Souls Unfractured

Maddie leaned down and pressed her lips to my forehead. When she pulled back, her hands were stroking my hair. “But then I feel this new, strange, overwhelming feeling in my heart, and know this is all real. That I have been saved, again. Because I feel fear and hope pulsing simultaneously through my body. I feel giddy and nervous at the same time. And I cannot breathe at the thought of being without you, for even one second.” Maddie’s hand lowered to rest on my cheeks, and she said, “So you may think you cannot be loved. But in my heart, in my healing soul, I am begging the question, how can you not? Because for me, you are truth. My truth. My heart, is all you.” Maddie smiled, the pretty sight like a punch straight in the heart. “I love you, Flame. And I will spend the rest of my life trying to make you believe that you are worthy of being loved.”

I groaned on hearing those words. I wrapped my arms around Maddie’s neck, bringing her down to my chest. I held her tight and rasped, “I can’t fucking stand the thought of that cunt doing what he did to you.”

Maddie’s arms tucked around my waist, and with her cheek on my chest, she admitted, “And I cannot bear the thought that someone hurt you either. Even now, I cannot fathom what really happened to you. I know that they hurt you at your church. I know it is because you do not see the world as everyone else does. But… who is he? Who is the man you refer to? The one who enters your mind? The one who takes you to the hatch and hurts you? I believe like Brother Moses did to me.”

I held her tighter as I thought of his face. His hard face and those eyes that stared at me with such hatred. I thought of the darkness, of the dirt floor… and the screaming… the motherfucking screaming…

“Flame?” Maddie called, summoning me from the darkness with a simple kiss on my chest.

I held her tighter, and confessed, “I’ve… I’ve never told anyone before…” My lungs squeezed, I could hear his voice pushing through, You evil little shit. You took her from us and now all he does is scream. Here, you fucking deal with it…

“Shh, Flame. All is well,” Maddie soothed.

I focused on her hands around my waist and her soft breathing on my chest, then I rasped, “The snakes didn’t work.”

Maddie tensed and her arms squeezed tighter. I stared at the ceiling and said, “The church, the poison; none of it worked. For months and months he kept taking me back to the church, back to Pastor Hughes. But nothing they did worked. He said the flames would never leave. That I was evil, and everything I touched would be ruined too. I never got better at understanding things, at being like normal people. And eventually they gave up taking me to church. But his punishments got worse.”

“Who is he, Flame?” Maddie asked, and his face came into my head again.

“My poppa,” I whispered in reply. My stomach ached at speaking his name aloud.  “He said I was evil. That I had flames running in my blood. He tried to get them out through God. Instead he told me that I belonged to the devil. That I was a curse on all of the family, because the devil had made me slow and stupid.”

“Flame,” Maddie whispered, and she lifted her head to look me in the eyes.

“I tried, Maddie. I tried real hard to speak to other kids, but I never said anything right. I… I didn’t understand what I said that made them laugh at me, or cry, or run away. Never ever understood.  Every time it happened, my poppa would get more and more angry. And he would hit me, send me to my room because he told me he couldn’t stand to be near me.” I inhaled and continued. “He would see me playing on the floor with my toys, and scream at me that I was evil, that I was a retard. And my mama… he would scream at her too. She would try to get him to stop. She would try over and over again. But he’d hurt her too when she did. When my baby brother was born, he would scream at him too, to stop crying. But he was a baby, and babies cry all the time.”

Maddie lifted her head and asked, “You have a brother? A mother?”

My stomach fell and I shook my head. I could feel my head twitching. My body jerked and I needed to get up, but Maddie shifted her body to lie across mine and her palms caressed my face.

“They are not here?” When I looked down, my arm was held out, my sharp nails scraping over my veins.

I choked, my throat too tight, and I whispered, “Maddie… I killed them. I hurt them… I fucking killed them…”

Maddie swallowed and prompted, “What do you mean? Talk to me Flame. Do not keep it inside, where it causes you pain. Share it with me. Let me share your pain.”