The Play
A Novel
by Karina Halle
Also by Karina Halle
The Experiment in Terror Series
Darkhouse (EIT #1)
Red Fox (EIT #2)
The Benson (EIT #2.5)
Dead Sky Morning (EIT #3)
Lying Season (EIT #4)
On Demon Wings (EIT #5)
Old Blood (EIT #5.5)
The Dex-Files (EIT #5.7)
Into the Hollow (EIT #6)
And With Madness Comes the Light (EIT #6.5)
Come Alive (EIT #7)
Ashes to Ashes (EIT #8)
Dust to Dust (EIT #9)
Novels by Karina Halle
The Devil’s Metal (Devils #1)
The Devil’s Reprise (Devils #2)
Sins and Needles (The Artists Trilogy #1)
On Every Street (An Artists Trilogy Novella #0.5)
Shooting Scars (The Artists Trilogy #2)
Bold Tricks (The Artists Trilogy #3)
Donners of the Dead
Dirty Angels
Dirty Deeds
Dirty Promises
Love, in English
Love, in Spanish
Where Sea Meets Sky (from Atria Books)
Racing the Sun (from Atria Books)
The Play
First edition published by
Metal Blonde Books November 2015
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 by Karina Halle
Digital Edition
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
Cover design by Hang Le Designs
Metal Blonde Books
P.O. Box 845
Point Roberts, WA
98281 USA
Manufactured in the USA
For more information about the series and author visit:
http://authorkarinahalle.com/
Table of Contents
Part One
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Part Two
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
For Bruce, pit bulls, and other misunderstood beings who are rarely given a second chance in life.
“I’ll awake you from this living sleep”- Matador, Faith No More
PART ONE
PROLOGUE
Edinburgh, Scotland
1987
It had started to snow the night before. The boy woke up on the floor by the fire, like he sometimes did when the winds blew in too cold and mum didn’t pay the electric bill. But by the time morning came around, the fire was out, just smoldering ash, and he couldn’t feel his fingers or his nose, the only things sticking out of the itchy flannel blanket.
Despite the cold and the damp that coated the small, dark living room, the boy woke up happy. Today was his special day. He was turning five, and his mother had promised, promised him last year, on his last birthday, when he had no presents at all, that when he turned five and became a big boy, he could go to the toy store and get whatever toy he wanted.
He had spent most of the year flipping through discarded catalogues he found in the housing complex’s rubbish (sometimes he’d have to wait on the sidelines while some rough, unpredictable characters looted around for food or something they could pawn), looking for toys that caught his fancy. He would find them, rip the pages out, and take them to the bedroom he shared with his mother, hiding them in the inner pocket of the single coat he had.
When he wasn’t so lucky with the catalogues, he would flip through the magazines he found at the library. That’s where he spent most of his time. He wasn’t in school, though he should have been at this point¸ so his mum had to put him somewhere while she did her business. The library was the best place for him. In the chaotic slums of Muirhouse, no one in the library noticed the little boy in his ill-fitting, threadbare clothes, sitting on the library floor for hours, looking through magazines and dreaming about a different life.
The truth was, as his birthday came around, he didn’t care at all about what toy he ended up getting. He just wanted something he could call his own. And even though he knew that boys like him should want army figurines and cars, he just wanted something comforting. A stuffed animal, maybe a bear or a dog. He loved dogs, even the ones who belonged to his neighbor that barked all night and tried to bite if you got too close. He loved those dogs, too.
The boy got up, shivering even with the blanket draped around his shoulders, and went to go look out the window. His large grey-green eyes widened in awe. The grime and dirt of the godforsaken streets below were completely wiped away by a layer of clean, white snow. It was the first snowfall in Edinburgh this year, and he couldn’t help but think that it was all for him, for his special day. With cold, fumbling fingers, he pulled his cross necklace out of his shirt and kissed it as thanks to God.
He wanted to tell his mother about the snow, so he ran across the thin rug, ever covered in tears and cigarette burns, and to the bedroom.
He really should have knocked first. In his excitement he forgot one of the few rules his mother gave him: “If I have a friend over, you must sleep in the living room,” and, “If my door is closed, never open it.”
But he opened it.
The window had a crack in it, and the frozen wind was seeping in, blowing the faded curtains around. Below the window was the bed, where his mother, clad in a dirty negligee, was currently sleeping facedown.
A naked man was standing over her, smoking from a pipe.
The boy froze, but it was too late. The man saw him, slammed down the pipe in anger, and in a second was across the room, holding him by the throat.
“You think you can judge me?” the man hissed in his face with rank breath that smelled of onions and blood. The boy closed his eyes and shook his head fearfully.
He had seen the man a few times before—his mother had so many male friends. They would all disappear into the bedroom. Sometimes for hours, sometimes for minutes. He would hear coughing, laughing, and cries of excitement on good days. On bad days, he would hear shouting, his mother crying, things being thrown around the room. On those bad days, his mother would be covered in cuts and bruises. She wouldn’t talk to him, and she wouldn’t go outside. He just stayed by her side, bringing her weak tea from teabags that had already been used a few times, because that’s all there was left.
“Do you?!” the man yelled again and squeezed and squeezed his neck. The boy couldn’t breathe at all. He thought this terrible man with the purple, bulbous nose and the mean eyes, was going to kill him.
In some ways, he wanted him to.
“Hey,” his mother said from the bed, slowly stirring. “What’s going on?” Her voice was ragged, and slurred as she sat up. “Leave my son alone.”
The man released his grip, and then looked behind him to glare at the woman. The boy pawed at his own raw throat, wheezing, trying to say he was sorry, but nothing was coming out.