The Night Children

Chapter 27

There was a pause. I counted the seconds on the clock. A breeze managed to seep under the window.

"You're lying to me."

My fingers dug crevices into my sheets. I could feel my mentality cracking, fatigue whipping down onto my words so they came out in sharp retorts. "So what if I am? It's not like you haven't in the last few weeks," I growled.

My mother hissed an impatient noise. "Your lies are getting people killed. Aleena is in hospital because of your actions. You've been emitted to hospital twice as a result of your wrongdoings. Chasing a boy is one aspect, hurting other people for your own sake is another," she took a strangled breath. "I can't even look at you anymore. Renee doesn't get community service, talks with the principal, absences from school. The Renee I know isn't as selfish as you are now."

I didn't realise tears were in my eyes until they rolled down my cheeks. I knew I shouldn't care for my mother's words, they never meant much to me anyway. But this was different. She was telling me the things that crawled in my nightmares. I pushed Aleena to uncover the Brookefield Murderer. I got Isaac shot. I got my wolf killed.

The common dominator in every situation was me. Renee Aurora Argent.

The girl with a heart of poison.

My mother's words came back, softer but just as pointed. "Why are you doing this?"
For them, I wanted to say.

The children with icicles wedged into their lungs. The children who's screams had been cut off in the forest. The children with Pincels bullets in their skulls.

And for her.

The girl with honey brown eyes and straight, blonde hair. The girl two levels above me, trapped in the wrath of a coma.

This had always been about them.

But had it? Had I been doing this for their sake not my own? Was there something in it for me that I was self-consciously pushing for? If I was as selfish as Mum depicted me as, maybe my intentions were not targeted towards the people I love, but the people I shouldn't.

I brushed a stray tear away, containing myself enough so my voice didn't break when I replied. "Is that all?"
Another pause. More silence. And then, "have your things packed. The hospital is letting you out early. While you do that, I have to come up with another lie when they ask me how you suddenly appeared in your hospital room considering you were supposed to be with me."

The line cut. I let the phone press against my ear for a moment longer. I could feel the tears brim my eyes, however with a frown, I brushed them away.

I left my phone on the bed when I ventured into the bathroom. Its yellow light stung my eyes, and it took me several seconds to blink the stinging pain away.

My eyes narrowed on my own reflection.

A girl stared back at me, looking three years old than she was. Her heart shaped face was etched with thin scratches, like cracked marble across a dirty canvas. Her brown eyes were dark with exhaustion, and half-moons printed dark bags under her eyes. Dirt clung to her hair, clumped with dried blood. Two indents from where a wolf's teeth had scathed her neck, swelling a deep purple.

My gaze shifted to the area where the shewolf had slitted my ribcage. The once white shirt now hung in bloody rags. I hadn't even thought to change it while I was at home. I hadn't thought about much. My mind had been focussed on the boy sprawled across my bed, his breaths long in slumber, and his lethal wound, its only remanence remaining in the winding scar that trailed up his chest. It was impossible. A miracle. A bullet wound would not heal in such a short space of time, nor would a scissored chest.