Page 13 of Borrowed
There was a pillow beside Mila.Cast away from her head.A faint red smudge kissed one corner.
I crouched beside her bed.Her skin looked strange.
Pale, blotchy.
Her lips were too blue, not like a pretty princess.
I reached out and brushed her cheek with my fingers.
Cold.
She wasn’t warm anymore.
A princess was warm.
“She was snoring,” I said aloud, frowning.“Last night.She was so loud…it hurt my ears.”
I didn’t want to hurt her.I didn’t.I just wanted her to feel good.She had come all over my fingers and tasted like honey.Toby said that was how love worked.
You give something sweet before you take it away.
I remembered her voice breaking, her fingers clawing at my wrist, her thighs trembling.She came hard like girls in the movies do.I remembered the taste of sweat and salt, the sound of breath choking off into silence.
But it hadn’t felt wrong.
Not then.
I was just trying to hold her still.Make her quiet down before the nurses ended playtime.I did it for her.So she could come.
“I think I did it wrong,” I whispered to myself.
The butterfly fluttered by the ceiling light—black wings like ashes in the air.
“You gave her peace, Zusje.You were merciful.Pleasure and no sense of pain.”
Toby’s voice wrapped around me like a blanket I didn’t deserve.
I curled beside Mila’s bed, arms around my knees.
“Then why do I feel like crying?”
“Because Mila didn’t say thank you.”
I stayed curled on the floor beside her, knees to chest, rocking just a little.
The hum of the light above buzzed louder now, like it knew a secret I didn’t.My breath sounded too sharp in the silence.Too loud, now that Mila’s was gone.
I traced a pattern on the floor.
Circles.
Little ones, over and over again.
My fingers were trembling, but I didn’t know why.I wasn’t scared.
Just…empty.
“She’s not breathing,” I whispered to no one.“She’s not loud anymore.”
