[P] a lousy bunch

[Hagar]

HAGAR IESHAN

Dust yourself off, girl, keep your chin up
You wanna hold a gun but they made you a pinup

I

am a deceptively simple girl, I think. Easy to figure, easy to please, just another beautiful, waifish shape in the courtyard. I have only ever wanted one thing: to be seen-- and I have only ever truly hated one thing, in all of my life: to be ignored.

I shouldn't, and a small part of my knows I shouldn't, but when I speak and Adonai's ear tilts my way but not his face, I feel like I am all twisted up, and hot, and rotten.

I remember, too, when we were young, the line drawn between the lot of us: brothers and sisters, like we were a different species in a different world altogether. Our father would gather up Pilate and Adonai and take them to court, and I would stay behind with Miriam, back when she would look at me and see the face of a child, and not the face of her own--often imaginary--shortcomings. I never wanted to be them, not really. I did not want all the trappings and business and the severe, sharp faces of other boys, who might be king, or might not, one day down the line-- but most of all, I did not want to be left behind.

Perhaps if I resent him, it is for that; in a way, he and I have always been at war over Pilate. First, for his time, and then for the privilege of peeling back his layers to find anything underneath that resembles the boy he once was.

Only, Adonai stopped searching, and then got so incredibly sick, and I was left with my prize: a brother, that loves me. A brother that I know. The only sibling I need-- I think.
So, no. I did not visit Adonai. 

--which brings us back to the room, and the eyes, turned away, and my stomach tying itself in knots as I try to stop myself from screaming, or crying, or something equally unforgivable. I think he is cruel. I think he is mean. I do not see the irony.

Finally, Adonai turns to me, his mouth tucked carefully into a smile, his voice sharp, and trite, and warm in the way that a hot knife is warm, not like cider, or wool, or summer. I do not know this Adonai. I wonder how he became this. It would make me sad if I were not still one large, red-hot tangle of thorns. Hello, Hagar, he says. I'm about to go practice my lyre.

Out on the terrace, he adds. Away from here, away from me. I smile back at him with clenched teeth. "Great, I'll come with you. It's been so long since I've heard you play."

@Adonai