What's In A Name

** Kye’s POV between “Brown Eyes” and “Charmed” **

“Kye?”

A strange sound wakes me. It sounds like a voice but I do not understand what it says.

“Kye.”

Cold. Cold, I am so cold. My body shivers.

Something soft and warm touches my face. It smells like peaches and like something more like a forest.

“Kye.”

There is that strange sound again. It is close, right above me.

“Open your eyes, Kye. Let me see your eyes.”

I obey.

A girl sits next to me. She has long curly hair and big eyes. She is frowning. Why is she frowning? I did what she asked. Did I do it wrong?

“Kye?” she repeats the word I do not understand. “Do you know who you are?” she asks. She reaches out a hand to me. I back away. Why is she trying to touch? Will she hit me? I do not know who she is. Nobody told me who I am. I have not answered her question yet.

I shake my head.

She frowns again. Her hand and eyes drop down. I do not understand why she is upset. Was I supposed to lie? Lying is wrong.

The girl stands and I look up. “Can you walk? We need to go upstairs. Can you do that?”

I nod and follow her upstairs.

Upstairs is loud. I do not like it. There are a lot of noisy people. Someone yells and throws something nearby, and it scares me. I do not like it here. Can I please go back downstairs?

“Wait,” the girl holds her hands up. “It’s okay. You’re safe. They’re really annoying but we’re not staying here. Can you keep following me?”

I pause but follow her like she asked. I stay close behind her as we pass a lot more people in the hallway. Many of them nearly walk into me. The girl turns around and gives a small smile.

“Are you scared? Will you let me hold your hand?” Her palm is open and it is better than people yelling or throwing things; her hand is warm.

Once upstairs, she directs me to a quiet hallway. It is better here.

“We’re going in there,” she points down the hall.

I wiggle my hand. No one is throwing things or yelling anymore.

“Oh,” she says quietly. “Do you want me to let go?”

I nod and she frowns again but she does let go. Was that the wrong thing to do?

The girl leads me to the room she pointed to. Inside are two more people. I was not expecting them.

I stop at the door. They are strangers. I do not like being here. Can I run away?

“No, no, wait,” the girl from downstairs says in a fast voice. “Kye, wait, it’s okay,” she holds up her hands again. “They’re nice. They are super nice people. They won’t hurt you. None of us will.”

“Do you promise?” My voice is dry.

The girl’s eyes get bigger. She exchanges glances I do not understand with another girl that is shorter; she stands next to a tall guy with dark hair. They stare at me; it is uncomfortable.

The girl from downstairs says, “Of course I promise. We promise.”

“You cannot break a promise," I remind her.

“You’re right. We won’t.”

Nobody speaks after that. It is okay with me. I do not have anything else to say or do. I wait until they tell me.

The girl from downstairs gestures to the bed. “Why don’t you sit down? You must be tired.”

Am I? Should I be? My body does hurt; the bed looks soft. “May I?”

There is a pause; I wait for permission. The girl frowns again. Maybe I am not allowed on the bed.

The tall guy speaks instead. “Please, Kye, yes sit down. Get some rest. Try to fall asleep.”

I do as he says.

“We need to go talk,” he tells me. “But we’re going to leave the door open, and we’ll be right out in the hall. If you need anything, you just let us know, okay Kye?”

There is that strange word again. They talk to me like they expect me to know it. Will they be mad if I ask? He seems nice so I ask, “What does kye mean?”

The guy pulls back suddenly. I must have made him upset with the question. “I am sorry. I do not understand the word.”

“No, you don’t have to apologize,” he says. The girl from downstairs leaves the room quickly; she seems very upset. “You are Kye.”

I look down at my hands. I am kye? I am a kye? The answer does not help but I do not want to anger him by asking again.

He lets out a breath. “I’ll explain later. Can you give us a few minutes outside? We’ll be right back. Just tell us if you need or want something, okay? Try to sleep.”

I nod. He and the others walk just outside the door. I put my head on the pillow and rest on my side. I hear their voices outside.

“That was –”

“Brutal. I know we were expecting this, but still, seeing this – seeing him.”

“This isn’t him.”

“Rose –”

“No, that isn’t him. That isn’t Kye.”

Oh. Are they talking about me? But she said “isn’t.” Am I a kye or not?

“It’s the best we can do for now.”

“And later? We can’t keep him locked up in Matt’s extra room for too long, no matter how many compulsions we use.”

“This sucks, no argument here. I hate doing this to Kye but it’s the only thing we can think of right now.”

“Then think harder!”

That was the voice of the girl from downstairs. She seemed nice but why is she yelling? I do not like yelling. I clutch the blanket.

“Rose, I swear the moment we think of something, we’ll get him off the compulsion charm. Until then though, it keeps the monster subdued.”

“And keeps Kye in some sort of magical drugged-up hypnosis.”

“True, but it keeps him safe. Did you see some of the cuts and bruises the monster did to him? I know it sounds awful, but he is safer this way. Which sounds wrong, I know, since right now, he’s highly vulnerable to everything. You saw him: he doesn’t even recognize his name. He’s spooked out of his mind, and we need to ease him into some sense of normalcy.”

“There is nothing normal about this.”

A pause.

“Let’s sleep on it. It’s been an insane evening, and it’s – God, it’s past two in the morning. We need to sleep; Kye needs to sleep.”

“Will he know that?”

A long exhale. “If we tell him to.”

“Wait, we have to order him? That’s absolutely horrendous! It’s unfair, it’s unethical, it’s so wrong!”

Yelling. More yelling. I cover my ears but I still hear them yelling and I do not like it. Please stop please stop please stop.

I grab the blanket off the bed and sit in the corner. Everything is so loud. The yelling. So many noisy people doing so many noisy things. I do not like it. I close my eyes. I cover my ears again. I hear them argue. I do not pay attention to the words; they are too loud.

“ – doesn’t know better – ”

“ – smartest, fiercest person I know! – ”

“ – not the same right now! – can’t treat him – sorry, truly I am sorry - you love him – isn’t a fantasy novel – love conquers all won’t work – keep him safe – get him out of this – ”

“ – never should have done this – ”

“ – wouldn’t be the same – ”

“ – did you? – ”

“ – rose – ”

“ – oh my god – ”

“ – none of us knew – ”

“ – such a BS answer, Aiden! – ”

“ – it’s a BS situation! – ”

“ – stop, we’re scaring him!”

Footsteps enter the room. I look up from the blanket. They come back inside. The girl from downstairs runs up to me. She was yelling. I want her to stay away.

“Kye,” she says and I do not understand what she wants. She crouches next to me. Too close. I do not want her this close. Then she puts a hand on my shoulder.

“No, do not touch me! Do not touch me! Stay away from me!” I am yelling too and my voice is too loud. I do not like it very very much and I very very much do not like her touching me.

I turn away from her. My hands shake holding the blanket. I hear her footsteps quickly leave the room.

“Rose. Rose,” the guy’s voice says.

“I’ll go after her. Can you stay with him?”

“Yeah, of course.”

More footsteps leave. I look over the blanket. The tall guy starts to sit next to me. “Please stay away,” I tell him.

He takes a step back. His palms are open. “Okay, don’t worry. Can I sit here with you? I’ll stay back like you asked.”

I do not like it but I do not disagree. He slowly sits down.

“I think we scared you, didn’t we? I’m sorry about that.”

I hold the blanket to my chest. “I do not like yelling.”

“Yeah, neither do I. We just had a really hard day. You did too. Are you hungry or something? Thirsty?”

I look at him. Should I be?

He sighs and pushes away his hair. “Right. It’s a little late for food, but I’ll get you a bottle of water in a while. You should – you need to drink it, okay?”

I nod.

“Good. I’m Aiden, by the way.”

“Hello, Aiden.”

He looks up at the ceiling for three seconds. “I think you need to go to sleep,” he tells me. “I wish we could get you some better clothes but you’ll have to get through the night in these. We’ll get you something better in the morning. Here, let’s get you to bed.”

He stands up and raises his hand out to me. I move back.

“Don’t touch me.”

He pulls his hand back to his side. “Okay, I’m sorry. But can you get into bed?”

I pull the blanket to my chin.

“Okay, I understand. Well, the bed is yours if you want it. I’ll stay here with you for the time being. Don’t worry, I’ll stay over here.” He takes a blanket over by the door.

“Will you stay with me? I do not want to mean girl to come back.”

He looks at me a long time. I do not understand why. “Yeah, I will. But Kye –” He pauses. “Never mind.” He sits down. “Goodnight, Kye.”