Read The Poison Morality for Free Online

mother’s house, full of people shivering against the walls, huddled around a barrel fire for warmth, covered in their tarps and cardboard, their breath poured thick from their mouths. 
    One minute she was walking towards the station and somehow drifted here.  She was used to it by now.  This was the way it was, absent mindedly drifting through life.  Once she was headed to the library, on the train towards Euston station to return some books and landed in a pub eating chips in Kensington.  It was the benefit, she supposed, of having no schedule and doing what she wanted, when she wanted.
    Perhaps seeing the girl she had given the dead man’s dinner to had triggered something in her, reminding her of the life or lack of it she had living rough before the day her first envelope appeared, changing her life.  Or sometimes she came on the days that guilt started to creep in or the memories of her home life dominated her thoughts and she needed to forget again.
    The familiar smell of filth and damp filled her nostrils.  “Sure.” Thankful this wasn’t the life she had any longer, she reached into her pocket and pulled out all the change she had and put it into his palm covered in a ratty glove with the fingers cut off revealing dirty nails.  It was hard to see his face but what she could make out in the shadow and the smudges was a man not much older than she was, lips chapped, covered in a few days of stubble, and his nose hooked and extremely bent to one side broken at least once.  He trembled from the cold or an addiction or both.
    “How about that coat, too,” a heavy smell of sweat wafted from him when he stepped closer to her.  It was the first time she had felt her safety threatened standing in the middle of this alley.  Either end seemed so far away.
    He was too close to her now, advancing on her, invading her personal space.  She stepped back into a wall.  Lightly she replied, “You can’t have my coat but here,” she slid the scarf off of her neck and handed it to him.  He snatched it from her hands and sniffed it deeply instead of putting it on, more interested in the scent than the warmth it would provide.  While he held it up to his face, she took the opportunity to get away.
    Sliding sideways against the wall, her eyes were fixed on him until she was free to run for it. Dropping the scarf, he followed her.  For every step she took, he advanced quickly on her, his strides longer.
    There was nothing to be said, nothing to do but try to get away.  Sophie analysed the distance to the street, confident that she could make it and once in the street she would be safe.  Sirens sounded very close, they passed by making his words hard for her to hear but she understood, the shine of a blade came into view when she glanced back to see how close he was.  He grabbed her arm.  She broke away, sprinting.  The adrenaline pushing her faster than she knew she could go.
    The sound of their running footsteps echoed.  His hand tugged her coat at the nape of her neck, nearly pulling Sophie off her feet.  The tug pulled her hair with the coat, she winced.  Shifting her shoulders, the coat slipped off of them easily.  She had no choice but to let the coat go to escape.   Once her left arm was clear, he pulled straight back on the coat, causing her to be jerked backwards and she felt the piercing pain in her side and cried out.  The warm blood quickly cooled as it trickled out.  The thought of blood made her feel sick above and beyond the pain but she had to get away.  No one offered help, only turning away or watching.
    The needle, she thought, still in her pocket.  Was there enough poison left on it to get free of him?  It was doubtful and she abandoned the thought as quickly as it came.  The pain was like a stabbing over and over with every move she made.  Her body felt heavier like she was carrying her own dead weight.  Her legs seemed shorter, tighter, seizing up while her knees were wobbling