Kissing Carrion

Kissing Carrion by Gemma Files Read Free Book Online Page B

Book: Kissing Carrion by Gemma Files Read Free Book Online
Authors: Gemma Files
Tags: Fiction
half-submerged by his own long limbs. I threw my keys in the corner, turning the bag of bed sheets inside out all over him. He made a noise that might have indicated protest, had it only been a little more conscious.
    â€œMove over, Rennie,” I said, flopping down on the futon’s edge. Methodically shucking and chucking jacket, boots, jeans, bra. Then, still receiving no reply: “Move the fuck
over
, Rennie. Now, not later.”
    He squirmed lengthwise, as if scalded. I kicked enough of the rest of him out of my way (lightly, gently) to slide in beside him, pull the sheets as far up as they could possibly go and curl up there in the red dark, breathing slowly, holding my head. Hoping the next thought I had wouldn’t be the one to finally make it shatter.
    A minute or so of blessed silence. Then, tentatively: “You okay?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œOh.” A pause. “Your head hurt?”
    I sighed. “Yes.”
    Another pause. A few more breaths, staggered and stretched. Heartbeat and aftershock matched pulse for pulse, lighting my skull’s fault-lines up like a neon map.
    â€œWant me to get you anything?”
    Oh, just the last five years to do over. And another whole life before that, while you’re at it.
    â€œI’m tired, Ren. All I want is to sleep.”
    â€œSure,” he said, like he understood. Adding: “Man, you know I know the feeling.”
    * * *
    I slept through most of Friday, part of Saturday. I needed it. Something had run out in me without warning, like an emptied engine, leaving nothing but fumes; as far as I could see, there wasn’t much worth waking up for. I heard Rennie moving around, flipping channels, snickering to himself as he mimicked the cast of
Law & Order
. Once, somebody knocked at the door—maybe Leo, maybe our legendary landlord. But neither of us answered, so they went away again.
    Later on, when the credits of
Neon Rider
were just starting to blare, Rennie called: “Hey, speak of the devil—Leo catch you, at the Laundromat?”
    â€œI saw him.”
    If you’ve been in really bad pain for a long time, its absence becomes almost good enough to qualify as pleasure. That’s where I was now, caught in languorous inertia, barely listening while Rennie rattled on.
    â€œThat guy’s a serious perv. I mean it, Ro—he wants your body.”
    â€œUh huh.”
    I could feel his tension mounting. I knew what I had to do, but I couldn’t get myself awake enough to care. Maybe I just wanted to see what would happen, the longer I let it slide.
    And would it have killed him to do it himself, just this once?
    3:00 AM. Global went out in a whine of test-pattern, and Rennie slipped back into bed.
    â€œI’m cold,” he complained.
    I turned on my side, fetus-curled away from his desperation. “You’re always cold,” I muttered.
    â€œRohise, I’m cold. I’m hungry.”
    â€œI’ll get you something.”
    â€œWhen?”
    â€œSoon.”
    With no TV, the apartment seemed twice as empty as it actually was—like some semi-permanent party had all just decided to go out for pizza. Rennie touched my shoulder, his hands chill with need. Asked, hesitantly:
    â€œHold me, Ro?”
    â€œâ€™Kay,” I said, rolled back the other way, and drew him to me.
    * * *
    There’s something about a sibling, either having one or being one—less intimate than twindom, less escapable than marriage, so much more chancy than any other relationship. Jos saw Rennie like a bad Xerox of me, unfuckable and uninteresting. Our Dad saw us like owned things, principalities in the familial city-state. Mom saw us so rarely, between trips to the Clarke, it was kind of like she never saw us at all.
    I looked at Rennie and saw myself, echoed but not reproduced, hero-worshiped into a flesh reflection at least twice my natural size. An addictive image.
    But just like anything else

Similar Books

The Waters of Eternity

Howard Andrew Jones

How Did I Get Here

Tony Hawk, Pat Hawk

Lake Como

Anita Hughes

The French Admiral

Dewey Lambdin

A Vault of Sins

Sarah Harian