Page 25 of Borrowed
I nodded.
“Do you miss her?”
“No.”
I didn’t.
Not really.
Mila liked cats.
She had been loud—too much of her.Always touching, laughing, talking about cats.But still…she was there.Now, she was not.I hated the ‘not’ more than I liked her.
He pushed into me, his cool body feeling closer.I felt his fingers drag across my ribs over the sterile, silent uniform they made me wear.The seams itched in a pattern, warning me.He didn’t make noise.Toby never did.He moved like fog—soft and everywhere.
“She took up too much space.Our room is just for us.No one needs to see what I do to you unless I want them to.”
“Mhmm,” I said.And the other patients looked at me.
“Now it’s just you and me again.”
“Like it used to be,” I whispered, quieter now so people would not watch.
“Exactly.”
Silence sat heavy between us.And I turned to face the talking boy—the one who cried before.
“I miss my friend.That’s what I miss today.My friend.Mila.She’s dead.”
Some of the other patients cried with the talking boy, and I watched their tears fall down on their paper clothes.
“We will miss her greatly, Jordie.”Nurse Smiley said.“But she’s always with us.Our love will keep her alive in our hearts.”
I smiled at Toby, looking at his face and agreeing with the words spoken.
“These people didn’t know Mila like us,” Toby said, possessively, dark like a snake coiled around their food.“Mila belongs to us now.”
I nodded.Mila did belong to us.I wanted to wear her like Toby, so she stayed inside us forever.But they took her away.I couldn’t let them take Toby again.He was a part of me.Without him, I’d be lost forever to the flames.
The water beat down on me like tiny fists, too hot, too sharp, but I didn’t move.My forehead was pressed to the pale green tile, slick with moisture.My paper clothes lay forgotten in a heap outside the stall, and I was naked beneath the fluorescent flicker.They took me here.Told me to ‘cleanse myself.’
It reminded me of Mother’s words after she came back from the building with a big steeple.The big book she used to knock me to the ground when she was angry.
“Cleanse yourself!You vile abomination.”
Steam curled around my knees.This wasn’t like Mother’s cleansing.
This felt good.
Clean.
Like the taste of bleach was leaving my tongue.
I could barely hear the other girls giggling two stalls down.But I wasn’t thinking about them.
Or Mila.
I was thinking about him.
