To Keep You

Twenty-Two: Chaya

If happiness where the sun, then I suppose sadness was the moon. For its presence is barely regarded and most disregard it. The sun shines brightly down upon our flesh and demands our attention, whether as the moon's faint glow hardly even catches the human eye. Sadness is a calm wind while happiness is a storm upon a vast ocean.

Like a child, sadness as grown throughout my life. When I lost Aunt Joe, I was as devastated as any eight-year-old could be. I cried for months, years even. Her death caused great sorrow to consume me, rarely did I find a moment to smile or laugh. When I lost Arnold, I was plagued with misery for losing my best-friend, overtime the despair that surround his death became a distant heart throb of pain. But when I lost Ryder and Oliver, misery as I have never known overtook me. Pain throttled me and insanity drove me to nearly tear out my own heart.

I could barely breath without them...I didn't want to.

Over the years my sadness rarely produced tears anymore, no, what attacked me now was gut-wrenching guilt and self-loathing. Betrayal was lending the army that attacked my soul daily. I should've died with all of them, yet here I laid beneath a bed like a coward who had failed to do the one thing that would've made everything right.

Would've made everything better again...

Tsking my tongue, I traced a single finger along the bars of the bed, the shed was consumed in its usual frigid piercing self, and I'd spent most of the day here. Every breath that emerged from my lungs was a puff of bitter air. Memories of the smoke trailing behind Asher's lit cigarette caressed my mind like the soft tips of a hand and I did little to brush them away.

Ever since our bizarre encounter in the barn all those days ago, I had failed to catch a glimpse of the rugged man. I had, however, caught passing glimpses of the other men who called this farm their home. When I'd been finishing up my work in the garden, a young boy had come running out of the woods with Joshua hot on his tail. The boy, who I later learned was Enoch, was laughing with pure childish joy even as Joshua was bursting with anger.

As Enoch had hurdled over the garden fence and raced to hide behind Esther, who had stood when his laughter pierced the once quite mid-afternoon air. Joshua threw open the garden gate with such barbarian strength that I feared it might snap as it slammed into the fence. He lifted a beefy figure and pointed at Enoch who peeked over Esther's shoulder to glance at his fuming brother.

"Give it back."

He'd ordered with primal rage swirling in his eyes, he stopped a good few feet away from Esther as if he was afraid his anger would get the best of him. My eyes had shifted and took in Enoch's nearly white hair that was pulled tightly in a braided ponytail. He looked like the embodiment of winter. His skin barely held a tan and his eyes a perfect light hazel with blueish swirls. He was young, younger than Elijah, so I assumed he couldn't be older than fourteen.

Esther had offered her oldest son a soft smile, "What's the matter?" Her words were softly spoken, and I nearly scoffed for she had hardly ever held such a gentle tone with me when she was ordering me around.

"I caught Joshua reading a poem by the river!" Enoch had exclaimed through bits of laughter.

I had said nothing as the young boy flung around a piece of paper like a white flag. Even as my eyes took in Joshua's eyes lit with embers, I remained silent. I knew it would've not been my place to intervene in such a personal fight. Whatever was on that piece of paper meant something to Joshua, I saw it in the way his fists clenched and in the way his eyes furrowed with a hint of sorrow.

Esther continued to smile even as she glanced at the paper, her own eyes filled with sadness, but her smile remained, "Enoch give the poem back to Joshua and get back to your chores." Her tone was still as soft as the clouds in the blue sky, but it was edged with refined brawn.