He looked down at his knuckle and saw a long scrape going from the base of his index finger almost straight down to his wrist, wondering how he had gotten the injury. He got a sudden flash of a wire mesh fence near Julie Peterson’s home and remembering slicing himself on it. Sighing heavily, he took another sip of his beer.
“Bram?” he heard a voice call out uncertainly, nearly making him jump out of his skin. He dropped his beer onto the carpet and it immediately started to soak into the coarse fibers. He cursed softly as he scooped up the Budweiser, then turned towards the hall that led towards the bedrooms.
She was absolutely beautiful. Maria Raine was by far the most delicate butterfly on the face of the planet, graceful and sweet. Even as she stumbled, her hands fumbling along the stucco walls of their familiar house, she still contained within her the motions of an expert ballet dancer. A pink, fluffy robe was clutched around her thinning body, only her wrinkled face and ankles exposed. Her features were haggard and frail, her face looking as though it were melting slowly in the fires of time. Even so, it wasn’t hard to tell that she had been beautiful once. Her friends had often said that her eyes were possessed of a constant sparkle, preserving her youthful exuberance.
Now her eyes were a chalky white all over, their pupils faded into obscurity. There were small scars along the bridge of her nose, burn marks that were the only other souvenir from the day she lost her sight. Everyone was very careful to tell her that she looked perfectly normal, even lovely at times, knowing that such words eased her mind and she would never know the difference. Her silver hair flew in all directions, all of the bangs falling in front of her face, concealing it slightly. “Bram, is that you?” she called out again, her voice quavering with fear. Her face darted around the room expectantly, looking towards each place that she heard a new sound. “Is somebody there?”
As soon as he saw her, Bram forgot about the beer. He left it chugging liquid onto the floor and went to her side, taking her hand and hip gently to guide her to a chair. “It’s me, Mama. It’s only me.”
A warm smile spread across the old woman’s lips, as she reached up and stroked him along his rough-hewn face. That tactile contact was all she knew of her son anymore, and it always brought her great joy. “Oh, Bram. You gave me such a start. I thought it was that Allan boy again, so rude. I don’t like him, Bramwell.”
“I know, Mama,” Bram nodded softly, fixing her hair with his thick fingers. “It’s okay.” He reached deep within his jacket pocket and withdrew a tape. There were words scribbled across the cover in indecipherable handwriting... but one supposed that didn’t make much difference to Maria. “I got you something today.”
The old woman smiled thinly, trying to conceal her excitement. “Is it what I think it is?” she asked coyly, tilting her head in his direction to hear better. She was starting to go deaf too, something she feared ever so deeply.
He placed the tape in her palm, carefully closing her hand around it. “It’s the audio transcript from last week’s ‘Mystery Theatre’, complete with description of action,” he smiled.
She beamed wildly. “Oh, thank you,” she laughed, clutching the tape deck to keep it from getting away. She leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek, which he graciously returned. “I’ll go have a listen right --”
There was a moan in the background, interrupting their happy moment. Bram turned back toward the hall that his mother had come through and started towards it without a word. Maria said nothing, for she was quite used to this behavior from him. There was nothing else on his mind at the moment, no thought for his manners.
The third door on the right was covered with get-well cards and posters of the Backstreet Boys, a band that everyone but the bearer thought was a dead band. She knew better. Bram opened up the door and there she was, his little Mercedes Raine. The little girl sat upon the bed, her knees crossed Indian-style underneath her Tinkerbell comforter. Her face was tilted downward and her long, jet black hair covered the majority of her face in two straight lines. Tears dripped from her gray eyes, streaming down her cheeks like tiny waterfalls, collecting in a small pool on her faded yellow nightgown. She was no more than nine years old, but looked much closer to seven.
He walked to her, taking note of the ripped posters of Nick Carter and Winnie the Pooh that scattered her walls, their shreds flapping in the warm air current coming from a heating duct. Bram took her in his arms, leaning her head against his powerful chest and heart. “Shhh,” he cooed, the same word that had caused so much fear in Greer Donaldson. Now, an onlooker would never recognize it as the same sound. “What’s the matter, baby?” he asked, stroking her hair down the back of her head.
She sniffed back tears, mushing her nose into him and covering the front of his shirt with mucus. He really didn’t care. “It h-hurts…” she stammered and sobbed, trying desperately to force the words out.
Bram put a finger to her lips gently. “No more tears, baby,” he
