David started to use Celine.

That night when he returned home, he was sure that everyone would be asleep. He could tell that it was really late at night because he'd barely seen the lights from any vehicle on the road, neither were any shops opened. Even Iya Saliu, who usually closed down her shop at 10 pm, was nowhere to be seen.

When he got home, with his clothes drenched in water, he rushed into the shed to have a quick change of clothes and then proceeded to the back door of the house.

Inside the house, there was an eerie coldness. Although it had rained earlier in the day with water dripping down the aluminum sheets of homes down the streets, this particular coldness that David felt could only be emitted from the presence of someone.

The throbbing pain around David's forehead had subsided because of Celine's pill, but now, bouts of pain emerged again, and goosebumps broke out on the pores of his cheekbones as he walked past the dimly lit kitchen. The silence in the house was so chilling and distinct that it felt like a piercing sound. David was grateful when he heard the caw-caw-caw sound from a bird afar off.

As David walked noiselessly, he hoped that he wouldn't meet anyone in the living room. Although he knew it was stupid to have such hope since the kitchen light had not been put out, he still wished nevertheless.

When he walked into the living room and saw that it was thickly dark with only the faint ray of the moonlight reflecting through the curtains that shielded the windowpane, David heaved a sigh of relief. The lights of the living room were out. Everyone in the house was asleep. The last person to retire to bed had probably just forgotten to put out the kitchen light.

Strangely, the thought that everyone had gone to bed without bothering about his whereabouts disturbed David. And David resented the fact that he was bothered by it. Why did their seeming lack of concern get to him now? This was what he'd wanted after all — to be treated like a murderer, like an unwanted criminal and a fugitive.

David decided to blame his weird sentiments on today being his first day of work, the first day of detaching himself from his family, so the reality of the separation had to be dawning on him. That had to be why he felt this way. David had no right to feel like Celine. He didn't deserve forgiveness and acceptance from his family. He would get used to the permanent separation as time rolled by.

David couldn't understand the fatigue he felt — because when it came down on him and weighed like a heavy sack, it was almost a shock to him. Then, he remembered how hectic the past two days had been. From running to Obalende Street to hunting for a job under the hot sun, the accident that had occurred earlier in the day, and then walking back home in the heavy rain.

He needed to rest.

David made a few more moves to walk into his room — or at least he tried, but he couldn't move his legs.

Why does it have to be now? David groaned. He was closer to his room. All he needed to do was use the armchair in the living room as support, but even when he saw the outline of one of the armchairs in the darkness and held on to it, his limbs felt heavier than a log of wood. His knees burned like an inferno. 

Then it dawned on him that during the pure water accident, he'd most likely sustained an injury on his kneecap as well. Not just his forehead. The realization made the pain in his knees escalate, spreading slowly to the regions of his thigh – as though the knees needed permission from his brain to hurt even more.

Suddenly, David fell to the ground with a loud thud.

"Ouch!"

The light in the living room came on. The sharpness from the light that radiated from the fluorescent bulb stung David's iris. His eyes took time to adjust to the bright light compared to the way they'd been used to the dim light from the kitchen.

David propped himself on his elbow and was shocked to see his father in the living room. His father had been in the living room all along, and when Kelvin, with a bewildered expression on his face, asked that, "Folakemi? Is that you?" David was aghast.

Kelvin approached David, using the back of his hand to rub his eyes, forcing them to open up after an interrupted slumber.

His father had been asleep in the living room when everyone else was sleeping in the bedroom. And that hasty mention of his mother's name as though he'd been expecting her. What was that about? Why was he waiting for her? Was his mother missing?

David's eyes shone as the possibility dawned on him. And even though he feared his father even more than he feared the devil, he couldn't stop himself from asking Kelvin his most feared question:

"Is mother not at home?"

"She is. I just thought she was coming out of her room to go out and look for you," Kelvin answered. The bewildered countenance on his face vanished, and a cold, granite demeanor, one that was fitting for a beast like Kelvin, took over the features of his face. "I would have stopped her immediately. I don't want a heavily pregnant woman running out on the streets, under the rain, looking for a boy who murdered her daughter."

Kelvin walked away, brushing harshly past David's foot as he retired to his bedroom.

On the floor where David lay, with blood oozing out of the dark patches of his knees, a surge of pain dashed through his chest. His lips formed into a thin line as he felt his eyes sting with tears. Why was he feeling this much pain?

He'd always wanted to be treated as an outcast after Sindara's death. Yet why did the fact that his father had referred to him as "a boy" pierce through his soul like a dagger? For a slight fleeting moment, David had thought that his father had been waiting for him, that his father had chosen to forgive him.

But the fact that Kelvin now saw him as a stranger and he'd been in the living room to prevent his mother from going out to look for him was unbearably shattering. A tear fell down David's eyes.

Later on, when David managed to get to his room by making crawling movements, he picked a razor blade from the table and used the object's edge to create straight, parallel lines on his forearms like incisions. Blood oozed out of each thick line he'd made. David smiled with as much force as he could garner. He liked the sight of the injury. It looked like art — like a snack garnished with thin lines of ketchup sauce.

The sharp cuts on his forearm combined with the overwhelming pain from his kneecaps made David move this way and that on the bed. But as restless as he was, he tried to stifle his groans so he wouldn't wake Alexander up. David didn't deserve any attention or care from anyone. He had to writhe in the pain alone. That was how he ought to live for murdering his sweet little sister.

***

When David saw how haggard Celine looked at the water factory the following day, he made a decision – a subtle one that he didn't even realize he'd made. There was a deep, bloody cut on her upper lip and the lid of her right eye took on a deeper red shade. There were a few red marks around her shoulders.

Instinctively, David felt the urge to ask her what had happened when he remembered what Celine had said yesterday:

"Please don't punish him or anyone else here," she pleaded. "I will make up for the mess."

"Oh, you will, won't you?" Mr. Akinwale smirked.

David swallowed a thick clump of saliva when he realized what had occurred. He felt a painful swell in his heart – a bulge full of so many emotions that he was unsure which sentiment would be the right one to express.

But Celine saved him the stress because she approached him first, and she did so hastily, her eyes flashing with great concern as they captured the fresh wound on David's kneecaps and forearm.

"What happened to your hand?" she took the arm that was freshly cut and examined it, twisting the hand hither and thither. "Did you...hurt yourself...on purpose?" She raised her head to look into David's eyes. Fear grew in her dark orbs.

David said nothing. Celine continued to examine his hand.

"Come. Let me treat your hand. I'll explain your condition to Mr. Akinwale so he'll leave you to go home. I'll make up for your absence."

"By receiving a few more punches from him, right?" David said coldly.

Celine shivered. For a brief moment, the shock was vivid in the lines of her forehead that he'd known what she meant by "make up for it." David knew he'd been right, telling from how Celine had hastily tried to look normal again. Then she surprised him when he said this:

"Take it as my gesture to you till you feel less of a murderer. I'll lessen the burden of the pain you have to bear until you don't hate yourself so much anymore. I'll suffer for you until then."

David stared and said nothing for a long while. Celine wanted to help David. She was willing to suffer for him. David decided to make use of the opportunity. There was something about Celine's offer of help that made David want to accept it. He didn't like the extreme, distancing coldness of his dad. He resented the unauthentic meekness of his mother and siblings.

But Celine. She'd never made him feel less of a murderer even with the story she'd shared, and yet, she was willing to make him feel better. It didn't make sense, but David viewed the situation and saw that her willingness to help was something he could manipulate, especially because it came from a wounded state of the heart.

Somewhere deep down, David felt an uncommon bond with her knowing that they were both pathetic human beings, and somehow, seeing her in this injured state because she felt she deserved punishment from Mr. Akinwale for her past sins pleased David greatly.

They were both sinners who'd been getting punished in several ways that seemed pretty much alike. Her right eye was swollen. His forearms and knees oozed out blood. David felt a strange sense of unity in the tragedy they shared, so he would use her.

How dare she heal? If he was writhing in pain every second of the day, then she didn't deserve to aim for healing or feel better. He was going to pull her down, and he was grateful she'd made it easier for him to do so — by choosing to suffer for his sake.

He would give her many reasons to suffer while he also sunk deep into agony. So he would never have to feel like the most pathetic human being on earth. Someone would be suffering alongside him, and while she gave herself out to him daily, he would do nothing in return to make her feel better. And then a day would come when she would loathe him, and she'd probably kill him. He deserved to die.

David also wanted Celine to realize that there was no use helping a murderer like him, but he wanted her to try because it would be pleasing to watch.

"I don't want to go home," David said.

"What?" Celine looked lost.

"You said you will explain my situation to Mr. Akinwale so he can let me go home. But I don't want to. I want to sleep at the quarters."

That night was the first that David spent away from his family. Celine treated his wounds. As the days rolled by, David gave Celine more reasons to suffer emotionally for his sake. On some days, he slit the side of his neck with a kitchen knife just to have Celine rush, panicking and begging David not to commit suicide.

One night, when he heard Celine crying in the kitchen, unable to lower her voice, David felt an overwhelming wave of guilt. Making Celine wallow in anguish for his sake no longer pleased him as he thought it would. David was just being evil. How could he have done that to someone when he was still regretting how he'd made his sister go through pain?

David began to hurt himself again. But this time, it was because he regretted his actions towards Celine. And when Celine worried about him and tried to treat his wounds, David knew he should have stopped her from caring for him.

But he didn't.

Because the synergy they'd shared in the ongoing toxicity seemed unbreakable.