Are We Lost?

As the rain pelted down on the bus shelter in the middle of the deserted city street, the two young occupants of its protection wept. They wept over their lives. They wept over the troubles and the pain. The boys, both ten, wept away the sorrows equal to those of a dying man.
The hooded boy, Luke, sobbed as he wept. He wept over the death of his mother, the abandonment by his brother. He wept over his short, but horrific life.
Aaron, the other boy, wore baggy tracksuit pants and a shirt. He shivered as he wept. With nothing but the clothes on his back, he wept over everything he could remember. He wept over his family, as well as his friends. They sat in the protection of that bus shelter, in the middle of that deserted street, while the world passed by and left them, sitting in the void of their lives.

Luke’s life fell apart the day he found the gun. His father had hidden it from the police, who had just executed a raid on the property. His father had told Luke that there was no gun. Luke believed him, until he found the weapon. He burst into the bedroom, waving the gun at his father, screaming with tears in his eyes. Then Graham, his father, tried to take it from the young boy. Luke, furious, pulled the trigger.
That’s when his brother left. He could not look into Luke’s eyes. And so he sat in the corner of the kitchen, crying. He played with the devil’s prized possession. His mother returned from work an hour later. Finding Luke with the gun, and the corpse of his father, led her into an uncontrollable frenzy. She took the gun, threw Luke out of the house, and soon after ended her own life.
It is said that she screamed before she killed herself. She screamed the damning words of a mother with only one child left, the words that damned Luke as a loner.
A child without a family.

Aaron had lived on the streets since he was eight. His family had deserted him when he was caught stealing his fathers money. He left with only the clothes on his back.
Aaron then went to the park, and shouted his anger to the God he once believed in. He was found in the early morning asleep on a park bench, by a man who lived in the park, in a cardboard box. Aaron needed someone to take care of him, and so agreed when this stranger offered him a place to stay.
That night, Aaron was raped. The man stabbed him in the arm with a broken bottle when Aaron tried to run. Aaron was once again a loner.
A child without a family.

Luke and Aaron met in the tunnel of a local railway track, both looking for shelter away from the rain, the police, and the world. From that day, they were inseparable. They stole, ran and even laughed together.
Then, one day, they came across the man that had changed Aaron’s life forever. He was drunk, staggering around the park. Aaron was filled with rage. Luke, now a brother to Aaron, decided that this man must suffer, and suffer he did. The man died by loss of blood.
That night, the boys slept together, the body warmth keeping the temperature up against the wind, their tears cooling theirs faces from the heat of their sins.
When morning came, the boys found their duty. They were to make those who inflicted the pain they felt to feel the pain themselves.

Aaron’s family were found burnt in the family home. Included in the dead was the new addition to the family, three week old Jeremy. Aaron’s brother. Once again, the boy’s slept together, comforting each other.

The next day, the boys were chased by 7 police officers, one of which was present at the raid of Luke’s former home. He identified the boy, who wore the same hooded jumper he had worn on that day. When the boys decided to separate, Aaron was found by the police. He was taken, kicking and punching to the police station. Two weeks later, he was released into foster care. His new family was faultless. And as such, Aaron did not fit in.
He ran away on the second night.
Aaron found Luke that night, passed out under a bench in the old park, obviously drunk. Aaron was horrified to see the recent scars that marked suicide on his best friend’s wrist. When he woke Luke, they cried.
Once again, the boys slept together, intent to never let go of the other.

The sun rose behind the cover of thick dark clouds, crying into the earth. The boys woke, saturated by the rains of the night.
They began their search for cover.
They found a bus shelter in the middle of a deserted city street. They made a pact, that day. They made a solemn agreement. As they sat in that bus shelter, they wept. They wept over their lives. They wept over the troubles and the pain. The boys wept away the sorrows equal to those of a dying man.
They followed through with their pact, their promise; their agreement.
As they wept, Luke with his hood, Aaron with his tracksuit and shirt, they each pulled their sleeves up, passed the elbow.
The boys, Aaron and Luke, both ten, slowly scarred their wrists, again and again.
The boys, Aaron and Luke, both died in that bus shelter, waiting for the shuttle of a better life.
The boys, both ten, passed from the world they hated with all the passion they had left.


Rest in Peace Boys
Adam C. McMahon