Chapter 1

AN END

The voices came when I died.

I was fourteen. Just a kid. A stupid fucking kid. 

No one knew how I'd done it. How I'd managed to fly almost eighteen hours on my own. Fort McMurray to Liverpool John Lennon. Aunt Linda said it was a miracle I'd made it. I was a bad kid. The kind you find in juvie or screwing your girlfriend. I was irresponsible, she'd always said. A nuisance. 

But I did what I had to do. 

“I'm fine," I'd said into the phone, my voice low.

“What in flamin' 'ell were you finkin'?” Jesus, Dad. His words—I remember they'd stabbed me, but I'd tried to ignore the pain. It didn't help that his accent turned him into a British commander when he was angry. 

Mom had been crying in the background. Let me talk to him! Let me talk to him!

Dad had said something to her, but I tuned out. I hated the situation exploding out of proportion. It wasn't meant to be like that. Wasn't meant to feel like that. Running away to Gran was supposed to be a release. A simple release. 

“D'you hear that, Sean?” dad had said, voice restored. “You see what you did to your mother?”

Don't give a damn, I'd wanted to say, spiteful as I was, but I knew he'd have reached through the phone and slapped me across the face, so instead, I kept quiet.

Gran was dying. She'd been sitting next to me in that poor excuse of a dining room, gazing out the window. Liverpool skies were boring. Though their grey glow illuminated her face, it didn't give it much life. She wouldn't touch her stew, never touched her food. Her chubby, liver-spotted hand rested there on the tabletop, hovering almost. It was an ugly hand.

I had told Dad she would take care of me, but then he'd reminded me of her cancer, ordering me not to move. He said he'd come with Mom to bring me home.

That was the last conversation we ever had.

Then the voices were louder. Devil child; breathing is pain; shrivel. Weird shit like that. It was dark from then on. 

No life.