A Month After,

Thursday

Life is always odd after a murder.

Not a lot of people expect you to recover from it, tacking you with pitying glances and comforting voices that are passive or pity, or both, in color. That is one kind. The other is the curiosity, sinking deep to find out, from your perspective, a tragic tale that only a very rare few can experience. No one wakes up one day and finds themselves in this ordeal. You are no longer just you, but a memory, a shared story, and an echo of a horrible feeling simultaneously.

What more a survivor of a serial killing case? A witness? A victim?

Life is odd.

Life for Sunny has always been odd, but it definitely got odder this time.

Time passed by like a mid-thought afternoon walk in the park when you were at a hospital. Four corners, the same machinery beeping and filtering to keep her alive- attached to her in some way or the other - with faces: family, the doctor, the nurses, and a few friends when she was a little bit better and less in danger to see them. And routine.

Sunny had started out wheezing, barely able to finish words without it being laborious enough that when people around her noticed, will quickly rectify, pat her pillow down, and tell her to rest. The world was quite sad, unable to move, and only permitted to see a few people at once.

But recovery is a slow process. Healing is even slower.

But even time can't take that away from you. The few blessings time can give is healing.

"Don't try too hard, Lorcan," Sunny warned, frightful for the stitchings still healing on his stomach.

But Lorcan Delos Reyes had been in bedrest almost the same time as Sunny. He woke up earlier than her, but his injuries took a lot more time.

With an anxious mother, had been kept from moving much even with the doctor's approval. Slowly, he was allowed unsupervised proceedings (before that, total supervision from any of the Delos Reyes that visited him daily, and there was an adjudicated person per day; Sunny particularly liked Tuesdays because it meant Mr. Delos Reyes was visiting, and he always had an extra lunchbox for Sunny, and a story for her from his childhood; he was a splendid storyteller. Kit had to meet him, was her first thought), first his room, then his floor, then the floor with Sunny in it, and now, into the outskirts of the hospital.

Now he's stretched, or attempting to, from his wheelchair to press buttons on the vending machine in the hospital's little plant area. Snow stretched in corners and across landscapes, but it was a relatively Sunny day, enough for a light jacket. Sunny had told him she could do it- she wasn't in a wheelchair - but Lorcan was insistent, almost desperate. So Sunny is looking at him now with a gentle worry from her perch on one of benches, legs tucked underneath her, her IV bag on the side, and her hands pressed lightly on Kit's manuscript.

"I can do this," Lorcan said stiffly, adamantly, back turned and maneuvering the vending machine. A few nurses stopped and wondered if they should help, but Sunny gave them a 'I really don't think we can stop him' shrug and smile, and they nodded in awareness, moving on.

They've probably seen more than one patient, recovering, wanting to feel normal again. There was more than one type of ghost pain that Sunny was realizing in this place; there were ghost limbs and ghost feelings, but the heaviest one present, especially with recovering patients, the feeling of the normalcy they lost. Before the physical trauma took place, there was a person still fresh in their minds, fresher in their muscle memory.

I know you can, I just don't want you to hurt yourself, is a thought Sunny wanted to verbalize but kept sewn between locked teeth. From the past few weeks, Sunny was realizing how stubborn Lorcan can be.

"A bull isn't he?" said an easy, cheery voice.

Sunny didn't need to turn, the voice was familiar, as well as the outstretched hand coming from behind her- brown skin with faded tattoos of a sun on the wrist and a couple of bracelets - offering a tupperware of freshly sliced green mangoes, dew drops from where they were washed clung. On the edge was a dollop of Bagoong.

It smelled so strong that Sunny's nose wrinkled, but she took a mango, a swipe of the dark violet dip, and took a bite just as Lorcan's victory was barely suppressed by him, and he swiped the water bottle Sunny wanted.

When he turned and realized what was happening, sweat visible from his forehead but was given no comment for, he laughed at Sunny's expression. "Told you that stuff is strong." He threw the water bottle at the man behind Sunny, who caught it with a curse, fumbling a little. "Kuya, I told you she couldn't handle it."

Pollux Delos Reyes sat on the other side of Sunny, tupperware still in hand and now a bottle in the other, and tilted his head to see more of Sunny's twisted face, laughing just the same. "Sour, isn't it? We loved this growing up, Lyssian was the only one who said he didn't like it even as he kept taking slices until he was shocked there wasn't anymore left. Then he'd look at me, the same way my daughter looks at me when I have food on my plate, and burns holes until I notice."

"I don't!" Atlas, six year old with sparkly shoes and pink leggings underneath a purple skirt, jumped up on her father's lap, giving Pollux a little oof. She glared at him, then turned, pleading to Sunny with big, round eyes. "I don't burn holes, auntie! I don't!"

Sunny's cheeks hurt from the pressure of the sourness, unable to keep her expression controlled or open her mouth to reply, as Lorcan took the bottle from Pollux after having wheeled himself back to them, opened it, and offered it.

"It's a metaphor, Atty," Lorcan explained. "It doesn't mean what it literally means."

"Then what does it mean?" She took a slice, took a bigger dollop of the Bagoong, and munched on it without as much as a wince. Sunny blinked at her as she chugged the water.

"It means you have big eyes."

Atlas pouted. "They're not that big!"

Lorcan, Sunny realized, was a little menace himself. His niece was his favorite victim. "Sure."

"Titooo." Then she flopped, dramatically, on her father's lap, curly hair covering her face. A beat later, her hand jut out to grab another mango.

Pollux laughed, setting the mangoes down and brushing his daughter's hair away from her face. "You know lola packed this for the patients." But he smiled as she kept munching.

"That's fine." Lorcan's eyes sidled to Sunny with a smirk, the dust of pink on her cheeks was a good color. "I don't think she can handle some more."

"I'm just not used to it yet." Sunny could be stubborn too. On odd instances. "I can eat more later."

The world moves with time. The trees sway with the breeze, getting cooler as the days go by. It stretches and bands, finds itself sweeping people and their problems, hopes, dreams forward.

Sunny was immersed in reading the manuscript, one of Kit's finals, already his fifth version; he was a beast when he got out of the hospital, and with injuries still healing- and with his mother at home and Sunny still in the hospital, there wasn't a lot of spaces to do things. So he wrote. Re-wrote. Edited. And wrote again. His words get crisper every new version he dropped by for Sunny to read; he kept every highlighted note or passage that Sunny did. These were her favourite words after all.

She almost didn't hear Lorcan ask about Lyssian, and the words she was reading faded back to just being words on a page. From the corner of her eye, she took note of Pollux's smile waning.

"He made a plea deal," Pollux said, voice low. "So he isn't going... inside. I don't know much else of the semantics, but he's technically free. He just isn't... leaving the house."

The rotation of the family when visiting Lorcan excluded Lyssian, but Sunny took no note of this. She remembered, distinctly, Kit's own words on white page. Lyssian had been locked in bird cages all his life, but when he was free, he was coerced in doing something horrible. Now, no matter how open the bird cage is, it won't matter to a bird who won't leave.

Punishment is a funny business. Especially one wrung from guilt.

"Not even to work?" Sunny took note of Lorcan's even voice, devoid of emotion. She couldn't pick it apart, he was very good at being blase. And she couldn't look up and see his expression; that would be too on the nose.

There was a slight shake of Pollux's head. "He barely leaves his room. Only Ma could bring him to eat, and that's from stubborness on Ma's end."

"He's sad," Atlas sighed.

"What's that, angel?"

"Sad." Atlas turned her neck looking up at her uncle, then picking at her father's jeans. "Uncle Lyssy is sad."

"Did he tell you that?" Lorcan asked.

"No, he just looks sad."

Pollux wrangled Atlas, fixing him to sit properly on his lap. "When did he look sad, angel?"

"When I go to his room to talk about my books. Witch parties are at my room, but I bring my cups to his room now because he says he can't go outside. So we play in his room. One time- one time Aunt Isla kicked the door, angry. She said she was done being ignored. Then sat down beside Uncle Lyssy and smacked him on the forehead. Now she has witch parties with us. She's the DJ, plays funky music white boy."

The interaction between niece, uncle and aunt was a surprise to both brothers, but Pollux smiled, in awe of his daughter. Lorcan had said, more than once, how stubborn his family can get. Lorcan looked relieved now. Guilt was a viper, eating away at you from the inside out. Family needed family, from whatever form that may be.

Sunny finally looked up, meeting Lorcan's gaze. There was an emotion there, owned and shared. A mutable silence. Then a smile.

It was already past curfew, the visitors of the day leaving before dusk settled, offering, yet again, a free witch party pass once Sunny was released. One day she was going to take Atlas up on her offer.

She was now situated on her bed, a place she had been familiar with for so many weeks (and more, if the coma counted), smiling at the nurse who gave her the nightly medicines and the customary question on how she was doing, how was her digesting, how was the walk out today, etcetera- now sat back and reading when five minutes later, there was a growing, hushed argument coming from her door.

Before she could react, there was a loud thud, something hittin the door. Sunny jumped. Then there was cursing, it sounded familiar, until the words- "-you didn't even twist the doorknob, you moron!" followed up by a cheery, crispy voice from her memories, "Oh, yeah, my bad!"

The knob twisted, and the door was swung open by the force of Lorcan Delos Reyes, still in a wheelchair, having been used as a battering ram from the sour look on his face, followed by the ever gangly, ever grinning, Kit Pouliot.

"It's past curfew," she said, grinning.

"He befuddled the nurse," Lorcan grumbled, wheeling himself as far away from Kit as possible, a glare or two thrown in for good measure. From his slight bedhead, he was already resting when Kit plucked him.

Kit mocked offense, a heart on his chest as he gently closed the door. "I take offense in that statement. I did not befuddle her. I do not befuddle. Who the fuck even uses befuddle?" I do, asshole was Lorcan's reply, but Sunny was busy taking note of Kit's hand. He saw her look and raised the barely opaque plastic where you could see the familiar green box of a well known cafe. Kit smirked. "I bribed her."

Lorcan snorted. "He charmed her before bribing her. D'you think a nurse would be bribed that easily?" Kit threw him a wink.

As Lorcan took a spot on the side of Sunny (and throwing Kit a middle finger), Sunny scrambled into tight sitting position as Kit took the space of the bottom half of her bed, already opening his box of treats; donuts and croissants, bagels and creme cakes. Sunny smiled, knowing this was a special box because Coffee Milk didn't sell a variety box, and at the fact that Kit looked and sounded better.

Most of his bruises and cuts have healed up, others, especially the one on his eye took longer. It was still purpled and yellowed on the edges, a band-aid stretched by his brow in thick stitches, but he can close and open his eye now at will. He wore white pants and a very pink sweater, a rose embroidered on the heart alongside a smaller sunflower after he discarded a puff, darker pink vest jacket. A green beanie stuck on his head, covering all his hair and ears.

Sunny got distracted by it, reaching to show one of his ears. Kit looked up. "Doesn't your piercings hurt like this?"

"A little bit," Kit admitted, his smile impish but gentle. He offered her a creme cake, the paper crinkling under fingers. A blueberry tart rested on top of it, dusted in some sort of graham dust. "Didn't feel it in the cold though."

"Hand me the matcha donut," Lorcan ordered.

Kit picked it up, dangled it in between a finger. "Say please, handsome master."

"Once I get out of this, I will beat you the f-"

But Kit's concentration is very peaky tonight, already turning to Sunny after handing the donut to Lorcan, still in the midst of his soliloquy. "Have you finished it?"

"You only just gave it to me yesterday." Sunny took a bite, the cake was soft, and softer and tartier in the middle. Tangy blueberry burst on her tongue.

Kit took the manuscript from her lap, flipping through the remaining pages from the current. "You've already made a pretty good dent. You're only fourteen pages left."

"How do you read so fast?" Lorcan asked, impressed. "I'm still in the middle and I've only read through the new edits." He waved the bitten donut at Kit. "You're a good writer but being a beta reader for new edits, as fast as you crunch them, is a tedious job."

"Gosh, thanks, really warms the old, dead heart."

"You're lovingly welcome."

"The affection you show each other is weird," Sunny murmured, flipping through the pages, devouring quickly. "What happened to the agent who wanted the story?"

Kit sighed. "They tripled overnight. I'm still unsure what to do. My therapist has been no help in the matter, she's glorious every other time, but she says this one is up to me. I don't want this to be up to me, so now I'm making it up to you two. You both stand to benefit and get aggravated by it going global as me."

"I already asked Isla, and she's all for it. Lyssian doesn't care either way, the only thing he asks is what he already asked you before."

Kit nodded. "Make him a separate entity from your family in the story."

"Just for Atlas." Lorcan had already eaten the chocolate pudding dessert from today's dinner, but he polished off the donut in record time. "She doesn't need the burden."

"I re-named everyone already, but yes, yes, I took note of that." Kit inhaled. "Can I be honest? I want to be honest. I want to publish it. I want to use it like a lighthouse for people. Entertainment too, obviously, but that's my greatest factor in the story- comic relief from a sinister root. But I also want the truth out there, for all its good graces and horrible monstrosity. Lies are so easily spread; dried leaves on a very, very hot day. And I don't want anyone to mistake or cajole any of you from what you've experienced."

Lorcan blinked. Sunny's smile was stretched.

"That's... uncharacteristically noble of you."

"- And I want to die a rich man on top of my pile of gold coins," Kit admitted.

"Gold coins seem like a very uncomfortable bed," Sunny mused.

"Are we just going to ignore the fact he wants to do this for the cash?"

"Not cash." Kit tutted him. "Gold coin. I am aware there is no longer a circulation of gold coins, too expensive than crispy paper, but imagine the magnificence that is me, and. . ."

The conversations fade, edges of laughter and seriousness tipping back and forth, refusing to settle. But one fact remained clear from the snow that slowly crested from the window of a hospital's room- the three of them, and more, would be okay.

The story was settled, the ending given in a perfectly looped letter.

The mystery was told and recounted, the victims heard, and the murderer caught for all his worth.

But this wasn't the end for Kit, Sunny, or Lorcan. Not by a long shot.

But for now, this one is final.

Here's to hoping there aren't anymore dead bodies that'll fall.

Fin. . .

Notable words:

Kuya - a term for n older brother

Tito - Uncle

Bagoong - is a Philippine condiment partially or completely made of either fermented fish or krill or shrimp paste with salt. Best eaten with green mangoes.