{Cary}

Cary's father was gone when he got home—gone for a couple weeks to teach at some important university or something. Beverly told him this while scrambling eggs for dinner in the kitchen.

Cary dropped his coat and backpack in the corner, feeling twenty pounds lighter. The eggs smelled like they were burning. He moved her aside. "Mom, let me do that."

Beverly drew a stool up to the counter and pulled her glass of wine towards her. "The nanny is upstairs with Liam. Phillippa. She speaks very good English, you know. Your father would not have someone foreign speaking bad English to his son." She giggled and Cary wondered how many glasses she had poured before he came. In Conall's absence, she was like a planet missing the gravitational pull of its sun.

He took the eggs off the heat and dug in the bread box for something to make toast with. He plated the meal with a garnish of parsley and presented it to his mother, relaxing his face in a smile. "Ta-dah."

She giggled again, then spun off her stool and across the kitchen to flick on the stereo for some dinner music.

They were in the middle of eating when she caught his wrist. She turned his arm over, pushing the sweater sleeve to his elbow, exposing the cuts. "What is this, Ciaran? What were you trying to do?"

Cary met her eyes, mouth shut, his tendons jumping as he clenched his fist.

"You promised," she said. "You promised me you would stay."

He jerked free. "I am."

She was pale, her eyes boring into him. "So what was that then—a mistake? A little joke to scare your mother?"

Cary got up and scraped his meal into the garbage, his shoulders tense as stone. He was done anyways. "No. Not a joke." He should have kept his mouth shut, but since he was already bleeding he thought she couldn't hurt him any worse.

"Did you ever think we could go?" he asked. "Every night could be like this, just the two of us and Liam." He held still, his fingers curled over the cool metal edge of the sink, listening to her silence while the music crooned.

"You want me to leave my husband. Your father. Our home." Her soft, cold voice made him turn and look. Her cheeks were flushed and the tips of her teeth showed under her sneering lip. "Let me tell you something, Ciaran. Your father could have put you out with the garbage. He could have turned us out into the street. You should be grateful he saw more in you than a baby-killer."

Cary hands flew up, like her words were shards of glass thrown in his face. "Mom," he gasped. "Stop. I'm sorry."

"You should be." She got down unsteadily from her stool and swayed out of the kitchen.

Cary put his fingertips against his eyelids, where he felt the prick and burn of tears that couldn't fall. He stayed still, trying to breathe. Of course she could still hurt him. She knew all his secrets.

He left the dishes and climbed the stairs. Liam's door was open, but he didn't turn his head to look. Instead, he went to his room and climbed out the bedroom window.

The shingles were rough under his palms. He imagined sliding forward to the edge of the roof, then kicking off into the sky, leaving the dead weight of his body and everything behind.

He grabbed the window frame with one hand. For a second that had felt so real, he thought he was going over. He hung on tight and swung around to drop back into his bedroom. There was a reason he should stay—if he could just remember what it was.

He reached into his backpack for his smokes and put his hand around Jon's Bible. He drew it out. Somewhere in this book was the story of the bleeding man. Somewhere in this book was the answer to the peace in Jon's house. It made no sense that those two things would go together.

Cary sat on his bed and used the ribbon to open to the stories about Jesus. He hunted for the part where they killed him like he was pressing a bruise. He read it all: the blows, the scourging, the nails pounded into Jesus' hands.

It was different in Jon's book. Jesus wasn't surprised when they arrested him and he wasn't afraid. He never broke when they beat him. He never begged. He never said he was sorry. He said, "Father, forgive them," when they stretched him on the cross. He died with a shout—"It is finished!"—that made Cary rock back and put his hand over the page.

How did You do that?

He held still, his heart beating double-time, thinking of what it would take to absorb that much hurt and stay yourself. Jesus was strong.

Cary wanted that to be a true story. He wanted to face his own shit with half that strength. Cary covered the cuts on his arm without looking. He was sure that he couldn't.

He shut the book and went to the washroom to bandage his arm. He felt like the Jesus in Jon's book was watching him. He didn't look up at the mirror. Jesus was totally different than him. Jesus didn't deserve to hurt.

Cary turned off the light and climbed into his bed, curling with his face to the wall. He didn't open the book to read to the end—the part where Jon said Jesus came alive again.

 ///

*Trigger: nightmares, blood. This is going to end well for Cary, I promise, lovelies.

He was in a hole in the basement, digging. The ground was hard and the light was poor. He struck his shovel into the dirt and chucked another clod over his shoulder. The hole went up to his chest; he'd been digging all night.

The plastic hanging from the ceiling rustled. Someone had opened the door at the top of the stairs. Cary hunched his shoulders. He climbed out of the hole and gathered the dirty bundle of blankets into his arms. He watched the figure coming down the stairs, tall and shadowed.

The stranger from the campfire stepped into the light of the single naked bulb. Cary drew in his breath. It wasn't who he expected, but he was still afraid.

"You have something that belongs to me," the man said.

Cary's arms tightened around the blankets. "Who are you?"

The man's lean face opened in a smile. There was a couple days growth on his chin. If he said a name, Cary didn't hear it. His ears were packed full of white noise like cotton. He was down here for a reason. He turned and picked up his shovel, dropping back into the hole and propping the bundle in the corner. One smudged little arm fell free of the blankets, limp in the dirt. Cary tucked it back in. She was cold. He turned his back and dug his shovel into the dirt again.

The man's bare feet dangled over the lip of the hole, then he dropped lightly in. His clean clothes and hands made Cary aware of the mud caked on the knees of his jeans and under his fingernails. "Get out of here," he said.

The man lifted his face, looking around. "How long do you think you can go on like this?"

Cary hefted the shovel in his hands. The way the man looked at him made him feel something. His skin sizzled: it was anger. "Get out."

The door at the top of the stairs bounced off the wall and Cary flinched. "That's him. Get out."

The man acted like he hadn't heard, looking at Cary with that stupid, open face. Cary swung the shovel at him. "Out!" He beat the man in time with his father's footsteps coming down the stairs.

"Where are you, Ciaran?" Conall called softly.

Cary whimpered and crouched in the hole, reaching to check that the bundle of blankets was safe.

The stranger got to his feet, blood pouring down over one eye. "Hide," Cary said. "Don't let him see you."

The man glanced at Cary, then put his hands on the edge of the pit and climbed out. Cary put his face in the dirt and covered his head with his arms. There was a din of noise, then silence. The door at the top of the stairs swung shut.

Cary lifted his head. There was blood everywhere: dripping down the plastic and pooling on the concrete. His breath hitched. There was also blood on his hands and spattered up his arms. He crawled out of the hole. His eyes jumped away from the body smashed on the floor.

The body moved. The man got up to his knees. Cary pressed his hands against his chest, frozen.

The man stood up. He stood in Cary's basement with blood sheeting his face. "You're bleeding," he said.

Cary pulled his hands away from his chest. They were sticky. "You shouldn't have come down here," he whispered.

"Give her to me," the man said. He held out his hands and said her name. There were scars on his wrists. On both sides.

Cary couldn't breathe. He knew the answer to his first question. He got into the hole and gathered the blankets in his arms. He uncovered her blue-white face and kissed her stiff cheek. He passed her up into the waiting arms of the man. Jesus.

When Jesus held the baby to his chest, she was alive. She turned her head and looked at Cary with pink in her cheeks. Cary's heart thundered as if it would burst out of his chest and he woke up.

He sat up with a gasp, his heart still thudding. He put his hand to his face. His cheeks were wet with something. Had he been crying in his sleep?

He saw the man with the scars and a fresh cut splitting his lip bleeding red down his chin. He made a noise and lay down, covering his face. He wanted one more minute to say he was sorry for everything. God, he was such a fuck-up.