Crooked Halos

“Fuck that, eat already.”

“Shan-”

“Don’t you ‘Shan’ me! You passed out yesterday evening, now fucking eat already Will, or I’m gonna force it down your throat.”

I glare at him before focussing my gaze on the food in front of me. Scrambled egg on toast – if scrambled is the right word, it looks more like they’ve beaten the poor egg to within an inch of its life, all that’s left is a liquidated mush.

I pick up one of the soggy pieces of toast and look at it suspiciously.

“Stop looking at it and eat it already.” Shannon sounds slightly impatient so I close my eyes and take a bite out of the toast. And another. Within a matter of minutes my plate looks like it may have been licked clean.

“That was quick.” Shannon laughs, looking straight at me, my face flushed and eyes bright.

“I forgot how good food tasted.” I try to catch my breath, letting out a little gasp.

Ryan laughs and pushes his remainders towards me.

“This isn’t even good food, Will.”

***

Another murder, two more kids I didn’t know. They’d both been nailed to the walls and their stomachs slashed, their guts all over the floor. Their eyes had been stabbed out too.

I overheard one of the psychologists talking, he said it was because there’s an old superstition that if a murder victims eyes are intact then sometimes you can see an imprint of the murder in the eyes. He said that a victims eyes are the first place the police will look for clues.

I think I’m starting to see sense in what Shannon said about we’re all going to die here.

Both of those kids were five. Neither had been here a year.

Part of me wonders if they still remembered their parents, or were those memories confined to the murky waters of times past.

I have no way of knowing now.

I don’t think I even want to know.

I dreamt about her again last night, my mother with her subtly waved hair and the way her eyes danced and she always smelt like she’d been baking, even just after she’d had a shower.

***

I burst in through the door, daddy picked me up from school on his way home from work.

I couldn’t see Mommy, but there’s cakes on the table, little cupcakes iced yellow, blue and pink all sitting nicely on mommy’s special cake-stand that daddy brought her last Christmas.

Daddy goes upstairs to change out of his work clothes and I’m hungry so I reach for one of the cakes.

“Now, now, Will. If you eat cakes you won’t have any room for your dinner.”

“But I’m hungry.” I look at her, my bottom lip jutting out a mile.

She rolls her eyes and smiles. “Okay, just one, but don’t tell your father.”

I grin and take a yellow one, running upstairs.

“And do your homework!” She calls after me.

***

I want to ask Shannon if he remembers his mother so I do.

His bright eyes darken slightly.

“No, I was too young, Jared remembers he better than I do, he was four when we were taken.”

“But you were five, surely you remember.” I cock my head slightly to the right, examining his eyes, I can always tell when to push my luck.

Shannons eyes are just like Jareds were, so expressive, every emotion he ever feels flickers across them, he can keep a perfect poker face when he wants to, but his eyes always give him away.

“I made a point to forget.”

I know when to push my luck and this time, I know not to.

I drop the subject, but my eyes burn holes in his back for hours afterwards.

***

I barely recognise Frank when we sit down for dinner.

His face is mostly a bloody mess, he has difficulty opening his mouth properly and one of his eyes is swollen shut, the other is so heavily lidded I wonder whether or not he can see at all. His nose is barely visible through the amount of blood covering it but it looks like it’s a pretty bad break.

“He told Gerard that Mikey was a cock-sucking squealer.” Jade breathes in my ear, sounding like he’s relishing this fact.

I blink and can’t help but wonder what sort of death wish Frank has when he said that.

Shannon puts his hand on top of mine and gives it a little shake, nudging me out of staring at Frank.

I force my eyes downwards to the stinking pile of slodge on my plate.

Trying not to think about what’s in there, I pick up my fork and start eating, luckily it doesn’t taste quite as bad as it looks. Still pretty disgusting, though.

“So, what about this new ‘eye thing’?” Davey giggles. “Pretty gross, huh?”

“Shut up.” Shannon shoots Davey a look, clearly warning him away from Frank.

The green-eyed boy doesn’t even look up from where he’s monotonously moving the ‘food’ from one side of his plate to the other, one hand resting on his one uninjured ear, cupping it carefully.

At least, I thought it was uninjured, when he shifts his hand, I can see the lobe, almost torn clean off, a bite mark and I stare again, my thoughts flashing suddenly to the way the kids found this morning were beaten, brutally, with such a horrific precision.

I freeze.

Shannon notices, but he sees my eyes and doesn’t say anything.

I leave the rest of dinner untouched.

***

“It was Gerard.” I don’t think I’ve ever sounded so certain about anything in my life.

“Will, you don’t have any proof, if you go to the wardens and tell them it was Gerard they’ll laugh unless you have proof.” Shannon sounds tired, exhausted.

“But I’m sure it was him. You saw what he did to Frank. They must have seen Frank, we can tell them it was Gerard who did that to him and... and...”

“And what, Will? Gerard would just deny it, say it wasn’t him. And you know what? They would believe him.”

“But, we have to do something! Anything! We can’t let him just kill people, you saw Pete! He let Ky die because of him! We have to do something! Tell someone!”

Shannon held up his hands. “If you would want to take on Gee, then fine. If it is him, then the smartest thing to do is to try and stay on his good side. But personally, I don’t think it was him.”

I pause and look at him carefully. “Why not?”

“Mikey.” Shannon says simply and sits on the other side of the room and picks up his deck of cards.

He tried to teach me a couple of games, but I quickly proved that I have no talent in that area.

I cross the room and sit behind him, winding my arms around his waist and resting my head against his back.

I like being close to him, for some reason, it makes me feel safe, like I’m in some sort of bubble that protects me from the world, as if nothing that happens can hurt me.

He puts the cards down and turns around, curling me against him and kissing the top of his head.

“If it makes you happy, I’ll tell one of the wardens that I think it was Gerard tomorrow.”

I nod and lean back against his chest, inhaling his scent, feeling so surrounded, and so protected.

I sleep.

***

It can’t be any later than 3am when I finally wake up, in my own bunk, Shannon dozing quietly in the bunk next to me.

I sit up as quietly as I can and look around, Ryan and Brendon are on the other side of the room sharing a bunk, Brendons arms wrapped around Ryan, holding him so tightly I wonder if Ryan can breathe at all.

I get up and kick my legs out from under the sheets and I pad over to the window, wanting a drink and I pass where Frank is lying curled up with his knees to his chest, on one side, his features twisted in pain and for the first time in my life... I pity him.

Gerard sleeps in the bunk above and I can hear him snoring softly so I try to be as quiet as possible when I gulp the water down and pad back to my bunk, drawing the covers back over myself and I find myself thinking, wondering.

How awful it must be for Frank, to have your trust in someone abused like that, to be disfigured and not have anyone to talk to.

I look over to where the moonlight outlines Franks sleeping figure gently, diluting his skin to milky white and darkening the torn flesh to an inky black.

I never wanted to forget how he looked that day.

I wanted it burned into my memory like a branding iron, I wanted the memories of how scared his eyes were, how ugly the scars and how pretty the green eyes had been.

I wanted the memories and more than anything, I want to hate the person who had betrayed the trust put in him.