I Fell in Love with Hope - Lancali

“You probably aren’t very good at being offended either. You’re quite
awkward.”
“I’m starting to think you’re quite mean.”
“Give me your story, Sam,” she demands. “Sate my quite mean
curiosity, and maybe I’ll tell you why I stole what I stole.”
“Something tells me your curiosity is quite greedy.”
“Tell me about the Hit List,” she says, and her scent and voice
surround me like a whirlwind, obscuring everything else until I’m sure
I’d tell her anything she wanted to hear. “What’s it for, other than
thievery? Who are you killing?”
“Time,” I say.
“Ooh,” she mocks. “Crafty enemy.”
“Disease.”
“Cruel enemy.”
“Death.”
I didn’t notice I was stepping backward till my heel knocks into Neo’s
box, the cardboard and contents jostling like a sound of pain. I pick it
back up, dusting it in apology.
“How do you kill Time, Disease, and Death?” Hikari asks.
“You steal what they stole.”
“Cigarettes and Beer?”
“Moments,” I correct. “Childhoods. Lives.”
Hikari stops her circling. She looks at me for a long while, that
breeze that loves her so, filling the silence. I should tell her more. I