Carving Us Out

Carver

Among the list of top seven things I have never wanted to do, I've done six.

Which is slightly ironic, since six is meant to be the number symbolising healing. Then again, if you put it three times in a row you get the devil's number.

And that's not ironic. It makes sense. I am unforgivable for doing six of those things, but I can heal from them, given time. Six isn't my lucky number, but it's fine. It's been with me my whole life. I was born on the sixth of June, 2506.

I need to stay on six. I was born on three sixes. Sixth day, sixth month, sixth year. Triple six is a devil's child, and if I am one, at least I'm on a nice tightrope.

So I'm not going to kill my best friend. Former, actually, but details aren't my strong point, not when they're not about numbers. I will not kill him. I won't even try. No matter how hard he tries to kill me.

Because if I do, there is no going back for me. I will be carved out of blood, and you can't go back once you're swimming in a river of it. I know how I'm going to be killed, because he promised. He promised he'd finish me.

And I don't have the power to stop him anymore. Not him.

A couple of years ago, I was sixteen, and he wasn't anymore. He was seventeen, and he had a cigarette between his front teeth, and he was being delicate about it, the way he'd be if he was trying to smoke a stick of dynamite.

Everything was all laid out across his bed. Some clothes, some books, some random gifts he'd received at the birthday party, which was the same as all the others in his year. All born on the 5th of June.

"You weren't there," he muttered, accusing and understanding at the same time. He pinched the end of the cigarette between his thumb and forefinger, letting out a breath that seemed to suffocate me. His eyes were bright, like the end of that little cancer stick, and for a second I thought he'd press the burning butt into my cheek just to show me how much my absence

hurt. He didn't, of course.

Because he was always better at understanding when I betray myself. Or maybe he just thought that I didn't want to make him look bad in front of all his family, his other friends. Who knows?

"Not even talking to me?" he laughed tightly, and I caught his index finger before it could poke my cheek, because so close a touch was going to be as painful as being burnt, and I didn't know if I could take it. His eyes narrowed. Another breath of smoke in my face, and he watched my expression contort.

The smoke carried some of us away with it, disappearing and fading into thin air without either of us paying attention.

"You'll do a great job," I admitted, and he snorted. Shook his hand free from my grip.

"I know that," he said with a simple truth that went beyond something as petty as arrogance. "I don't want you to be my crystal ball, Carver. I want you to be my friend. And you're doing a pretty bad job, so far, in case you haven't noticed, darling. Why weren't you there? My going away party only happens once, you know. You only turn seventeen once."

He never called me by my first name, and that was out of respect to my mother, who hadn't lived to see my face. We joked that the family name was all that was really mine, and any name someone gave me was forfeit, since neither of my parents were around to give it to me.

Actually, we hadn't been joking. He had been trying to calm me down after I got angry about a change in the Statutes.

Why could he still show me such great regard? I was starting to hate how easy it seemed to be for him to go.

"Good luck," I forced out, through the iron lump of loneliness in my chest. He shook his head, and I grabbed him by the hair, making his eyes go all wide with delight. "I mean it, Bas."

The corner of his mouth turned up. "Was that really so hard?"

He was my best friend, but sometimes I wondered if all we had in common was making each other miserable.