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Enjoy a new voice! Also did someone say they wanted the boyfriend term to stick around ...? 😏

Seen Through A Child's Eyes

Mama walks fast. It shakes me on her arm. Bushes swish. I don't know this part of the forest. We stop.

There are people. A boy and a girl. He's tall. They stop talking when Mama runs and speaks, but she speaks too fast, I don't understand. I dangle, my hands are empty and then full again but it's not Mama. I stare at the boy. He stares at me. I want to go back.

Mama!

"Mama!" I twist and it hurts my neck where the ouchie is. "Mama!" She runs, without me. She also has ouchies so she's slow when she runs. I wiggle but the boy doesn't go after Mama – why? Where is Mama going? Why is she leaving without me?

"Well, that was weird," the boy says. He has black hair and is tall and his eyes are small like almonds. I like almonds. "Just another day in village life?" His almond eyes look at me. They become even smaller. It makes him look evil but I'm not afraid.

It's cold. It was warm in Mama's arms. Why is he making me dangle too, holding me like a stinky bag of laundry? My legs are all heavy and his hands hurt, clutching under my arms. I whimper. My throat hurts.

"Here," the girl says and takes me from him, holds me like Mama did. I'm warmer now. She isn't soft like Mama but warm and her coat has the same brown colour as Mama's. Trees are also brown and mud and Bruno and the ouchies when they're not blue anymore.

The girl's hair is short but she is a girl. She smiles at me which is nice. She makes a goofy face but she isn't silly enough so I don't laugh until the boy makes an even sillier face. He isn't warm but he is funny. He stops then.

"Riza, look, he's got—" He sounds evil too now. No, it's fear. He is afraid. I'm not. Where is Mama?

He pushes the girl and now I am afraid, but only a little. I'm brave. I'm Mama's brave boy.

I hear Mama. My head whips around and it hurts but I can hear her far away. And then—

Papa.

They are fighting. I want to hear Mama and look around to see her, but Papa is yelling and I'm scared and then I see them. He raises his arm. Mama is small, covering her head. He beats her.

The blonde girl is frozen like an icicle. She's scared. I'm scared. She doesn't breathe. Her heart is racing ba-dum, ba-dum, da-dum really hard under my fingers. I grasp her coat. Ba-dum, ba-dum, my heart is also fast and I'm scared and I stare to where Papa's silhouette is making a fist.

"Riza." The boy pushes the girl again, against a tree. He's so tall, I only see his chin. "Look at me. Don't look anywhere else, just look at me." He takes her face with his hands. "Breathe, Riza."

Stop talking, stop talking, her eyes say. They are like mirrors, wide and shimmering and she's so scared, and I am too, I don't want Papa to find us. The girl doesn't say it though, her lips are shut and her tongue is like a brick. She's very white.

Papa stopped yelling. Mama's voice is gone.

The boy is still shielding us. I can't see. He's whispering now and the girl stops squishing me but it didn't hurt, it was warmer and it's even warmer when the boy is so close. They wait. I breathe again. The girl does too after a while. Her chest stutters like a donkey carriage.

We wait some more. I hope Papa left. I don't hear him.

"I'll go see if she's okay." The boy leaves. The girl hesitates but goes too. He tells her not to so she stops. She and I watch as he goes to where I saw Mama and Papa. I don't see anyone. The boy crouches. I see her then – Mama, on the ground, not moving. My heart goes ba-dum really fast.

The girl approaches because I wiggle and kick her and start crying. She hums. It feels like the oven, buzzing, warm, soft, and so I sniffle and pull up my nose, wiping it with my sleeve. I'm a brave boy.

"… not unconscious. I pretend because otherwise he won't stop."

"Mama!" I kick and struggle when I hear her. The girl doesn't let me down but we go there.

Mama sits up. Her dress is dirty from the moss and mud. Her cheek is red and big, her lip is bloody. She moves her arm funny. A new ouchie, I think, because she is holding her side.

"I'm sorry. Thank you for taking him," she says. She looks at me. I move some more and push against the girl's chest. She is very stiff, watching the forest. Papa. When she doesn't see him, she sets me down and I wobble into Mama's arms. Mama flinches but hugs me back.

The boy is crouching next to us. "Do you have family outside of town? Friends?"

"My sister," Mama says. "She lives in East City, but she moved; I don't know the address. She wanted to write me a letter."

"Does she carry your name?"

"She married recently—"

"Good." He takes her arm – the not-ouchie one. He knows. Mama stands with his help. He helps her more so the girl picks me up to carry. She hums when I sniffle which is nice.

The sun is bright outside the forest. It's drier here. I have to sneeze. Mama's dress flutters in the wind, showing why she can't run fast. There is a thing that they call 'platform' and a tiny house. It's locked. We don't knock. It's so tiny, there's only a desk and a chair inside, behind a window. For the 'conductor' they say.

A map is standing on the platform. Lines are scribbled across it, a circle in the middle. Letters too, but I can't read them.

The girl walks to the map. Her finger traces a line. "Four stations," she mumbles. Her finger reaches a black dot with bigger letters, two words. East City? Or My Sister. Or Aunt Donna, I don't know.

"Gina," the boy is saying. He is speaking into a 'telephone'. From his pocket, he takes coins. They rattle inside the machine, drop somewhere I can't see but hear them. "I need you to find the address of a Donna Horgan, née Ede. Married Walter Horgan in April. Lives in East City, used to live here. Yes," he tells someone. Gina.

I don't know the boy's name.

He gets out a notebook and pencil from his coat and starts writing. He interrupts to put more coins into the telephone. Then he says, "Oh, and there will be a letter coming from Donna. Yes, to here." He asks Mama for the address – it's our address. I know it by heart. "I need you to intercept that."

The voice on the other end is louder and he cringes. It's a woman, I think. Gina.

"Just do it," he grumbles. Like when he sounded evil but he is not evil. It's worry.

I look at the girl. She was so scared but she is still here. I don't know her but she holds me like Mama does, she hums and she smiles when she notices me looking. It's kind. She doesn't know me or Mama, the boy doesn't know me or Mama, but they help us.

Mama tells me this again later. That she didn't know them. That they were kind.

The boy and the girl ride the train with us. He paid the tickets. I've never seen paper money before. Mama thanks him so many times, ten times and more but I don't know what comes after ten. Does anything come after ten?

The girl is scared of the train. She doesn't run away though or stay behind. He holds her hand so I hold her other hand where I'm still on her lap. Mama's ouchie must be bad that I'm not on Mama's lap.

"Your first train ride," the boy tells the girl quietly. There are people on the train but not here with us. I see the backs of their heads over the benches, one of them like a peeled hard-boiled egg, shiny and without hair. I want to touch it. "I wish it were under different circumstances," the boy says.

"It's okay." Her voice is feeble like Mama's when Papa is there. Papa isn't here now. The train is the girl's Papa, the movement scaring her. I pat her hand and she smiles. It's a nice smile. She isn't silly like the boy when he grins or like Mama when she wants me to stop crying.

"We can go on a trip. Explore East City to make this a nice experience." The boy moves his thumb over her hand.

Her cheeks aren't white anymore but red when she says, "I'm just happy I'm riding my first train with you, Mr Mustang."

So he is a Mister. He doesn't look like a Mister. Misters have wrinkly skin and glasses that don't stay up their noses and they cough a lot.

The young Mister smiles. "It's getting late. We could grab a bite in town before we leave again." His almonds are bigger, brighter. He wants to eat. He wants to eat with the girl – Riza, he called her earlier. I'm good with names. I know my name, Mama, Papa, the old wrinkly Mister Rouse and the fat Mister Macks. I know aunt Donna too. Mama speaks about her when Papa isn't home.

"Only if you let me pay."

"Out of the question."

"You already paid my ticket, Mr Mustang."

"And I'll have Gina pay our tickets back. Courtesy of Madame. Master lets me use his elements for experiments; it's only fair."

"That's my father, not me. And I don't want to burden your aunt."

The young Mister with the aunt waves off. Is she called Donna too? "It's not a burden. She's been trying to smuggle me money to give to you for two years. I told her you wouldn't accept it."

"And you still did it." Now her eyes are almonds, slits where they were big and brown like trees a moment ago.

"You noticed that…?"

"For someone trained by the best, as you claim, Mr Mustang, you ought to know that I count the money in my purse." She gives him one of those looks, is what Betty would call it. Betty is Mama's friend. She has a daughter named Olive. Olive is a name and a food. A soft almond with a small hard almond in the middle. Olive's papa doesn't beat Betty. Betty gives him looks, arms forming triangles on her hips.

The Riza girl doesn't make triangles because he still has his hand over hers on the seat and I'm holding the other one. It's not soft at all. It's not wrinkly either, it has little hills of harder skin and crusts and cuts. I play with the plaster around her thumb. There are two more, one on the third and one on the fourth finger. Ouchies. Not blue-purple-yellow-green-brown ouchies. Tiny blood ouchies.

"But Riza, I can't let you pay dinner. Madame will put me up for adoption and then still shoot me if I don't pay dinner on a date— Uh, I mean, no, I meant she would kill me if I let you pay. She cares about you is all." He scratches his neck, looks away. I look where he looks but there's only the egg-head.

I look at Mama but she isn't looking anywhere at all. She's asleep. Her face must be getting cold against the window. Mama is often tired. She doesn't sleep well, so I don't wake her or crawl away from the Riza girl. Mama needs her sleep. She says she feels better afterwards. I feel better after I sleep.

I want to sleep in Mama's bed tonight. All nights. I hope aunt Donna doesn't have two beds. Papa always comes home with stinking breath. It gives him trouble walking; he'll sway and run into things and smash them for being in the way. Mama then sleeps in my small bed. I hope she will do that when we're at aunt Donna's house.

The Riza girl is even redder when I look up. Now she looks silly enough to laugh and I do. The Mister cringes some more but when the girl laughs quietly, he does too. She tells him she will pay for the way back instead of dinner. He smiles and grins and is red too. He must really be hungry to want to eat dinner so badly.

I'm also hungry.

We get off the train after a long time. It's loud here, very loud. There are so many people, like ants but more, more than ten and then some more. The young Mister takes the lead. He goes to a map that looks different from the one before – with thick lines and many letters on those lines.

"This is the Main Road," the Mister explains. He and Mama search for aunt Donna's address. The girl is carrying me. She opened her coat and closed it around me which is nice. I'm warm. I can feel her heart go ba-dum, calmly.

We leave the 'station' which is a big 'platform' I think. There are more trains here. I watch one drive away, smoke rising from it. It hisses and rumbles. My chin is on the girl's shoulder. I'm sleepy. She rubs my back and says something but I'm not listening.

I listen when we stop and there is a new voice.

"You're a jolly fellow, calling me out here when I'm on a job."

"I called Gina."

"Gina's in Central, Roy-Roy, she— Oh my gosh, no way," the woman gasps. "You brought her?" She gasps again. She's tall and skinny and blonde and really pretty. She paints black around the eyes like Betty. Her hair is longer than the girl's but shorter than Mama's and it curls and looks soft. She closes her eyes for a moment. There's glitter on her lids. "I won the bet," she whispers. "I met her first."

"Cut it out," the Mister shoves her. It doesn't hurt her like when Papa does it. She hardly moves at all even though she has these high uncomfortable shoes on. She just laughs. "We're trying to save a woman and her kid from domestic violence. Focus."

"Feelin' pretty bold, aren't we?" The woman raises a brow. Her arms form perfect triangles. "Bossing me around. Are you trying to show off in front of your girlf—"

"Ruby!"

She laughs. His shoving doesn't hurt her, it makes her laugh. His face is red like her lips that she coloured.

"I called us a taxi. Where's your luggage?" the Ruby woman asks Mama. Mama's hands are empty. She plucks at her dress, glances at me. I try to smile back, let her know I don't mind that she didn't bring anything. I'm a brave boy, I don't need my teddy.

A 'taxi', they call the noisy metal carriage. The girls takes a step back, even though the taxi is smaller than the train. The Mister doesn't make her go in when Mama and I do. I listen to him talking to Ruby while Mama speaks to the man at the front of the taxi.

"About that… I need some cash."

Ruby laughs. "Can't pay a decent restaurant?"

"I spent the money on the train."

"How are you going to get back?"

"Riza wanted to—"

Ruby gasps again, very loud and dramatic. "Roy."

"I know, I know, shame on me."

"If Madame—"

"Well, Madame isn't here and you're not gonna tell her." They look at each other for a long time. It's tense. "Riza isn't like the girls in Central; she doesn't want me to pay everything. She sees us as equals and I really like that about her and why am I telling you this? Just gimme some Cens so I can at least take her to a good place. She's scared of the ride back."

Ruby smiles, all slim like his almond eyes becoming evil. A smirk.

She digs through her handbag. I don't see her give him money when Mama thanks the girl who is at the other window of the taxi. I want to thank her too! I hold out my hand and she takes it, very gently. The plaster on the thumb is missing – did I do that?

We drive away when Ruby is in the car with us. She repeats something about a letter that the Mister said into the telephone and leaves us with aunt Donna. Donna is warm too and nice. I'm hungry.

I wonder if the food tastes better when the boy eats it with the girl. He really wanted to eat it with her.