Free A Dream of Lights by Kerry Drewery Page A

lungs burned, my stomach clenched; I tried to gasp in breath that wouldn’t come. My eyes stung with hot tears, my head spun, the world, my world, turned and tilted in front of me.
    This dreadful thing, this terrible thing. And all because of what I had said, and all because of Sook.
    I hated him. Hated , hated , hated him. And I hated myself. Why did I tell him? my head screamed. Why did I say anything? Why did I trust him? I wanted to kill him, I wanted him dead. I wanted him to suffer, I wanted him to feel the pain that I was feeling for him betraying the trust I had given him.
    I saw him in the crowd and watched him, my stomach turning over and over, my teeth grinding, my fists clenching with rage. I wished I had a gun, or a knife, or a rope to show him how angry I was and how much I hated every single piece of him now. I was a fool to think I had loved him, a fool to think he could have felt anything for me.
    I shook and sobbed as I stared down at the scene in front of me. My grandmother crying as the soldiers carried a wooden post from the van, standing it up on end, hammering it into the ground. I closed my eyes as they forced my father to undress, embarrassed for him, but I heard the crowd’s jeers and taunts, and when I looked again he was pulling on a thick grey one-piece suit, and I remembered what my grandfather had told me when we watched the last execution. “The suit soaks up the blood,” he said. “Straight into the fabric. Makes it easier for the guards to clean up after.”
    My father’s blood this time.
    I watched them lead him to the post and I wanted to scream out at them to stop. I watched them tie him to it, a rope round his legs, one round his chest, and I wanted to run to him and throw my arms round him, tell him that I was so very, very sorry, that I wished I could take it all back, and that I loved him so very much.
    At his feet they placed a large bag. Then three soldiers stepped back, loading their rifles, taking position, staring down the sights towards my father. Who had held me as a baby and clapped when I first walked, who cuddled me when I was ill and talked me through bad dreams. Whose hand held mine on the way to school and whose smile made me feel loved and wanted and needed.
    Whose death I’d caused.
    I didn’t want to see this, what was to happen to him, didn’t want to remember it. But I couldn’t close my eyes, I couldn’t look away.
    The man in charge of the soldiers turned to the crowd. “You will witness how miserable fools end up,” he shouted. “Traitors who betray the nation and its people end up like this.” He looked to his men. “Ready your weapons!” he told them, and they lifted their guns to their shoulders.
    “Aim at the enemy!”
    They squinted their eyes down the sights. My father stood resolute, tall and dignified, not a word, not a cry, not a sound. I loved him.
    “Single shot! Fire!”
    The shots rang out as one, tearing into the ropes round his chest. I flung my hand over my mouth, stopping myself from crying out. Shaking and trembling. I could hear my grandmother, see my grandfather holding on to her, grief flooding them.
    “ Now he bows to us!” the man shouted as my father’s body bent over, the ropes round his legs still forcing him upright.
    “Fire!” he shouted again, and they shot at my father’s head, the bag underneath positioned to catch everything.
    It was too much; I swayed back and forth, rubbing my hands over my head, through my hair, my fingers clenching and unclenching, my anger and shock and disbelief clawing inside me like an animal trying to escape. I stood up. I didn’t care any more. I didn’t care what he was guilty of. He was my father and I loved him.
    I wished I could’ve spoken to him before this, could’ve said sorry. Wished I could’ve told him for the first time, and the last, that I loved him, that he meant the world to me, that I was so proud of him, so proud to be his daughter. All those things I had never,