LiTTLE CHERiNE Book 02 - post141

arthur.grafo (69)in #sfandf-fiction • 6 years ago

^{“Damn, but you girls keep on finding excuses to make me look ridiculous. We better go to the farm where you can put a nappy on me.”

She giggled, “We have this one from Irene.”}

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1056

Soon as Dommi saw me she realised it was me. She sent me a burst of love and approval.

“You are Cherine? You please excuse me, my English is not so good. Roberto calls me his Albanian girl, I am Aganthi and this is our daughter Irene. Do you know this baby?”

“No.” She came close and looked at me. She gave me her finger and I took hold of it. “Can I hold him? I won’t drop him.”

They let her hold me and she played with me for a while. When she sat down on the carpet and cradling me began rocking motions, I closed my eyes and she was enthralled, thinking she was putting me to sleep.

“Cherine, you know that Roberto of mine, he is so good, but sometimes he is also a very stupid man. Is your Roberto also stupid sometimes?”

“No. I hate your Robert. He is horrible.”

“You know that what he did to you, it made him very sick. The other Cherine and all his girls, we got very afraid for him.”

“I’m glad. I hate him.”

“Do you hate him or are you only a little afraid of him?”

“I’m not afraid of him. I hate him.”

“He will be very sad to hear that. You see, he was afraid you would love him. You can, but only as a friend. He got too afraid and did those horrible things to make you not love him. But now he remembers what he did and he got very sick.”

“I’m glad!”

“I think my Cherine is nicer than you. She can feel the pain in other people so she never hates anybody. Can’t you feel how other people feel?”

“I can. Better than her I bet!”

“I think you cannot. Let’s do a test. Feel how the baby feels and tell me.”

She nearly dropped me. She began to cry. “Mummy, the baby is very sad. It wants to die. It is afraid.”

“What is it afraid of? Why is it so sad?”

“I don’t know - it is only a baby, how can I guess?”

“You want me to tell you why the baby is dying?” She stared at her, her eyes huge. “That baby you are holding is not really a baby. It is the Robert you hate. We had to make him into a baby to try and make him better.”

At least she did not throw me away. She put me down on the carpet and made to pull away. I smiled at her and held on to her finger. She let me hold it, but sat as far away as she could. Soon as my fingers relaxed she pulled away, sitting almost on the other side of the room.

“You do not have to be afraid of him. Cherine, you really hate him?”

“Yes.”

Dommi spoke up. “While he is a baby he cannot hurt you. If you hate him you have my permission to pick him up and go to the front door, to the concrete steps outside and throw him down hard, on his head. That will kill him and you never have to be afraid of him again.”

1057

Marian cried out, but her husband held her back. “It is up to Cherine, let her decide what to do.”

She came back to me, slowly and wary of me. I gurgled and smiled. She put out a hand and touched me. Suddenly her face was hard and grim and she picked me up.

“I can really do what you said?”

“Yes. He wants you to feel better and if you have to kill him to feel better we have to let you.”

I felt the anger in her and her wish to kill me and it hurt. I told the protector that if the others tried to stop her it must not let them, and wept at the damage I have done to her. She saw my tears and stopped bewildered. She looked across at Rob who was staring at her, his horror in his eyes. Slowly she bent over and put me down again.

“You are trying to trick me. You want to make me bad like him.”

She ran to Rob and he picked her up and held her in his arms.

For all our babies we only use the old-fashioned nappies. I got Irene to come and undo mine and lay it like a towel on me. I grew myself to the age of about five and sat up. She stared at me, fear in her eyes again.

“You remember that monster in the void, the one I made to frighten you? There is something else called the protector and it is stronger than that monster. It could kill a thousand monsters like that one easy-peasy. But the protector is good, it is not a bad monster. It loves children and looks after them. I am going to tell it to show itself to you.”

The protector became a creature of pure white light, shimmering as a curtain of light between her and me. Everyone in the room gaped at it, but I saw she was still afraid of it because she sensed it comes from me.

“Some time ago I hurt my Cherine by mistake and the protector got angry with me and killed me. Luckily for me, my Cherine loves me a lot and she came to the void and brought me back. I now do not have my Cherine with me, so if I die, the void will eat me, you remember what it feels like, you sent the feeling to me last time.

The monster you saw in the void, it was only a picture, I was tricking you to stop you from hurting me. Cherine, you do not believe me, but I do love you. I love you because I love my own Cherine so much, can you understand that? I do not want you to grow up afraid. Especially not of me. It makes me sick with pain inside. I would rather die.

I will tell the protector, I will explain to it how badly I hurt you and it will get very cross and kill me. That way you do not have to be the bad one, nobody will blame you. If I do this, will you stop being afraid and will you stop hating me?”

She refused to answer me, only her eyes staring at me as she huddled in his arms. Rob pulled her face up to his. “Please don’t let him do this Cherine. For me?”

“Don’t Rob. It must come from her. Marian, the protector will not attack me as a child. Can I have a pair of your husband’s trousers. I do not think you want the sight of an adult in the nude.”

Dommi was pleading with me not to do it, but I refused to answer her. Irene and Aganthi could hear her and they too looked at me with a plea in their eyes. Suddenly Cherine, my Cherine arrived, her face pale with fear. Dommi had told her what I am about to do.

“I will not allow it to kill you. How can you kill yourself because one silly child hates you, there are so many of us who love you!!”

By mind-speak I told her the protector and healer will make me a new body, they will not lose me.

“Cherine love, if it was a child that hated me, that simple, I would agree. This child fears me more than she hates me. I am to blame for that fear. If I have to die to rid her of that fear, then I must die. Little Cherine knows what it feels like to die. She had me to bring her back. I will stay dead until she can stop being afraid.”

Marian brought me the trousers and also pleaded with me not to do it.

1058

“I have to. Do not worry about having to get rid of my body. The body will be destroyed.” I stood up in her husbands large pants. “Cherry, do not get afraid. The girls made me a baby to try and make me well again. I now have to make myself a grown up so that the protector will hurt and kill me. I will not hurt you. Okay?”

She stared without speaking and then nodded. Irene took a couple of steps and stood in front of her.

“He is my daddy and I love him very much, I need him. If he dies because of you, I will never forgive you.”

“I think this has gone far enough. You do not have the right to make a child responsible for your life or death!”

“I agree. That is why I will kill myself.”

The protector rippled and wrapped itself around me. It raised me into the air, close to the ceiling, and slammed my body into the floor. Bones snapped and I screamed. It picked me up again and Cherine ran under it, screaming at it to stop. My blood dripped onto her upturned face.

It slammed me into the wall, leaving a smear of blood. Cherine and Dommi jumped and grabbed hold of my body, trying to stop the protector. Even as they held to me, they saw the protector thicken as it wrapped around my leg and snapped it.

Little Cherine started to scream to her Robert to stop it, not to let it kill me. The protector set me down and went to her. It spoke directly into her mind.

*If he ever hurts you again I will make him feel even more pain and then I will kill him. Do not ever be afraid. Your Robert and I will always protect you.*

Irene pleaded, “He is hurt! Fix him please.”

“Cherry?” She looked at me. “I have been hurt too much, I cannot fix myself, the protector cannot fix me. Only one person can, but that person must really want to. You are that person. Do you want to?”

“I can’t!!”

“All you have to do is put your hand to me, touch me somewhere, anywhere you want. Keep your hand there and you will see me being fixed.”

Rob brought her to me and from the safety of his arms she touched my hand. The healer made a big show of bones moving back into position, wounds closing and within half an hour or so I was sitting on the floor completely healed.

I took the hand that had been touching me and kissed it lightly.

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