My Sister, Lilly

Ch. 01: Hushaby, Sweet Baby Girl

My Sister, Lilly

Ch. 01: Hushaby, Sweet Baby Girl

“Give me your wallet, now!” The man screamed. I felt the cold bite of metal nick my forehead, and it didn’t matter if I knew that I should be terrified, I couldn’t feel from underneath my drunken haze.

Slowly, I reached into my front pocket and took out my leather wallet. I tossed it at him carelessly. “There. All you had to do was ask. You didn’t have to scream.” I told him.

The man narrowed his eyes at me and raised his fist in the air. With my reaction time somewhat delayed, I wasn’t able to move out of the way before his fist connected with the side of my face. “You little bitch!”

The force of the blow sent me to the floor. “What the fuck?” I raised a hand to my mouth and felt the blood there.

“Don’t you know who I am? Don’t you realize that I’m seconds away from blowing your brains all over that wall?”

Did I realize that? Yes. Did I care? Well, that was a different story entirely. “If you’re gonna kill me, then do it already. Don’t act like you care about me. Don’t think that you can act all coy with me.”

The man frowned. “You certainly are a mouthy little, whiney kid, aren’t you?”

I shook my head. “Nah. I’m just a kid who’s got nothing else to lose.”

The man’s face contorted brutally and I waited for the shot that would end me. Silently, I wondered how much time it would take for me to die. Would it be quick and painless? No, I didn’t deserve such mercy. For each second that it took for me to die, every moment of burning pain that I endured, I knew that it could only be a shadow of what she had experienced. But that shot never came.

Slowly, I allowed my eyes to flutter open. When had they closed? The man still stood before me, but his entire body was frozen. The gun was cocked and pressed to my temple, but he couldn’t pull the trigger. I blinked. What the hell was happening? And that’s when I saw her. A tiny, translucent form stood beside him on the gravel alleyway. Her blue eyes were focused on the man, who started to flicker like a television with bad reception.

And then, he vanished entirely. Dumbly, I looked around for him. The only hint that he had once been there was his gun, which fell down onto the soggy gravel with a loud thud. Unfortunately, my wallet seemed to have vanished entirely. But the money I had lost didn’t hold my attention for long. Instead, I turned to face the translucent form that had saved me from an untimely death. I wasn’t sure whether I should be thankful or infuriated.

However, before I could voice my inner turmoil, she had disappeared. Unlike the man, there was no evidence that she had been there at all. I just shook it off, blaming it on too much alcohol and silently promising myself that I would never touch another bottle. It was a lie, but I had found that if you can convince yourself of a lie, it makes you feel better, if only for a little while. And that’s all I really wanted. To not feel like shit for five minutes.

Was that too much to ask for?

--

It had been three days since Lilly’s death. Today as the day of her memorial service. Mom had been extremely clear as to where she expected me to be while the service took place. In my room. The door locked. The television unplugged. The computer off. She didn’t want her shame to have to be seen by the world. I understood, to some extent at least. I did want to tell Lilly how much I loved her one last time, but that could wait until later.

So, I sat out on my balcony. A half-empty carton of cigarettes sat on the wet, rotted wood in front of me. I must’ve burned through half of that carton in the last hour and a half. Just sitting there, reflecting on that night when my entire life was blown to hell, didn’t really help my psyche. In fact, it allowed me to realize that my Mom’s words were true. I didn’t deserve atonement. I deserved to wallow in my own, internal hell forever.