Avril had always wanted a younger sibling but her mother was unflinching. Alina tried to convince her in roundabout ways that even if she had wanted, that opportunity had passed. Alina asked if she was bored with her books. Avril loved her books, that was the problem, noone other than her mom could speak with her about every new story she read. Clay only cared about machines and sleeping, Tenor only read when he wanted to cook something and had no interest in fiction and Soot had forgotten how to read, which Avril thought was stupid.
She wanted someone her age to talk about her series with. Her mother was too busy and her opinions on myths annoyed her. Avril figured all of the adults grew up to be boring and she needed to save herself as soon as possible. More than herself, she wanted to shepherd someone else towards an exciting future of great stories with no adults saying knights aren’t interesting.
Avril had dreamed of it, showing off her collection and ranking her favorite books to a younger version of herself. But that was just dreams, so Avril would’ve been fine with just a younger sibling but apparently that was also too much to ask. It just made sense for her, waking up every day in their apartment alongside her mother, Avril knew that something was missing, a vacant space that she couldn’t ignore. Avril could tell her mother was annoyed by having to hear her mention it so much, enough that she had stopped arguing about it. Avril had begrudgingly started to stop asking as well, but it wouldn’t leave her mind so easily. Naturally, Avril couldn’t help but feel a little lost when her wish appeared one day, shying behind her mother’s back.
“Can you take care of them for a minute Avy dearest?” Alina asked in her most polite tone, impressing on her the importance of the task.
What Avril supposed was her wish made manifest had been delivered in the form of a pale and lost looking child, shorter than she’d been. Their wide and sad eyes looking at everything around them in a mix of wonder and fear. Her mother had already gone back into the hall, leaving Avril to take the reins.
The child was awkwardly wrapped in a white blouse much too big for them, hiding their legs and arms under the cloth. Avril non-hesitantly reached for an arm to grab and the child staggered backward, immediately focusing back on her. Near them still, Avril tried to grab their other arm to the same reaction. Already starting to feel frustrated, Avril sighed and pointed to her room. The child looked between the doorway and Avril’s room. They both could see the neighbors speaking in the hall, her mom’s back always looking the most imposing. She couldn’t see her face but the others looked stern and spoke quickly. Avril couldn’t make out their words even though she tried.
Avril’s attention went back to the child, they seemed to have made up their mind in following her instead of running back between Alina’s legs. The child would get startled by any noise louder than a click of the tongue as Avril led them to her room.They couldn’t have been that much younger than her, classes had been recently canceled for her age group due to a lack of children. Maybe the child had landed here because they were the only one in their class. The child sat themselves down in the middle of her room, seemingly very comfortable in their oversized blouse. They kept looking around, taking the environment in, still startled by any little noises like clicks from the kitchen or wind gusts from her window.
“Can you talk?” Avril asked the child.
“Not well!”
She couldn’t have said why but Avril hadn’t expected an answer. The child’s voice was raspy as if they’d cried but she didn’t see tear marks on their cheeks.
“Do you have a name?”
The child looked down, the blouse had a name tag on the chest but it was empty, the ink rubbed off.
“Not yet…”
Not yet. Avril felt confidence rise in her chest. She had wanted to take the child’s hand in her own but didn’t expect a better reaction than last time so she pointed to the window instead, leading them to stand on her bed. The child almost tripped on their coat while climbing but hung on, earnestly following. When standing on the bed, Avril could see outside the wide rectangular window, a sprawling view of the upper stratum unfolding itself. The child had to stand on their toes to barely peek through and Avril quickly went down to gather her biggest books and laid on the bed, prompting the child to stand on them. They were barefoot and the sole of their feet was covered in dust and dirt but she didn’t care. She had dreamed of this moment.
They could now both watch outside. The bustling Hull and fragments of sky shaping a dichotomous festival, bathed under the white Sun. After having spent her whole life beside it, Avril didn’t find the view thrilling anymore, even at night where colors would blossom. Her attention was focused on the child, their eyes sparkling with undescribable wonder. Her heart fell full, this is what she had wanted this whole time, to see the light of discovery that must’ve once inhabited her, reflected in another. She’d silently wished that moment would last forever, but in a second beat she wished for more.
“Can I give you a name?”
The child looked back at her, their eyes even wider, and nodded violently, hard enough that Avril thought the child would break their neck. She laughed, Avril finally felt she had found another part of her. She had read about events in the life of others, leading towards new truths about themselves. Avril had longed for it, deeply convinced she was owed this moment, her own realization that her life made sense, in the purest and most intimate way possible. Even if she had sought it from stories, narration could never transcribe what she had felt then, and she would never try to recapture it or let it escape her mind. It was hers, forever.
The memory played in vivid detail as she stood in front of the elevator. Her ears were buzzing, Avril only heard her own breath leaving her mouth, following a constant rhythm. She wasn’t sure how much time had passed, both Tenor and Clay had left her side. Raime didn’t hold her gaze, their eyes unmoving, looking nowhere. They still laid on their side, their chest faintly rising and falling. Avril couldn’t hear them breathe, she’d called their name once but received no response and hadn’t found the strength to try again.
Her attention shifted to Tenor, coming back with a thick slab of synthetic meat in hand. He gently nudged Avril out of the way before lobbing the slab towards Raime. The meat landed on their side with a disgusting sound before slowly sliding to the ground, prompting a pathetic groan out of Raime who only shuddered at the impact.
“What the fuck?” Avril protested, almost too shocked to comprehend what had happened.
Clay was coming out of his apartment with boxes of tools under his shoulders, “Grab them by the shoulders and get to their bathroom, I’ll clean this up.”
“Aren’t they hurt? Shouldn’t we call everyone?”
“No!” Clay cried out nervously, laying the boxes down next to her, “Have a talk with your mom later if you want but now we move fast.”
Avril looked at Tenor, seemingly resolute to oblige. She hesitated a second more but stepped into the elevator cabin, attempting to not step in the blood. That effort would multiply tenfold as she took a hold of Raime’s shoulders under her hands, trying to dislodge them out of fetal position. Avril expected Raime to struggle but was met with no resistance, they were limp in her hands animated only by faint gurgling which gave way to a startling amount of blood violently spilling from their mouth onto the floor of the cabin. Avril’s heart skipped a beat but Tenor got a hold of their legs in the same motion, shaking her out of the shock.
Raime was entirely naked, the thin layer of crusted fluids crackling under the pressure of her hands. Her and Tenor awkwardly got them out in the corridor, Avril had stopped paying attention as to where she stepped, Raime’s head resting uncomfortably against her chest. Thoughts of dropping them right then parasited Avril’s mind, viscous blood and hard scabs falling between her fingers made her want to gag. They waddled backwards to Raime’s apartment, pushing the door open with her shoulder and both of them lifted Raime’s body inside the narrow bathtub. The red tiling of the bathroom that no previous resident including Raime had bothered decorating would have welcomed them but the Sun was high now, inexorably draining the apartment.
Averting her eyes from looking at Raime’s shivering figure for too long, Avril nervously washed her hands as best as she could in their sink and quickly went to pull down the shutters of the window she’d closed the morning prior. The loud and slow mechanical curtain lowered itself as she went back to the bathroom. The sickly red of drying blood still covered all of Raime’s skin, slowly flaking away with every breath they took. The size of the bathtub didn’t allow them to go back to the same position they’d been in the elevator, forcing them to sit up albeit lazily. Tenor was already heading back, not communicating his intentions, but Avril thought he couldn’t surprise her more after throwing steak onto a defenseless victim.
She didn’t think twice about labeling them as a victim, even as she struggled to fathom what could’ve possibly happened to leave them in this state. Avril had never seen this much blood in her life. She cursed the thought forming in her head as she could feel nausea catching up. Avril activated the bath water to distract her momentarily. Raime yelped in surprise, coughing coarsely and throwing up more deep red blood.
“Sorry…” Avril muttered.
Because what else could she say? Raime looked back at her, water and dried tears slowly revealing their face. Beneath the layers of various fluids she didn’t want to identify, Avril tried from afar to look for open wounds but she couldn’t even make out a scar. Raime tried to speak between coughs and gags, but their voice sounded broken, unable to manage a single word. Avril let herself fall next to the toilet, as a precaution and to finally sit down. The water kept flowing, she hadn’t checked the temperature but Raime looked to have acclimated and the room felt warmer.
Having closed the shutters, both of them had regained colors of their own. Avril was more covered in blood than them now, she loathed herself for feeling relief that she hadn’t encountered this incident while wearing her best suit.
“Can you even hear me?”
Raime nodded slightly, their movements still lethargic.
“Looks like everyone except me has some idea of what’s going on with you. I don’t know if I should feel jealous.”
Raime wasn’t the most expressive person she knew but they’d lived side by side for most of their lives and she could discern the distress painted on their face. They tried to speak again but was met with the same resistance, blood had stopped flowing from their mouth and was replaced with a coarse cough. Avril doubted the strain she’d seen on their face was purely physical. She entertained the idea of continuing the one-sided conversation but all the things she could say felt aimless. Her nausea was abating, she could see steam rising from the bath, water flowing against their body turned into faded shades of pink and yellow. Raime didn’t hold eye contact, their eyelids closing as they slowly sank deeper into the tub, below muddied water. Avril jumped to her feet and leaped towards the tub, startling Raime who straightened up, looking at her wide-eyed and retreating from her hands.
“Oh, I thought…” Avril gasped, her hands falling on the side of the tub as she felt the heat on her fingers, “Fucking mess, the water’s scorching!”
Avril lowered the temperature on the tub’s side and staggered back, staying up this time. She thought of her mother, she knew of whatever was happening with Raime to an extent. Avril couldn’t piece anything together because she’d obviously been kept out of something everyone else was privy about and it infuriated her. She wasn’t even sure what she was seeing right now. Raime’s body was unscathed, laying in and throwing up blood that might as well have not been theirs. Had they been able to stand upright and speak coherently, Avril might’ve been convinced they had killed someone. But even under the hot streams of water, she could see them shaking, regularly coughing hard enough that their whole body recoiled in the effort.
“I’ll have more questions but I’ll interrogate the others first, right now the only thing I can do for you in undo what happened yesterday and put you back in bed,” Avril sighed.
Avril had wanted to induce a laugh, maybe just a chuckle. She was good at throwing a straight ball at Raime whenever they looked down on themselves. It had a great success rate and they usually both felt better for it. Avril thought she could manage that much at least but all she saw was a pained expression between two harsh coughs and eyes that didn’t look back at her.