The Girl Who Would Be King(19)

“Hhh. Yeah,” I say, still trying to catch my breath, making sure to keep my eyes open wide so as not to see the images plastered to them when they close. He pulls me toward him, in spite of my hot, wet skin and rolls me into him like sand filling a shell. Before I even realize it, we’re kissing and pieces of clothing are falling away and in moments his skin matches mine in sticky sweetness. He’s inside me almost flawlessly, not like I’ve imagined: awkward and strange, foreign and obvious. There’s a pinch of pain, but mostly it’s like sticks of butter melting into each other rather than butter being stabbed repeatedly with a knife as I’ve kind of been picturing. I can’t help but feel like it’s this way because he’s who he is and I’m who I am, that maybe it’s more like the butter and knife thing when it’s not the right person. It seems like a silly idea, and soon I can’t think about anything, even sticks of butter melting into each other.

We lie together after, curled into one another, with no covers on. He’s sleeping, breathing softly into my hair in a steady rhythm and for some reason all I can think about is Delia, about what her life had been like when she was my age. I’m wishing hard now that I had asked her things before I killed her. That I’d at least asked who my father is or was, and if she’d loved him the way I love Adrian - hopelessly, desperately, almost violently.

I wonder afterward if that’s how it is for every girl, super-powered or otherwise.

Thinking about how much I love Adrian ends up confusing the hell out of me though. I’ve been me long enough to know that there’s something wrong inside. I mean, assuming that bad equals wrong, or that wrong equals bad, or whatever, then am I bad or wrong or both? And most of the time I think I’m honestly okay with that, whatever the answer is. I don’t really feel I have a choice about it, like maybe Delia couldn’t help it either. That we just are the way we are, deep down in our blood, and no amount of feeling bad about stuff or trying to be different can change it. Like it’s a disease that never goes away, like Aveline said in her letter. But I don’t understand how love goes along with all the other things I feel most the time. It makes the feelings I have for Adrian seem like an alien inside of me, like I’m an unwelcome creature on a foreign planet. Does the fact that I feel like I’m betraying some ancient part of myself by having tender feelings for him mean something?

Usually I can block all this out, push it from my mind. Except when things are like this, like, happy. It’s feeling happy that does it, I guess. Feeling happy is the trigger. It feels wrong inside to be happy.

I think I’ve got a raw deal, sometimes. Superpowers or not, a person should be allowed to be simply happy, without feeling like they need to strip off their skin.



°

Turning a corner, deep in thought, I don’t notice anything, until I see a shadow fall across my path and I almost smack right into her.

Sharon.

Apparently she hasn’t forgotten what I’d done to her and has been paying attention to when I’d be released. She looks rough, like the months since she left the home have been hard on her. The hand I crushed is still damaged, permanently disfigured. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that an orphan’s hand wasn’t properly repaired. My guilt doubles. Triples. She hides the hand underneath crossed arms when she notices me looking at it. I open my mouth to say I’m sorry but I can see it will mean nothing to her and so I turn away, determined not to get into another physical altercation with her.

“Not so fast!” she almost screams as she reaches out with her left hand and grabs the strap of my duffel bag, pulling me backward. I probably could have dodged her, but my guilt is keeping me pretty contained; I don’t want to hurt her again; I’ve obviously done enough already. Ironically, when I had crushed her hand I’d done it because I naively thought maybe it would keep her from hurting other people. From the look and feel of her now that has backfired horribly. As she pulls me backward toward her by my strap she wraps her right arm around my neck, so that her face is right next to my ear. I am tense and ready to move, but letting her call the shots.

Her knife slides into my side and I feel like I’m just a bundle of nerves strapped together with electrical tape. I yelp and pull away from her. As I pull forward she stabs me in the back repeatedly. Pain and fear shoot through me and the world starts to slip away just as another voice pushes into the alley. My vision is being eaten away at the edges, but I see a pair of huge black boots as I hit the dirt with a thud, the knife still wedged between my shoulder blades.