NaNo 2006: Machine Break 01
The sky is always red when Cielo’s dream starts out.
Sharply spattered blots of red ink cover the floor behind her as she stands on the narrow windowsill. The cold marble under her feet makes her shiver, and the fine wood and silken curtain that she holds onto with her right hand seems to be slipping from her fingers like liquid. She tries to turn, to look at where the door would be, because Mother would always be there, standing all beautiful, sad and calm. Her long auburn hair would cascade down her shoulder and sway with her every step; she knows this because she sees it every time on the television. Mother was the prettiest actress there was, and she was as pretty without makeup on as she was with it on. But whenever she turns her red-haired little self, Cielo never sees her mother. Instead she sees her seven year old self, her head bleeding from a bullet that forced its way though skin and flesh and bone.
She could see her left eye close up from bruising, could see how the blood running down her face had dried up and made her hair clump up and look brittle. She could see how her simple sleeveless white summer dress had turned into a canvas of red and charcoal black, how it had been ripped and torn at various places. She could feel the pain of the little girl; she remembers all that happened. She stares on at the little girl’s eyes, seeing through the pain and anger and confusion that she couldn’t understand back then. Soon enough Cielo can no longer look at the little girl, and she turns her head back to look at the faded light of the early morning, only to fall into a black shroud of consciousness.
And then the sound comes.
Bang bang. BANG. She feels the pain of the bullet entering her skull just short of four hours after midnight, right on her birthday, nine years ago. It wasn’t a dream - it was a memory, revived every single night because of feelings she cannot leave behind. The bullet goes through her head, pronounced in its entry, blood and brain matter spurting out of her as she hits the ground with a dull thud. Unconscious for the first few beats and then imminent death approached her. She should have died that night. In fact, she did die - her heart had stopped completely for a good two hours. But then it started to beat again, never mind the bullet that was still lodged in her brain.
The first thing that comes to her mind is her mother.
She picks herself up and off the floor of her room and runs out, out out and out to look for her mother. Mama, Mama, where are you, she could remember screaming these words as she ran through the halls of the house. She could remember how her feet would slip on the tiles, her blood leaving bright red marks on their gleaming surfaces. She remembers the way she pushed her mother’s bedroom door open, how it slammed against the wall with a harsh sound.
And there she stood, oh dear Mother, in all her mournful godly beauty, on the same windowsill Cielo herself stands on in her dreams. There she stood, her hair being blown back by the wind, scarlet rivulets of seemingly opaque paint running down her arms. There were glass shards all over the place; the windowpanes have all been broken. Dear Mother stood on the window, her feet cut up by the shrapnel left on the windowsill, though there wasn’t a single inch of pain on her whole being.
Then she turns, looks at her young daughter with eyes frosted over, and she smiles. She smiles, and now Cielo, in her dream, finally opens her eyes, as real as any vision could be in a dream, and it’s no longer the little girl standing by the door, but her jaded sixteen year old self. She stands there, looking at her mother’s face, her faint smile slowly growing, and in her mind that smile eats up the room, eats up the house, the city, everything and it becomes too much.
Mother jumps off the window, and then everything shrieks in a loud inharmonious melody, burning its notes inside Cielo’s ears. She watches on, petrified by the ghost of the pain, and although this was a dream it seemed like a very real dream, and Cielo screams along with the world as it upends its soul on her listening ears. Then the tender ache in her chest breeds on with unbridled self-loathing and loneliness as she feels her heart rupture from the pressure inside her that she cannot name.
But now she feels something soft, something cold, something comforting being pressed against cheek. She tries to brush it off, but it doesn’t leave her.
And she realizes she’s no longer asleep.
“…Allen?” She murmurs miserably, pushing her hair out of her eyes. “Stop wiping my face, please?”
Allen turned her over, so that she lay fully on her back, and brushed her hair out of her eyes for her. The low yellow light they’ve left on in the room bathed them both in visual warmth that felt… right. Cielo looked away from him. Uncles were never supposed to be of the same age as you.
“Your nightmares never change, do they?” He asked, the sympathetic smile on his face never leaving him. “I saw part of it… it woke me up.”
“Sorry for that.” Cielo just smiled at him, though it was a smile that said nothing was alright but they could pretend as like it for the meantime. Allen was a good friend, and a good family member, but he was hardly anything like an uncle.
Allen, whose full name was Allen Corva - and he shares his last name with his niece, so that makes her full name Cielo Corva, but you already know that - and he likes his name completely. Corva meant crow, and both he and Cielo had forgotten what language it was that it came from, or they were just both too out of it to remember. Allen had the eyes of a crow as well, deep black with a hint of red if you looked carefully, and you could say that red is a color that runs through their family because it does. His hair is on fire, in figurative, the shade being a bright ruffled red with a soft tinge of burnt orange here and there. His hair looked hand combed, regardless of whether he did comb through it with his fingers or with a brush; it always defied him, like a stubborn child that refuses to straighten out his creased shirt collar. His skin was a healthier shade that Cielo’s, which is to say that it was soft and pale like pink, but with a hint of yellow and brown and white, depending on what shirt he wore for the day. Allen was tall, too, six feet and a few inches, though his hushed presence makes him look a few inches shorter. And then there was his smile, an amicable, soft-edged smile that seemed to please him as much as it calmed those he bestowed his smile upon. Allen was quiet, and peaceful, and he was a good man.
But his rage was something he would never speak of, and Cielo was more than happy to not hear of it.
Allen, who had been sitting at on end of her bed, leaned back against the headboard. He just sat there, pouting a little, staring at the blank wall on the other end of the room that they both never got around to decorating. “Hey, if… if you want, you can tell me, yeah?”
Cielo remained quiet.
There were some things that one couldn’t tell anyone without running the risk of losing trust, or respect, or even affection and love. Sticks and stones can hurt one’s bones, but whoever said that words could never hurt you must have been deaf. The world frowns on physical expression, because at some point in time it became either vulgar or illegal. Words, words, words, so many of them and they always seem to hurt in the worst possible way without meaning to.
But she could trust Allen. They were family. And more than that, they were the same. They had the same so-called disease - and that made things a little easier for them both.
“Remember that time when you picked me up from the airport?” She asked, her eyes planted on the fleeting shadows that coated the ceiling, though her hand had found its way into Allen’s. “I just came out of the hospital - my body grew without me for three years after…” She trailed off. She wasn’t going to try to finish it; not yet, she thought, give me some more time. She gave out a little sigh and skipped the thought. “I was living under the city until I got the letter from Big Guy… and then… It’s not like I needed to come back up and live here, but…”
Allen’s grip tightened. “We made a promise.”
And that was that. They both went back to bed, for it being only past three in the morning, and whatever dreams came this time were either forgotten or were never there. She fell asleep rather easily, at least, and Allen was glad for that.
***
Meanwhile, on his bed, Allen lay quiet. It had been three months since his niece had came to live with them, and it had been a rather nice change in their lives. Big Guy - that is, his older brother Janssen, him being the eldest in their brood - had kept the news of Cielo’s existence from them all for a full sixteen years, this being Lucien’s request, Lucien being the red-haired female’s father. Allen was more than surprised, and just this side of disappointed, as he never got to know his other brother other than through stories told to him. Allen was the youngest, and of the same age as Cielo, that meaning that they’re both sixteen and fully young, while Damien was twenty-four and Janssen was forty-two, and you can blame the age difference to their father having married twice and having two sons to each wife.
In his head Allen thought of the little piece of dream that made its way to his head, and he sighed, troubled that his niece and friend - his only other friend, as Allen was not open to making well with people - carried in her things that she thought better of sharing with him.
Of course, it wasn’t his choice to be told of these things, but he felt he should know. Family is family, after all, and what is family without trust? He turned and shifted, and tried to find a means to fall asleep, or at least be distracted. This took him a few long minutes, and then he decided to just stay still and wait for the sandman to visit.