Chapter 173 - 167. Void of the Soul
There were times when Zein wondered what it would be like if he could see his mother now. What it would feel like if she was still alive somehow, somewhere.
Times, when he looked at the picture of her smiling face, laughing at someone he knew now, was his father.
He had wondered if she would come up in his dream someday, now that he knew what she looked like. He wondered if she would be young, just at the age when she had him. Or would she grow up with him, a decadently beautiful, lovely woman.
He wondered about seeing her in many forms.
But not this.
The blue eyes were as pretty as his, if only they weren’t looking so hollow. If only they weren’t placed above sunken cheeks and cracked lips. If only the fingers caressing him weren’t so cold and bony.
The woman in front of him bore his mother’s face. But it was also the face of the women in the red-zone. Wretched. Bitter. Riddled with misery, abuse, and hunger.
"Look at you," the bony fingers caressed Zein’s frozen cheek, as the cracked and dry lips stretched into a smile. "Growing up so beautiful. So vibrant. So..." she paused, pressing her thumbs on Zein’s cheeks before continuing in a breathless voice, "...plump."
And then she laughed, a shrill voice that crushed his heart as those cold fingers left his cheek. They traveled down his neck, and shoulder, and back, as she moved to his side while speaking in a mocking cheerfulness. "Oh, the thing I had to endure to make sure you were born..."
Zein felt a breathy sigh on his neck, as the thin arms hugged him softly from behind, palm caressing his hair.
"Ah, my son..." the voice felt so near, a voice that couldn’t be real, because Zein couldn’t even remember it. "If I didn’t have you...don’t you think I’ll be able to live?"