I. Mirror

Achilles closed his eyes. That image, flowing in his head, the haunting memory. There was that brunette, with a stone in her hands, glaring at him. Achilles remembered that he saw actual flames in those lively eyes. As he was thinking alone in the hiding place, a spasm of pain struck him. It came from the leg. The damned broken limb that makes him not whole. Achilles stared away at a plastic bag and made no sound.

He clutched the wooden box he was sitting on hard and with great difficulty, stood up. He was in the middle of a narrow, dim alley full of rubbish and without any people in sight. There were two exits. One leads to the river that was nearby, where he did the most splendid and regretful thing in his life. One leads to the main street, where the girl he killed got him a family of dirty urchins.

The girl. Poke.

There was one thing in the whole damned world that Achilles could not bear, and that was people seeing his weakest moments. And how does that feel, eh? The lower-classed one-legged street bully knocked down by a bunch of children much smaller that himself, with the leader of them, a nine-year-old girl standing on him, seeing his eyes showing fear, and demanding him to do something?

But fortunately, he won.

He always have ways to won over. Even in his weakest times, when it was almost impossible to win the short game, Achilles could won. He would not go fight for the short battle, he let it happen, let the opponents do whatever they wanted to do to him, and then he would say things, he would do things, he would act himself out as if he was the nicest and weakest person ever. He had only one intent: To win the long game.

Winning for what? To stay on top of things. To live. He had won the battle some days ago, and he perfected his performance day by day. Now they were all his. He was a papa. He won over the trust of the street kids, and the miserable woman Helga. But he should still stay vigilant, he knew he must.

For there was still two people he had to eliminate. One was the leader girl, Poke. His impression of her was nothing but hatred. He had hated her from the start. Her dirty faces, her clothes made from strips of dispensed fabrics, her little but strong figure, and her two glittering eyes burning with anger. He knew from the very beginning of his winning that he had to perish this girl from the world some day. She was one who knew Achilles' painful past, and he would not allow that to happen. Not under his own watch.

The other one was a boy called Bean. He was small, but he was clever. Achilles was actually a bit surprised and scared when he recognizes what he was doing that day. Kill him was what the little boy shouted. How old was he? Three at the most. How could god let such a sharp mind into the world? If there was Bean, then why Achilles was on the world? Achilles made him his arch-enemy. Someday in the future they would have to come face to face, and if one lived, another must die. Achilles told himself. The boy was dangerous. The boy knew what I am doing. The boy gazed through my mind like I am transparent. God knows what the hell was going on in his little mechanism brain! What he was thinking about! Killing me?

By now Achilles had reached the river. He sat on the riverbank, sighing with relief as he lie his broken leg into a comfortable position. He looked into the water. The water was peaceful, there were little bugs occasionally jumping by, making little ripples around, and soon the water was tranquil again. Achilles saw himself. He began thinking again.

Two days into his new home, he was drawn to the girl. Whenever she passed by, a wave rose in his heart, and it would not stop until she left his sight. He told himself to hate her, he did that bread thing trying to oppress himself to stay vigilant that she was still his enemy. He was confused, irritated, and the girl had his soul. He thought about her day and night, shouting and beating the ground for relief. He was insane for a period of time.

Until he came up with the perfect plan.

So he set up a trap to lure her away. He kissed her, first on the cheeks, then on the lips. He found a sharp piece of a mirror's shard, and hid it inside his clothes. And on that night, when the girl told him to not do that, when the girl said that she loved him, Achilles almost failed to do it. And then he told himself to be ruthless, so he did it.

He looked down onto the serene river like he would look at a mirror. He saw himself.

Achilles. Killer. Achilles. Killer. Achilles. Killer. Killer Achilles. A voice in his mind shouted out loud.

There was this strange feeling, circling me and holding me tight. Achilles told himself. After the incident, he had gone into hide. Partly to make this a perfect, flawless plan, and partly to have some time to himself alone. He needed to think in tranquility.

It grabbed his heart and squeezed it. That weird feeling. He could feel nervousness in it, and he knew why. This was his first kill, he was supposed to be nervous. And as they say, the incident will stay with him for the rest of his life. He could feel regret in it, for he had not understood until the last moment that he too, loves Poke. He could feel grief in it, he had seen death, uncountable deaths occurs everyday on the streets, but he had not caused one. And now he had killed a girl he loved, but it didn't end like this. He would have to lie about it and cry for it and claim he didn't do it. This thing he will hide till the end of time.

I love her, and I killed her.

Who on hell says that I don't feel?!

A single drop of tear fell from his lid.