There are only two colors I see. Gray and red. Red like fire, like rust, like blood. Gray, like steel, ashes, and dying souls. I see these colors in the ceiling when I wake up, and feel them behind my eyelids when I try to drift away. He comforts me when I try to disappear, and dream of a different world, where I can play, and dream in the day. But there is no time for dreaming. The smell of crimson is too strong, and it traps me between the cracked walls of a crumbling building.

He tells me that this will be over soon, but I see his frozen eyes melt, and know that his words are dust. They disappear into the air, and are forgotten forever.

When I can’t sleep at night, I unfold my arms and reveal my soul. A bound leather cover, and four hundred and thirty-five ink-filled worlds. He reads it to me while the dark surrounds us, and its claws scratch the pavement in longing. They will not reach us yet.

The mask is constricting. I do not like it. It smells like death. But it is my portal to another day. It makes my breathing sound mechanical, and sometimes I forget that I am human. I look in his mask and see a machine too, but behind the clouded glass I see his diamond eyes, and I keep walking.

The fire roars out in agony, but the screams are louder. He holds my hand as we walk away from the inferno. The heat licks my back. As I turn my head to watch the silhouette crumble behind us, it sinks into oblivion, joining the many other shadows tumbling into the gray abyss.

I have read the book fifty-seven times. It is all I have. The title has long since faded. I try to imagine what it was at one time. I cannot think of anything.

“Girl,” he says. “Come here.” I do. He towers over me. He is twice my size. A giant. We are alone with each other. We read the book together at night, when the echoes spread across my mind. The echoes of the lost. I stretch my sore eyes across the pages, reading a ghost of the past. A secret I keep to myself; I know what happens in the end.

I wonder what death is like. Maybe this is not real, and when I die, I will awake in a different place, somewhere different from here, where I can read other books, with other stories. Do those exist? I don’t know. I don’t intend on finding out. I will stay here, with him, for now.

“Do you want to know how to shoot?” he asks. I don’t know, I tell him. The steel hammer would be waiting. Could I lift it?

I have read over my soul fifty-eight times. I awoke with curtains of sweat joining me in slumber. I did not want to wake him. He looks peaceful when he sleeps. I doubt he has my nightmares. His usual wrinkles are gone, and the worry that paints his face has been washed off. I think of the icy diamond eyes behind his resting eyelids as I lay down again, my soul cradled in my arms.

My hair is blond and dirty. It used to be in a nice braid, but I forgot how to do that long ago. Ever since I remember, the waves of crying-yellow flowing down over my shoulders have been unkempt, sticking out sometimes. I don’t remember the last time I let water run through the strands. But I like my hair. It’s disheveled, but it’s mine.

My bunker was a sunken ship. It smelled bad. Dirt laced the lead walls. The neon light above was my sun. The cans, my fields. The bottles, my river. It was my kingdom. But I was an unhappy queen. For I had no subjects except for the smell of empty bones, and the crackling fire in my stomach. When the vault door opened with a great thunderclap, his hand reached down, and I took it in mine. He lifted me out with his sturdy grip. It was a hand from God perhaps. Perhaps not.

I heard the siren’s call. I heard a melody that I felt in my soul. It was not a beautiful song, but I loved it. It came from under a pile of steel and burnt wood. I sat and listened to it until it was time to go. I asked him who was playing the song. “Four men. They were very talented,” he answered. The notes hung in my head for the rest of the day.

I have flipped through the pages covered in the dark fifty-nine times. I am beginning to know the colors of the book by heart now. They are mostly red, but a warm red. And yellow, a soft yellow that makes me smile. Fifty-nine shades. I wonder how many are left to discover.

The others prowl tonight. They move like shadows, and cackle like broken machines. They are ashen gray, with fire in their eyes, and sparks in their coal dust fingers. “They were us, girl,” he tells me and we crouch in the shadows. “But they… changed.” They look like us, but I know better. I hold my breath, and wait for the wails to stop.

I find a piece of cloth. It is jammed between a steel beam and a cinder block. It is dark red, with stained gray-white and broken blue. There is black crawling along the edges. He tells me to put it back. I oblige.

I wonder where all the metal came from. It slumbers quietly in a heap, or bends over to the will of a past master. I ask him what it was as we pick through the scraps. His cold diamond eyes gaze over the land. “It was all connected, working together as machines.” I ask him why it is in shambles now. He doesn’t answer. He reaches into the fallen army, and pulls out something small. He bends down and pushes it through my shirt. “It’s a pin,” he says, and smiles, a rare occasion. I return the favor.

I close the book for the sixtieth time. He sits beside me, and I lean against him. My eyes still feel jolted from nightmares. “You know,” he says, “There used to be buildings with these.” His breath smells like stale bread. His voice is like soft, crackling lightning. “Thousands.” I look up at him. “Really?” My voice is soft too. We are carrying the silence together. If I am too loud, I’m afraid I will break it. “Yes,” he replies. I breathe in. “With other books? What kind?” “All kinds,” he replies. “Lots that are similar to this, even more that are different.” He pauses. “Well, each one was different in it’s own way.” I nod. “It sounds nice.” “Yes,” he whispers. The silence grows as we carry it along into the night. “I like this one.” I say finally. His diamonds soften. “Me too.”

“What do you want to be when you grow up?” he asks me. I am confused. “What?” “If you lived back before all this. What would you be?” he explains. “Oh,” I say softly. “I don’t know. A-a reader?” He laughs. “Those didn’t exist.” I try to keep from shivering. Sheets of rain dance around us, laughing because they have touched heaven. The night bites my skin with tiny teeth. “Then… then a writer.” “A writer,” he echoes. He laughs harder. So hard that his blood paints the floor. He clutches his wound. The steel had sunk into him hungrily. His cold blue eyes become frosted. “It’s not too late.” He looks to the ceiling, beginning his journey into the infinite. His hand drips with deep red ink, and he paints his final picture. Saying goodbye is hard. Especially when there is no one to say it to. A few extra raindrops join the dance of ink and heaven.

The nightmares are deafening. I wake up wrapped in my own screams, but they disappear quickly into the folds of the room. Quiet. The space that he once occupied is now nothing. I wipe the sweat from my forehead, and get up. Dust hangs in the air with apprehension. A slice of dawn breaks through the boarded window. It greets me with a mocking song. His arm is not there to comfort me. I lay back down. I want to fall asleep again, but what awaits me there is just a mirror of reality. Dreams and nightmares. I don’t see the line.

They are fast. The world is a blur as it rushes past me, eager to get somewhere far behind me. I do not know where, but it is not where I am going. I hear them call towards me with parched throats. “Girl! Girl! Come here!” A simple task, but their jutting cackles give them away. They are a pack of laughing wolves, and I, a white dove. I am faster. But there is something I do not consider: what is ahead. The flames greet me with open arms. A burning building. The gates of hell swung wide open, its inhabitants behind me. I enter. At least the flames may be merciful. My pursuers enter, bathing in the blaze. They search for me. I hide in a small room hidden in the folds of the flaming edifice. But they find me. I, the dove, stare straight into the wolves’ plague-colored eyes. My pin presses into me, and I feel it slice my skin. Their breaths are burnt, but their eyes are still blazing. Suddenly we hear a crack. Silence. I look into a pair of sick eyes. Then the ceiling breaks open, and falls upon us, the prey and the predators. I watch as the flames fall from heaven. Or perhaps they are from hell. I watch as the concrete flays my attackers. I see one swing his silver knife, and I feel its teeth sink into my arms. I cry out in pain. But my yells are smothered by the falling building.

I awake from my slumber with another nightmare. Instantly the pain roars into my shoulder. I can’t feel my arm. I turn my charred head to see a large piece of rubble settled in it. I scream. I am affixed to the earth. I feel the weight push down, not just on my arm, but my stomach. A sick feeling churns inside me. The argent knife is still in my arm, hungry for more. Another color: pure white.

Stones somersault across the ground as I stumble forward. I do not know to where. The backpack and most things in it were destroyed. I had pulled the book from the ashes. It was okay, just a bit charred. I pass a window of an abandoned store. In it I see a very young woman. We look at each other quietly. She has a coal-covered face. It’s pretty, with mature, yet soft features. Her hair is very dirty, and very uneven. She is taller than I, and more beautiful. She looks broken. It’s only a few seconds, but she leaves quickly. Maybe I will see her again.

I fumble with the pages, but they do not cooperate. For the sixty-first time, I close the book, but this time in rage. Why will they not turn? I try to hold it open with my arm, and pin it to the ground, but I can’t turn the page without letting them all slip away. Something bubbles up inside me. I scream with all my soul, and toss the book through a rotting window. The momentum of the throw catches me off-balance, and I fall to the ground, unable to catch myself with my arm. I look at the ghost of my other one. I am weak from all the crimson that dries on the floor. I can barely prop myself against the wall. I close my eyes. I am right behind you.

A bump at the door. My eyes bolt open. The door quivers again. Dust jumps from its resting place at the foot of the door. I hold my breath. A third bump, a fourth, and a fifth.Then silence. After a few moments, I let my breath out. Then the door bursts from its hinges, springing forward onto the cracked floor. A figure walks in, a gun cradled in his arms, a machine mask plastered to its face. It scans the room. I am the only thing in it. We let the dust rest again. Then I bolt, and a bullet greets me.

I do not feel it sink in. It does not bury itself in my skin, and bathe in my blood. Instead, it finds a home in the corner of the room. But I do not miss my mark. I wrap my arm around him. I wish I had two. The words rise to the surface so quickly I feel I might throw up. “IloveyouIloveyouIloveyouIloveyou.” They keep coming. I bury my face in his jacket. I realize that tears have come out from their hiding place and are streaming down my face. I squeeze his jacket in my hands. It all comes out, until I am reduced to nothing. “I-I’m sorry.” I squeak through gritted teeth. I wait for death to rake its fingernails across my face. But they linger, just a little longer.

He closes the book for his first time. “What is your name?” He asks. His face is freckled, and his skin is bronze. His eyes are green, like mine. Like emeralds. Not diamonds, but they are enough. “I don’t know,” I reply. The roughly made tourniquet on my arm feels a little odd, but I’m glad that I am okay. I stuff a spoonful of soup in my mouth. “What’s yours?” I lean back next to a pile of papers, filled to the brim with my ink. “John, I think.” He chuckles. “We’ll have to make a name for you.” I look at him. “How about... Lucy.” “Lucy…” I echo. “Lucy.” The skies are gray today. They look like an ocean, which fallen angels can float through, and look in their distorted reflections. Maybe the clouds are silver. They seem brighter now. “No… not Lucy.” I whisper, but it is loud enough. A familiar tune plays in my head.“Not yet.”