THE OMEN GIRL | Wattys 2020 Winner

𝟏𝟔

They bind me and put me in my old cell, the one I had stayed in that first time in the temple. They won't kill me, not yet, not during the Decade-Races. The blood of my death would bring only stains and bad luck, after all.

My jaw is swollen. My cheek is split. In the rocked frenzy of the crowd, Esp had slipped away. The mother, a solitary figure lonely on her height, wept on.

The High Suns stand before my cell. The guardians fan around them. All of them ask me questions: Where is the real Lumi? What is your real name? What is your relation to that red headed woman? Why did you do it? How could you do it?

I tell them nothing.

There's no point now, no point at all.

They confiscate Gaia from me and store her for the moment in a steel locker in another cell down the trench, because they are unsure how a star like Gaia could have accepted something like me. Perhaps the star has been corrupted, somehow. Such a thing shouldn't be possible.

The High Suns and others are leaving. Yashi is set as guard over me once more, and she takes her place to the side of the grate, and does not look at me.

The races will continue as normal, though guardians and police will be deployed in searching out the city of Tall Titan, to look for the body of Lumi Sidik. A few days after the Decade-Races officially end, I will be executed on the stage in the plaza, before the eyes of all.

I wonder if they will use a bolt gun, the same kind of gun from years ago, against the canvas of that white wall, against the head of that blue-eyed girl.

I see Naqi. He's come to the cells.

Back at the plaza, I had kept my eyes down, down, because seeing Naqi and the faces he might have worn – I would have shattered open.

Now I rise to my feet and climb up the ladder. I press against the grate.

The High Suns have stopped him. They stand stoic before the boy, murmuring. I don't hear what they say. Naqi hangs his head, looks up at me several times, and does not smile.

They don't let us speak. They tell me nothing else. Naqi is led away with a hand on his shoulder, and he looks back at me the entire time. His neck strains against the turn and the distance. His eyes cling like grasping, desperate hands. My cheek sinks into the lines of the grate, and I do not blink. My eyes burn and water, and I do not blink.

I don't dare blink; Naqi's back and neck and needy eyes will be the last things I ever see of him.

#

In the middle of the night, someone rattles my grate.

I turn, and look up, and see Pea.

Yashi is standing guard to the side, eyes gleaming in the moonlight. She says nothing with her hands, to me or to Pea, so I push up from my bed. I move to the ladder, though I do not climb. I stand there, looking up, waiting.

For a long while, Pea says nothing. She watches me in the dim. Her hands are fisted against her robes.

I remember how she used to touch the back of my hand.

I remember, seated by the edge of my hammock, how she had said – you can talk to me, you know? Whatever is on your mind. Anything. I'll listen.

So I open my mouth.

I say, croak out, "I'm sorry, Pea."

My voice is a crumpled thing. My heart is a crumpled thing.