nodded his understanding, "I know. All I need is a company to join. One night should be enough."

She glared at him, "This train don't move. It ain't got coal, gas, or nothing. It's all burnt up. It stopped moving before I was born. It's a company in name only."

The man got closer, a smile forming on his face. "Maybe that's exactly why I want to join. How about it, sister?" He ungloved a hand and knocked the back of it against the brown rust of the boxcar. Delia winced at the thought of cold burning into his unprotected flesh.

"Talk to my mother. She's who you need to ask," Delia said pointedly. She knew enough about stranger danger to allow him on without her mother's permission.

He sighed, "fine if that's how you want to play it." The man turned away, his back facing her as he walked away. Delia kept her eyes on him as she tried to plunge herself further into her blankets. Trying to warm herself up.

Without warning, the man turned around, sprinting toward their boxcar. Delia watched with horror as he swung his bag onto their car before launching himself into it.

She should have screamed—she would have screamed— if it hadn't felt like too much effort. Instead, she watched in wide-eyed silence.

Knowing he would kill her and her mother made Delia giddy with relief. Death was a nice escape from the cold.

"What are you doing?" She demanded when she'd found her voice.

"Seems like my civic duty to help a dying lady and her daughter, don't you suppose?" The man asked in a way that informed more than asked.

Helping himself, the man walked to the section of wood Delia and her mother sometimes used as a makeshift table. He hoisted the section of wood against the car's opening. It helped to keep some of the draft out. He rummaged in his bag before pulling out a hammer and nails. With a few quick bangs the man hammered the wood in place.

It might have made the boxcar warmer but Delia couldn't tell, she'd long since gone numb. The Man crouched in the space between Delia and her mother, and pulled something else out of his bag.

A scraping of match box and there lay a portable fire between them. Delia had no energy but to slump towards the fire.

Up close, in the glow of the fire, Delia got a good look at the man. She felt herself blush. He  was handsome. Curly brown hair, olive skin, and unable to come up with a better description, mint colored eyes. They were so light—definitely green—but more of a grey hue than a yellow as light green eyes often had. His eyes were mesmerizing and inhuman.