The small, sickly milk skinned girl entered the room, her knees buckling and her teeth grinding against each other. Her boney arms peeled like a molten cocoon over the floor. Motioning to a chair, I ask her to take a seat and enjoy the various refreshments which are prepared on the desk in front of her. She does not correspond. A hesitant twitch flows through her ragged, framed face as she looks over my shoulder.
Avoiding contact. Another one of them. Of those.
Shifting, her spine does not coincide with her waist. I notice the girl’s hunch; the composition of her posture wouldn’t be considered aligned whatsoever. If you’re daring, you could take a step off the edge and describe it as a strangled assembly of wringed out, dry cracking bones. But then again, I could say the same about the majority of the young, frightened girls who entered my office. However, this one was different. This one, as I could sense, would do anything to survive, to keep her family safe.
Then was the time which welcomed my urge to shout.
“Sit,” my voice crackles and echoes around the nearly empty office. Melting with my sunlight trickling through the dusty windows and curtains, the girl sinks into the seat anxiously. Stirring, she tries to find a comfortable position. Her chin rests on the desk at a sharp angle, her face barely outreaching the tabletop.
“S-Sir?” she stutters up at me, her breath shallow and hitching. The corners of my mouth bend slightly into a crooked sneer as I watch her delicate cheeks puff in and out. “My mama,” she gingerly removes a tattered note from her shoe, her nimble fingers unfolding the coffee-stained paper in front of me. “Wanted to give you this.” My eyes collapse over the note, burning with curiosity. I throw my body upright in my chair, causing her to thump her knee against the under end of the table. Swinging out, my pendulum of an arm snatches up the worn note and tucks it into the pocket of my jacket.
“I do not ask for much, and I will only order you to complete tasks in which I see fit for your..” Tilting my head towards her, I find the words to finish my statement. “petite stature.” She squirms in her seat, a muffled cough rising in her throat. My deathly, frostbitten eyes swoop down on her, over and over. Predators pick the flesh from her in my mind, darting down every so often to capture more meat from her precious limbs.
“My mama wants to know what’s required,” she breathes into the desk, causing moisture to form in small circles beneath her flaring nostrils.
“Whatever I tell you to do is required, sweetheart,” my voice travels down to her ears which are buried beneath the desk.
“But my mama,” she speaks louder, to a degree. I can feel my eyes turn to scorching coals. My urge to snap heightens. Rain begins to pour outside, its source my slow-beating, hideous organ I call a heart. I stand up from my chair, the back of it slamming against the wall.
“Your mother knows quite well what you will have to do to stay alive!” I shout into her frightened, shaking face. Quivering, my finger points at the helpless girl. My body sways in my wind coming from the cracked window. Staring only makes the knot in my stomach grow. We bask in the silence forming around us as I stand, frozen. The rain patters less and less on the sidewalk outside until there is no sound at all, leaving a trace of a ringing sensation in my right ear.
Why is it always a ringing, I ask no one in particular, sending waves of words over the pacific coast nearby. Wrinkling up my nose, deep crevices form above my bushy eyebrows. Always my right ear; always a ringing. A unique punishment of the sort was always required. My form of punishment was always a sharp pain in the side of my right earlobe.
Her shrunken eyes flash into mine, signaling to me her suspicion. Out of all of them, she was the first to discover my true abilities. Although she had not caught on entirely, she would figure it out before long, hastily trying to piece together the particularly unimportant details during the last few seconds of hope she still had. She would come to be my one true friend, and frankly the only one who would fully understand me. It’s a shame good things can’t last forever. Let’s not get too further into the future, though. We will arrive there soon enough.
I will, however, clue you in on one thing.
She will never see her papa again, and I blame myself.
I know what will take place. My power has its limits, but it’s nonetheless classified as one of my abilities. I still wish I could have stopped the events, laid them out before my eyes to decipher them. The risk of knowing the future is not about creating outcomes to your advantage, but being brave enough to change it for the good. You feel like a coward afterwards. A cheater for knowing things others would never dream of.
I step through the slim space between the wall and my desk, walking over to the side of her chair. Patting her back gently, I speak in a soothing voice.
“You’ll start tomorrow. Let me guide you to your living quarters. You’ll be sleeping there and waking up at four am precisely.”
Outbursts of words come from her mouth. “Four in the morning? That’s kind of early… I need my rest to be in tip top shape, sir.”
“I believe you can catch enough sleep if you return to your quarters at the appropriate time,” I respond, croaking. My legs extend ahead, broadening the distance between her and myself. Leading her down the corridor, our footsteps echo on the bleached marble flooring. How had she crossed these mazes to get to my office? She skips down the hallway, sucking in her stomach to skid past me. Giggling, she twirls and her dusty dress sends dirt flying onto the clean floor. My mind summons a few drops of rain to fall outside of the window. If she continues, she may as well cause the world’s destruction.
“Is it this one? Or this one?” She points to various doorways which contain room for extra storage, presumably consisting of what my workers throw into them. “Ooh! What about this one!” Pushing on a door, it creaks open unexpectedly and she falls flat on her face to the other side.
“Yes, my dear. You have guessed correctly,” I respond, cringing.
