Page 184 - creative spark 2020

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Seeing Liron squaring his shoulders, I rocked my head
back and forth, almost playfully, continued.
“Why?” Liron had relaxed a little, whether because he knew
he still had a chance to stop me or because he was spared,
or both.

This time I said, croaking out incoherent breathes, “Trust
me, I know what I'm doing,” then I coughed up blood onto my
snowy sleeve.

Liron hurried to my side, patting me on the back. The child
asked, will-slit-my-throat-if-I-answered-badly-ly, quietly, “How many
meals have you skipped?”
I blinked--not a morse code--saying ‘I don’t know’.

So, Liron sighed and walked off to the kitchen.
I was doing this for me, I told myself.

During those years, I had worked hard to keep us alive.
Liron had been eating on my blood, sweat, and tears. And he ought
to pay me back. Surely, the naive child could not resist the
conviction reflecting in his patron’s eyes.
He should be the bridge to my vociferous world.

“What are you reading?” Liron asked, bringing me a glass
of warm bedtime milk.
‘None of your business,’ I let the eyes said. Somehow it
sounded solemn, tinted with melancholy, and I didn’t try to hide
when he took a peek.