HELPER12, Jack Blaine [reading in the dark .TXT] 📗

like poor Cinq must have felt, as though someone has made a horrible mistake.

Helper made a point of setting one plate at the formal dining table for me.  When I came to the kitchen with Jobee to eat, she turned me away.

“I’m sure you would prefer the dining room,” she said.  “Your place is set there.”  And she sneered. The Driver wouldn’t look up from his own plate.

When I went to the dining room I found a covered dish waiting.  Underneath was a bowl of thin, cold soup.  Nothing else.  I started to eat it, but then I thought about what Helper might have done to it and I couldn’t.  I fed Jobee his bottle, and came upstairs hungry.

I am so tired.  I just want to be unconscious, but sleep won’t come.  I get up and splash some water on my face, to see if that will help.  As I’m climbing back into bed, I hear a door downstairs—I think it’s the door to the courtyard.  Thomas must be back.  I tiptoe to the window, and see that the Driver has parked the vehicle in the courtyard—he left to pick up Thomas after dinner.   I shouldn’t care, but I feel relieved.  He was so angry when he left this morning.

I hear something downstairs, some sort of scuffle I think.  I open my door to the hall, and creep out onto the landing.  Light floods upward from the main floor.

“Sir!  Mr. Thomas, stop!”

It’s the Driver, and he sounds strange.  I’ve never heard him speak to Thomas in that tone.  There’s a bang, and some more scuffling.

“Let go of me now, Driver or I’ll—”

I hear the Driver shout, but I’m listening for Thomas.  Shadows flash on the walls and I see someone stumble into view.  It’s him.  He grabs the rail of the stairway, and begins to pull himself up the stairs as though he’s hurt, or so tired he can barely stand.  The Driver is hovering behind him, trying to steady him.  But when he reaches out to touch him Thomas strikes out at him almost blindly, shoving him away.

“Just leave me!”  His voice is ragged, hoarse.

I must gasp or something, because they both stop and look up.

Thomas’s face is ashen, and his eyes are swollen.  He’s crying, so hard I don’t know how he can see through the tears.  But he does—he sees me, standing on the landing looking down.  And if it’s possible for him to look more anguished, for one split second, he does.  Then, his face stills, though his tears still flow.  He shakes his head, such a slight movement I might have missed it easily, and he looks away from me, straight ahead, at nothing.

“I’m fine Driver,” he says, in a dead voice.  And he goes to his room and closes the door, so quietly and carefully I can’t make out the click of the latch.

I stand there frozen.  The Driver looks up at me then, and his face is like a reflection of my own—sorrowful and torn.  He wants to go after Thomas, I can tell.

“Go,” I whisper down to him. “Go and help him, please.”

He shakes his head at me.

“I’m not who he needs, miss.”  He stares up at me for the longest time, and then he bows his head and backs away.

I check on Jobee; he’s sleeping soundly.  I tug on my robe and slip out my door, shutting it as softly as I can.  I tiptoe down the stairs, and down the second floor hall to Thomas’s room.  I put my ear to the door, but I can’t hear anything.  I tap lightly on it and wait.  Nothing.  I’m afraid to knock any louder; who knows where Helper lurks after dark.  I try the door, and the mechanism gives—he hasn’t locked it.

Slowly, as silently as possible I open the door, just wide enough to let me slip through.  It’s dark in the room, and I stand there trying to let my eyes adjust.

“What do you want?”

It’s a low growl, almost inhuman, and I jump when I hear it.  He’s sitting on his bed across the room.  The moonlight is streaming in through his windows, and as my eyes grow accustomed to the darkness, I can see the shape of him.  He’s shirtless, and his shoulders are gleaming.

“Thomas, what happened?”  I whisper, almost afraid to speak to him.

“What happened?  What happened?”  He laughs then, a wild, guttural sound with no mirth attached to it.  He shakes his head.  “She killed him.  That’s what happened.”

I stand still, shocked.  Then I cross the room quickly.  I’m sitting next to him in a moment, my arm around his shoulder.

“Thomas, what are you talking about?”

He rocks back, throwing my arm off of him.  He grimaces, and shakes his head back and forth.  I know he’s fighting more tears.  He covers his face with his hands.

“Go away, just go.  Please!”

“I can’t leave you, Thomas.  Not like this.”  I get off the bed, and kneel in front of him.  I take his hands in mine, and pull them away from his face.  His eyes are glittering in the moonlight, brimming with tears.

“Is Gregory dead?”  I whisper, as though perhaps if it’s only whispered, it won’t be true.

Thomas’s face crumbles then.  He nods, but he can’t speak.  He reaches for me, and pulls me in, holding me so tight I feel like I might not breathe again.  Then, suddenly, he pushes me away, gently, but firmly.

“You should go,” he rasps.

I can’t go.

I rise from the floor, and carefully, I kneel on the edge of the bed facing him, one knee on either side of his thighs.  I lower my body until I’m sitting on his lap.  I touch his forehead, gently smoothing my fingers across his brow.  His head hangs down; he’s oblivious to me.  I rake my hands through his hair, combing it back from his face, tangling my fingers in it.

“Benna,” he whispers, his breath coming faster.  He takes my hands in his, and brings them