Kill Switch by Penelope Douglas

She stops biting, explaining it to me. “He told me if you’re
hurt in more than one place, your brain only registers one
pain at a time. Usually the stronger one. I had a hangnail one
day, and it really hurt, so you know what he did? He bit my
finger. It was so weird, but it worked. I didn’t feel the other
pain anymore.”
One pain at a time. So if something hurts, you can make it
hurt less by adding more pain?
The sting starts to return but not as strong, the feel of her
bite still lingering.
She does it again, and again, the sting disappears.
“Is that okay?” she asks. “Better?”
I want to smile, and I think I do a little as I nod.
Amazing. I wonder if the cut were deeper, would I have to
bite harder? And does it have to be biting? Can I do something
else to make the pain go away?
She releases my hand and smiles up at me. “It doesn’t
make me happy like Oreos in ice cream, but it’s relief.”
Oreos in ice cream, huh? Yeah, I like that, too.
We sit there for a while, enjoying the noise of the
waterfalls, the maze falling quiet and the lightning bugs
starting to spark up around the hedges. The music and party
and nothing else exist except our little hideaway.
“I wish we didn’t have to leave the fountain,” she says.
We don’t. Not yet anyway. Let them come find us.
“Why do you wear the rosary?” she asks.
I follow her gaze, looking down and seeing the wooden
beads peeking out from under my shirt where they’re caught
on my collar.
“They get mad when kids wear it like a necklace, you
know?” she points out.
A laugh escapes me, and I can’t help it. I swallow. “I
know.”