Melaine

Chapter 33

"Alan?"

The boy stood in the door way till his sister noticed him and motioned him to come inside the room. It's late at night and she thought that he would have slept by that time but here he's standing in his grey night pajamas, wide awake and chewing on his lower lip which had peeled off the translucent layer. She patted the space beside her on the mattress and he joined her on the bed.
"Can I braid your hair?" He pleaded to his sister when he noticed a comb in her hand. The girl pouted at him, eyeing him suspiciously but burst out into giggles.
"You do like to do my hair." She passed him the comb and reached for the pins on the table to pin her hair in their place. He settled behind her with legs folded at his side and started passing comb through her thick tresses of hair. He tugged at the knots little harsher than usual that made the girl flinch.
"Did I pull too hard?" He asked gently taking her hair in his hands and parted them.
"It's okay." She assured her brother. He was unusually quiet than normal and she couldn't help but worry herself about him.
"Alan?"
"Yes?"
"Is something on your mind? You do my hair whenever you're stressing about something." The boy suddenly stiffened and stopped midway of knotting the hair.
"I wish we hadn't come here." He answered resuming his work on her hair.
 "I know, Alan. I miss all our friends back at the orphanage. It was difficult sometimes but alot easier."
"Why we cannot run away from here?" He questioned desperately.
"We tried last time.Have you forgot what Darren did to us?" She shuddered at the memory of being caught by him two days ago when the siblings tried to elope. Darren had locked the girl in the basement for entire night as punishment in darkness. She cried, begging him to forgive them and take her instead of Alan whom he had taken inside his bedroom. She couldn't shake off the memory of his screams that ringed her ears throughout the torture of night and which she couldn't cut off despite covering her ears.
"I don't feel pain." He spoke placing the parted fractions of her hair above each other to make a cris-cross pattern.His voice sounded hoarse because of the raw throat from all the screaming he had done two nights ago. She noticed a visible change in his brother.He had become distant and cold nothing compared to his cheery, radiant old self when their parents were alive. She couldn't fulfill the promise she made to herself at the burial of their parents to protect her brother. But she failed herself. She failed to protect him from their foster father.
"It's my fault that we got caught. I should have been the one to be punished not you."
"No! Don't say it like that!"He shouted at his sister making her wince at his sudden outburst.
"I will kill him before he tries to touch you." He wiped his tears with back of his arm and she pulled him into half comforting and half mourning hug.
"You will not, Alan." She forbid him to do anything reckless that could tear apart siblings from each other. She could have killed Darren herself if she hadn't had the fear of being separated from Alan.
"I asked him to spare you and take me so that you won't have to go through the pain. Why would you say it that it should have been you?" He sobbed clutching the girl tighter which strangled the breath out of her little lungs.
"Alan..." The girl coughed and he slackened his grip on her realizing that he had unconsciously asphyxiated her again.
"One night or another he is going to come back to me. He himself had said it that it could be tonight when he returns home. I cannot escape it." She sucked in air and took his trembling hands in hers. She herself was crying too and Alan squeezed their joined hands back biting on his lower lip.
"I promise I will protect you. I will never let him reach you and touch you again." He told his sister determinedly and caught glimpse of red ribbon tied around her left wrist.
"What is that on your arm?"
"It's bracelet. Roni made it for me. Do you like it?" She asked excitedly showing him her friendship bracelet.
"No." He spat clenching his fisted hands at his sides.
"Why? It's so pretty. Roni is a good person, isn't he?"
"I don't like him." The bitterness of his tone unsettled the girl at his bold words.
"I thought you two were friends. Did he hurt you?" She questioned putting her hand on the shoulder in concern. He shook his head and tucked his chin against his chest refusing to look at his sister.
"He is not good. The bracelet is even ugly!"
"But he is always asking for you when you don't come to play at the..." Before she could finish her sentence, he shot up from the bed and ran out of the room.
"Alan!"
She called out for him and followed him outside the room into the lounge. She ran after her brother whom she fretted could possibly hurt himself whenever he's upset about something. She saw him going downstairs towards the basement and chased him down to the cellar in confusion. The boy must have hid himself again because he was nowhere in her sight.
"Alan?"
The door was open and she went inside the basement switching on the light and looked around for him in the empty room.
"Alan. Where are you?"
She questioned again and suddenly sensed him right behind her. She turned around to see him standing still in silent and staring intently at her with an expressionless face.
"Alan..." Her eyes fell on the crowbar which he was holding in his right hand.
"I have promised myself to protect you and I'll protect you."
"Alan..."