The Blue Council

Chapter four

Once Ryan has left the house to go to work, I go back to the bed, and I lay down with my clothes on. Can't be bothered to change again.

My brother's words are still stuck in my head, piercing my brain and making me feel shitty about my behaviour. I'm not going to tell him sweet words now that he explained the reason why he has taken me in. I'm not going to change the way I act around him, either. I'll just play it cool, as usual. I'll let the words sink in for a bit, while he's at work, and then I'm just going to go back to normality.

I look around me and I try to find something to do with myself while I wait for Ryan to come home. I usually go out, maybe in the fourth zone, where Zachariah lives, but now I'm too knackered to even think of leaving the house. Zac loves to describe himself as my friend, but the truth is that I only spend time with him because I don't have anything else to do.

I don't like people. I never have. Ryan has always been the entertainer, the "people person"; the one that you can trust with your own life if it comes to that. I guess it's one of our main differences. You could say that is due to our different pasts: I've never had to interact with many people.

I get out of bed and I start strolling around the house, looking for something to do, to keep me busy with the slightest of efforts. I could sleep, but, weirdly enough, I'm too tired even for that. I could read something, but I'm not sure my eyes would resist.

That's what I hate the most about my job: the day. From the moment the sun rises, to the moment the sun sets, I'm not allowed to go to any of the bars my clients usually attend. It's one of the rules: each one of the five lines of work has its timetables, and we need to respect them.

Ryan, for example, is a Builder, the second least respectable job here in Athenaia. Above him there are three more occupancies: employee of The Basin, the Public Guard and, on top of them all is the Royal Guard. My job, of course, is the last on the food chain.

All the builders work – and usually live – in the fourth section. For some reason my brother managed to move to the third section of Athenaia. I'm so glad for it: the fourth section is always dusty and full of men walking around in dirty uniforms.

The fifth region is where I go almost every night, and it's where prostitutes live (except for me... Thanks Ryan!). I quite like it there, to be honest: I feel free, almost like the farthest I am from the Blue Pantheon – the city core – the more I feel like myself.

The other three sections are, of course, richer than the last ones. The Basin employees, the Public Guard and the Royal Guard – which surrounds the Blue Pantheon – inhabit them.

Eventually I give up, I take a book out of the shelves and I go back to my bed to read it. Time two minutes and I fall asleep, with the book on top of my chest.

I'm in a garden, with just my mother beside me. She's caressing my hair, and her hands are as gentle and kind as I remembered them. I remember this day: she took me to the park, and we spent the day together, shielding ourselves from the mooch by standing beneath the trees' shadows. She had never like the mooch and, every time we went out, she found an excuse to avoid its light.

I look up to her, and I notice that she's crying. She is telling me about this group of people who once ruled the Earth by using fear and control. It's the fairy tail she used to tell me when I was little; when I was so naïve that I believed in everything she told me.

She notices I'm staring at her, and she smiles at me, her brown hair tickling my face. I feel some sort of sadness rising inside of me, but I keep it down, just like every time I dream of my mother.

She opens her mouth as to say something, but something is wrong with her voice, and everything is becoming blurred and confused. I open my eyes and I find myself in my bed, with my brother staring down at me, just like my mom did in my dream.