All the Colors of the Dark

by Chris Whitaker

“You think I’m beautiful?” He nodded. “Entirely and absolutely.”

“We won’t need to hide. Because we’ll be brand-new there. We’ll start over. I won’t be the girl who no one sees. And you, well you don’t need to change much at all. Because, I was thinking, to me you’re kind of perfect. Even with the missing eye. You’re the boy who—” He kissed her then. Her first kiss. And his.

He shook his head. “She’ll see it now I’m gone.” “See what?” she said. He spoke without intent, just a brutal and complete honesty. “How little I left behind.”

“Will Patch be the same?” she said. He stood and stretched and collected his things. And he touched her cheek as he left. “None of us will be, kid.”

When they calmed she closed her eyes to the afternoon sun and could not recall the last time she had laughed. Or smiled. Or felt much beyond the agony of the past year.

“I’ve been…I’ve been here.”