Amaranthine

Chapter Twenty Five

 © Copyright 2011
All work is property of Leah Crichton, any duplication or reproduction of all or part of the work without explicit permission by the author is illegal.

Condemnation: (kon-dem-hay-shun)

an expression of strong disapproval

pronouncing as wrong or morally culpable

 

By the time I heard the front door open my stress hadn’t lessened one iota, and paranoia seemed to flow through my veins like blood. “It’s Luke and your mom,” Orion said.

Naturally, he was right. Heavy footsteps pounded up the stairs at mach speed. Luke flung the door open.

“I.Q.” He rushed over to me, giving Orion a nasty scowl.

I buried my face in his shoulder. “Luke, what am I going to do?”

His voice cracked. “Shh, I.Q., it’s okay, it’ll be okay. We’ll figure this out.”  

“Please, just tell me what I should do!”

Luke pulled away from me and stalked toward Orion, pointing his finger. “This is your fault.”

Orion nodded in agreement. “Yes, it is.” His voice was cold now, void of the emotion he gave to me.

My brother didn’t care that he didn’t have a hope to do anything at all in my defense. The fact that he had failed to protect me assaulted his sense of responsibility, and for whatever reason he was determined to compensate now. “What are you going to do about this?” he demanded.

“Your sister needs to be the one to make that choice, not me.”

“Right,” Luke spat. “Not you. It’s not your choice, but you put her in this position because of your actions, your choice. Death is supposed to be compassionate. What does that make you?”

“Don’t tell me what I should be. You know nothing about it.”

“I know enough. How could you do this to her?”

“I didn’t mean for it to get complicated.” The detached nature of Orion’s voice faltered. “It shouldn’t have been this way.”

“Well, it is complicated and now you have to fix it.” 

“I can’t fix it.” 

“Why not? You can do everything else. Fix it!”

“How? What exactly do you want me to do?”

“Fix it!” Luke screamed as he leaned over and picked up one of the lamps from the side table. Lifting it over his head, he pitched it in Orion’s direction.

Orion’s hand shot up just as quickly, stopping the lamp in midair. It hung there for a moment before falling to the ground and shattering into hundreds of miniscule, powdery pieces. I looked at the floor, thinking my life was like that lamp. It too had been momentarily suspended in time and fell, smashing into hundreds of unrecognizable little pieces.

I stepped in front of Luke. “Stop.”

He looked right through me, still focused on Orion. “You can’t just watch her go through this and do nothing.”

“I’m not just watching,” Orion replied.

“You are! Why couldn’t you just stay away from her? You should have stayed away! You should be condemned.”

“I am condemned in ways you cannot imagine,” Orion said. “I couldn’t stay away from her, Luke. I’m sorry. You wouldn’t understand.”

Tears filled Luke’s eyes. “You’re right, I’ll never understand. You could’ve stayed away, but you didn’t.”