Tiny Hands

A leaf snaps underneath my toes as I hurriedly walk across the scratchy concrete to get to my house. My younger sister, Elle, pushed me down and ran away, blanketed with laughter, with my flip flops hidden away under her arm. She loves to torment me. I don't mind, though. Our family has always been so close. Like, we are the type of people who eat meals together and go on bike rides. We even do karaoke nights on Wednesdays!

I've never taken anything for granted, especially not after they saved me from my original drug-infested family. There's not much you can do after drugs seep into the walls of your home. They spread faster than termites. You can't begin to imagine the destruction. 

"Jamie! Why is there kool-aid all over the floor?" Our two-story brick home is in my view now. The first thing I notice is Elle's tiny frame standing in the doorway. She flips her long, blonde curls in my direction. I look above her, and the door is slightly cracked open.

"What are you talking about, little bean?" I use the nickname that I gave her because she stole a handful of beans from a bin in the supermarket years ago. 

I close in the space between us by stepping on the creaky wooden steps. I see drips of something red close to the edge of the door frame.

"I don't think that's..kool-aid.." I press my palm against the old door. As the living room slowly comes into my vision, my stomach pushes its way to my throat. The smell answers most of my questions before my eyes have the chance to. It smells like something that I have never smelled before. Like..death and decay and the feeling of despair. The air in the room has become heavy and suffocating. It stops just before it crawls into my nose. Elle is locked in on something cradled on our faded yellow couch. Is that what I think it is?

I take my trembling hand and push my precious little sister behind me as I walk forward. I soon realize that I am still barefoot. The sensation of our shaggy carpet brushes against my calloused feet. I try to hold in the cry that sneaks up to my tongue when I step onto something damp. I don't even lower my head. I just bite my lip and focus on whatever is laying fearlessly silent on our couch. I scream when I see the bruised fingers soaked in crimson. An amputated, lifeless hand is asleep on the same couch where I would curl up next to my dad and watch movies. There's blood drenching the same living room where I would dance with Elle and daydream about college and books. I don't even want to see what is hiding upstairs. 

Before I grab my sister and sprint far away from the house, I notice one more haunting detail. There's a ring wrapped around the ring finger of the frail hand. It's the same ring that my dad gave my mom ten years ago. The only difference is the stone. It's tinged red now. 

Panic sweeps me off of my feet and I grab a protesting Elle and run down the street. Away from the house of terror. My mind doesn't have the ability to process what is happening.

"Jamie! Jamie, let go of my wrist! That hurts!" I release my grip, not realizing how tight I had been holding onto her. I still haven't slowed my pace. 

"Sorry, little bean." I say, trying to sound as calm as possible. I have to be calm. 

"Why were you acting so weird? What was on the couch? Why are we walking so fast? Where are we going?" She continues her long list of questions, as every nine year old does. 

"We're just going to keep walking for a while, okay?" I look around as she still continues to babble. The street is eerily deserted. Every house has a dark shadow cast upon it. I tighten my arms around my chest. 

A few minutes pass, and my sister says something that quickly gets me out of my head and makes me return to reality. "Why don't you call mom? We're supposed to be home." She doesn't understand that mom won't answer her phone. A tear escapes my eye as I think that she will never answer her phone ever again. "You better tell her that there's kool-aid all over the floor. She's gonna be so mad!"

The sky keeps getting darker. We've been walking for miles. We finally reach a busy road, but cars are too busy speeding past than to pay attention to two kids. I spot a clear awning covering a small metal bench. When we finally sit down, I realize just how bad my legs have been aching. I guess Elle dropped my flip flops before we left. I really wish she hadn't.

If someone really did..murder..our parents, why wouldn't they come for us next? We're two defenseless children sitting alone at a bus stop in the middle of a racing city. I can't tell Elle anything. She doesn't need this to worry about. 

"Jamieee.." She scoots closer to me and squeezes her tiny arms around my waist. I nuzzle my nose into her hair. I take a deep breath of her strawberry shampoo and I feel the lost sensation of home for just a split second. 

"It'll be okay, bean. We'll be home soon." I try to believe the words as they escape my lips. Maybe I should call the police? No, I can't. What if they separate me and Elle? I can't go back into the system. I can't. 

Elle starts to doze off into my lap when a hot and sticky voice dribbles against my ear. "Wellll aren't you two dollsss just so prettyyy." My eyes shoot open, but my body doesn't move. The stench of alcohol follows his slurred words. I feel a rough hand reach from behind me and trace my collarbone. I still can't move. My mind is racing. I feel tears welling up behind my eyes. I feel his touch lower down my body. Before an evil laughter erupts from him, I hear a gunshot right next to my ear. Then silence. My head is ringing and everything feels like it is playing in slow motion. 

“Get the hell away from her.” I feel tiny hands pull me out of my trance. Was that Elle’s voice? I look up and I see my little sister holding a pistol in the direction of the perverted man. Her eyes are full of concentration and hatred. The man collapsed onto the pavement. A pool of blood circles around him. 

“Elle, put that down! What are you doing?” I reach up and try to grab the gun. She jerks away from me. “Stop! Where did you get that?” She keeps her index finger resting on the metal trigger as she traces the barrel of the gun against her jawline. 

“Daddy didn’t see me.” She giggles. Her smile looks so foreign that I wonder who has replaced my once sweet little bean. 

“What are you talking about?” My breath heightens as she walks closer to my shaking body. 

“They said that they would send me away. Mommy saw me slicing open Barry, and her and daddy called some bad people.” My eyes widen as she mentions our little kitten, Barry. I thought he had ran away weeks ago. Elle reaches down and her small thumb brushes away the tear trickling down my face.

“So I thought that me and you could run away and be happy. I mean, we’re better off on our own anyway, right?” Oh my God. She is actually delusional. Did she really do that to mom and dad? Mom’s hand...dad’s gun..no no no..

“Little bean,” my voice cracks as I try to reason with her. “You know that we can’t do that. We can fix this. We just have to get help, okay?”

“You know, Jamie, I really did have higher hopes for you.” I don’t have time to think when she positions the barrel of the gun between my eyes.

She leans in closer to my helpless face. “Such a pity.”

The last thing I saw before everything was gone was her tiny hand squeezing the trigger. 

“Wait! You little bitch!” Elle’s head shoots to the direction of the voice. I look over, and it’s the man she shot. All of his teeth are glowing at her. While she’s off guard, I reach up and grab the gun out of her hands. When she reaches my eyes again, she only sees the gun. 

“Don’t. Move.” I grit my teeth at the evil glare she is giving me. “This has gone way too far and you know it. Now, let’s go.”

She opens her mouth to protest at me, but before anything happens, I feel rough fingers grab my arms. They then snag my gun. I try to push against him, but he’s too strong. His arm is wrapped around my neck and the pistol is resting against my skull.

“Listen here you little bitches. You’re both going to come with me and not say a damn word about it.” I can feel his blood seeping down against my thigh from where Elle shot him. I really wish it would have killed him.

Elle throws her hands up in surrender at him. I can’t believe that she actually looks scared and defeated. She has killed people, and now she’s about to give up on some old rapist guy? 

She gets close enough for me to see her eyes. She winks at me. Just as I was about to question it, I hear sirens. I look up, and there are about five police cars speeding in for the rescue. The guy released his tight grip from my neck and tried to run. The police are chasing him now. 

As me and Elle try to gather ourselves, I look over at her. Her eyes look empty and hollow. Somewhere deep inside, my heart aches for her. As much as I know that what she has done is unforgivable, I also know that we can never tell anyone. We’ll tell the police that the guy broke into our house, killed our parents, and then set off to kill us. 

Then we will live the rest of our lives in wonder. Wonder for who the man actually is. Wonder for when my sister became her own tiny demon. Wonder for how life will ever move past this very moment in time where I am hugging her and breathing in her strawberry shampoo.

Everything will fall into place. 

It has to.