Girl
WHAT ARE YOU drawing now? Pink asked, clambering to the edge of
Suraya's notebook to try and take a peek. Suraya was eight now, tall
and thin, with skin tanned a ruddy brown from constantly being out in
the sun, and a wide, ready smile. Her dark hair obscured the pages
of her notebook as she hunched over it on the bed, her pen moving
quickly. Suraya never drew with pencil or crayons these days, only
black ink.
(But what if you make mistakes? Pink would ask, but she only
waved him off. "They're never mistakes," she told him. "Only
chances to make something new.")
"Shush, Pink," she said now, distractedly. "I'm trying to get this
right." She'd been seeing a picture every time she closed her eyes,
as though it was seared onto the back of her eyelids, and if she
concentrated, she knew she could get it just right on the page.
Pink shrugged. Suit yourself, he said, settling into a sunny spot
on the windowsill and stretching out his long grasshopper legs so
that his entire body could bask in the warmth.
So caught up was Suraya in the movement of her pen, the deft
strokes bringing to life an undersea world of swirling waters and the
curve of a mermaid's shimmering tail, that it took a while to register
the sounds wafting in through her open window. When she finallylooked up, she saw in the distance a group of children from the
village—boys and girls of about Suraya's age, cycling unsteadily
through the trees on hand-me-down bicycles they still hadn't quite
grown into. They were children she'd grown up with her entire life—
Kiran, with the wide smile and the mass of dark curls; little Ariana,
with her short bob and perpetual sniff, the two of them always arm in
arm and whispering secrets to each other; Aiman, Ariana's older
brother, with his shaggy haircut and an ever-changing map of scars
and bruises from his various adventures; David, who once covered
himself in glory by chasing a snake off the playground and away
from a group of shrieking younger children; and Faris, who had once
disastrously tried to hold Suraya's hand while waiting in line for the
ice cream man and hadn't really been able to look at her since.
They'd tossed their bicycles aside now and were laughing and
shrieking together in a carefree way that made Suraya wince,
sending a peculiar pang rocketing through her chest. She saw these
kids every day, sat with them in the classroom, knew their names
and their families and the scabs on their knees—but when she was
around, there was none of this camaraderie, this easy
companionship they shared, Kiran's head bent close to Ariana's,
David's arm looped easily over Faris's shoulders, Aiman cracking
jokes to make all of them giggle. For a moment she imagined herself
among them. For a moment she wondered what it felt like to belong.
Pink hopped off the windowsill and sprang onto the bed beside
her.
Suraya.
"Hmm?" She barely noticed, still caught up in her daydreams,
watching the little group chasing each other through the trees.
Suraya.
"What, Pink?" She glanced at him. "Are you hungry?"
No. You know I do not feel hunger. I am a ghost. I only need your
blood for the binding.
"Right," she said. The last binding had been just a couple of
weeks ago. It was funny; when they first began, Suraya had
imagined a binding would be a magical occurrence that involved
colorful sparks and electricity coursing through her veins and a
sense that Something Big was happening. In reality, a binding wasmore like digging out ear boogers: a necessary irritation and a minor
discomfort you had to get out of the way every so often so that things
worked the way they were supposed to. "Then what is it?" She bent
her head back over her sketchbook, trying to shake away the
stubborn, lingering aftertaste of heartache.
Listen. Suraya. LISTEN. Why do you never play with the other
children?
"What?" She looked up, frowning at him slightly. "What do you
mean?"
Well. He scratched behind his antenna with one long leg. For as
long as I've been with you, I've never really seen you play with the
other children. It's always just you and me.
She smiled at him. "You're all I need, Pink," she said. It wasn't
quite true, but it was worth it to see the way he held his head higher,
pleased and proud. "Besides," she said, turning back to her
notebook, "the other kids don't really like me. They think I get away
with murder 'cause my mother's the discipline teacher and she'd
never punish me, or whatever. And they think I'll tell on them and get
them into trouble. And I think they just think I'm weird, and that my
drawings are weird." She felt her stomach twist at the thought of her
drawings being laid bare for all to see and clutched her notebook
close.
Your drawings are not weird. They are beautiful.
She sniffed. "I don't mind. Who needs those kids, anyway?" And
in that moment, she meant it.
Pink said nothing, but she knew he was still thinking about it. Pink
had a way of playing with his antennae when he was deep in
thought, just as she had a way of working her feelings out on the
paper. Now, for example, she could tell from the thicker lines, the
way she was pressing the pen onto the page, that this was bothering
her more than even she would admit to herself. Her art was always
truthful, even when she wasn't.
Sighing, she went back to work, her tongue sticking out ever so
slightly as she concentrated on the swoops and curves of the
mermaid's flowing hair.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Pink hop back onto the
windowsill and stare out of the window at the little gang outside.
If you were watching him closely, you might have seen his
antennae flick forward. Just once. But Suraya didn't.
And then suddenly the laughter turned into screams of terror, and
that's when Suraya dropped her pen with a start and quickly leaped
out of bed and ran to the window to see what was happening.
The air was so thick with mosquitoes that they blocked out the
sun, their shadows throwing the fields into darkness, their collective
buzzing so loud it sounded like the combine harvesters that mowed
through the paddy fields. They moved in a swarm, quickly and with
purpose, bearing down on the shocked children until they were
surrounded.
For a moment, the world stopped, as if everyone and everything
held their breath, waiting to see what would happen next.
And then the mosquitoes pounced. How they feasted on the
children, latching on and supping blood freely from any exposed
flesh they could find: arms, legs, faces, necks, ears, all were fair
game.
And as the children screamed and screamed and screamed, Pink
laughed.
Suraya felt her face freeze into a mask of horror. "Pink." He
turned, and in his eyes she saw a dark, wicked glee that made the
blood turn ice cold in her veins. "Pink, make it stop."
Fear made her voice quiver, and it was the quiver that dissolved
the wickedness in his eyes. He flicked his antennae, and just as
suddenly as they appeared, the mosquitoes were gone again,
leaving the children bewildered, sobbing, and covered in bright red
hives and welts. They scattered, running for their homes, yelling for
their mothers, rubbing at the bites that were already starting to itch
unbearably.
"Did you . . . did you do that?" Suraya whispered. Her heart was
pounding so hard that she could feel her whole body shake.
Slowly, Pink nodded, his eyes never meeting hers.
"What are you?"
Your friend, Pink said softly. I am your friend.
Was that true? Was Pink her friend? If he was, why had she
never seen this side to him, this darkness, this cruelty? Had he kept
it hidden from her? Or—and she felt a whisper of guilt whip aroundher belly—had it been there all along and she just chose not to see
it? She pressed a hand to her temple, as if she could somehow
knock all her racing thoughts back into place.
"And why did you hurt those kids?" she said finally.
You are my master, Pink said firmly. And I am sworn to protect
you. And they were hurting you. I would hurt anyone who hurt you.
You only have to say the word.
For just one fleeting moment, Suraya let herself imagine the
satisfaction of revenge, of being able to get back at every kid who
had ever ignored her, taunted her, pushed her aside. To make them
feel exactly how she felt.
Then she thought about the way Kiran's eyes crinkled at the
corners when she smiled, and the way Faris's hand had felt when it
tentatively brushed against hers, and her mouth went dry. She drew
herself up straight and tall and took a deep, steadying breath. "Don't
you ever. EVER. Do something like that again." Her hands were
clenched into tight fists by her sides, and her eyes were full of tears,
but the anger in her voice was great and terrible, and for the first
time ever, she saw him shrink back as if to hide from it. "Do you hear
me, Pink? Never again. I never want you to hurt anyone, not even for
me."
But what if, Pink argued back. What if you were in danger? What
if the only way to save you would be to hurt someone?
"What kind of danger could I possi—"
What if?
"Fine!" Suraya threw her hands up in the air. "Fine. If I'm in mortal
danger, if it's the apocalypse, if you need to save me from the jaws
of death, then you can hurt someone." She couldn't keep the
exasperated sneer out of her voice. "But that's it. Do you hear me?"
Pink nodded his grasshopper head, his eyes still trained to the
floor, as though he were afraid her anger might burn him.
"Say it. I want to hear you say it."
I will never hurt anyone again, Pink said. Unless you're in danger.
And, he added quickly, unless you want me to.
She set her chin and looked straight at him. "I will never want you
to. Not ever."
And that night, for the first time, Pink and Suraya slept side by
side instead of entwined with each other, the space between them
only inches wide, but big enough to feel like an entire world.