Godforsaken Salvation

Coltello looks much happier now. He’s packed up some clothes and his most important things because he expects to never return to this house again. I’ve also done the same because I didn’t buy return tickets to View-of-Few.

“Eori, there’s no return tickets,” he told me the next day after I gave him the tickets.

“Yeah. No need to come back.”

“Ah… yeah. No need.” He doesn’t seem convinced, looking at me with some sort of pity that I could not pinpoint the origin of.

“We’ll have to transfer in Engsang—Ankrokros City—and spend maybe an hour waiting for the train towards Biscerra, which will stop in Coyrety along the way.”

“How did you even get these tickets?”

“Just guess.”

“You threatened the people at the station?”

“You think I’m a villian.”

“It seems in character for a person like you.”

“Well, no. I bought them with your parents’ money.”

Coltello just laughs to himself. He seems to be unable to hold in just how happy he is to go home. It’s unsettling, this shift in his mood, but it doesn’t matter to me because it fills me with joy too to see him like his usual self.

Today’s the day. I check everything in the house and make sure that nothing is out of place. Even though I know that I’m not coming back, I want to leave this house with dignity. After packing my suitcase and a backpack, I cleaned this old shack on the hill. The windows were cleaned, the floors broomed, the shelves dusted. I even made my bed even though I don’t usually make my bed. The trash went out the window and on top of my neighbor’s roof who I’m pretty sure hasn’t been home for months—on his front door is a tacky sign that reads “On Vacation!” As if they too would come back one day.

The house looks stunning, even in the drab light of the afternoon sun.

I’m ready to leave, Coltello doubly so.

A knock at the door, which I answer.

“Riri.”

God damnit.

“Touma—wait, no. I don’t know who you are. What’s your name?” I’m being insufferable on purpose. She just needs to get out of my sight.

Touma leers back at me with eyes that speak anger but a voice that speaks sorrow.

“You must come to church. Please. You can be saved, saved!”

“No. I don’t want to be saved.”

“You don’t understand, it’s our la-”

Coltello’s jovial voice startles me: “Touma! Long time since we’ve seen face!”

I wince at the fact that he said that to Touma of all people.

“Oh, Coltello!” She seems to have already given up on me. “It’s great to see you! You must come as well, the Minister is collecting dues and blessing us for a safe travel away from this cruel world! Please, please come with me. If not Eori, at least you must come too, Coltello. Please. Coltello. Coltello, I know that you’ve been suffering. I can see it in your eyes. I know your family is far from here, Lorenz tells me about how he misses his family all the time. But he has me. You have me.”

It seems like she hasn’t taken a single breath. She’s nearly crying, pleading for us to find salvation in a universe that doesn’t give one single damn about what happens to us.

“Coltello, please. Please come with me. Please. Please. Please.”

This is too much for me. Coltello is speechless and I think he’s about to cry too because Touma was one of our closest friends and here she is, pouring her soul out to us because she believes she can save us.

A small break in the clouds lets a bit of light shine on Touma’s grey hair. It gleams. She winces and squints her eyes at the sudden sunlight and she’s still pleading. All this reminds me of how much she thought she was a special chosen one because she was born with the colors of the clouds.

We were born with the colors of the sky, the ocean, the ground. That’s what they always told us. But Touma was born with the colors of the clouds, and this in itself was a miracle.

Coltello gently pushes Touma out of the way of the door and shuts it. “We’re going to Den Coyre,” he says as the gap between the home-but-no-longer-home and the wild world closes.

“What!?”

She knocks a bit more on the door, then begins to pound on it, and soon her words become vile. I stop listening to her. She’s pulling out the worst curses on me and my family and on Coltello’s family too, because she has no more reason to care for us. She’s about to find a new life in Heaven, and we will find one in Hell. Coltello doesn’t even understand what she’s saying. He’s looking at me with concerned eyes and I just hug him and wait until it’s all over.

With one last kick on the door, Touma finally disappears. Thank God, as ironic as that sounds.

…

Time to leave. That commotion left me and Coltello in a bit of a sour mood. He doesn’t know much about the religion of Heorlas, so he didn’t understand much of what Touma was saying. But he seemed to understand how she felt.

It’s a bit later in the afternoon. We better make it to the train station on time.

“Let’s go,” I say.

We exit the house with our belongings and I lock the door. Goodbye, my home, this greedy house on stilts. I grew up in you, and when the time finally came, I had to abandon you too.

I let my hands linger a bit longer on the door handle that I shook a few times to make sure that the door was actually locked. I considered leaving the key here, but I felt compelled to keep it with me like a little souvenir.

“Come on, we’re going to be late,” Coltello calls out at the bottom of the stairs to the front door.

The streets are littered with trash and a piece of the handrailing that I can only guess was a result of Touma’s rage just a few hours ago.

I come down and join Coltello.

No looking back; there’s no use staying in this godforsaken town.