@lambflayed said, 42: sender barges into receiver’s home unannounced.
THE DOORKNOB JOSTLES AFTER MIDNIGHT. they’re in the ungodly hours of morning now — and ashley is tossing and turning where he lays, sheen of sweat on his skin, even with the air conditioning unit kicking and humming beside him. he’s back in harlan, and it’s got him good, it’s caught him like a rabbit in its maw. the summer heat is wearing him down to the bone, digging deep in the flesh, fatal. all the windchimes and slamming screen doors bring him back to rougher seas. windchimes, wind howling, doorknob jostling. he’s back to that night in may, the night he turned eighteen, the night his father grabbed a knife and did the unspeakable. that night in may, a decade ago, he was sweating like a stuck pig. bleeding like one, too. as the screen door slammed shut behind him, it was morgan who grabbed his shoulders, it was morgan whose eyes widened with horror, it was morgan who held him upright when his legs gave out beneath him. when he came to, they were at the widow’s homestead. he was laying in the truck bed, and morgan was pressing his flannel against the wound on his face, trying to stop the bleeding.
the doorknob jostles. he stirs. the sheets are sticking to his skin, pain crawling across his face, a foreign feeling. the doorknob jostles, and he’s brought back from the homestead, brought back from the blood and back into the motel bed. the awful crawl in his core begins to strangle his lungs. the doorknob jostles, and he’s got a hand wrapped around his gun before his vision clears. yellow lamplight flicks on. fluorescent glow creeps in through the doorway as the door swings open. he’s already on his feet — white cotton shirt stuck to his skin, briefs settled on the bones of his hips. and it’s scarlett. in harlan, in his motel room, with a key in her hand from the clerk at the front desk. the gun in ashley’s hands suddenly feels too hot. too heavy.
‘ fuck. scarlett? ’ his voice is still rough, gritty from the sleep. for once in his life, she catches him off guard. all his ghosts are in the room. and the scar on his face, angry and inflamed, stands out like blood on the wool of a lamb. ‘ learn to fuckin’ knock. ’
