"Trinity: Saints and Angels" excerpt -- Daryl's Dream, chapter seven
I love dreams. I love the jolting, disjointed, but still significant quality to them, and hopefully I captured a bit of that feeling here:
Daryl's Dream
The barn was burning. Was always burning.
A charred wreck, a husk of wood and flesh.
And memory.
She was lying there, in her canopy bed of
shimmerfilm fabric that made her look like
a queen.
a charred wreck.
Kissing her cross with wine-soaked lips
and not seeming to notice the
flaming fingers
clawing up the bedsheets.
You’re my angel, y'know that?
You saved me. Every day, you save--
She was reaching out to him now,
her arms dripping flesh and fire
and she’s always been sad, smiling and sad
when she wasn’t too drunk not to be.
Every day-
He reached out to grab her, to drag her free from the flames. Beating at burning arms and crumbling timber that spat and snarled and bit at his flesh. And her eyes were
burning smiling
crying
He couldn’t move. An iron cuff trapping his wrist, pinning him in place. Merle laughed from behind him, watched him through blue-grey fourteen-year-old eyes that still knew how to show something other than steel and
Not much of a angel to her then, were ya, Darlyna?
He’d taken it back the minute he’d said it. Hadn’t said so out loud but Daryl’d seen it floating in those eyes, and eyes had been as close as either of them had ever come to ‘I’m sorry’ anyway.
But he wasn’t apologizing now.
Staring at Daryl, cold and silent, and
Daryl had never looked down on his big brother’s face before but he didn’t have time to think on that because Mom was snarling from inside the barn and Merle was chained to his wrist standing still as stone and too damn strong for a fourteen year old and Daryl wrenched his wrist and
Suddenly, he was free.
The empty cuff fell across Merle’s knee, and
Daryl’s severed hand fell to the
burning. Always burning rooftop.
Connor stared at him from behind blue-grey eyes, and
Mom was singing her goddamn lullaby and
Connor hefted the hand, squinted down at
her pale, freckled flesh bled fire as teeth sank into
his fingers, one by one.
It’s not there…
The hell’s not-?
Sophia caught the severed limb and
Merle, full grown and wheezing laughter,
tossed away Daryl’s hand and
she snarled, tore rotting teeth into the calloused flesh and
Daryl screamed, falling, clutching at the empty air where his severed hand had been. Feeling the skin rip away from his
Fingers! Let me see your-
burning flesh. A charred wreck. Fire streamed from the torn, ragged space between skin and curled around his finger, blackening flesh in an odd pattern. Letters:
Murphy
And Connor was singing Mom’s lullaby.
And the barn around them burned.
.-
For the first night in weeks, Connor enjoyed a dreamless sleep.
Daryl's Dream
The barn was burning. Was always burning.
A charred wreck, a husk of wood and flesh.
And memory.
She was lying there, in her canopy bed of
shimmerfilm fabric that made her look like
a queen.
a charred wreck.
Kissing her cross with wine-soaked lips
and not seeming to notice the
flaming fingers
clawing up the bedsheets.
You’re my angel, y'know that?
You saved me. Every day, you save--
She was reaching out to him now,
her arms dripping flesh and fire
and she’s always been sad, smiling and sad
when she wasn’t too drunk not to be.
Every day-
He reached out to grab her, to drag her free from the flames. Beating at burning arms and crumbling timber that spat and snarled and bit at his flesh. And her eyes were
burning smiling
crying
He couldn’t move. An iron cuff trapping his wrist, pinning him in place. Merle laughed from behind him, watched him through blue-grey fourteen-year-old eyes that still knew how to show something other than steel and
Not much of a angel to her then, were ya, Darlyna?
He’d taken it back the minute he’d said it. Hadn’t said so out loud but Daryl’d seen it floating in those eyes, and eyes had been as close as either of them had ever come to ‘I’m sorry’ anyway.
But he wasn’t apologizing now.
Staring at Daryl, cold and silent, and
Daryl had never looked down on his big brother’s face before but he didn’t have time to think on that because Mom was snarling from inside the barn and Merle was chained to his wrist standing still as stone and too damn strong for a fourteen year old and Daryl wrenched his wrist and
Suddenly, he was free.
The empty cuff fell across Merle’s knee, and
Daryl’s severed hand fell to the
burning. Always burning rooftop.
Connor stared at him from behind blue-grey eyes, and
Mom was singing her goddamn lullaby and
Connor hefted the hand, squinted down at
her pale, freckled flesh bled fire as teeth sank into
his fingers, one by one.
It’s not there…
The hell’s not-?
Sophia caught the severed limb and
Merle, full grown and wheezing laughter,
tossed away Daryl’s hand and
she snarled, tore rotting teeth into the calloused flesh and
Daryl screamed, falling, clutching at the empty air where his severed hand had been. Feeling the skin rip away from his
Fingers! Let me see your-
burning flesh. A charred wreck. Fire streamed from the torn, ragged space between skin and curled around his finger, blackening flesh in an odd pattern. Letters:
Murphy
And Connor was singing Mom’s lullaby.
And the barn around them burned.
.-
For the first night in weeks, Connor enjoyed a dreamless sleep.