Retrograde

Chapter eleven: Colder and Colder

"B6."

"No. G7."

"Hit. C4?"

"Absolutely not. E3."

She heard a drawn out intake of breath and grinned.

"Honestly Ward, I don't even know why you play this game. It's like you're cursed."

"I'm not cursed I'm just...unlucky."

"Which is the same as being cursed."

He looked at her, deciding on the truth of that statement "Can't argue with that."

"You know, when I was in the orphanage there was this kid, Tyler, and he was the most superstitious kid I've ever met in my life. He wouldn't go near ladders, avoided black cats like the plague and mirrors? Forget about it. Didn't ever touch them in case he smashed them. He believed he was cursed."

"What? Why?" Ward frowned sceptically.

"Said it all started when he was born. Apparently he was born on the 13th of January, which, according to him if you used the Lunisolar calendar would be the thirteenth month, at exactly 13:13 in the afternoon."

"Wow. Poor kid."

"I know," she shook her head "It was all true as well. I hacked into our files and his birthday was accurate as well as the time. That lunar solar calendar thing however," she shrugged "Haven't a clue."

"If all that was true for me I think I'd avoid a ladder or two."

"Same. But I think after a point it got to be partially a self fulfilling prophecy for him."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, because he thought he was unlucky, born unlucky, that he couldn't ever escape it so he looked for the bad everywhere. And in my experience if you look for the bad you find it."

He looked up from his board, caught off guard for a moment, just taking in the girl in front of him. With everything that had happened in the past year he seemed to forget that she was still so young. Yet she had been through so much resulting in an outlook on life that was far beyond her years.

"You're not wrong. Looking for the bad has been the thing that's kept me alive for so long and I've damn sure found it more often than not."

She nodded "See? Self fulfilling prophecy."

He wondered briefly if he had had a different outlook for the first part of his life if things might be different. If he hadn't thought his life was already over and there was a way out when he had set that house on fire could he have a different life now? Would he still somehow have ended up in juvie or in Garrett's path some other way?

And if that was true would he still have met Skye?

Maybe in the normal way, like in a coffee shop or through work in a boring office or through friends?

Would she have liked the real him?

Maybe all of this bad could have been avoided if he truly thought he could have been good.

"B2?" Skye interrupted his thoughts.

"Miss. A4?"