u/Trash_Tia

When I was eight, a boy with freckles ran over to me during recess and said, “I’m Sam. Let’s be friends!” 

Two days later, Lara joined us. Orange pigtails and a soft voice.

Then Charlie, glaring and kicking gravel, hand in hand with my Mom. I liked his bright red hair. “This is Charlie! I saw him playing alone, so I figured I'd bring him over.” Mom never has a face in my memories, so I pretend she's smiling.

Charlie grabbed a handful of dirt, and threw it at Sam.

That moment made us BFFs. 

Then, at fifteen, we finally cemented it.

Drunk on wine coolers and spread out under  darkness, clammy, entangled legs and unsure kisses. A constellation of stars. We declared our love for each other; something more than friendship, something that set off butterflies wriggling in my chest.

At twenty seven, I was marrying my true love.

Standing in front of a crystal mirror, I smooth down my  beautiful white gown that pools at my feet. 

“I feel like a Princess!” I whisper, bouncing on inexpensive glass slippers.

“Millicent.” Adora, my fiancée's maid, violently tugs my hair into a braid. After finishing, she lays my veil on top of my head. “What did I tell you?” Adora grips my chin, forcing me to look at her. I can't stop grinning, tears stinging my eyes.

While I am happy, they’re painful.

“Mistress Abigail’s order was to make sure you do not cry until after the ceremony. Do you understand?” 

I collapse into giggles as she drags me from the mirror, but I glimpse my bare feet sticking from my dress. “Wait,” something sharp fills me for a moment, like poison, freezing me in place. I stare down at my toes. But they're so… dirty. I can see filth clinging to my toenails. I blink, my gut twisting. “Where did my shoes—” 

“Mills, are you decent?” A voice yells from outside.

Sam pokes his head in. Half dressed, tie hanging off his collar, five o'clock shadow. “Hi.” He winks at me, before being yanked back.

“Samuel, what did I TELL you?” another maid screeched from outside. “Where’s your suit? 

I twirl again, risking another look. 

My shoes are on my feet— perfect glass slippers. 

I roundhouse kick the air in my dress, just to make sure. 

Adora twirls me around to face her. “You're ready, Milliscent.”

I nod, nerves twisting as she pulls me from my room.

“Can I… ask you a question?” I whisper, as we descend a staircase of diamonds. 

Adora doesn't look at me when we step out onto the beach. An arch of flowers and white chairs filled with shadows await us. I can feel the soft sand beneath my feet, but I’m wearing shoes. “Of course,” Adora hums. “What is it?”

I choose my words very carefully, moving towards the love of my life. She stands in crystal shallow water, sculpted in white, long blonde hair bleeding into the water.

Abigail. My question unravels in my throat when I see her smile. Bathed in radiant light, Abigail is the sun. She is my sun.

“We are gathered here today,” a man begins, when I join the others at the altar. Charlie and Sam wear white suits, Lara and I wear matching dresses. Abigail stands in front of us. She grabs our hands separately as we speak our vows.

“Do you… Abigail Soren take Milliscent Reed, Charlie Simmons, Samuel Hollow, and Lara Atlas, to be your lawfully wedded husbands and wives?” 

The words spill from my lips before I can stop them.

“I do!” 

Sam smiles. “I do.” 

Charlie nods.

Lara’s eyes fill with tears. 

The man smiles and turns to Abigail. “And do you—”

“Milly?!”

The voice is like a knife cutting through me.

Suddenly, reality splits apart. 

Sirens fill my ears.

Men and women in black swamp me.

A woman stumbles over to me with tearstained cheeks. She grabs me like she knows me, cradling my face. “Milly,” the woman sobs. “Sweetie, it's your Mom. It's… it's going to be okay.”

I stagger back, words choking my throat.

“Milly.” The woman's grip tightens. “I've found you.” I pull away, stumbling back into Sam. “Look at me,” she whispers.

“That girl,” she jerks her head at Abigail. “She took you away when you were eighteen! You told me the girl in your classes was crazy, and I didn’t believe you.” Her trembling hands flit through my hair, but her fingers tickle. 

“No…” I find my words, but they're suffocating. 

The woman slaps me, and I see red. Bright, intense red.

The world jerks around, and the crystal shallows of the sea bleed into rough concrete. I’m not standing on a beach.

I'm in the middle of nowhere. I stare down at my toes. My filthy, bloodied toes, chains cutting into my wrists. My dress is half of a torn curtain cruelly stapled to my flesh. 

I slowly run my hands over my head. 

But I feel nothing, only my scorched, rugged skin. 

My wedding ring is melded to my finger. 

If I didn't wear it, Abigail would…

She would…

A raw screech tore from me, my breath ripped from my lungs. I remember how painful the chains are, slicing into me. I remember I'm not allowed to cry—

I'm not… allowed… to cry. 

“Milly.” Mom— something inside me splinters. 

Oh, God, my Mom. 

Mom grasps hold of my shoulders, her nails digging in. “Sweetie,” her shuddery breaths tickle me. “Where are the others?” She demands. “Your friends, Milly,” I'm covered in blood and Mom's grip hurts. Red paints me like I am its canvas, staining and ingrained into my skin. Into all of me. My gaze finds Sam, Lara and Charlie still standing in halo light. 

I am standing on cruel concrete.

While they join hands, walking  away from me into the shallows, Mom jerks my head towards her. “Where are they?” 

There's a scrap of notebook paper tucked inside my locker.

My thoughts are scattered, caught between thinking about Mom’s visitation and homework.

I'm still not sure what to talk about. What was there to talk about?

Last time, we just sat in silence. Every so often, she'd lean over like she was going to touch me, hug me. I needed a hug.  But then she'd chicken out and drop her hands like I was contagious. I wasn't any better. My go-to was, “How are you?” 

Instead of responding, Mom did that thing where she'd pretend to not cry, swiping at her eyes every zero-point-two seconds, like I was born yesterday.

I googled “ice breaker” questions, but I'm not sure about asking Mom, “So, if you could have any superpower, which one would you choose?” 

I'm considering canceling the parent-child visit, when I pull the scrap of bright pink paper from my math textbook.

My breaths quicken and I feel hot all over, my skin tingling, prickling. I pull out my “RED” ID tag and slam my locker shut before scanning the highlighted text:

“I like you, Nate. I've been thinking about you. I keep thinking, maybe if I tell you how I feel, my heart will stop aching. It's a shot in the dark, but If you wanna be with me, meet me HERE at 9pm.” 

Underneath, a badly scribbled heart colored over the lines.

I've never received a love note before.

I almost drop it, a grin stretching across my mouth. Didn't this kind of thing only happen in movies? I read the note three times, and each time my stomach flips.

I peek over my locker, searching for eyes. Every other kid pushes past me, eyes glued to the floor or quietly talking to a friend. The silence wasn't surprising.

It's visiting day, after all.

I fold it up into a square... 

Too late.

Before I can hide my secret admirer's feelings, the note is snatched from my hands. “Is that a freakin’ love note?”

This boy doesn't understand personal space. Quinn was three inches from my face. Bright red hair, freckles, and a permanent smirk. He's been wearing the  same sweatshirt for three days.

His eyes are noticeably red rimmed, but I pretend they're not. I pretend he's not trembling, trying to keep it together– and failing spectacularly. I already know Quinn has seen his mother. 

I swallow heavily and exaggerate a groan. I'm performing. But it's okay. He's been performing since he left the visitor’s office. “Yes, it is.” I snatch the scrap from his fingers with a teasing smile. “Someone likes me.” 

“Are ya sure?” Quinn grins, and I feel a little better, less like I need to walk on eggshells. Quinn shoves me with a laugh and grabs his GREEN ID. He takes a deep breath, and slams his locker.

Then he takes the love note, makes an exaggerated coughing noise, and holds it in front of him. “I LIKE you, Nathanial,”

He mocks the sender’s voice. “I've been THINKING about you. I keep thinking, maybe if I tell you how I feel, my heart will stop aching. It's a shot in the dark, but If you wanna be with me, meet me HERE at 9pm.” He raised his brow.

“Somebody wants to get to third base.” He smirked. “One last hurrah, and they choose YOU?” 

“Shut up.” I grab the note again, screwing it up and dumping it in a trashcan. Heat creeps across my cheeks. I roll my eyes. “It's stupid, probably a dumb prank.” 

Quinn’s smile fades slightly as we head to class, a sea of neon red and green enveloping the hallway.

I try not to notice Emma’s empty locker flying open, her Pokémon stickers peeling off rusty metal.

“But would you meet them?” Quinn asks. I look away, my heart lodged in my throat. “Your secret admirer probably wants to confess to your face.”

He laughs. “I don't know ANYONE dumb enough to have a crush on you. Mayhaps a self-inflicted brain injury…” 

“No.” I lie. “Can we talk about something else?” 

“Your Mom.” Quinn’s words are like a knife to my spine. I don't blame him. Technically, he's got nothing to lose. He could pull out a knife and stab me through the throat and nobody would bat an eyelid. He walks quicker. Almost like he's running away.

“It's visitation day,” he calls over his shoulder. “I just had mine.”

“Oh, yeah?” I say. “What did you say to her?” 

He laughs. “I told her to go fuck herself.”

After class, I drag myself to the visiting office.

Mom stands six feet away, filling out my papers, ticking boxes, and signing her name at the bottom.

I consider strangling her.

Will it make a difference? No. 

Will it make me happy? Fuck yes. 

“I love you, Nathanial,” she tells me, placing the pen on the table. 

I smile back, bile filling my throat.

“Love you too, Mommy.” 

I leave the visiting office feeling numb.

8:45.

The love note comes to mind, and I find myself drawn to my locker.

I lean against it, scanning the darkness.

8:55. 

This was stupid. Embarrassment fills me like poison. 

9:00. 

I grab my backpack and start forwards.

But a shadowy figure is already there.

“Hi.”  My secret admirer is hesitant. They come closer. Drenched in the light from floodlights outside, I glimpse their face, already scribbled on, arrows and dots outlining which parts they will slice away.

I don't think about that. I… don't think about anything. I don't think about my Mom ticking everything. All of me.

Heart. 

Lungs.

Liver.

Kidneys. 

Unraveling me, right in front of my face.

“I'm not coming back.” Quinn whispers, when he's suddenly in my arms, and he's kissing me, and I'm liking it.

I'm just thinking about Quinn, his warm tears staining his cheeks, his lips that taste like spearmint gum. 

“I know.”

I'd had my beautiful long haired tabby for sixteen years. 

The sunset is a welcome distraction, streaks of late afternoon gold illuminating the horizon over the stream of  evening traffic. Callie sits in the backseat.

She's silent. I'm not really surprised, she knows exactly what's going to happen. 

It's not the first time we've been on this journey.

The last time was a checkup appointment, and the following, my decision to put her down. She screamed and howled the whole time, and I didn't tell her to stop.

I couldn't. My heart was breaking.

Sixteen was so young. I thought I'd have more time with her. More memories. 

My husband brought up the idea of evading euthanization. The law came into force two years after her tenth birthday.

Sick cats were to be humanely put down.

Canada was welcoming sick cats over the border, regardless of their condition and diagnosis.

I thought maybe I could do it— pack up everything and move Callie to Canada.

But there was logistics; my parents were law abiding.

They supported the current government, while my husband was heavily against them. He begged me to consider Canada. 

My mother sat me down and told me Callie was ready. “It won't hurt her, Elizabeth,” she whispered, grasping my hands and squeezing.  “It's Callie’s time.” 

She was right. Right? Callie was sick, she would just suffer. 

Her quality of life was already deteriorating. Letting her go was better.

That's what I told my husband when I handed him the euthanization papers, and I'll never forget his face.

Wide eyes, lips curled into a snarl, like he was going to hit me. 

He didn't respond, silently walked upstairs to grab his bag and a few necessities, and left me. 

He tried to take Callie with him, tried to justify letting her suffer. But she was my baby. “You're an evil bitch,” he told me, burying his face in our cat's hair.

He was sobbing, screaming, demanding I reconsider.

I tore my sweet tabby from his arms, and let him leave. 

Callie cried after him, yowling and scraping at the door as if she wanted to follow. 

She didn’t move from the door, hissing at me when I tried to gently pull her into the lounge. 

Callie had always liked my husband more. 

She hated my parents, ignoring them when they visited and hiding when they tried to talk to her.

I locked her in the house that night, just in case my sweet, sick kitty tried to run away.

“Callie, baby are you okay?” 

No response. She doesn't even bite me anymore. 

That's a bad sign, especially with cats diagnosed early. 

It meant giving up. Resignation.

“Callie,” I repeated, blinking back tears. I cranked the radio up. Callie loved Olivia Rodrigo. But she's silent. In the corner of my eye, she's curled up on her blanket, head tucked between her legs. “You know I don't want to do this,” I hesitated, my heart lodged in my throat. “It's for the best."

No response, again. I stab the radio on to avoid the conversation I don't want to have with her. Saying goodbye. What would I even say to make it hurt less? How could I possibly say goodbye to my long-haired tabby without breaking apart?

So, I don't.

I save the goodbye for when she's gone, and I can't show her I'm ashamed.

Pulling into the parking lot, I scan the significant amount of cars.

I don't turn around, grabbing toilet paper from my glove compartment and swiping tears from my cheeks. 

“You're okay.” I force a smile, reassuring myself more than Callie.

I jump out of the front, and gently coax her from the back seat. She's so warm, already panicking, already trying to fight back.

“Shhh,” I whisper, stroking her hair. “It's going to be okay.” 

My phone vibrates and I pull it out. 

“Beth.” Adam’s voice feels like needles in my spine. “Please tell me you didn't do it.”

His shuddery breath sent me spiraling, my heart already full of doubt.

I squeezed my eyes shut instead of speaking. If I did, I'd say something I'd regret. If I let Adam brainwash me, just like my mother said, I'd jump back in the car and tear our baby’s euthanization papers. 

“I'm just down the road,” Adam whispered. “I have enough gas to get us to the border. I've packed your bag, Beth. Just come and meet me, and we can forget all this.”

His laugh broke me. “I told your Mom to go fuck herself.” 

“Adam.” I say, my words tangled and wrong.

I swallow my words when Callie leaps out of the backseat. 

“Callie!” I shriek, as she darts into the road. 

“Is that Callie?” Adam yelled. “Beth. Listen to me. You love her? Right? You love her more than anything.” His voice cracked. “Then let her go.” 

But I'm already grabbing her. 

My mother’s words suffocate me. “She’ll suffer, Elizabeth. Do you want Callie to suffer?” 

No. 

Callie screams and yowls, trying to bite me.

“It’s okay!” I don’t know how many times I’ve said it.

Okay doesn’t feel right.

She’s not going to be okay, is she?

Callie is going to die, and I’m going to regret it for the rest of my life.

“Beth.” Adam whispers. “I’m here.” 

“I'm sorry,” I whispered, and ended the call.

Stepping inside, I tightened my grip on Callie. The waiting room was full, dogs and cats with wide, frightened eyes. I sat down, ignoring Callie’s whimpering. 

A golden Labrador came over, his gaze glued to my baby. I shooed him away, an oldish looking woman violently yanking him back. 

“Callie McLester?” Her name was called.

I stood, pulling Callie with me. 

“Mom,” Callie whimpered, as I pulled my long-haired tabby inside a room of pristine white.

My long-haired tabby.

That's what Mom told me to envision.

A beautiful, blue eyed long-haired tabby. 

Not my autistic daughter. 

I'm eating breakfast when my eldest son appears in the doorway. 

He's smiling, which is unlike him. Usually, my eldest is a little shit in the morning.

I was scrolling through Facebook over my morning coffee, and he jumped into the seat opposite. I greeted him with a patient smile. “Have you taken your medication?” 

After several ADHD assessments, my son was taking Adderall daily.

His smile was wide, too wide, practically crawling off his face.

“Nope.” Jax stood up, and I admit I was a little taken-aback. He walked over to me, his hands behind his back before whipping out a small gift wrapped in sparkly paper. “Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.” 

I took the gift, my heart swelling. Mother's Day was a month ago, and my children put together their allowance and bought me a brand new vase. Jax rolled his eyes through the whole gift-giving thing.

While my other children were hugging me, my eldest steered clear, only offering me a sickly grin. Jax Sinclair would be estranged if he didn't live with me.

I tried everything. 

Therapy for both of us. Attempts to bond with him. I even took him to Italy for a mother-son trip, hoping a week away together might change things.

The little shit ran away and tried to buy a ticket to New York using my card. 

I spent three hours at customs proving he was my son while he sat there, silently seething because he wasn’t getting the attention he wanted. By that point, I was desperate. I bought him a PS5. 

At first, he actually seemed happy with it. 

Then I found it dumped in the trash.

So, my fifteen year old son randomly handing over a Mother's Day gift one month after Mother's Day was a red flag.

I mentally went through my Mom checklist. Did he want anything?

No, Jax never asked for a cent. I had to force him to even consider birthday and Christmas gifts, and even then he refused to unwrap them. Did he need anything? 

For breakfast, he usually made himself cereal and coffee. I started buying him little store-bought canned iced coffees, and he magically decided he hated them.

I heard some boys his age were talking about the new Grand Theft Auto. Could this be his attempt at asking me for it? 

“Mom?” Jax’s voice snapped me out of it, slicing through my thoughts. 

“Hm?” I didn't realize I was crying. 

I took the gift, swallowing my questions. “Thank you, sweetie,” I whispered, blinking back tears. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. Maybe his father had put him up to it.

Either way, a simple gesture of affection from my son had made my entire year. Running my fingers over the wrapping paper, I noticed it was perfectly wrapped. “Is this just from you, darling?”

“Yeah,” my son smiled wider. “Happy Mother's Day, Mom.” 

I was about to open it before my husband walked in. 

“Morning.” He made himself coffee, his curious eyes glued to my gift. “What's that?” 

“Nothing.” Jax surprised me with actual words, snatching the gift back. 

“Jax got me a Mother's Day present.” I grinned, taking the gift back. “How sweet!” 

“The kids already celebrated Mother's Day.” My husband sighed, ripped the gift from my hand, and dumped it in the trash. Something snapped inside me, bile filling my mouth. I swallowed my protests, pasting on a wide smile. “Go upstairs and get ready for school,” he snapped at Jax. 

Jax didn't move. “I want Mom to open her Mother's Day present,” he said. His lips curled, eyes narrowed. “Right in front of you.”

My gut twisted, my chest aching suddenly.

Fuck. 

Was that why? 

I was far too aware I was sweating, my heart in my throat.

Did my son… oh god, did he know?

“Go upstairs, honey,” I spat out before I could choke it back. “Now.” 

Jax nodded, turned around, and ran upstairs.

“Teenagers.” My husband laughed, pecking me on the cheek. “Ignore him! He’ll grow up one day.”

“Yeah,” I whispered, “of course he will.” I laughed. “It's just… Jax.” 

When he left to shower, I fished my son’s gift from the trash. I had half a mind to throw it away. Of course he knew.  Tearing through the paper, I found exactly what I expected: a DVD. Marked in bright red pen: “I HATE you.”

I ran upstairs to my bedroom, locked the door, and slid the DVD into our ancient player. As I pressed play, my hands were clammy. How much did my son know about my affair with his math tutor? It had just been a blip. 

I’d lost my mind for a few months and done things I regretted. Jax liked his math tutor, and I took that away from him. But how the fuck had he managed to film it? 

Was this blackmail? 

What did he want?!

The screen lit up, and I recognized the location.

It was our garage. 

Years ago. 

The date at the bottom of the screen read: 15/09/2016. 

Three small figures illuminated in harsh white light.

Annalise, Sammy, and Jax. 

“All right,” my husband’s voice growled. “Repeat what I said one more time.” He strode over to Jax. ”What is your name?” The small boy squeezed his eyes shut. 

“Zach.” 

I jumped when my husband grabbed his hair, tugging it. 

“I said WHAT is your NAME?” 

“Jax!” The boy squeaked. “It's…it's Jax!.” 

“And?” My husband demanded. “Fuckin’ SPEAK, kid.” 

“We want to go home,” the little girl whispered. “Please can we—”

“I said SPEAK.” My husband snapped.

“You're my Daddy,” Jax whimpered, “and… and that woman—” he squeaked, “Mom! I mean Mommy! The woman is my Mommy!”

My husband stepped back, and so did the camera. 

“Good.” 

He turned to me, who was filming. “Do you like them, sweetheart?”  The camera panned to my glistening eyes and wide smile. “Happy Mother’s Day.” 

I have to stay awake during my own dissection. So, I'm going to tell you about my first love.

Waiting to die is the worst part of dying. The drugs are cruel and cold, sliding into my veins like poison.

They say it's a precaution. I know the truth. They're scared of me. Of course they are. They're already in relationships.

Inside this ice-cold operating theatre, my body is flesh on metal, like meat to the slaughter. Figures loom over me in masks. This room is full of predators preying over my body, circling which parts they are going to cut out and which parts they will use.

But to them, I am the worst one.

I am the one with teeth, despite their cruel blades and scarlet hands.

I'm not the first one they have taken.

If I turn my head, I can see the body-shaped lump of lying limp on a gurney.

They had the mercy of being given a dignified death– and for a moment, not even the drugs can suppress the disdain bubbling inside me.

The operating theatre stretches like it is liminal. Endless.

It is spacious and has four exit doors, but to me, those sterile white walls are quickly closing in.

Cold hands grasp my face, jerking me to face the bright, sterile light blinding me.

Their touch is clinical, and I hate the feeling of rough latex against my skin.

The muzzle over my mouth is replaced with a tube forced down my throat.

I gag, contracting, my body jerking into a violent arch, straining against velcro straps. One figure shoves me back down.

“Administer 200 ml of Midazolam.”

He stares down at me through thick rimmed eye protection. Grey lenses hide his glee.

I’m supposed to be awake. It's the law.

Because I am technically a citizen, I must be awake to witness my own dissection.

I barely feel the new intrusion in my veins. Instead, I am laughing, spluttering through the tube lodged down my throat.

I watch one figure with blood-slicked gloves run his finger down my chest.

“Can I tell you guys something?” I whisper.

The masked figures don't respond, and my dissection begins.

I ignore the first cut.

I ignore the blooming crimson spreading across my flimsy hospital gown. So red, it startles me, my breath catching.

Since when has my blood ever been so colorful?

Instead, I focus on the light.

I can pretend it's heavenly.

That's the beauty of the human mind.

I can pretend I'm not being sliced open, unravelling piece by piece.

I speak again, because maybe they didn't hear me the first time.

“Can I tell you something?”

“Sure, kid,” the man cutting me open says. I hate being called a kid. Is that what our age-group has been reduced to? Kid?

I'm too old to look like a high-schooler, but too young to be considered a fully grown adult. If I was a real kid, they wouldn't be cutting me open.

I watch his steady scalpel cut through my skin, a small river of red following. I am numb to the cruelty of the blade slipping through me, like a knife through butter.

I wonder how he plans to unravel me. Will he start with my blood or organs?

Which parts of me are special, and which parts can be left on the cutting room floor?

The masked man gets to work, opening me up. His tone is gentle.

But I don't trust it. He adjusts the light, inserting a metal clamp inside the cavity in my chest, prying me open.

Maybe he's going for my heart first.

It is the root of infection, after all.

“Why don't you tell us all a story?”

“Dr. Carter,” another masked figure, a female, hisses. “We were explicitly briefed not to engage with this subject.”

The male surgeon, Dr. Carter, chuckles.

“Marie, do you know the story of the chicken running in circles despite having its head severed?”

“Yes,” she says, her voice is emotionless. Maybe because she had to be.

There's a moment of silence, and all I can see are my own scarlet insides.

His scalpel digs in, cruel and cold and merciless.

I half wonder when my body is going to give up.

Will I watch him unravel me until there is nothing left to beat and pound and pump?

I await the female surgeon’s response, but she does not give one.

“In the case of the chicken,” the surgeon continues.

He turns, wet fingers grasping a saw. I try not to cry out when blades start whirring.

I pray the dislodging of my heart will be enough to send me to sleep.

The male surgeon is clinical and cold, a certain detachment in his eyes.

He only sees me as a specimen on a table. I am not even a “kid” to him.

He cuts further into me, as the female surgeon hurriedly fights to stop blood flow. I’m not sure why. It's not like they're planning on me walking out of here.

“As we all know, the chicken’s head was fully severed from its body.”

I notice he's watching me more closely now, burrowing deeper and deeper.

“And yet, due to residual neuromuscular activity, the chicken exhibited extraordinary behavior,” he says, miming with his index finger. “It ran in circles, round and round, until it succumbed.”

Dr. Carter lets out an unprofessional laugh, his facade splitting open.

“Of course, the chicken is not alive.”

His eyes find mine. “It just thinks it is alive.”

“Right,” the female surgeon hisses.

He turns to her, head inclined. “Marie, are you in distress? You can leave if you can't stomach it. I can perform the dissection.”

“No,” she said quickly, regaining her composure. I'm stupid to think she's actually feeling sympathy.

I might not be human, according to Dr. Carter, but I definitely look like one.

The younger surgeon pulls down her mask. “I'm fine.”

“Get your shit together, Marie.”

This man confuses me.

He has the medical knowledge and vocabulary of a professional, and yet chooses to sound juvenile.

Dr. Carter stops the saw momentarily, glancing in my direction.

I hold his gaze, pretending not to notice the amusement in the folds of his mask.

“I have a hypothesis,” he murmurs.

“Given the heightened neural activity and the specimen’s condition post-infection, we may observe something… entertaining when we sever the head.

His attention flicks back to me.

He's making sure the procedure is slow, making sure to leave every nerve untouched, so I, like the chicken, will dance for his amusement.

“Go on,” he urges me, eyes wide, exhilarated. “Tell us a bedtime story.”

In response, I spit at him. Red fills my mouth, sticky and metallic, when he stabs into my upper chest, maybe my respiratory tract. My body jerks violently.

I can't breathe, suddenly, but it feels freeing, like I can let go.

My eyes roll back, and for a moment, there is darkness bleeding into me, drowning, but I let it. I embrace it.

“We’re in VF!”

Consciousness flickers, the female surgeon’s voice rings in my skull, frantic.

She sounds like ocean waves, coming in and out as my brain shuts down.

”Dr. Carter, the higher ups were very clear! We must keep it awake throughout the dissection. The subject is still a citizen—”

”I am aware. Defibrillator. Charge to 200.”

Pressure on my chest. I'm suffocating on slick scarlet spewing from my lips.

“Again—charge.”

“Come on, I need a rhythm!” Dr. Carter's voice breaks slightly. “I need a heartbeat!”

More pressure.

“Pulse! We’ve got a pulse!”

Darkness swims in and out, and my eyes fly open.

Through blurry feathered light, I can see the fleshy red of my exposed lung tissue.

I try to jerk my head away, but ice-cold, gloved fingers force my head up.

No.

Something in me snaps. My body contracts, a fountain of red hitting the mask pressed something plastic.

The female surgeon is suffocating me, pumping air into my lungs.

Her eyes are wide. Terrified.

I can't tell if she's terrified for me, or for herself, if she lets me die mid procedure.

Fear creeps into me, cruel and painful, a feral cry ripping from my throat.

The cruel slab of metal holding me trembles.

The female surgeon notices I have one arm free and she lunges forward, her eye protection dislodging and for a second, I am staring at terrified blue eyes.

She's younger than I thought, a med student, probably forced to start early.

Her expression crumples. “Fuck!”

“Are you all right?”

She nods, her hands reaching for her eye protection. “Yes.”

“Did it make direct eye-contact with you?”

“No.”

“Did any blood splash your face?”

I watch her turn to a sink, plunging her trembling hands into water.

She checks every crease in her palm, every nail, stabbing at her skin.

“No, I… I think I'm clean.”

His voice hardens, and through debilitating drugs, I feel his incisions growing clumsier. Dr. Carter is scared.

“You think you're clean, or you are clean?”

The female surgeon hurriedly slips on clean gloves. “I am clean, sir!”

“Good. Hold it down.”

Gloved fingers grip my arms, pinning me down.

No.

No, I don't want to be awake.

I don't want to be alive.

I'm aware I'm coughing, convulsing, my eyes flickering, rolling back and forth.

“The subject is stable,” the female surgeon gasps out, pulling back.

Her gloves are scarlet, dripping with me, half lidded eyes, like she is holding back a scream.

She swiped them on her scrubs, and yanked down her mask. She's grinning, her fingers grasping for my arm.

Her smile falters, slick fingers slipping from my arm. I can see her frenzied eyes.

“I've… I've successfully stabilised the young man!”

Dr. Carter doesn't look up from the flaps of skin he is peeling back. “Young man?”

“Yes!” Marie pulls down her mask, her eyes are bright, the crease in her mask widening. “Yes, I managed to save him!”

He sighs. “Keep it alive. No matter what.”

Dr. Carter meets my gaze, eyebrows furrowed. “Speak, kid,” he orders. “You wanted to tell us something. Correct?”

Again with the “Kid”.

I'm twenty five years old, asshole.

I have to think about my words, my thoughts are spinning.

“When I was 18,” I squeezed out. I'm surprised I have a voice, even with my head connected to my torso.

I wonder if my larynx is the last thing they will cut out.

Dr. Carter stops me, holding up a gloved hand. “Wait a moment.”

In a blink of my drugged up eyes, he pulls a pistol from his scrubs, stabs the barrel into Marie’s head, and pulls the trigger.

I barely flinch when her blood showers me, warm, tickling my face.

Her body drops to the floor, and to my confusion, Carter continues the procedure.

His attention flicks back to me.

“Continue,” he mutters. “When you were eighteen…?”

I do. Somehow.

"When I was eighteen years old, I realized I was a sociopath," the words tangled in my throat, and somehow, I am back there.

Joey Brekker’s end-of-school senior party. I was tipsy on several beers, teetering on the edge of the pool, dangling my feet in glistening blue.

I tip forwards, and it felt good, like I'm falling, but also not.

Several kids already in the water cheered me on, and I saluted them with my beer instead.

The summer heat prickles my skin, perspiration glues my hair to my eyes.

Mirren, my best friend, crouched in front of me, head tilted like she is studying me.

She grabbed my arms, swinging them playfully. “Can I ask you something?”

I laughed, sipping my beer. “It depends what.”

She laughed too hard, and I had to throw out my arms to stabilise her.

I pulled her closer, and I caught her eyes widening, her breath catching.

Mirren was beautiful, freckles speckling her cheeks, short blonde hair almost exclusively pulled back.

I should have liked her. I should've wanted to be with her.

We had been best friends since we were kids.

She fell in love with me when we were eight years old, proposing to me on the beach with a haribo candy ring.

I said, “Okay!”

But I wasn't expecting to feel nothing for her growing up.

I was seventeen years old, and I still didn't understand what feelings were.

I thought I could grow into them like puberty. I expected to just wake up one morning and fall deeply in love with her.

I asked her if we could wait until we were adults, in case it was just low-key.

Maybe I did love her, and I just couldn't feel it like others.

Mirren told me it felt like butterflies, like a fluttery warm sensation, like being drowned, suffocated by your own heart.

Very poetic.

Unfortunately for her though, I didn't get that feeling when I looked her in the eyes. I couldn't describe the feeling.

I tried to, but I sounded sociopathic, like I had no sense of feeling. Zero empathy.

But to me, she was like white paint, like tasteless yogurt, like a cloudy sky.

No real feeling, more of an acknowledgement of her existence.

“Hey,” I said, “How much did you drink?”

In response, she pulled a face. “I'm an adult!”

I couldn't fight a smile, helping her sit. She sort of fell onto her ass, tipping to the side.

“Hey, Jem?” she studied me through fluttering lashes, prodding me with her manicure.

I let her grasp hold of my chin, cradling my face with iced tips, jerking me to face her. “Can I ask you a question?”

“You already said that,” I said.

She frowned, open mouthed, her gaze elsewhere. “Oh.”

I laughed, letting her stroke my hair. “Yes?”

My best friend frowned at me.

“Are you like.... a sociopath who can't feel?"

Her words managed to splinter through my cold, dead, exterior.

If this was what feelings were, I didn't want them. I found my voice, somehow, speaking through the gutter in my throat.

“What's that supposed to mean?” I said, trying to hide how fucking hurt I was.

Mirren’s eyes shot open, wide and sorry, but also not sorry.

“Oh no, I didn't mean it like that!” she squeaked.

She reached out to pull me up, but her arms wandered, entangling around my neck, and pulling us closer.

Her breath tickled my cheeks, tainted with beer, but I let her pull me closer, and then closer, her lips finding my ear.

“How about now?”

Before I could respond, she smiled brightly, laughed, and cupped my cheeks.

She kissed me, and it was warm and fleeting, and felt like a goodbye.

Mirren tasted like a cocktail of lipgloss and beer.

Her skin was hot and sticky against mine. I expected to feel it: fireworks, explosions, butterflies.

But the party around me continued, dull and flat and colorless.

Mirren was a good kisser, and I kissed her back.

I copied her, touching her like she wanted me to. Her hands were far more frantic, as if she was driven by a desire that was nonsensical and alien to me.

It was feral, animalistic, dilating her pupils and turning her almost crazed and mindless. When people kissed, I could never understand what drove them into that animal-like euphoria.

Mirren was almost gnawing at my lip, and I didn’t feel anything except pain.

Still, I tried to mimic her.

The kiss deepened, her nails digging into my skin, scratching me.

Her body moved like it wasn’t hers. Her sharp exhales, gasps for breath, and wandering hands finding my torso told me she wanted to be touched.

She wanted me to follow in her wake. She wanted me to feel. When my hands clumsily found her face, she grabbed them, slamming them down on her butt.

Her breath tickled my mouth, in sharp gasps. “Like this,” she teased, guiding my hands to touch her.

I did, and grew more intense, lips finding my neck, whispering she wanted to be with me.

I tried, but my touch felt floppy and wrong, and eventually, she gave up.

There were no feelings, no sensations or desire inside of me that wanted her.

And maybe that numbness, that lack of desire, was contagious.

Mirren pulled away suddenly.

Her face was flushed, breaths heavy.

She leaned forward, pecking me on the cheek.

Then twisted around, and walked away.

”That is fascinating,” Dr. Carter’s voice bounces around my skull, stabling me to the present. Bright light feathers behind my eyelids. I'm not sure his voice is real.

I’m awake, but I'm not conscious.

I can sense the procedure continuing, but it is so much colder.

I imagine the blissful peace that accompanies death. Those phantom fingers wrapping around me, suddenly loosening and slipping away.

I want to, but the opposite clings to me.

While the darkness is cold, that blooming warmth I try to deny, keeps me from falling.

“A boy who does not know how to love,” Dr. Carter laments. I can feel myself being pulled back. His voice is louder, pricking the back of my mind.

“Tell me more."

Well, I tried to feel, I told him. Intimacy wasn’t just something I wanted; I craved it.

When I started college, I rebuilt myself as an extrovert. I joined a frat to dive into relationships, both platonic and sexual.

I slept with guys and girls, freshmen and upperclassmen, a guy from my classes whose name I don't even know, and with Mirren at her nineteenth birthday party.

But each empty relationship, each numb touch, clumsy kisses, and awkward sex only brought one realization: I didn't know how to love.

I couldn't feel it because there was no feeling. Around me, everyone else was in love, crushing, or falling.

They lived in a colorful world where everything made sense.

They were brought together, and knew what to do, driven by desire, passion, instinct.

I was stuck in monochrome nothing, black and white that was twisted, dull, and drowning me. I slept with a random guy just to feel something.

Maybe I was chasing a thrill, someone faceless and nameless who flirted with me while I was too drunk to care.

I didn’t want him, not really.

I wanted the butterflies, that aching in my chest and twisting in my gut others always talked about. Maybe I could find it if I was drunk enough. So I dragged him into a bedroom and kissed him first.

He was hot, sure, half lidded eyes, and crooked teeth. But when his lips touched mine, there was nothing. Just like with Mirren.

”Get on with it, young man,” Dr. Carter's voice bleeds into my brain.

It's definitely not him. Too playful and whimsy.

I'm grateful for my mind playing tricks on me, though. I prefer this version of him.

The dark is closing in on me. It's not close, but there's an inevitability to it I'm suddenly afraid to accept. Oblivion, and truly falling.

Did that mean I would stop thinking? Did that mean I completely stopped? Would I finally die?

“Young man,” Fake Dr. Carter’s voice is impatient. ”I told you to continue.”

Okay. Existential thoughts aside, yes. I did want to think out loud.

Before I was captured as an infected, I spent 365 days trapped in school lockdown…alongside the bane of my existence.

But that's not where it started.

On a random Monday in mid-June, I didn’t have to worry about not feeling anymore.

The cafeteria was packed. I was squeezed between two strangers I didn’t know, trying to eat a burger while Mirren sat on the table, her legs dangling.

It was too warm; hot, sticky heat prickled at my scalp.

The cafeteria had an open ceiling, so the sunlight was baking my back.

There was a strange scent in the air, BO mixed with a cedar-like musk.

It was following me.

Cologne.

Someone was either extremely over-confident, or had zero sense of smell.

I smelled it coming out of class, and bleeding into the cafeteria too.

The smell was coming from a guy.

Charlie, a freshman known for peeing on a girl at a party, was shuffling over to a group of girls.

Mirren slowly straightened up, moving from cross-legged to kneeling.

I had to swipe my plate of fries before she flattened them.

“What is he doing?” She murmured, intrigued. Mirren immediately started filming, alerting the rest of the table.

I could tell by the way her fingers moved, tipping the phone to landscape, this was viral worthy.

I was curious, intrigued by Charlie’s slumped shoulders and the slight stumble in his steps.

He walked all the way over to the girl, looming over her like a bad smell.

“Evelyn,” he said, like a whine, his body language growing progressively more unstable until he was bouncing on his heels, repeating her name like a mantra.

The atmosphere shifted rapidly from playful to concerning. Even Mirren lowered her phone, her eyes wide.

“Evelyn. Evelyn. Evelyn. Evelyn.”

Charlie was swaying, unsteady on his feet, eyes rolling back, jaw slack.

“Evelyn, Evelyn, Evelyn, Evelynnnnnnnn.”

He didn’t stop until the girl finally turned to face him, her expression frantic.

I noticed a slow, reddish blush blooming across her cheeks. She was embarrassed.

Furious.

“You didn’t call me,” Charlie stated loudly, drawing more eyes. He stepped closer, until he was uncomfortably near.

Mirren zoomed in on her phone.

I caught it too, a slow-spreading blotch of red, like diluted blood, creeping across the white of his left eye.

“You didn't call me, Evelyn,” Charlie said, his face twitching, eyes flickering.

His whole body twitched, fists coming apart and together. He broke out into a sob, his lips breaking into a manic grin.

Evelyn was frozen, her eyes frantic, lips parted. Charlie laughed, and then spluttered up a mouthful of blood.

That was when the screams started.

Mirren dived to her feet, still holding the camera. The girls sitting with Evelyn grabbed their bags and backed away.

But the girl herself stayed frozen, trembling.

One girl tried to pull her away, but to my confusion, Evelyn refused to move.

Instead, she stood up, closed the distance between them, and slowly reached out, and cupped his cheeks.

“We had a great time,” Charlie said, “and you never fucking called me."

“Charlie,” Evelyn said softly. “I dated you for a bet.”

I caught Mirren's smirk.

It happened fast, too fast to process, the world around me falling apart.

Charlie lunged forward like an animal, sank his teeth into Evelyn’s neck, and tore her throat out. I couldn’t move.

Screams crashed into me as Charlie hurled himself into the crowd, tackling students and tearing into them.

But I was the only one who noticed that Evelyn wasn’t dead.

I was dragged back, stumbling over the bodies falling like dominoes.

I was caught between surviving and understanding.

Evelyn’s corpse spasmed.

Her neck twisted at an unnatural angle, eyes snapped open, a fountain of red burst from her lips.

I backed away, slipping in the blood pooling beneath my feet.

Fuck.

“Jem!" Mirren was screaming.

Evelyn's eyes flew open, a vicious, terrifying stain of scarlet spreading across her pupils. She sprang to her feet.

And lunged for the nearest person.

Mirren was already running toward the door. The world seemed to move in slow motion. I couldn’t move.

Out of the corner of my eye, a dark-haired boy leapt onto her back, knocking her onto the ground.

I remember her wide, terrified eyes. I remember her scream.

But, just like Evelyn, she was paralyzed, eyes flickering, like she was confused.

The boy didn't even hesitate, plunging his hand into her chest, and ripping out her heart.

Human hearts remind me of paint. Her heart was just that.

Thick, lumpy paint dripped through his fingers, ventricles squeezed in his palm.

She hit the ground, dark red blossoming around blood-stained blonde.

My best friend, who I had known since we were kids.

Who called herself my soulmate.

I remember screams, dulling to ocean waves slamming into my ears.

By the time I reached her, crawling on my knees, she was unrecognizable.

I counted my steps, stumbling over myself.

All around me, students were alive, and then they were dead.

They were running, and then they were on the ground, lying in their own entrails.

One step. My breath shuddered, my steps clumsy and wrong.

A guy lunged at me, and I shoved him aside.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Fivesixseveneight—

By the time I reached the door, half the cafeteria was infected.

Mirren was sitting up, head lolled, eyes half lidded.

She slowly pulled herself to her feet, ankles broken, and dragged her body to an infected guy ripping into a freshman.

Evelyn and Charlie were wrapped in each other’s arms, chewing on each other’s faces.

I didn’t understand the virus yet, but I knew one thing.

It wasn’t spread just through biting or blood. There was a visible pattern, especially in the freshly infected.

They were faster, hungrier, and obsessed with multiplying.

Day One: my college campus was overrun by zombie-like creatures wearing the bodies of college students. I watched my best friend’s heart ripped from her chest.

I found a bathroom stall and locked myself inside, cradling my arm, my fingers tip-toeing over the raw bite mark ripped through my shoulder.

I wanted to be in denial, but I had felt the bite. Vicious teeth sliced into my skin, clamping down.

It only let go when I slammed a chair into its skull.

I traced the bite, pressing my hand over my mouth to stifle the sobs.

In a fairer world, my jacket would have shielded me from the bite.

I prodded the bloody skin where the teeth had skinned away two layers of flesh, dark red veins pulsing across my arm and creeping toward my elbow.

Of course I was infected.

Outside the stall, one of them was feasting.

I could hear the flesh being ripped apart, bones snapping, and the gnawing.

I worked fast, tearing off my jacket and wrapping it around my hands, restraining my wrists.

I slipped onto ice cold tiles, pressed my head against the wall, closed my eyes—

And waited to turn.

However, hours turned into days.

Curled up against the door, eyes squeezed shut and praying for a miracle, I realized I wasn’t turning.

”Almost finished.”

Fake Dr. Carter's voice bleeds inside my mind, pulling me back to my present, where most of me had been ripped away.

I had been torn apart, hollowed out, only my head and torso left.

That's what I guess, anyway. The only parts of me left were my brain and heart.

If I focus, pushing myself through the drugs, I can sense his scalpel scraping across the cavernous hole that is my torso.

"Your kind is truly fascinating! The bodies are clinically deceased, and yet here you are."

Fake Dr. Carter… No, it's the real one.

That sadistic tone is all too familiar.

It's not a hallucination, either.

The lingering parts of me can sense and feel his scalpel.

He stabs at raw nerves, and my body convulses.

"I've been studying neuromuscular abnormalities in the human brain for your entire lifespan," he hums. "Who knew the perfect specimen would be delivered right to me?"

I shiver when he drags his blade purposely across my arm.

“What makes you tick, though, hmm?” His warm breath tickles my ear.

“You are infected. In most cases, the pathogen fights to multiply. But in your case, the mode of transmission is…”

I sense him move back, jerking away from me.

He knows how fast it is; knows how fast I can end his life.

He stabs at my arm again.

“Unique.”

Dr. Carter is right. This thing wasn’t just spread through bites.

I realized that on Day 12, when I broke out of the stall, confident I wasn’t going to turn.

I had been feverishly monitoring my infection.

Day two, I started going hot and cold, breaking out into cold sweats.

Day 4, my bite started to heal, leaving behind a tendril-like rash spreading across my neck and down my back.

Day 8, I managed to eat half a candy bar I had in my backpack.

Day 10, I drank a full bottle of water and was able to stand up, pulling open the stall.

I tried to ignore the corpse at my feet spilling its insides. The first thing I glimpsed was my reflection in the bathroom mirror. I resembled a ghost.

Sickly pale skin, hair plastered to my forehead in floppy strands.

Looking closer, I saw it, a single red smudge, slowly spreading across the white of my right eye.

While those thin black veins, the ones creeping down my spine, were spider-webbing towards my left.

I was definitely infected.

But I wasn’t turning.

I pushed open the boys bathroom door, but it didn't move.

Movement outside. Footsteps.

“Anyone in there?” a male voice squeaked. “Are you infected?”

I stepped back, pulling on my jacket to hide my bite mark. “No,” I lied.

“Cover your eyes,” he said.

“What?”

“Cover your eyes,” he repeated, “Or you're on your own.”

The door opened slightly, and a piece of torn cloth slipped through the gap.

I picked it up, following his instructions.

“Wrap it around your eyes, and stay out of my way.”

I blindfolded myself, the sound of the door setting my nerve endings on fire.

Something snapped inside me, a sudden feral urge to get closer to this person.

“All right, my eyes are covered,” I said, stepping back.

Being blindfolded in an outbreak wasn't a great idea, but if he was a survivor, I had to work with him.

It was silent, so silent that the sound of my own breath sent me spiraling.

Then came footsteps. Drawing closer. Closer. Until I could feel someone standing right in front of me.

“Eye contact,” he murmured, “is a form of transmission. The infection starts with a bite... but they don't transform until there’s a mutual, intimate connection.”

I couldn’t resist a laugh.

“You’re kidding,” I said.

In response, he shoved the door open and gestured me through with a quiet hiss. I followed.

“Take off your blindfold,” he muttered, standing behind me, breath tickling my neck. “But don’t look at me. Look down at your feet, and then tell me I’m kidding.”

This guy had a condescending tone. I immediately wanted to punch him in the face.

Still, I pulled off my blindfold, blinked rapidly, and stared straight down.

Bodies.

A girl and a boy entangled like snakes, wrapped around each other, their mouths fused together. They were still alive, still moving, their skin slick and wet. I jumped back, muffling a cry.

“Holy fuck!”

The boy reapplied my blindfold.

“Stage two of infection,” he murmured. “Find a mate.”

I almost turned around, and, sensing his scowl, I stayed still.

“Mate?” I hissed. “Like—”

He blew a raspberry. “Yeah.”

We continued down the dimly lit hallway, filled with writhing bodies curled together like they were hibernating.

“I’m infected, by the way,” the boy said casually, and something in me snapped. I almost faced him again, and he shoved me. “I said don’t fucking look at me!"

I twisted forward, my breath stuck in my throat.

“You’re also infected,” he said. “I can smell it on you. You stink of rot, dude."

I had zero other response than, "Thanks?"

We reached the end of the hallway. I didn’t dare turn around.

“I’m Conrad,” the boy said, surprising me with a gentle nudge to the back.

“The school is locked down, so we can’t get out.” He opened the door for me, and I stumbled through blindly.

“The infected won’t attack us because we’re technically infected too. They’re just looking to mate.”

I found my voice, rasping through the gutter of my throat. “How do you know so much?”

He didn’t reply until we were safely inside a classroom.

“I saw it,” he said, his voice flat. “One of my best friends was bitten and thought he was okay... until he started talking to a girl. Next thing I knew, they were eating each other’s faces off. The virus lies dormant until the host makes a connection.”

“But the girl wasn’t infected, right?” I said.

He let out a frustrated hiss.

“Are you deaf? I said, you don’t have to be bitten. Bites only infect. But actual connection, intimacy, makes you turn.”

I held my breath. The irony was killing me.

“So wait…” I choked back a laugh. “it’s spread through feelings?”

“Yep!”

Conrad barricaded the door, and I leaned against a desk, keeping my gaze on the floor. I glimpsed his bite through my blindfold, a raw, red mark on his ankle.

I found myself scooting back, swallowing. “You said those things aren’t gonna attack.”

He sighed, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw him slump to his knees, burying his head in his lap.

“Yes, because we’re infected,” he said, with a condescending edge to his voice. “It can take one single look.”

He still wasn't making sense.

We sat in comfortable silence for a while.

The blindfold was sticky with sweat, and I was prickling with the urge to tear it off.

“Don't,” Conrad broke the silence with a sigh. “That's what it wants.”

So, I stayed blindfolded.

Conrad wasn't the best companion.

Pretentious, self-righteous, and constantly nagging. He reminded me of my mother.

But he had his vulnerable moments. He opened up when we were stuck in the faculty office. I’d grown used to wearing a blindfold. Conrad was like a shadow.

I never saw his face, but his silhouette was always by my side.

“I was in an abusive relationship,” he admitted once, while we were eating scraps of food, our backs to each other.

“She was a senior, and I was a freshman. I didn’t realize it was wrong until she was emotionally and physically abusive. And, like an idiot, I stayed. Until she actually fucking hurt me. She pinched me in the face when I told her it was over.”

Conrad went quiet for a moment. “I was brought up to be a ‘man’,” he said bitterly. “So I thought I was weak, letting her hurt me. Eventually, I told my dad, and he laughed. He said, ‘What? You’re being hurt by a fucking girl?"

He went quiet, before continuing.“Ever since, I’ve struggled to even touch people. I can’t even hug them.”

I nodded, even though he couldn’t see it. “So… that’s why you’re not turning?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I can’t stand touching people.”

“You're in luck,” I said, with a laugh. “I’ve never had feelings for anyone. Ever.”

He surprised me with a chuckle. I could hear his smile.

“Good to know,” he said. “You didn't tell me your name.”

“Jem,” I introduced myself.

I could hear the smile in his voice. “Sup, Jem.”

Against all odds, I had survived the Love Bug Virus. Yes, I named it.

Love Bug. Which would later officially be penned LV.

365 days since an infection that spread through feelings turned my college campus into a quarantine zone.

It started with feelings, consuming each other, and finally, becoming one.

At my feet lay two bodies entwined around each other.

The girl had burrowed her way into the boy, the two of them becoming one singular creature, sliding across the hallway floor.

“Urgh,” Conrad muttered beside me, carrying a baseball bat for emergencies. “You couldn't pay me to do that to you.”

Conrad was why both of us were still alive.

This virus thrived on feelings, and I had grown to despise this boy.

He wasn’t crazy about me, either.

And 365 days since meeting him, Conrad had become the bane of my existence.

Maybe it was when we finally looked at each other by accident. We were no longer anonymous, two lost shadows.

Now we were face to face.

I accidentally tore off my blindfold after a long day of searching for supplies, and he was just standing there, his raw eyes staring directly at me.

Conrad wasn’t what I expected. Wide brown eyes, blondish hair tied into a ponytail, and freckles.

He kind of reminded me of Mirren. He was younger, maybe by a year, that scarlet smudge alive in his pupils.

With him, it was more prominent, visible, pulsing black veins protruded along his neck. For a moment, I was startled.

Just seeing another human after so long felt alien.

Conrad had always been a shadow to me, and now here he was, gawking at me like a deer caught in headlights.

I snapped out of it, slapping my hands over my eyes when he made a choking noise, twisting away.

“Fuck,” he hissed, turning his back.

I caught him peeking through his fingers. “Why aren’t you wearing your blindfold?!”

“I thought you were asleep!” I bit back.

From what I had witnessed, immediate eye contact counted as a connection.

However, nothing happened.

The two of us stood staring at each other, waiting for something to happen.

But nothing did.

Still. No extended glances, or stuck in enclosed spaces.

No touching.

That's how it spread.

The problem with Conrad was, he was noticeably more far gone.

It started with memory loss, refusal to eat, and quickly turned into erratic behavior. Wandering the halls alone. Intentionally seeking out a mate.

The virus wasn’t just dormant inside him.

It was awake and fucking with his mind.

His eyes were nearly scarlet, with just a sliver of white left.

His erratic behavior made him unbearable. We were sweeping the campus when I found what was left of Mirren, crawling across the floor.

Somehow, she had grotesquely fused with a boy.

They were a frenzy of slimy limbs, clawing for meat.

Nearby, Conrad crouched over someone’s vertebrae.

“Don’t touch them,” I warned. “It spreads through blood.”

“Don’t touch them,” he mocked, twisting to me. “Relax, Mom. I’m fine.”

Gunshots rang out, followed by thudding boots.

Soldiers.

Conrad’s head snapped up, eyes glassy. The virus was already inside us, pushing us toward a mate.

Conrad had stopped pretending.

I tightened my blindfold.

“We’re infected,” I whispered. “We’re fine with each other, but if we make eye contact with them, we’ll transform.”

Conrad wasn’t listening.

He had already locked onto someone else, nostrils flaring.

“Conrad!”

He blinked red out of his eyes, veins spreading down his arms.

“What?”

"Come on," I tugged on his arm, and he pulled a face, lips pulled back in a snarl.

Territorial.

I yanked him harder, and he stumbled, already muttering threats.

Half-turned Conrad was driving me insane.

I dragged him into a closet, ignoring his protests.

Enclosed space.

“We’re too close,” he whispered as soldiers thundered past the door.

I was frozen in place, unable to tear my eyes off of him.

Had his eyes always been this brown?

“Hey,” he hissed, his breath warm on my face. “Snap out of it.”

I nodded, my breath shuddering.

"Jem," he said.

"What?"

I didn't realize we were bumping foreheads.

His right eye was fully red. "You're sweating," Conrad whispered. "Bad."

I swiped at my burning skin.

“I’m not infected,” I said defensively. “I'm with you.”

He scoffed and cupped my face. Touch.

But I didn't pull away.

His voice slurred, the first sign of turning.

“Well, neither am I.”

My body burned. My heart pounded.

He kissed my neck suddenly.

I let him.

Sensation flooded me. Sensations I thought were dead.

I kissed him back, desperate, feral for his touch.

Our limbs entangled.

Skin on skin.

Clarity cut through me.

This was what it felt like.

Fireworks.

Butterflies.

This was what it felt like.

“You’re definitely infected,” he murmured.

Time slowed, and I felt myself lost, falling, but flying.

I barely noticed his kisses becoming bites, tearing into my throat.

But I let him burrow deeper, and deeper, tipping my head back.

This was what it felt like.

Conrad was what it… felt like.

“Do you think we’re turning?” he whispered, lips splitting into a grin.

His mouth found mine again, but they were comfortable.

Warm.

I didn’t pull away. I kissed deeper, until I was falling.

I was violently pulled back to the present.

Back to Dr. Carter tearing me open.

But it was getting easier to fade. Back to this memory.

Back to my first love.

I didn't want to let go of him. Ever.

I wrapped my arms around his neck.

Conrad's question played on my foggy mind.

Were we turning?

Nah.

I was in a hurry, and coffee was needed. 

“Uh, hi,” I greeted the scowling barista.

My type. The zero sleep, zombie looking college guys with floppy hair and narcolepsy. His black nylon shirt was covered in sugar, and his apron was loosely tied, like he'd dressed in his sleep. 

He was already rolling his eyes, notepad and pen ready, anticipating my typical TikTok girl order. It wasn't a viral drink.

It had been my order since I was seventeen.

“Could I have, uh…can I get a triple ristretto espresso, lightly pulled at around 198 degrees, with oat milk that’s been steamed to exactly 55°C so it stays naturally sweet without scorching?” I took a deep breath, my cheeks steaming.

“With one pump of sugar-free vanilla, half a pump of brown sugar syrup, a quarter pump of hazelnut, two dashes of cinnamon, one shake of freshly grated nutmeg, and orange zest.” I could already sense the stares, quickly adding, “No foam.”

“Cassie.” The barista was fighting a smile behind his notepad. He peeked over. “You do realize you don't have to repeat your order every single time you come here.” 

Before I could respond, he took an exaggerated deep breath and closed his notebook.

“A triple ristretto espresso lightly pulled at around 198 degrees, with oat milk that’s been steamed to exactly 55°C so it stays naturally sweet without scorching with one pump of sugar-free vanilla, half a pump of brown sugar syrup, a quarter pump of hazelnut, two dashes of cinnamon, one shake of freshly grated nutmeg, and orange zest.” His notepad slipped from his fingers in a mic-drop. “No foam.”

I opened my mouth, and he immediately cut me off. “Pour a heart instead of a tulip, and dust only the LEFT side with cocoa powder.” 

He smirked. “None-sweet vegan cocoa powder.” 

Two teen girls behind me began clapping, giggling to each other. 

I wasn't sure if they were mocking me, or him. The barista was unbothered, mouth curved into a smile, and I found myself grinning back, butterflies buzzing in my gut as he scribbled my name on a coffee cup. “Coming right up!” 

I watched him make my coffee, entranced by his movement, making every little thing perfect. When he handed it over, I almost asked him his name, and then swallowed it down and handed him the cash instead. 

“I'm Quinn,” he said. 

Before I could respond, he nodded to the woman behind me, and seemingly forgot I existed. “Hello! What can I do for you, ma’am?” 

I backed away, my cheeks warmer than the coffee. The two girls were laughing.

I could feel their eyes burning into the back of my skull. “What a fucking pick-me, I'm literally SO embarrassed for her,” one of them said. Loudly. So everybody could hear. I made a quick escape, making a note to never step inside there again. 

I headed to my brother’s office, to annoy him.

He was a software engineer, and my own personal (reluctant) therapist. 

I slumped in a chair behind him, watching my brother type meticulously. Every time he made a mistake, he shot me a glare like it was MY fault. I was halfway through the barista story, when I caught his gaze drifting towards his headphones. “Anyway, the guy was cute. Literally a zombie. Totally my type. He even knew my order—”

“Fascinating.” My brother muttered, gaze stuck to his computer screen. “Don't you have a job?” He typed, backspaced, then retyped. “That's NOT here?” 

“Jonas.” I groaned.

He twisted in his chair, glaring. “Cassie,” he mocked my voice. “Go.” 

I did leave, bumping into a friend from college. 

“Yo, Cassie.” Ethan was walking his dog, a large golden retriever, Pippa. I stroked the dog while he offered me weed. “Still single?” He winked, and I shoved him. We made a joke-pact in high school. If we were still single by twenty four, the two of us would elope in Vegas.

I still had six months. 

He had a boyfriend who was interested in being polyamorous. 

Ethan left me with his number and a half smoked blunt.

I headed back to my brother’s office to annoy him further. 

On the way, a whole street had been blocked off with yellow tape. 

I started to run.

It was my brother’s apartment.

In a daze, I tried to throw myself through a barrage of police, only to see Jonas’s mutilated body being carried on a stretcher. I could barely see his face, only what used to be one, skeletal white jutting from pooling red, his limp hand hanging over the edge. “We’ve got more,” I heard a police officer hiss behind me, his voice slicing through the ringing in my skull.

“Male. Mid twenties. Found in the park. Poor guy’s dog was disembowelled a few meters away. Two teenage girls were found with their faces ripped off.”

All of the breath was squeezed from my lungs. 

Ethan. 

Jonas.

The two girls. 

If someone was targeting the people I’d interacted with, I knew who was next.

Somehow, I managed to sprint back to the coffee shop, and just as I’d feared, Quinn was gone.

I ran all the way home with my phone pressed to my ear.

“Hello?” I choked back a sob. “I think someone’s killing everyone I talk to, and now someone’s missing…”

I yanked open my door, and found myself face to face, breath to breath, with Quinn the barista. 

Quinn, who calmly held Ethan's severed head in one hand.

And my coffee in the other.

“Hi, Cassie,” he said. “He's your triple ristretto espresso, lightly pulled at around 198 degrees, naturally sweet with one pump of sugar-free vanilla, half a pump of brown sugar syrup, a quarter pump of hazelnut, two dashes of cinnamon, one shake of freshly grated nutmeg, and orange zest.” 

He dropped Ethan's head, smiling sheepishly. “Oh! I almost forgot.” 

He stepped closer, his breath feathering my cheek. “No foam.”

I picked her up outside a hotel.

I already knew she’d been thrown out.

The clerk stands in the doorway, arms folded, a phone to his ear.

She looks exhausted, dark shadows under her eyes, but she’s wearing a smile that’s already resigned. Fifteen or sixteen, around my age. Ready to give up.

She’s wearing a summer dress and sandals, and I can tell she hasn’t had a shower in weeks.

Her dress sticks to her, thick brown curls glued over her eyes, and a blooming red sunburn stains her skin. I wonder how long she's been hiding in the hotel.

Teenagers are public enemy number one, so it's not surprising the clerk’s beady eyes follow her to the passenger side of my beaten up bug.

“Hi!” She grins, relief bleeding from her tone that's almost a sob.

She jumps into my truck. “I'm Cinna.” She introduces herself with a fake name. Cinna is her favorite character in her favorite book tucked at the bottom of her pack. Her real name is Addison Hart.

16 years old.

She escaped a nullification camp with six dollars, a stolen iPhone 17, and a Polaroid camera.

She apologizes for her lack of hygiene with a laugh, and I smile and blast the AC.

“Don't worry about it,” I tell her, gesturing to my shorts and t-shirt combo I've been wearing since I found a lake off route 46.

Since then, it's just been hoping for rain, and sneaking into motel bathrooms.

Addison, sorry, Cinna, twists in her seat and asks me point blank:

“Dude,” she laughs, but she's blushing, embarrassed, already shifting uncomfortably. “Do you have any pads?”

I'm kinda surprised her life on the run hasn't significantly fucked with her cycle.

I haven't had a period since I was sixteen.

But I smile, nod, and gesture to my glove compartment. “I have tons.” I laugh when she snatches one up, her smile widening.

“I pick up a lot of kids,” I tell her. “I've lost count how many times I've been asked, so I raided a hotel bathroom.”

Addison squeaks excitedly, and leans back in her seat, squeezing the pads to her chest like a newborn baby. “You are an angel!” Then she blinks. Surprised. “Wait!”

Her eyes widen, and she sticks her head out of the window. “A beaten up red truck, and a teen driver!” She gasps. “Are you her?”

“That's what I've been reduced to?” I say. “Her?”

Addie grins. I catch her snatching up a cereal bar and stuffing it in her mouth. She doesn't even chew.

“You're the one who takes kids to a safe-haven,” she says through a mouthful, spitting crumbs everywhere. “I heard about you from a guy who was…” she drifts off, her smile fading, crawling from her face. “Anyway.” Addie demolishes the cereal bar in a single bite. “He said you're like, I dunno, a Gen Z Katniss.”

“I'm just a transporter.”

I tap the steering wheel, fiddling with the radio. Taylor Swift sputters through the static, and we both groan.

Addison pulls a face, and I know exactly what she's going to say. “I can't believe she sold out,” she whispers. “I fucking hate that stupid message she tacks onto the end of her songs.” Addison mimics the radio. “If any of my fans are out there, just know you're loved, and coming home will keep you all safe!”

“She was forced to, you know,” I remind her, as an ex-swifty who burned all of my albums. “They threatened her family.”

“I don't care." Addison grumbles. We’re both avoiding the elephant in the room.

It's comfortable, better, to talk about issues that don't matter instead of issues that do. “They're all the same.”

“So, where are you headed?” I ask.

Addison smiles, throwing her feet up on the dash. “The safe-haven! You can take me, right?” Her eyes widened. “Wait, do I need an ID? My mom burned all my shit before she sent me to—”

“No ID.” I say before she goes off on another tangent. She reminds me of Asa, my ADHD riddled bestie. Asa’s parents shot him in the head when he was asleep. “You're fine. I'll just drop you off.”

“Yay!” Addie cranks up the radio.

Oasis. She sticks her head out the window and screams the lyrics.

I can't help singing along loudly, slamming my hands on the wheel.

It's just us, the long, dusty dead road, and a band none of us have cared about until now. “This was my mom’s favorite song!” Addie yells, laughing. Her hair whips my face. “I said, maaaaybeeeeeee!”

After absolutely destroying our voice-boxes singing to every classic, she leans back in her seat.

“Sooo.” She says, playfully kicking me. “What kinda kids have you picked up?”

I have to think about that.

There's been a lot.

“There was one kid called Elliot,” I began. “Total asshole. He could, like, do this,” I mimic Elliot’s power, snapping my fingers. “Literally like a human firecracker.”

I'm pretty sure Elliot’s blood still stains her seat.

It's okay, though. She won't see it. His body is still in the back.

Addie laughs. “Was he at least HOT?”

“Ew!” I giggle. “No. Not my type.” I sigh, stretching.

“Then there was Aris. She reminded me of a princess.” I smile at the thought of her lying in a ditch, just off route 46. “Her power was x-ray vision. She was cute.”

“Where are they now?” Addie asks.

“Exactly where I'm taking you.”

“Sounds fun!” Addie kicks her feet. “Do you wanna guess what my power is?”

She's so innocent, so fucking stupid. I almost feel bad for what I'm going to do.

I can't wait until I carve it from her skull.

I take the powerful ones for myself, and deliver the rest to our great president.

“Shoot.” I laugh. “Can't be worse than Elliot The Firecracker.”

Addie's smile widens. “Telepathy, babe.”

Professor Orwell is my favorite professor.

“Good afternoon,” Orwell booms. I notice his collar is wonky, the buttons on his shirt uneven. He leans against his desk at the front. “Take your seats,” he ushers. “Class is about to start.”

“I'm gonna ask him for his number,” I whisper to my friend Ben, "Do you think he's single?”

Ben rolls his eyes. “Shut up.” 

Orwell’s expression twitches when he notices Ben. 

“Benjamin Sykes!” he laughs. “Wow. I mean, I'm a BIG fan,” he leans forward, his eyebrow quirking. “How's Daddy, Ben?” 

“Dead.” Ben deadpans. “You killed him.” 

The class laughed, a little nervously, more of a titter.

Orwell doesn't budge, his smile widening. 

I saw Ben’s parents die live on TV. 

His siblings mutilated bodies crushed under rubble. 

Ben was fifteen, his horrified, bloodied, screaming face broadcast across every news channel. 

Orwell doesn't wait for Ben’s response. “We're not going to have a problem, are we?” He smirks. “I have the right to defend myself.” 

Ben smiles evenly. “I want to learn how to do it,” he says. “What you did to my Dad.” 

“Oooh, a defector!” Orwell teases. “I would be HONORED to teach you.”

“It's not like I have a choice,” Ben says, “I was sent to a reeducation camp.” 

I shove him. “Shh!” 

Orwell starts the class.

“All right! Take out your laptops, notepads, pens, and pencils.”

Orwell wheels in three gurneys, each carrying a person strapped down. Teenagers, by the look of them—two boys and a girl.

I lean closer.

Wait.

Their skin is too… glossy. 

“Wait,” Ben murmurs. “Are they…”

“Correct, Ben! They are mannequins! I see you have your father's intelligence and insight.” 

I wanted human volunteers. 

That's the whole reason I joined this class; to be up close and personal to the most horrific psychological torture from the man himself. “Well, they WERE going to be mannequins! However! Today’s lesson has been… altered slightly, on account of a willing volunteer.” He nodded at me---no, next to me. Ben. “Mr Sykes, you want to learn, correct?” The teacher’s grin was manic, almost feral. “Become my… assistant, let's call it! And I'll show you how I killed your father.” 

“You didn't kill him,” Ben's voice cracks. He's still smiling. “You made him kill himself.”

“Oh, but not just that,” Orwell’s maniacal giggle makes me flustered. The teacher grins. Wide. Animalistic.

“I made your brother rip out your sister’s heart— and enjoy it. I made your mama feel pleasure, dear boy, when she drowned you in the tub! Oh, the thoughts I made her think! About how perfect it would be to stick her fingers down her own throat and rip her lungs from her sternum while you fought for air! The perfect mother-son bonding session.” He shrugs. “Well, It almost was. Unfortunately for me, you seem to be a fighter.” 

“I don't want to hurt you.” Ben says. 

Orwell grins. The doors to the classroom slam shut. 

“A fighter,” he repeats, skipping across the stage. “You survived my massacre. And you survived reeducation camp.” Orwell is looking at Ben the way I wish he looked at me. “Believe me, Mr Sykes, you are exactly what we want.” 

Ben’s eyes ignited. A beam of concentrated red light shot from dilated pupils. The professor ducked, and it bounced off one of the gurneys, slicing the head from another student. Laughs followed, and I had to stifle my own. 

“Ben Sykes. One of the last superheroes on Earth, because we fucking killed them all!” Orwell gestures him closer. “Be my volunteer. That’s why you joined  this class, right? You’re fascinated with my methods.”

“I am,” Ben says, and his voice breaks. 

I believe his expression, his trembling, his half smile that's already given up. Ben stumbles to the front, entranced, eyes wide and glassy. 

He lies on the gurney and allows Orwell to pin down his wrists. 

“Now, this, class,” Orwell tells us, “is the perfect way to lower the hero's inhibitions. Just a bed with simple restraints. Nothing fancy. Don't show off.” 

I write that down, next to my doodle of Orwell and our child: “Don't show off. Simple restraints.” 

“Psychological conditioning,” Orwell says, preparing his instruments, “is simple. You just need to know how to do it.” 

Orwell gestures. “Any other volunteers? For the breaking.” He catches my eye and smiles, running his finger over a scalpel blade. “Anastasia?” I'm on my feet, breathless, already stumbling to the front.  It feels like I'm walking on clouds.

Orwell hands me a thin metal rod. “Straight through the base of the skull, Anastasia. This is what Introduction to Villainy is all about. Leaving your empathy behind.” 

I take the needle, and plunge it through Ben’s skull.

He screams, wails, his cries rattling my skull.

“Okay!” Orwell wipes the blood trickling down his temple. “So, today, we are going to teach Ben how to feel exactly how WE feel, by manipulating the pleasure of points inside his brain.” He mimes me plunging deeper, and I followed.

Ben’s eyes shoot open, wide and delirious and he began to laugh. Hysteria bubbles up, in slow trickles of red spewing from his lips. Orwell leans closer to the boy, lips to his ear. “Do you remember what I did to your father, Ben? The way I… wormed my way inside his head, and twisted him inside out? I made him want to die, Ben, and it felt… euphoric.” 

“Yes.” Ben whispers, giggling, pulling at the restraints. “Yes, yes, yes!” 

I plunge deeper. 

CRUNCH

“How did that make you FEEL, Ben?” Orwell hums.

“Amazing.” The boy whimpers. His eyes roll back, lips parting. 

“I feel…amazing…” He tosses back and forth, his limbs contorting, mouth stretching wider. 

“Amazing… amazing… amazing… amazing-”

A door creaks open.

“Daddy?!”

A small voice cries from the back of the room.

I twist around, blood slick across my palms. 

DADDY?

A little girl. Maybe five or six. Her eyes widen, mouth parting.

And begins to scream. 

I picked her up outside a hotel.

I already knew she’d been thrown out.

The clerk stands in the doorway, arms folded, a phone to his ear.

She looks exhausted, dark shadows under her eyes, but she’s wearing a smile that’s already resigned. Fifteen or sixteen, around my age. Ready to give up.

She’s wearing a summer dress and sandals, and I can tell she hasn’t had a shower in weeks.

Her dress sticks to her, thick brown curls glued over her eyes, and a blooming red sunburn stains her skin. I wonder how long she's been hiding in the hotel.

Teenagers are public enemy number one, so it's not surprising the clerk’s beady eyes follow her to the passenger side of my beaten up bug.

“Hi!” She grins, relief bleeding from her tone that's almost a sob.

She jumps into my truck. “I'm Cinna.” She introduces herself with a fake name. Cinna is her favorite character in her favorite book tucked at the bottom of her pack. Her real name is Addison Hart.

16 years old.

She escaped a nullification camp with six dollars, a stolen iPhone 17, and a Polaroid camera.

She apologizes for her lack of hygiene with a laugh, and I smile and blast the AC.

“Don't worry about it,” I tell her, gesturing to my shorts and t-shirt combo I've been wearing since I found a lake off route 46.

Since then, it's just been hoping for rain, and sneaking into motel bathrooms.

Addison, sorry, Cinna, twists in her seat and asks me point blank:

“Dude,” she laughs, but she's blushing, embarrassed, already shifting uncomfortably. “Do you have any pads?”

I'm kinda surprised her life on the run hasn't significantly fucked with her cycle.

I haven't had a period since I was sixteen.

But I smile, nod, and gesture to my glove compartment. “I have tons.” I laugh when she snatches one up, her smile widening.

“I pick up a lot of kids,” I tell her. “I've lost count how many times I've been asked, so I raided a hotel bathroom.”

Addison squeaks excitedly, and leans back in her seat, squeezing the pads to her chest like a newborn baby. “You are an angel!” Then she blinks. Surprised. “Wait!”

Her eyes widen, and she sticks her head out of the window. “A beaten up red truck, and a teen driver!” She gasps. “Are you her?”

“That's what I've been reduced to?” I say. “Her?”

Addie grins. I catch her snatching up a cereal bar and stuffing it in her mouth. She doesn't even chew.

“You're the one who takes kids to a safe-haven,” she says through a mouthful, spitting crumbs everywhere. “I heard about you from a guy who was…” she drifts off, her smile fading, crawling from her face. “Anyway.” Addie demolishes the cereal bar in a single bite. “He said you're like, I dunno, a Gen Z Katniss.”

“I'm just a transporter.”

I tap the steering wheel, fiddling with the radio. Taylor Swift sputters through the static, and we both groan.

Addison pulls a face, and I know exactly what she's going to say. “I can't believe she sold out,” she whispers. “I fucking hate that stupid message she tacks onto the end of her songs.” Addison mimics the radio. “If any of my fans are out there, just know you're loved, and coming home will keep you all safe!”

“She was forced to, you know,” I remind her, as an ex-swifty who burned all of my albums. “They threatened her family.”

“I don't care." Addison grumbles. We’re both avoiding the elephant in the room.

It's comfortable, better, to talk about issues that don't matter instead of issues that do. “They're all the same.”

“So, where are you headed?” I ask.

Addison smiles, throwing her feet up on the dash. “The safe-haven! You can take me, right?” Her eyes widened. “Wait, do I need an ID? My mom burned all my shit before she sent me to—”

“No ID.” I say before she goes off on another tangent. She reminds me of Asa, my ADHD riddled bestie. Asa’s parents shot him in the head when he was asleep. “You're fine. I'll just drop you off.”

“Yay!” Addie cranks up the radio.

Oasis. She sticks her head out the window and screams the lyrics.

I can't help singing along loudly, slamming my hands on the wheel.

It's just us, the long, dusty dead road, and a band none of us have cared about until now. “This was my mom’s favorite song!” Addie yells, laughing. Her hair whips my face. “I said, maaaaybeeeeeee!”

After absolutely destroying our voice-boxes singing to every classic, she leans back in her seat.

“Sooo.” She says, playfully kicking me. “What kinda kids have you picked up?”

I have to think about that.

There's been a lot.

“There was one kid called Elliot,” I began. “Total asshole. He could, like, do this,” I mimic Elliot’s power, snapping my fingers. “Literally like a human firecracker.”

I'm pretty sure Elliot’s blood still stains her seat.

It's okay, though. She won't see it. His body is still in the back.

Addie laughs. “Was he at least HOT?”

“Ew!” I giggle. “No. Not my type.” I sigh, stretching.

“Then there was Aris. She reminded me of a princess.” I smile at the thought of her lying in a ditch, just off route 46. “Her power was x-ray vision. She was cute.”

“Where are they now?” Addie asks.

“Exactly where I'm taking you.”

“Sounds fun!” Addie kicks her feet. “Do you wanna guess what my power is?”

She's so innocent, so fucking stupid. I almost feel bad for what I'm going to do.

I can't wait until I carve it from her skull.

I take the powerful ones for myself, and deliver the rest to our great president.

“Shoot.” I laugh. “Can't be worse than Elliot The Firecracker.”

Addie's smile widens. “Telepathy, babe.”

My school implemented a 10pm mandatory sleeping curfew for sixteen year olds.

We protested, initially.

Then it became our new normal.

My friend Jay had been in sleeping-jail for three days. 

No pillow, no blanket, stuck in a dark classroom.

He needed rescuing.

“Jay.” Kneeling, I prodded him. Then I noticed the sheen of sweat, strands of damp hair clumping against his clammy forehead. “Hey!” I shook him, panic creeping up. He didn’t even flinch.

I slapped him. His eyes twitched once, lashes fluttering, before going still.

The last thing he said to me was, “I'm tired.” Then he zonked out in algebra.

Unzipping my backpack, I brandished my water bottle.  

“I wouldn’t doooooo that….”

A sing-song voice came from the back of the room. Beck Whittaker sat with his head half-buried in his arms, peeking up at me through thick strands of red hair. He stretched, curling into himself like a cat.

“Shocking them awake could be fatal.” 

I stood up. “Why are you pretending to be asleep?” 

“I'm not pretending,” he mumbled. His eyes flickered. “Do you ever question why we have to sleep? Why we don't… remember?” Whittaker's eyes drooped, his shoulders sagged ahead, almost falling forwards. He stood up, to my surprise, and stumbled over to me, grabbed my face, tugging me closer to him. 

“Sohhhryyyyy,” he slurred.

And then, without a word, headbutted me so hard I saw stars. 

I hit the ground, blood filling my mouth. 

Whittaker didn't speak, slumping into his chair, eyes fluttering shut. “Na-night.” 

Soft snores followed.

“Miss Erickson.”

I jumped. Mr Clay shadowed the doorway, glaring. “Are Mr McGuire and Whittaker awake?” 

“Nope!” I lied, throwing my jacket over Whittaker’s head. 

I spent the rest of the day trying to sneak back inside.

But the classroom was officially under lock-and-key.

By 9:40pm, my head felt like a lead pipe had split my brain apart. 

I was used to being “sent” to sleep, but this time it was different. I was halfway downstairs when curfew slammed into me. I tumbled down, my limbs failing. My vision blurred. The last thing I saw was Mom running towards me. 

“No running downstairs at 10pm!”

Time to sleep. 

What I wasn't expecting was to wake up in a meadow lying in a pile of corpses wearing my face, my thin blonde ponytail, my bloodstained shorts and t-shirt. Mutilated chunks lying in pooling red.

Springing upright, a feral scream clawed at my throat.

I was fucking lying in pieces of me.

“Get down!”

I ducked, flattening myself into bloodstained flowers. 

A barrage of armed shadows loomed over me. I recognized the leader, my heart slithering into my gut. Bearing a gun, eyes set forwards, was Whittaker.

“Go.” He snapped to the others. A girl I vaguely recognized from math classes bounded forward, sending a spray of bullets seemingly at thin air. Whitaker turned to me. “What are you doing?” He snapped. “Grab a gun!” 

His expression faltered when I didn't move, frozen. 

“You're awake.” He tossed me a pistol. “Point and shoot, Erickson,” he ordered.

I glimpsed an ethereal boy sifting on a branch in a tree. His features stood out, pointy ears and porcelain skin. “See any of those little fucks?” Whittaker fired, and I slammed my hands over my ears. The bullet bounced off the thing’s face. “Blow their fuckin heads off.” 

“Wh-?!” I squeaked. 

“Fae.” Whittaker shot at another who came flying at him, a bullet piercing its eye. “Short version? When we sleep, we kill these little bastards. We're the last line of defense. The town brings us back when we’re taken out, and we don't even remember it.” He laughed. Loudly. Almost hysterical. “For obvious reasons. Trauma, PTSD, blah, blah, blah…”

“Beck!” A girl squeaked behind him.

“Be careful,” He told me. “One wrong move, and they can—”

He stopped, eyes widening.

And dropped, his head rolling clean off.

“You again?” 

Twisting around, Whittaker’s killer approached me, confident, uncaring of the gunfire around us. 

Fae. Beautiful features, razor-sharp incisors jutting from a snarling mouth, thick blonde curls adorned with flowers threaded through bone. A prince, my phantom memories told me.

He started towards me wielding a thin wire, already stained scarlet. “I'm getting real tired of killing you. What's wrong?” The fae inclined his head. “I miss our talks. You almost got me last time! It was a decent shot, too.” He clapped mockingly, eyebrow cocked. “Why so quiet, hmm?”

“Alex!”

The voice came from above. 

Jay. 

Hanging upside down from a branch by his entrails, a vicious writhing blur of scarlet pouring from him. His frenzied eyes found mine. “They won't let me die,” he cried, when live vines brutally forced his eyes open, a thick layer of mold creeping across the cavernous hole in his gut. 

“Please! Kill me! Fucking KILL ME!” 

The fae prince shoved me onto my knees, and I pointed the gun, my hands trembling. He laughed. “Oh, WOW, my favorite human has lost her spark!” Closer, and he was inches from me, staring down at the barrel. “Go on. Shoot me.”

His lips curled, a horrific screeching sound escaping him.

He was laughing.

“You're funny,” he giggled, “coming into our world, and massacring my kind, and looking at me like you're frightened.” His eyes darkened to hollow oblivion. “Like you didn't rip my mother’s head off and shoot my siblings. Babies.” He laughed again, hysterical giggles pouring from him.

“I'll keep doing it,” he whispered. “I don't care how many times you come back. I'll slaughter you, again and again, and a-fucking-gain.” His breath tickled my cheek. “Until you stay.” He tugged the wire around my throat, slicing cleanly through bone. I tried to speak, tried to scream, my words gurgling, sputtering.

“Dead.” 

…

“Honey?”

I woke up screaming, in my mother’s lap, already feeling for the wire, trying to rip it away. Mom’s expression terrified me. 

I wasn't her daughter. 

I was her soldier. 

“Did you kill them?” 

I'm eating breakfast when my eldest son appears in the doorway. 

He's smiling, which is unlike him. Usually, my eldest is a little shit in the morning.

I was scrolling through Facebook over my morning coffee, and he jumped into the seat opposite. I greeted him with a patient smile. “Have you taken your medication?” 

After several ADHD assessments, my son was taking Adderall daily.

His smile was wide, too wide, practically crawling off his face.

“Nope.” Jax stood up, and I admit I was a little taken-aback. He walked over to me, his hands behind his back before whipping out a small gift wrapped in sparkly paper. “Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.” 

I took the gift, my heart swelling. Mother's Day was a month ago, and my children put together their allowance and bought me a brand new vase. Jax rolled his eyes through the whole gift-giving thing.

While my other children were hugging me, my eldest steered clear, only offering me a sickly grin. Jax Sinclair would be estranged if he didn't live with me.

I tried everything. 

Therapy for both of us. Attempts to bond with him. I even took him to Italy for a mother-son trip, hoping a week away together might change things.

The little shit ran away and tried to buy a ticket to New York using my card. 

I spent three hours at customs proving he was my son while he sat there, silently seething because he wasn’t getting the attention he wanted. By that point, I was desperate. I bought him a PS5. 

At first, he actually seemed happy with it. 

Then I found it dumped in the trash.

So, my fifteen year old son randomly handing over a Mother's Day gift one month after Mother's Day was a red flag.

I mentally went through my Mom checklist. Did he want anything?

No, Jax never asked for a cent. I had to force him to even consider birthday and Christmas gifts, and even then he refused to unwrap them. Did he need anything? 

For breakfast, he usually made himself cereal and coffee. I started buying him little store-bought canned iced coffees, and he magically decided he hated them.

I heard some boys his age were talking about the new Grand Theft Auto. Could this be his attempt at asking me for it? 

“Mom?” Jax’s voice snapped me out of it, slicing through my thoughts. 

“Hm?” I didn't realize I was crying. 

I took the gift, swallowing my questions. “Thank you, sweetie,” I whispered, blinking back tears. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. Maybe his father had put him up to it.

Either way, a simple gesture of affection from my son had made my entire year. Running my fingers over the wrapping paper, I noticed it was perfectly wrapped. “Is this just from you, darling?”

“Yeah,” my son smiled wider. “Happy Mother's Day, Mom.” 

I was about to open it before my husband walked in. 

“Morning.” He made himself coffee, his curious eyes glued to my gift. “What's that?” 

“Nothing.” Jax surprised me with actual words, snatching the gift back. 

“Jax got me a Mother's Day present.” I grinned, taking the gift back. “How sweet!” 

“The kids already celebrated Mother's Day.” My husband sighed, ripped the gift from my hand, and dumped it in the trash. Something snapped inside me, bile filling my mouth. I swallowed my protests, pasting on a wide smile. “Go upstairs and get ready for school,” he snapped at Jax. 

Jax didn't move. “I want Mom to open her Mother's Day present,” he said. His lips curled, eyes narrowed. “Right in front of you.”

My gut twisted, my chest aching suddenly.

Fuck. 

Was that why? 

I was far too aware I was sweating, my heart in my throat.

Did my son… oh god, did he know?

“Go upstairs, honey,” I spat out before I could choke it back. “Now.” 

Jax nodded, turned around, and ran upstairs.

“Teenagers.” My husband laughed, pecking me on the cheek. “Ignore him! He’ll grow up one day.”

“Yeah,” I whispered, “of course he will.” I laughed. “It's just… Jax.” 

When he left to shower, I fished my son’s gift from the trash. I had half a mind to throw it away. Of course he knew.  Tearing through the paper, I found exactly what I expected: a DVD. Marked in bright red pen: “I HATE you.”

I ran upstairs to my bedroom, locked the door, and slid the DVD into our ancient player. As I pressed play, my hands were clammy. How much did my son know about my affair with his math tutor? It had just been a blip. 

I’d lost my mind for a few months and done things I regretted. Jax liked his math tutor, and I took that away from him. But how the fuck had he managed to film it? 

Was this blackmail? 

What did he want?!

The screen lit up, and I recognized the location.

It was our garage. 

Years ago. 

The date at the bottom of the screen read: 15/09/2016. 

Three small figures illuminated in harsh white light.

Annalise, Sammy, and Jax. 

“All right,” my husband’s voice growled. “Repeat what I said one more time.” He strode over to Jax. ”What is your name?” The small boy squeezed his eyes shut. 

“Zach.” 

I jumped when my husband grabbed his hair, tugging it. 

“I said WHAT is your NAME?” 

“Jax!” The boy squeaked. “It's…it's Jax!.” 

“And?” My husband demanded. “Fuckin’ SPEAK, kid.” 

“We want to go home,” the little girl whispered. “Please can we—”

“I said SPEAK.” My husband snapped.

“You're my Daddy,” Jax whimpered, “and… and that woman—” he squeaked, “Mom! I mean Mommy! The woman is my Mommy!”

My husband stepped back, and so did the camera. 

“Good.” 

He turned to me, who was filming. “Do you like them, sweetheart?”  The camera panned to my glistening eyes and wide smile. “Happy Mother’s Day.” 

I'm eating breakfast when my eldest son appears in the doorway. 

He's smiling, which is unlike him. Usually, my eldest is a little shit in the morning.

I was scrolling through Facebook over my morning coffee, and he jumped into the seat opposite. I greeted him with a patient smile. “Have you taken your medication?” 

After several ADHD assessments, my son was taking Adderall daily.

His smile was wide, too wide, practically crawling off his face.

“Nope.” Jax stood up, and I admit I was a little taken-aback. He walked over to me, his hands behind his back before whipping out a small gift wrapped in sparkly paper. “Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.” 

I took the gift, my heart swelling. Mother's Day was a month ago, and my children put together their allowance and bought me a brand new vase. Jax rolled his eyes through the whole gift-giving thing.

While my other children were hugging me, my eldest steered clear, only offering me a sickly grin. Jax Sinclair would be estranged if he didn't live with me.

I tried everything. 

Therapy for both of us. Attempts to bond with him. I even took him to Italy for a mother-son trip, hoping a week away together might change things.

The little shit ran away and tried to buy a ticket to New York using my card. 

I spent three hours at customs proving he was my son while he sat there, silently seething because he wasn’t getting the attention he wanted. By that point, I was desperate. I bought him a PS5. 

At first, he actually seemed happy with it. 

Then I found it dumped in the trash.

So, my fifteen year old son randomly handing over a Mother's Day gift one month after Mother's Day was a red flag.

I mentally went through my Mom checklist. Did he want anything?

No, Jax never asked for a cent. I had to force him to even consider birthday and Christmas gifts, and even then he refused to unwrap them. Did he need anything? 

For breakfast, he usually made himself cereal and coffee. I started buying him little store-bought canned iced coffees, and he magically decided he hated them.

I heard some boys his age were talking about the new Grand Theft Auto. Could this be his attempt at asking me for it? 

“Mom?” Jax’s voice snapped me out of it, slicing through my thoughts. 

“Hm?” I didn't realize I was crying. 

I took the gift, swallowing my questions. “Thank you, sweetie,” I whispered, blinking back tears. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face. Maybe his father had put him up to it.

Either way, a simple gesture of affection from my son had made my entire year. Running my fingers over the wrapping paper, I noticed it was perfectly wrapped. “Is this just from you, darling?”

“Yeah,” my son smiled wider. “Happy Mother's Day, Mom.” 

I was about to open it before my husband walked in. 

“Morning.” He made himself coffee, his curious eyes glued to my gift. “What's that?” 

“Nothing.” Jax surprised me with actual words, snatching the gift back. 

“Jax got me a Mother's Day present.” I grinned, taking the gift back. “How sweet!” 

“The kids already celebrated Mother's Day.” My husband sighed, ripped the gift from my hand, and dumped it in the trash. Something snapped inside me, bile filling my mouth. I swallowed my protests, pasting on a wide smile. “Go upstairs and get ready for school,” he snapped at Jax. 

Jax didn't move. “I want Mom to open her Mother's Day present,” he said. His lips curled, eyes narrowed. “Right in front of you.”

My gut twisted, my chest aching suddenly.

Fuck. 

Was that why? 

I was far too aware I was sweating, my heart in my throat.

Did my son… oh god, did he know?

“Go upstairs, honey,” I spat out before I could choke it back. “Now.” 

Jax nodded, turned around, and ran upstairs.

“Teenagers.” My husband laughed, pecking me on the cheek. “Ignore him! He’ll grow up one day.”

“Yeah,” I whispered, “of course he will.” I laughed. “It's just… Jax.” 

When he left to shower, I fished my son’s gift from the trash. I had half a mind to throw it away. Of course he knew.  Tearing through the paper, I found exactly what I expected: a DVD. Marked in bright red pen: “I HATE you.”

I ran upstairs to my bedroom, locked the door, and slid the DVD into our ancient player. As I pressed play, my hands were clammy. How much did my son know about my affair with his math tutor? It had just been a blip. 

I’d lost my mind for a few months and done things I regretted. Jax liked his math tutor, and I took that away from him. But how the fuck had he managed to film it? 

Was this blackmail? 

What did he want?!

The screen lit up, and I recognized the location.

It was our garage. 

Years ago. 

The date at the bottom of the screen read: 15/09/2016. 

Three small figures illuminated in harsh white light.

Annalise, Sammy, and Jax. 

“All right,” my husband’s voice growled. “Repeat what I said one more time.” He strode over to Jax. ”What is your name?” The small boy squeezed his eyes shut. 

“Zach.” 

I jumped when my husband grabbed his hair, tugging it. 

“I said WHAT is your NAME?” 

“Jax!” The boy squeaked. “It's…it's Jax!.” 

“And?” My husband demanded. “Fuckin’ SPEAK, kid.” 

“We want to go home,” the little girl whispered. “Please can we—”

“I said SPEAK.” My husband snapped.

“You're my Daddy,” Jax whimpered, “and… and that woman—” he squeaked, “Mom! I mean Mommy! The woman is my Mommy!”

My husband stepped back, and so did the camera. 

“Good.” 

He turned to me, who was filming. “Do you like them, sweetheart?”  The camera panned to my glistening eyes and wide smile. “Happy Mother’s Day.” 

I picked her up outside a hotel.

I already knew she’d been thrown out.

The clerk stands in the doorway, arms folded, a phone to his ear.

She looks exhausted, dark shadows under her eyes, but she’s wearing a smile that’s already resigned. Fifteen or sixteen, around my age. Ready to give up.

She’s wearing a summer dress and sandals, and I can tell she hasn’t had a shower in weeks.

Her dress sticks to her, thick brown curls glued over her eyes, and a blooming red sunburn stains her skin. I wonder how long she's been hiding in the hotel.

Teenagers are public enemy number one, so it's not surprising the clerk’s beady eyes follow her to the passenger side of my beaten up bug.

“Hi!” She grins, relief bleeding from her tone that's almost a sob.

She jumps into my truck. “I'm Cinna.” She introduces herself with a fake name. Cinna is her favorite character in her favorite book tucked at the bottom of her pack. Her real name is Addison Hart.

16 years old.

She escaped a nullification camp with six dollars, a stolen iPhone 17, and a Polaroid camera.

She apologizes for her lack of hygiene with a laugh, and I smile and blast the AC.

“Don't worry about it,” I tell her, gesturing to my shorts and t-shirt combo I've been wearing since I found a lake off route 46.

Since then, it's just been hoping for rain, and sneaking into motel bathrooms.

Addison, sorry, Cinna, twists in her seat and asks me point blank:

“Dude,” she laughs, but she's blushing, embarrassed, already shifting uncomfortably. “Do you have any pads?”

I'm kinda surprised her life on the run hasn't significantly fucked with her cycle.

I haven't had a period since I was sixteen.

But I smile, nod, and gesture to my glove compartment. “I have tons.” I laugh when she snatches one up, her smile widening.

“I pick up a lot of kids,” I tell her. “I've lost count how many times I've been asked, so I raided a hotel bathroom.”

Addison squeaks excitedly, and leans back in her seat, squeezing the pads to her chest like a newborn baby. “You are an angel!” Then she blinks. Surprised. “Wait!”

Her eyes widen, and she sticks her head out of the window. “A beaten up red truck, and a teen driver!” She gasps. “Are you her?”

“That's what I've been reduced to?” I say. “Her?”

Addie grins. I catch her snatching up a cereal bar and stuffing it in her mouth. She doesn't even chew.

“You're the one who takes kids to a safe-haven,” she says through a mouthful, spitting crumbs everywhere. “I heard about you from a guy who was…” she drifts off, her smile fading, crawling from her face. “Anyway.” Addie demolishes the cereal bar in a single bite. “He said you're like, I dunno, a Gen Z Katniss.”

“I'm just a transporter.”

I tap the steering wheel, fiddling with the radio. Taylor Swift sputters through the static, and we both groan.

Addison pulls a face, and I know exactly what she's going to say. “I can't believe she sold out,” she whispers. “I fucking hate that stupid message she tacks onto the end of her songs.” Addison mimics the radio. “If any of my fans are out there, just know you're loved, and coming home will keep you all safe!”

“She was forced to, you know,” I remind her, as an ex-swifty who burned all of my albums. “They threatened her family.”

“I don't care." Addison grumbles. We’re both avoiding the elephant in the room.

It's comfortable, better, to talk about issues that don't matter instead of issues that do. “They're all the same.”

“So, where are you headed?” I ask.

Addison smiles, throwing her feet up on the dash. “The safe-haven! You can take me, right?” Her eyes widened. “Wait, do I need an ID? My mom burned all my shit before she sent me to—”

“No ID.” I say before she goes off on another tangent. She reminds me of Asa, my ADHD riddled bestie. Asa’s parents shot him in the head when he was asleep. “You're fine. I'll just drop you off.”

“Yay!” Addie cranks up the radio.

Oasis. She sticks her head out the window and screams the lyrics.

I can't help singing along loudly, slamming my hands on the wheel.

It's just us, the long, dusty dead road, and a band none of us have cared about until now. “This was my mom’s favorite song!” Addie yells, laughing. Her hair whips my face. “I said, maaaaybeeeeeee!”

After absolutely destroying our voice-boxes singing to every classic, she leans back in her seat.

“Sooo.” She says, playfully kicking me. “What kinda kids have you picked up?”

I have to think about that.

There's been a lot.

“There was one kid called Elliot,” I began. “Total asshole. He could, like, do this,” I mimic Elliot’s power, snapping my fingers. “Literally like a human firecracker.”

I'm pretty sure Elliot’s blood still stains her seat.

It's okay, though. She won't see it. His body is still in the back.

Addie laughs. “Was he at least HOT?”

“Ew!” I giggle. “No. Not my type.” I sigh, stretching.

“Then there was Aris. She reminded me of a princess.” I smile at the thought of her lying in a ditch, just off route 46. “Her power was x-ray vision. She was cute.”

“Where are they now?” Addie asks.

“Exactly where I'm taking you.”

“Sounds fun!” Addie kicks her feet. “Do you wanna guess what my power is?”

She's so innocent, so fucking stupid. I almost feel bad for what I'm going to do.

I can't wait until I carve it from her skull.

I take the powerful ones for myself, and deliver the rest to our great president.

“Shoot.” I laugh. “Can't be worse than Elliot The Firecracker.”

Addie's smile widens. “Telepathy, babe.”

It was hot.

The air was too thick.

Blistering July heat scorched the back of my neck, sweat sticky on my skin, gluing my hair to my forehead.

The track ahead flickered like a mirage, each lane blurring into one.

I straightened up, stretching my legs, then my arms, my heart pounding in my chest.

Mima, my bestie, stood nose to nose with me, hands on her hips, lashes complimenting her cocky grin.

She held out my water bottle.

“Nope! Too slow!” she giggled, following it up with a “just messing with you” before finally handing it over.

I took a swig and spat it toward her. Mima danced away, barely avoiding the splash.

I envied her dress and sandals. Mima resembled cherry blossoms in full bloom.

Meanwhile, my uv shirt felt like it was melting into my skin.

"I can't believe they're making you run in this heat," Mima ran her finger down the sheen of sweat on my arm. "This is technically child abuse."

"I'm fine."

"You don't look fine!" Mima prodded my face, eyes wide. "You're all red and puffy!"

I stuck my tongue out and waited for Coach Croft’s whistle to signal us to get in position.

She pulled her phone from her shorts and bumped me with her hip. “Guess who’s trending?”

I didn’t even have to look at the screen to know who.

“What’s he done this time?”

Mima’s grin told me everything I needed to know.

“He was caught doing coke at some exclusive club in L.A with a group of kids.”

“Isn’t he twelve?” I hissed, jogging in place.

“Twelve and a half! He’s celebrating his birthday on TV,” Mima announced, shoving her phone in my face.

I caught a quick glimpse. Yep.

Baseball cap, oversized sunglasses, doing a poor job of hiding behind his equally baby-faced friends.

Mima was practically glowing.

She’d been rooting for his downfall ever since he won a Teen Choice Award for a three-second cameo.

“He’ll be fine. He’s like, the nepo baby anyway.”

I took the phone, peering at the photo.

Prince Hawthorne, America's crown jewel turned scandal magnet, was everywhere but in a classroom.

Our country's leaders were… messy.

Ever since the Hawthorne family established a monarchy after the collapse of the amendments fifty years ago, we’d had a royal family.

But none of them wanted to believe that the twelve-year-old heir to the throne was a tabloid disaster in the making. Snorting lines with child stars?

Even I hadn’t seen that coming.

"Isn't he supposed to be grounded?" I muttered. "In Washington."

“Alll runners, please make your way to the track! I repeat: all runners taking part in the one hundred meter relay, please make their way to starting positions.”

Mima twirled around with a grin, gave me one last wave and a sweaty hug, then ran over to the stands.

I took my place on the track with the others, slowly lowering myself into the starting position.

Breathe, I told my racing heart.

I dropped into position, my legs aligned, one heel braced behind me, the pads of my fingers poised, barely touching the steaming concrete.

My breaths shuddered.

I was suddenly all too aware of the scout watching every twitch of my limbs, every shaky breath, every time my heel bounced off of the starting block, waiting for me to choke.

Smile.

That’s what Mom said. “Smile! Be confident! Show him you want this!”

Mom had no idea what she was talking about.

She wasn't a runner. She didn't understand that success didn't come from smiling or positivity.

Success came from sweat.

Athletes didn’t smile, not until they stood on the podium.

But even then, it still wasn’t good enough. They didn’t smile until they were the best, until they had won the gold, and clawed their way to the top.

To my left was sixteen-year-old silver medalist Jesse Cromer.

He looked like a Calvin Klein ad.

Dirty blonde hair slicked back, lean frame frigid with focus, lips curled in concentration. I tried not to stare.

I had a major crush on him. Until he opened his mouth. I'm now convinced Jesse Cromer was Chat GPT in human form.

“Hey, Jesse, how are you?”

“I'm okay. How are you?”

Was our overall communication.

To my right, fifteen-year-old regional champion Poppy Cartwright, already grinning like she was perched on the winner’s podium.

I was jealous of her confidence. And her stupid red hair tied into an obnoxious braid, effortlessly bleeding down her back.

At thirteen, with no medals or trophies, I was completely out of place.

As nonchalant and deadpan as he was, Jesse kept sneaking glances at me like he was thinking, What’s this actual child doing here?

But I was quick.

The youngest athlete being considered for a scholarship to Brookside, the school for up-and-coming Olympians.

Brookside was my one way ticket to becoming something better.

“Take your marks!” Croft yelled, and I reveled in that initial rush of adrenaline already surging my body into fight or flight.

A robotic buzz from the stands cut through my focus.

“The World Health Organization is now considering the YMRV-12 virus a potential global threat, as confirmed cases continue to spread beyond Iceland."

"Infections have been reported in Norway and Denmark, and just this morning, a flight was grounded in Edinburgh, Scotland, after two passengers tested positive for the virus.”

Breathe, focus, I told myself.

“Nicknamed ‘Ymir’ after a Norse god, the virus was first identified in Reykjavík two weeks ago. Since then, the death toll has climbed rapidly, with more than three thousand fatalities confirmed in Europe."

"Unverified reports describe rabies-like symptoms and hypothermia—raising fears that—”

“Can someone turn that off?” Coach ordered. “I said no phones in the stands!”

Coach Croft was obsessed with ”her” fans, and with a former Olympian sitting in the audience, she was understandably freaking out.

The newsreel continued.

“A now-deleted TikTok video alleges a masked nurse inside an Oslo hospital, claiming she was attacked by a patient pronounced clinically dead."

"The video had over fifteen million views. Officials have since declared the footage a hoax.”

Coach Croft snapped again. “Turn your phones off, or leave.”

Despite her yelling, the video volume cranked up louder, freezing me in place.

I noticed Jesse lost his composure slightly; his back leg spasmed.

Poppy was jittery, her heel bouncing against the starting block.

They didn’t have to say it aloud.

Being an athlete meant being selfish.

To us, the world could be ending, but all we cared about was reaching that goal: a medal, a trophy, a spot on the US team.

Sometimes, though, not even selfishness could shield you from reality.

The doomscrolling. The radio on the way to track. The empty shelves when I was buying Gatorade.

I got used to fear. The fear of losing a race, the anxiety and mental punishment on myself when I failed to reach the top.

I glanced toward Mima, who, in return, threw me a cheesy grin and two thumbs up.

But this type of fear was primal, something I couldn't ignore.

I felt myself falter, my aching chest, my stomach twisting.

The scout’s gaze burned into the back of my skull. I reminded myself that it's only my future on the line. No biggie.

But did I even have a future?

3000 fatalities, the report bounced around in my head.

Wasn't it 250 a few days ago? I heard it on the way home from practice before Mom switched the station.

“The estimated number of confirmed deaths reaches 250.”

Jesse let out a shuddery breath.

He was trembling. His breathing was uneven, like he was gasping for air, trying to steady it. I knew that feeling.

For him, forcing oxygen into his lungs was a matter of sinking or swimming.

Winning or losing.

But for me, watching him choke at the first hurdle was an opportunity.

Out of the corner of my eye, Coach Croft was marching up to the stands, her strict blonde plait whipping from side to side.

“On your marks!”.

I lost my breath, my mind, my thoughts, all in that one moment.

I only thought of one thing.

Winning.

The gunshot cracked through the air, sharp and intrusive as my body wired to launch.

But none of us moved. My body swung forwards, but my back leg was paralyzed, my heel stuck to the starting block.

Jesse was frozen, his head tilted back, eyes fixed on the sky.

Coach Croft was screaming at us to run, but I found myself suddenly shivering.

My breath prickled white in front of me.

A sudden, cutting chill slammed into me, knocking the air from my lungs.

Slowly, I lifted my head.

A shadow had fallen across the sky, swallowing the sun, and every bit of warmth scorching my skin.

Something danced in the air, tiny white flecks drifting down in front of us.

Being an athlete is being selfish, but there's only so much we can ignore in favor of not losing our minds.

Jesse let out a quiet sob.

The boy’s shoulders slumped, his expression no longer nonchalant or uncaring, just as we’d been taught.

The art of ignorance had been hammered into us since childhood.

We were puppets on strings, and Jesse’s had been savagely cut.

Emotion bloomed across his face.

His eyes were wide, lips parted.

Terror.

He was choosing to be scared.

Seeing him fall, I lost all composure, finally sinking to my knees, severed from strings, and held out my trembling hand.

A single flake landed in my palm, dancing gracefully across my skin.

It didn’t melt.

Instead, it clung to the flesh of my hand, crystallising, sharp edges slicing into my skin.

I had to pluck it from my palm like a splinter.

Snow.

I was aware of my own panicked breaths joining Jesse’s, but I couldn’t move.

A biting wind whipped my hair from my face as flakes grew larger, spiraling around us in a frenzy and settling on the asphalt. It’s snowing, I thought.

In July?

—

After.

I wasn't alive, but I wasn't quite dead.

I had no name. No memories. My thoughts were foggy. Disjointed.

I was cold, but I didn’t know why I was cold or why it didn’t bother me.

In front of me, a sky full of stars blinked at the backs of my eyelids.

I was giddy before I opened them.

The stars above me were far away but close enough to grab, if I just reached out. So I did, throwing out my arms.

Each one was a bleeding explosion of light, seeping through my fingers.

Stars. I was so cold. But I held them, squeezing them between my fists.

Did I like stars?

Did this body and brain believe in stars?

I blinked, and the starry sky melted into the sterile white ceiling of somebody’s bathroom.

I was lying in a blood-stained tub, my arm still raised like I was catching stars.

The blood splatters reminded me of paint. Ah, good, so that's my first cohesive thought in… How… How long?

Was it my blood? Had I been the one to turn the water red?

Instead of the sky, clinical white tiles glared down at me.

When I shifted, I was on my back, submerged in filthy water.

My head felt stiff and wrong, pressed against the ice-cold porcelain. I was seventeen, maybe eighteen?

My legs were longer than I remembered, poking through the bubbles.

Sticky auburn strands of my hair were pasted to my back.

I was… so cold.

But I didn’t remember this kind of cold.

This body had grown up with a different kind of cold: drinking Grammy’s iced tea on the porch, slurping fruit slushies.

Cold.

That was the cold this body used to know. A man’s voice grazed my mind, warm eyes lit up by flickering embers.

The memory was sweet: a campfire against the backdrop of a mountain, stars blinking down from above.

He leaned forward. He didn’t have a face, more of a silhouette.

“Are you cold, sweetheart?”

“No,” I heard myself squeak. I was preschool-aged, rubbing my hands together, desperately trying to stay warm.

The memory flickered, unstable, shadowy, and hollow.

I remembered shivering. My teeth chattering. But before I could fully see it, it was cruelly ripped away.

I knew winter used to be that kind of cold.

The kind that was snow days. Sledding. Watching flakes settle on the ground and praying for a blizzard.

The cold that whipped my hair from my face on winter nights walking home from school.

This was biting and bitter.

This cold was dead cold.

This kind of cold glued my body to the base of the tub, sculpting me into a coffin filled with suds.

Tracing the curve of my throat, I felt a raw sting in my neck. My skin felt like plastic, wet and slimy.

I could feel the stickiness of my dress clinging in all the wrong places.

Taste the metallic ick on my tongue and teeth and throat.

I gingerly pressed two fingers over my heart.

There was no warmth in my skin, no pulse in my neck, no breath flickering on my lips. I tried twice. I tried to inhale, but my lungs felt deflated.

I didn’t need air.

I could’ve drowned and stayed there, numb, cold, and wrong.

I was dead.

The thought slammed into me, delirious, like a fucking joke.

I’m fucking dead.

Sinking deeper into the bath, I stared at anything but my body.

I focused on anything that wasn't the lack of pulsating under my skin or the ice crystals prickling my arms. I tipped my head back.

The overhead lights were painful, burning my forehead and legs.

My gaze wandered, desperate for distractions, landing on shampoo bottles lining the edge of the tub.

Huh. I tilted my head.

They were the bougie kind.

Creamy Passion Fruit. Orange Thrush Blast. Cinnamon Joy.

I blinked water out of my eyes. Maybe being dead wasn’t that bad.

I didn’t feel dead. Yeah, my body was cold and rotting, but I could pretend I was breathing if I really wanted to.

I jerked my big toe.

Then my whole foot. I could still move. I pressed my fist to my chest and tipped my head back, testing my voice.

“Hello?” I whispered, my voice croaking.

I hauled myself into a sitting position, risking a peek over the side.

The bathroom was bigger than I’d realized, expensive marble floors, two bright yellow towels hanging on a rack.

It looked like a shared bathroom, which immediately threw my thoughts into something resembling panic, but for dead people.

This body knew fear, I realized, suddenly paralyzed by a crippling pain in the chest and knots in the stomach.

This body was used to being scared.

Even dead, its limbs were already flailing, hands desperately grasping the sides, scrambling to get out.

This body knew how to run, to catapult forwards, bones already programmed by adrenaline and panic.

But panic wasn’t part of me anymore.

Panic was obsolete inside of dead flesh. I clawed at the edges to haul myself up, only to be pulled violently back.

I wasn’t alone.

Something was attached to me.

Something warm.

Breathing.

The lump cuffed to me wasn’t dead. I yanked again, the handcuffs binding us yanking me closer to warmth.

It was a boy, curled on his side, half drowned.

He looked my age, maybe younger.

His clothes told me everything: he was rich: a ripped white shirt, soaked jeans, and a Rolex strapped tight to his wrist.

Unlike me, his heart beat was healthy and right, pounding in his chest. Ba-bum. Ba-bum. Ba-bum.

I envied his breaths, his heartbeat, the shivers wracking through him.

This boy didn't know my type of cold.

He was normal cold. The kind from my memories.

Human cold.

I was wrong cold. I shouldn’t have been able to sense every beat of the boy’s heart, the blood in his veins, every shallow breath.

I shouldn’t have been able to smell it, his scent choking at the back of my nose and throat: antiseptic, burned plastic, and a thick, metallic stink.

The boy groaned, shifted, and rolled over, his face pressed against the side of the tub. I saw his arm, lacerations cutting into his wrists.

Bruising bloomed under his fingernails, greenish yellow spreading across the skin of his elbow. He jolted suddenly.

His breaths came quick and staggered, panicked, like he was awake.

But playing dead.

“They're watching,” His voice was a shuddery breath. “Pretend to be asleep.”

“Who are you?” I whispered, my voice a permanent croak.

He didn't reply for a moment, before he twisted around, pulling his cuffed hand, and me, closer to him.

“I don't know,” he hissed. “I woke up here. I'm a blank slate.”

I recognized his voice.

His face, however, was still hidden, submerged in the filthy water swirling around us. His sudden jerking movement caught me off guard.

“Why are you so cold?”

Instead of responding, I lay back and let my gaze drift to the ceiling and the giant surveillance style camera inches from my face. I blinked. It hadn’t been there before.

“If they think we’re asleep, they fuck off for a while. But it doesn't last,” the boy muttered, his back to me.

I did, just for a second, squeezing my eyes shut before I couldn’t help myself and let them flicker open.

It was still there, reminding me of a curious child as its lens zoomed in and out.

The camera studied the two of us for a moment, a dull red light blinking twice before folding silently into the ceiling.

The boy curled into a ball, burying his face in his knees.

Which jerked me toward him.

Part of me resented him for his sharp gasps—his insufferable fucking heartbeat.

Ba-bum.

Ba-bum.

Ba-bum.

I definitely knew this boy. I risked a glance at him.

“Stop looking at me,” he grumbled into the water.

“I'm not.” I said.

"Yes, you are," he snapped back.

His voice familiar, but also not.

Bratty, like a never ending whine. "Also, you didn't answer me. Why are you so cold?"

I knew this asshole.

But from where?

I shoved his identity to the back of my mind and focused on the dead thing.

Denial was fun.

Maybe being a corpse wasn't as bad as I thought. Dead people, for one, weren't even dead.

Once again, I found myself thinking back to those fancy shampoo bottles. Dead people had fancy bathrooms, right? They had luxurious showers, and scented soap.

The kind Mima’s parents had at their place.

My eyes snapped open. I didn’t realize I’d slipped under the water.

Mima.

I jumped up and out of the tub, wobbling off balance.

My arms and legs were stiff and wrong, and very dead, my body landing with a wet-sounding splat, knees first, flipping onto my stomach.

I didn’t know my own name or anything about myself. I didn’t know why I was fucking dead or why I was bound to a boy who was still breathing.

What I did know was that her name was Mima, and she was my best friend.

I saw cherry blossoms in my memories. Only cherry blossoms.

Sun-kissed pink beneath a crystalline sky, strawberry-blonde curls, and a winning smile. I couldn’t see her eyes.

Her face was shadowed, more of a ghost.

But it was enough to jolt my stiff limbs into motion.

A gurgled “Wait!” bubbled up from the water just as I leapt from the tub, arms windmilling.

I didn’t realize I was dragging the guy with me until our bound wrists yanked him, and pulled him over the edge.

He landed face-first on top of me with a muffled “Ow.”

It wasn't until he was sprawled over me that I realized two things.

This boy was warm. He was a startling relief against my icy skin.

He lifted his head, his identity bleeding from the shadow: thick dark curls, a pointy nose, and the exact same scowl I knew all too well.

But this time, he wasn't a bratty twelve-year-old glaring at me through a leaked photo on Twitter.

Hawthorne.

The disgraced Washington royal.

He was seventeen now, inches from my face, lips curled like he'd found me stuck to his shoe.

And yet, there was something undeniably different about the young heir.

For one, he didn’t know who he was. My gaze flicked to the bruises on his arms and wrists.

There were needle marks, signs of injections.

I reached forward, grasped his face, and pulled him closer. He snapped out of it, blinking rapidly, eyes narrowing.

“Hey!” he snapped, trying to wrench away.

Prince Hawthorne was warm. His skin prickled with heat.

When he leaned in, his breath tickling my face, I retracted slightly, all too aware of how close he was, his legs tangled with mine. The prince’s pulse was suddenly incredibly close, pounding in my ears.

He was undoubtedly human.

Undoubtedly alive.

“Can you let go?” he hissed, shuffling back. “You’re freezing!”

“Just a sec,” I muttered.

He tried to pull away again, and I tightened my grip on him. “This is harassment.”

“Stop being a baby.”

I peered closer, ignoring his childlike squirming and the sound of his blood rushing under his skin.

I could sense every artery, every bleeding pulsating pump in his heart.

I shook the thoughts away and forced myself to focus.

Pale skin, like mine, with a purplish tint. His right eye was a deep brown.

His left, strangely, bloomed an unnatural blue.

Like watercolor paint pooling in his pupils. When I jerked his face even closer, I saw it: a dancing fluorescent light, like a frozen web, a parasite spiraling around the prince’s iris.

Not just his eyes. His brows were noticeably crystallising.

Ice, I thought, gingerly prodding his cheeks.

Hawthorne’s eyes narrowed.

“Stop poking me.” He pulled back again.

I found myself mesmerised.

He was still human.

But that exact same cold rot was eating away at his skin too.

I shuffled back, my voice tangled in my throat.

He let out a frustrated breath, trying to inch away from me like I was a diseased dog. His breath, I noticed, was freezing.

“You're—”

He shifted the cuffs, yanking me closer. “Look,” he spat in my face. “I don't know what the fuck is going on, or how I got here. I don't even know who I am.”

He was getting dangerously close, his lips grazing mine. I didn’t pull away. Why wasn’t I pulling away?

He was warm. His blood was warm. His skin was warm. Everything about him was warm.

“Do you know who I am?” he whispered, a flicker of vulnerability bleeding into his tone. His expression softened, and for a moment, I glimpsed raw fear. He tugged at the cuff again, raising our bound wrists.

“You do know who I am,” he murmured. His eyes narrowed, lips curling.

I didn’t respond. His heartbeat was too loud, thudding in my ears.

He was scared.

“If you didn’t, you would’ve pushed me away by now.”

He straddled me, leaning closer. I caught a whiff of that metallic tang in my throat, and something in me began to unravel.

“Did you do this?” he hissed, shifting to sitting on my legs and pinning my arms. “You kidnapped me and chained us together to live out your fucked-up fantasy?”

“This is Big Brother.” A mechanical voice cut through my thoughts.

The prince sprang away from me with wide eyes.

He caught my gaze, lips parting. “What the fuck?”

I shared his sentiment.

What the fuck.

“Houseguests are reminded to not engage in intimate actions. Can Isabelle please come to the diary room for daily briefing?” the mechanical voice stuttered. “The downstairs bathroom is now open.”

“Isabelle.” Hawthorne whispered. “That's you?”

He spoke up, this time to the people watching us.

“Wait, so if she's Isabelle, who am I?”

There was no response. In front of us, the door slid open.

I jumped up, dragging him with me. He stayed stubbornly still, arms folded, making it clear he had no intention of following.

I yanked him again, and we both stumbled through the doorway into a long, colorful hallway.

I found myself mesmerized by another blood splattered crime scene.

There was a pool.

The water was a murky red, and a single beach ball bobbed on the surface.

The house had long since been abandoned by the real world, a reality TV show set left to rot.

I dragged us past the empty living room and kitchen, both eerily clean.

Beanbags and chairs were cheerfully arranged in flower formations. Cameras were in every corner, twitching left and right, watching us.

Hawthorne tried multiple times to yank away, seemingly with the memory of a dead fish. We were cuffed together.

Every time he retracted and slammed back into me, he seemed to remember that.

I caught a whiff of something and was immediately drawn to the scent.

There it was again, thick and tangy, controlling my limbs.

I didn’t even notice I was running until Hawthorne pulled me back.

“Where are you going?” he hissed, stumbling behind me as we climbed a bright green staircase. I could barely hear him over his heartbeat. “You’re supposed to be going to the dining room!”

“Diary,” I corrected, surprised by how fast I could move, my toes primed, leaping up each step. “Didn’t you watch Big Brother?”

“I wouldn’t know,” he muttered, tugging me back. He was taking full advantage of the cuffs. “You’re not telling me who I am.”

I opened my mouth to snap at him, then I saw it. Red, dribbling down the stairs.

Another step, and the staircase was drowned in it. Bodies littered the corridor.

Dismembered heads and glistening entrails oozed from every door.

Hawthorne stopped cold, his breath hitching.

He dropped to his knees, dry heaving.

I kept going, tugging him with me.

That smell. I felt like I was dancing, walking on air.

Reaching the last door, I pushed it open, revealing a large bedroom filled with beds. I recognized it as the main room for Houseguests.

Hawthorne tried to stop me, but I was already stumbling toward a bed covered in velvet red sheets—

No.

I stopped. The sheets were white.

What stemmed across them was a vicious scarlet pool.

Two twitching figures sat back to back, their wrists savagely tied together.

I only recognized one of them. The boy, a brunette, twisted and twitched like a monster, lips pulled back in a snarl, the flesh of his throat ripped from the bone.

The girl, a blur of sun-kissed curls, violently wrenched against her restraints, her eyes vacant.

She was older than I remembered. Taller. Beautiful. It wasn’t fair that I missed seeing her grow up when we should have been together. And still, she was Mima.

Heart-shaped face, freckles spattering across too-pale cheeks.

Even with entrails glued to her mouth and elongated teeth curled back in an animalistic hiss, I recognized her.

She was freezing. No breath. No heat under her skin.

My best friend was a corpse.

Mima was the only face I knew, the only one this body had held onto.

“Isabelle.”

The mechanical voice cut through my agony. The dead shouldn't feel pain like this.

I didn’t realize I was on my knees, arms wrapped around her, a screeching Hawthorne awkwardly pressed to my back.

“Isabelle, you have been summoned for daily briefing,” the voice droned from every speaker. “Please come to the diary room.”

I straightened up and nodded, marching out of the room without looking back.

The disgruntled prince stumbled along behind.

“Okay, so how do we do this?” Hawthorne whispered, his face practically pressed into my shoulder to avoid having his lips read.

His warmth made me envious. I stomped on his toes before I could revel in it.

I wasn't expecting him to stamp on mine. Harder.

I dragged him back down the stairs and straight into the main hallway.

“Do we go in together, or…?” Hawthorne held up his cuffed wrist, shooting me a glare. “I'm not shitting with you next to me."

We reached the large door leading to the diary room, and I shoved it open, pulling Hawthorne along with me.

After a brief but brutal tug of war, I managed to get him inside.

Just as I thought, it was nearly identical to the original show: a single cushioned chair sitting in front of a screen displaying camera feeds of every room.

Mima and the unnamed boy were still tied up in the main bedroom.

A group of people, definitely alive, were huddled in what looked like a storage room.

And finally, Hawthorne blinking directly into the camera.

I was nowhere to be seen.

“Woah,” Hawthorne muttered next to me. “So this is some kind of TV show?” He frowned at the camera and did a double take, prodding me. “Wait, where are you?”

On the screen in front of us, only Hawthorne showed up.

He waved a hand, and so did the footage onscreen. “They're fucking with us, right?”

“Hello, Isabelle.” The mechanical voice rattled in my ear. It was a guy this time. Less drone-ey.

“Due to the privacy of our conversation, we will be temporarily limiting your fellow Houseguest’s consciousness. Will that be okay with you?”

I found my voice, surprisingly calm. “If you want to talk to me, you can talk to him too.”

I gestured with my cuffed hand, almost dislocating Hawthorne’s shoulder. “Go ahead.”

The voice didn't reply for a moment.

“That's not possible,” it said finally. “Isabelle, you personally requested memory erasure.”

If looks could kill me (again), hawthorne’s glare would've done the trick.

“What?” Hawthorne yanked our bound wrists a little too hard. His heart started hammering again. “You're part of this?!”

Before I had a chance to reply, Hawthorne’s head swung forwards, his body going limp in the chair. He was heavier than I thought.

I poked him. Nothing.

He was out cold.

“It's temporary,” The voice repeated when Hawthorne’s head found my shoulder. Warmth. “Isabelle, how much do you currently know about the outside world?”

“Nothing,” I said, before I could bite it back.

One camera sitting on the ceiling zoomed closer, a red light blinking.

“Do you want to know about the outside world, Kid?”

I don't know what it was. Maybe the familiarity in the voice that was supposed to be robotic, or a crack in the emotionless facade.

Drowning was a human feeling. Chest aching, stomach twisting, lungs starving for oxygen. That's what I felt.

The sensation was boiling hot in my veins, agonizing, and human.

I felt my knees hit the ground, my nonexistent breath knocked from me. That voice reminded me of something.

The memory was like a single flicker, and I desperately lunged for it before it could fade. It took me back to thirteen years old, and my first real race.

I won.

I beat two professional olympians, and was awarded the scholarship.

But as a selfish athlete, who had to be selfish and had to look the other way, I refused to see the world crumbling.

Europe went into lockdown while I visited Brookside for a tour. Jesse drove me.

Ever since the first snow fell, Jesse had become less of an NPC, and more like a big brother.

His car radio was constantly tuned to the news.

He was obsessed with getting sick, insisting I wash my hands and use sanitizer every hour. I didn't blame him.

There were no restrictions on flights, so the “ice” virus was guaranteed to reach us.

There were already reports of people “coming back to life” on the streets.

But it wasn’t zombies.

These people weren’t reanimated corpses. They were cold.

Their blood was frozen, ice slick on their skin, and yet they moved through the streets of every European country, attacking anything warm.

Begging others for something they couldn’t name.

Every news report said the same thing: “This virus isn’t killing people. It is turning them into monsters.”

A male reporter was clearly panicking. “I know what we’re all thinking, and I’m going to be the one to say it—”

“Please don’t.” Jesse muttered under his mask. He switched the radio off with a sigh.

I watched the blizzard pile up on the windshield.

Jesse was getting increasingly frustrated with the wipers. I didn't speak, and he nudged me playfully.

“It'll be okay,” he said. “They said it's a virus that only survives in cold climates. So, we’re fine.”

I only had to glance outside to prove him wrong.

Jesse shrugged, shooting me a grin. “I'm trying to sugarcoat it, kid,” he chuckled.

He turned the radio back on. “The first case of YMRV-12 has been confirmed in Sydney, Australia—”

Jesse panicked, turning the dial. “Do you, uh, have a Spotify you want to link up?”

When we arrived, the tour was cut short. The principal was in quarantine.

When I was packing to leave, the first case of YMRV-12 was confirmed in the US.

Two days later, it was 100.

Then 500.

1000.

Two weeks later, during my first professional-level race, the US went into full lockdown.

The mass burials began, and Brookside was converted into a hospital.

Mom called me and said she was sick, that she was freezing cold and couldn’t get warm.

“It’s probably the flu,” she told me.

Mom died three days later.

And, according to my father, she woke up and tried to rip his throat out.

Mom was cold. The type of cold that was vicious and craved warmth.

When Dad stopped responding to my messages, I realized she had found it.

The virus was only killing and turning adults.

Kids were either completely immune or asymptomatic.

Brookside kids were stuck in the dorms.

We were bored, so Jesse was planning to drive a group of us into the city.

We snuck out, dove into Jesse’s truck, and squeezed down back roads.

Then we stopped for gas and Jesse disappeared.

I remember going to look for him, then a clammy hand slamming over my mouth.

Jesse was in the van I was shoved into, in handcuffs.

I overheard them talking on the drive, saying kids were being rounded up everywhere, herded onto school buses.

Once half of the US population were dead, kids were goldmines.

They told us we were the cure.

The facilities were sold to us as places to protect and "nurture the future."

I was thirteen when I got my first extraction.

Strapped to a metal bed, wrists and ankles bound, I watched my blood drain, crimson droplets creeping into the tube.

The nurse flashed me a razor sharp grin. “Just a few more pints!”

And I believed them.

Five years later, my world was gone, and I was partway through my transformation.

The virus didn’t change or kill us. So the monsters who froze the planet kept us as personal blood banks. When we reached a certain age, we began the change.

We called it YMRV at first. Ymir, the Iceland virus. Then we called it Cold.

And then, we started calling it what it really was.

Vampires.

Waiting Rooms were vampire conversion facilities.

You entered at twelve or thirteen.

And you left at twenty as a bloodsucker.

Two IV’s per day.

One drained us, the other filled us with poison.

I lost my breath first.

I woke up, and it was gone. I no longer needed air. Then my body functions shut down. I stopped eating, sleeping.

My sweat crystallized. Even my reflection was a shadow.

Technically, I was clinically dead.

To be fully turned, however, a human had to die.

The converting facility, next to the dorms, was a slaughter house.

The screams still lived in my head, daring me to wonder just how they were killed.

I wasn't expecting an impromptu public turning.

He is turned not killed

Roll call was at 9pm. Nights were days. Days were nights.

I was standing in knee-deep snow, my camp uniform clinging to my skeletal frame. Kids in Waiting Rooms were categorized: Reds (18–20) and Yellows (12–18).

I stood at attention, snowflakes dancing around me.

It had been snowing for five years straight.

Mima was nowhere to be seen, probably dead, and the only person I did have left was on limited time.

I blinked rapidly. Blood loss made my head spin.

It didn't matter if my body was changing, I still needed my blood.

The key was to focus on the woman who called herself our Godmother.

Mrs. Moriarty. The most obvious vampire I had ever seen.

World leaders at least tried to be subtle.

She, however, had no problem playing into the vampire stereotype.

Unnaturally beautiful, and terrifying, wearing black for every occasion.

Standing in knee high boots, a long black dress sculpting every curve, sleek black hair nestled under a fedora, she meant business.

Mrs Moriarty resembled an Emo Effie Trinket.

“Children!” she greeted us with a scarlet grin.

“Children!” a voice muttered behind me, mocking her.

Jesse.

Jesse Cromer, former medalist, wore a red camp uniform, which I was in denial of.

I was in denial I was losing him. He’d become less boyishly handsome, more dad-like. I didn’t like what he was becoming.

Gaunt cheeks, sharper teeth, and unnatural eyes.

Twenty-year-olds were practically turned.

But Jesse still knew me.

Even if Jesse stared through me on most days.

I couldn't tell if he was brainwashed or pretending.

“It’s a beautiful morning,” Mrs. Moriarty announced, her voice bright with triumph.

“The last of the humans have been captured. The royals have fallen. The heir is in our hands. Truly, a glorious day.”

She began to clap, eyes gleaming. I sensed the crowd around me drinking this in; we were the only humans left.

There was nobody left to fight for us.

Emo Effie Trinket was fucking ecstatic. “Come now, children—clap!”

We had no choice. Applause broke out. I mimicked her grin.

When she stopped, we stopped. One boy continued and was dragged out.

“Now, I know you're all dying to know what's happening,” she gushed. “Waiting Rooms have been a success! We have converted over six million children!”

Cue applause.

“Give me a break,” Jesse muttered.

His hiss carved the smallest smile on my lips. I risked twisting around, and caught his eye. Jesse was an enigma.

Definitely brainwashed— and physically changing. But he was still him.

“However,” Mrs. Moriarty’s tone darkened.

“I want to do a thing. Let's see if we can fix a problem. The newborns are a little.. feral.”

She laughed. So did we. Then she stopped, her beady eyes scanning the crowd. “You,” she pointed at Jesse, whose nonchalant expression faltered.

“The red with the cheeky smile! Come on up here!”

Her beautiful facade splintered, lips curling back in a ravenous snarl.

“You haven't turned yet, so I would like to test something.”

Jesse hesitated. We were supposed to look straight forward.

But I couldn't help it.

I wasn't supposed to be able to feel fear, so why could I feel the erratic thump of my own heartbeat as he made his way up to the front?

I was paralyzed to the spot, my lips parted, like I was going to protest.

But that would get me disposed of.

Jesse kept his head held high, fashioning his expression into something vacant, emotionless, as he joined Mrs. Moriarty's side.

The vampire queen herself gently took his shoulders, twisting him around to face the rest of us. Jesse didn’t move, even as his frantic eyes found mine.

I missed his selfishness.

Human Jesse would have had no problem throwing another kid under the bus to save himself.

Moriarty wasn’t subtle, her lips finding his neck, sharpened incisors dragging across his sculpted throat.

It wasn’t fair. They took my breath.

They took my ability to feel human and left only the weakest part of me. I was far too aware of my heart hammering in my ears.

She shoved him to his knees. “And what’s your name, love?”

“Jesse, ma’am,” Jesse said loudly.

“Jesse.” Mrs. Moriarty crouched in front of him, her manicured nails gripping his chin, violently jerking his face toward her.

She inclined her head, maintaining a fanged grin. I noticed his lips curve into a scowl.

She disgusted him. Still, he managed to hide it.

“Well, darling,” she said, pulling out a blade and plunging it through his head.

A scream tore free from my throat, raw and feral. Guards were already grabbing me, yanking me back. Moriarty didn’t even notice. She twisted the knife, the crunch of my friend’s skull splitting open sending me to my knees.

Jesse flopped onto the ground, red droplets dribbling from his eye.

The woman’s gaze found mine, maintaining eye contact as she kicked him into the snow.

“Would you like to tell everyone what you find so amusing?”

—

The memory splintered, and I found myself back in front of the cameras.

Hawthorne's warmth seeped into my shoulder, a small comfort.

Except for the drool.

I had just managed to recenter myself, telling myself I didn't need to breathe, when the main speaker spoke again, a condescending, cruel edge to it.

“So, kid,” the voice drawled, the camera moving closer until I was staring right down the lens. “Do you remember now?”

“It could be a mental illness, I guess.”

That's what I tell my fifth therapist across from me. She sits patiently, one leg crossed over the other. I’ve spoken to four different therapists about my boyfriend’s obsession with stealing cars, sometimes while they’re still moving.

He’s stolen six in the last month and totaled every one. This therapist looks mildly horrified, but she nods politely.

“It’s embarrassing being on the road with him,” I say, rolling my eyes. “He’ll jump out of our car in the middle of traffic, run straight to another one, and speed off.”

Therapists think it's something to do with his childhood, kleptomania, maybe he grew up with strict parents and was conditioned into thinking stealing was the only way. “He's twenty four,” I tell her. “He's not a kid.”

The therapist nods, scribbles something down, and pretends to listen. Her office is suffocating and I want to leave. I can tell she's stalling, glancing at her watch when she thinks I'm not looking. 

I already know what she's writing.

I’m a lost cause, and my boyfriend is a psychopath. 

“Senna,” my therapist leans forward. I can tell by the twitch in her brow she’s about to say something problematic. “This might seem like… a strange question,” she says. Her tone is far too sweet, like she’s sucking on a sugar cube. “Senna, would you say you have been feeling… off lately?” Her smile widens. “For example, have you … kicked a passerby?” 

“What?”

She leans closer. Her breath smells like nothing. “You told me about your boyfriend. Jude, was it?”

“Yes.” 

She nods. “Jude does things, perhaps, impulsively. Do you think you share that with him?” 

I lean back. “No! What are you talking about?” 

She cocks her head. “Are you sure, Senna?” She hums. “Come on,” her lips curl into a smirk. “Surely you have some dark thoughts. It can't all be your boyfriend. Go on. Surely you want to call me… perhaps, a stupid fucking bug-eyed bitch.” 

She smiles wide when my cheeks heat up. “I suggest you talk to Jude.”

Her eyebrow quirks. “Why not go for a nice walk on the beach? You can talk about his… impulsiveness to steal cars.” 

She’s smiling like she knows something I don't. “Does Jude get…arrested a lot?” 

“Yes,” I whisper. “Multiple times a day. It’s a problem. He’s changed! Jude was a normal guy, and then he started getting violent. Scary. He steals cars and doesn’t even care. He attacks people on the street, and it’s like nobody else sees it but me.” 

I can feel myself starting to splinter when she smirks, my patience wearing thin.

“My boyfriend has a mental health issue, and you’re laughing?”

“Yes.” The therapist looks me dead in the eye. “It’s very funny. Your boyfriend has lost his filter. It’s quite common. Head injuries are usually the cause. Think of Jude as having a moral barrier. Right now, it’s broken.”

I laugh. 

When she doesn't, I find my voice. “I'm sorry, what?” 

I leave therapy early, slamming the door behind me. “Thanks for nothing!” 

Outside, Jude waits for me beside his latest stolen car: a bright yellow Bug.

“Yooo, Senna!” he yells, sticking his head out of the window. He’s wearing a suit I don’t remember him buying, his thick brown curls pinned back by sunglasses.

He's wet. Soaking wet.

He grins, spitting water from his mouth. “Coming for a ride?”

“Why are you wet?” 

He shrugs. “Fell in the sea.” Jude pats the drivers side. “Hop in!” 

I hesitate, before climbing into the front.  “Is this car…stolen?” 

Jude grins. “Oh, babe, you know it is!” 

“So, I talked to a therapist about you,” I start. 

“Oh?” He laughs, cranking up the radio. “Do tell.” 

“Jude, slow down.” I manage when he speeds past a red light. “She says you've lost your filter.” 

I try to explain it the way she did. “Your brain has a moral wall that stops you doing bad things.” 

I choke on my words when my boyfriend speeds up, loudly whooping.

The psychotic gleam in his eye sends my heart into my throat. “Jude, she said you’re suffering from a head injury!”

“Ha!” He shoots me a grin. “You're funny!”

“No, I'm being serious!” 

He stops the car suddenly. 

So abruptly, I swing forwards on my seatbelt, and am violently yanked back. 

Jude taps the steering wheel, smirking.

“You know what's funny?” He says. He gestures in front of us at the afternoon rush hour. “People."

He revs the engine, twisting to me. “Don't they remind you of bugs when they run?”

Jude starts the engine, and I scream when he rams straight through the crowd, sending us veering off onto the beach.

I stumble out of the car, breathless.

Jude stands still, knee-deep in the shallows, glaring at the sky.

“I hate you,” he whispers, laughing, and my therapist’s words slam into me.

“Your boyfriend’s filter is broken.”

He shoves me onto my butt. 

Violently. 

“I hate you.” He stamps on my head, giggling. 

“I hate that you're SO fucking oblivious.” Jude pulls out a knife, and plunges it into my gut. “Does that hurt?” He hums, as blood spills from my mouth. 

“Awww, does it hurt?” His lips graze mine and he twists it deep in my abdomen.

“Tell me it hurts,” he moans. “Tell me it hurts. Tell me you're going to die. Tell me you're closer, baby.” My vision feathers, his face bleeding into shadow. “When are you gonna die, hm? Is it now?” He laughs, and my vision goes dark. “... now?”

Death feels like melting.

But I'm not dead.

I wake up on the beach, standing in the exact same spot. 

Jude is three inches from my face.

Behind me, a bustling crowd of people.

No screaming.

No sirens. 

“Three letters,” my boyfriend mutters, his lip curled in disgust. 

He points a pistol between my brows, lips splitting into a grin.

“NPC.” 

I picked her up outside a hotel.

I already knew she’d been thrown out.

The clerk stands in the doorway, arms folded, a phone to his ear.

She looks exhausted, dark shadows under her eyes, but she’s wearing a smile that’s already resigned. Fifteen or sixteen, around my age. Ready to give up.

She’s wearing a summer dress and sandals, and I can tell she hasn’t had a shower in weeks.

Her dress sticks to her, thick brown curls glued over her eyes, and a blooming red sunburn stains her skin. I wonder how long she's been hiding in the hotel.

Teenagers are public enemy number one, so it's not surprising the clerk’s beady eyes follow her to the passenger side of my beaten up bug.

“Hi!” She grins, relief bleeding from her tone that's almost a sob.

She jumps into my truck. “I'm Cinna.” She introduces herself with a fake name. Cinna is her favorite character in her favorite book tucked at the bottom of her pack. Her real name is Addison Hart.

16 years old.

She escaped a nullification camp with six dollars, a stolen iPhone 17, and a Polaroid camera.

She apologizes for her lack of hygiene with a laugh, and I smile and blast the AC.

“Don't worry about it,” I tell her, gesturing to my shorts and t-shirt combo I've been wearing since I found a lake off route 46.

Since then, it's just been hoping for rain, and sneaking into motel bathrooms.

Addison, sorry, Cinna, twists in her seat and asks me point blank:

“Dude,” she laughs, but she's blushing, embarrassed, already shifting uncomfortably. “Do you have any pads?”

I'm kinda surprised her life on the run hasn't significantly fucked with her cycle.

I haven't had a period since I was sixteen.

But I smile, nod, and gesture to my glove compartment. “I have tons.” I laugh when she snatches one up, her smile widening.

“I pick up a lot of kids,” I tell her. “I've lost count how many times I've been asked, so I raided a hotel bathroom.”

Addison squeaks excitedly, and leans back in her seat, squeezing the pads to her chest like a newborn baby. “You are an angel!” Then she blinks. Surprised. “Wait!”

Her eyes widen, and she sticks her head out of the window. “A beaten up red truck, and a teen driver!” She gasps. “Are you her?”

“That's what I've been reduced to?” I say. “Her?”

Addie grins. I catch her snatching up a cereal bar and stuffing it in her mouth. She doesn't even chew.

“You're the one who takes kids to a safe-haven,” she says through a mouthful, spitting crumbs everywhere. “I heard about you from a guy who was…” she drifts off, her smile fading, crawling from her face. “Anyway.” Addie demolishes the cereal bar in a single bite. “He said you're like, I dunno, a Gen Z Katniss.”

“I'm just a transporter.”

I tap the steering wheel, fiddling with the radio. Taylor Swift sputters through the static, and we both groan.

Addison pulls a face, and I know exactly what she's going to say. “I can't believe she sold out,” she whispers. “I fucking hate that stupid message she tacks onto the end of her songs.” Addison mimics the radio. “If any of my fans are out there, just know you're loved, and coming home will keep you all safe!”

“She was forced to, you know,” I remind her, as an ex-swifty who burned all of my albums. “They threatened her family.”

“I don't care." Addison grumbles. We’re both avoiding the elephant in the room.

It's comfortable, better, to talk about issues that don't matter instead of issues that do. “They're all the same.”

“So, where are you headed?” I ask.

Addison smiles, throwing her feet up on the dash. “The safe-haven! You can take me, right?” Her eyes widened. “Wait, do I need an ID? My mom burned all my shit before she sent me to—”

“No ID.” I say before she goes off on another tangent. She reminds me of Asa, my ADHD riddled bestie. Asa’s parents shot him in the head when he was asleep. “You're fine. I'll just drop you off.”

“Yay!” Addie cranks up the radio.

Oasis. She sticks her head out the window and screams the lyrics.

I can't help singing along loudly, slamming my hands on the wheel.

It's just us, the long, dusty dead road, and a band none of us have cared about until now. “This was my mom’s favorite song!” Addie yells, laughing. Her hair whips my face. “I said, maaaaybeeeeeee!”

After absolutely destroying our voice-boxes singing to every classic, she leans back in her seat.

“Sooo.” She says, playfully kicking me. “What kinda kids have you picked up?”

I have to think about that.

There's been a lot.

“There was one kid called Elliot,” I began. “Total asshole. He could, like, do this,” I mimic Elliot’s power, snapping my fingers. “Literally like a human firecracker.”

I'm pretty sure Elliot’s blood still stains her seat.

It's okay, though. She won't see it. His body is still in the back.

Addie laughs. “Was he at least HOT?”

“Ew!” I giggle. “No. Not my type.” I sigh, stretching.

“Then there was Aris. She reminded me of a princess.” I smile at the thought of her lying in a ditch, just off route 46. “Her power was x-ray vision. She was cute.”

“Where are they now?” Addie asks.

“Exactly where I'm taking you.”

“Sounds fun!” Addie kicks her feet. “Do you wanna guess what my power is?”

She's so innocent, so fucking stupid. I almost feel bad for what I'm going to do.

I can't wait until I carve it from her skull.

I take the powerful ones for myself, and deliver the rest to our great president.

“Shoot.” I laugh. “Can't be worse than Elliot The Firecracker.”

Addie's smile widens. “Telepathy, babe.”

When I was eight years old, I saw something I shouldn’t have.

I didn’t mean to. I mean, I was just a curious kid. I couldn’t understand why my elementary school insisted on hosting “video time” for a select group of students every Friday afternoon.

It was the whole fifth-grade class, as well as my class, all of them except me.

I didn’t think much of it at first.

I thought it was because these kids were well-behaved and were being given a treat, but Elliot Marsh definitely was not well-behaved.

He couldn’t sit still throughout class and regularly pulled girls’ pigtails until they cried. So imagine my confusion when he, too, was allowed to participate in this super-exclusive video time.

Elliot spat in other kids’ faces and talked back to the teachers, while I stayed quiet and only spoke up when I was asked a question.

It didn’t make sense to me why even the worst kid in the class was dragging his feet into video time while I was left out.

I didn’t like the look of the room, either.

It wasn’t a classroom, just a small room with red lights and a matching carpeted floor.

I had only managed to catch a glimpse of it, and I already didn’t like the idea of sitting on the carpet, drowned in harsh red light.

I started forward to get a closer look when a warm hand wrapped around my arm and gently pulled me back.

“Freida, aren’t you supposed to be at recess?”

Mrs. Parish wasn’t easily fooled when I told the white lie that I was supposed to be in there, too.

Naturally, she didn’t believe me, escorting me outside to play with the stragglers, who were just four kids I didn’t even know.

When I spotted my two younger brothers following the long line of kids into the video room, I started to get angry and frustrated.

Why was I so different?

I wasn’t that badly behaved, right?

Sure, I messed up my spelling sometimes, and I still couldn’t do math very well, but I wasn’t a bad kid. I deserved video time too, just like my brothers, and they were a year younger than me.

I thought older kids got things first.

I admit, I was jealous.

I didn’t care that the rest of us were allowed a second recess. I wanted to know why the other kids were allowed to watch movies and I wasn’t.

I even asked them, cornering my friends when they walked into class the next day with their usual smiles.

I asked them what the big secret about video time was, but they just smiled and pretended to zip their lips.

That made me more jealous.

Mom didn’t help.

I said I wanted her to talk to the teacher and let me join in, but she just shook her head with a sigh.

“Some things aren’t for you, Freida.”

That hurt.

I mean, she was kind of right. I couldn’t have everything I wanted, and I knew that.

But there was something about being the only kid in my class who wasn’t allowed to watch movies that made me feel like I wasn’t good enough.

I remember Mom’s words cutting into me like a knife.

I had always admired my mother for being honest and telling the truth.

When I was five years old, I happened to find a photograph in our attic of a baby who looked like me, cradled in another woman’s arms.

She didn’t try to keep anything from me or hide behind a façade.

It’s not like she could have tried, anyway. I was adopted, obviously.

Anyone could see that.

I didn’t have my mother’s blood-red hair and pale skin, which both of my brothers had inherited.

Instead, I was a mousy brunette.

Mom reassured me that I could always ask about my real mother and that, when I was older, I could write her letters and even visit her if I wanted to.

This made me feel safe and loved.

I could have two moms, and both of them loved me.

However, I didn’t like that she sided with the school and refused to talk to my teacher about allowing me to join video time.

She kept asking me the same question, and I realized I couldn’t answer it.

Why did I want to join in so badly?

I thought about it and concluded that I didn’t like being left out.

It’s not like the other kids boasted about video time.

Some of them even forgot it existed.

I asked them if they had fun watching movies, and they blinked at me, confused.

“What movies?” they would say before giving me an odd look and running away.

I asked my brothers what movies they were all watching over dinner, and they, too, looked at me like I was a weirdo before Mom changed the subject.

She did that a lot, especially when I got kind of desperate, grilling my younger brothers on what exactly they were all watching in that big room.

But Mom would quickly start talking about something unrelated.

I did manage to question one of them in the car when Mom was getting groceries.

Cam was the quiet one out of my siblings, usually keeping to himself, glued to the newest Pokémon release.

I found myself with the perfect opportunity. PJ, our brother, was at a friend’s house, so it was just me and him.

“You guys watch movies in that red room, right?” I leaned over in my seat and poked my brother’s cheek teasingly. “So, what do you watch?”

My brother didn’t look up from his DS.

“They’re not movies, stupid head,” he mumbled around the stylus in his mouth, his gaze glued to the screen.

“Huh?” Intrigued, I leaned over and plucked the console from his fingers.

“Hey!”

“What do you mean they’re not movies?”

“Give that back!” Cam reached out and tried to snatch it back, almost choking on the stylus he had been lazily chewing on, but I quickly hid it behind my back, tucking it into my skirt pocket, which was my prime hiding place. “I’m going to lose my Squirtle!”

“Tell me what you all watch in that weird room.”

He straightened up, his eyes slightly unfocused from staring at his game. “What are you talking about?”

“I want to know what video time is,” I said, a quirk of a smile on my lips. I enjoyed annoying Cam. I liked it when his cheeks turned the same shade as his hair and his voice turned whiny, like he was a baby.

I folded my arms and fixed him with my best smile, only for him to spit at me. “If you don’t tell me, I’m throwing your game out of the window.” It was a lie, obviously.

But Cam didn’t know that.

I held my ground when he opened his mouth and threatened to call for Mom.

But Mom was in the grocery store, and we both knew if we started fighting, neither of us would be getting the peanut butter ice cream we had been promised.

I ignored his death glare, meeting it with a smile.

I had won.

Only just.

If I had something important, like my phone that I used to play App Store games on, he could easily swipe it from me.

“So if they’re not movies, what are you all watching?” I asked. “Wait, are you watching cartoons? How is it fair that you get to watch cartoons and I have to go to stupid recess?”

Cam blew a raspberry and held out his hand for his game.

“If you give me my game back, I’ll tell you.” He stuck out his tongue. “I’ll give you five seconds.”

I blew a raspberry back at him.

“You can’t time it!”

“Yes, I can.” He wiggled his hand. “Give me my game.” He curled his lip. “Or I’ll tell PJ that you’re hiding his favorite cereal under your pillow.”

I had no idea he even knew about that. Cam was sneakier than I thought.

Reluctantly, I handed him back his DS, and he opened it to check his progress.

“Well?”

Cam shrugged.

“It’s not movies that we watch,” he mumbled. “It’s a tutorial.” He waved his DS in my face. “See? Just like a game.”

I nodded slowly.

“So, it’s showing you how to do something?”

“Yep!”

I leaned back in my seat, frowning at a stray raindrop sliding down the window.

“But… what is it teaching you?”

Cam didn’t answer, enthralled by his game, and I admit, I don’t think I wanted to know. All I had initially wanted to know was why they were watching movies without me.

I found myself no longer caring about video time.

In fact, I enjoyed my extra recess, deciding to sit on the jungle gym and pretend to be the queen of my subjects: the four kids left behind, who refused to play with me.

I ordered them to fetch me a giant cake, but the four of them just frowned at me in confusion.

They were the least energetic kids I had ever met, choosing to sit on the grass and pick their noses, staring at the sky like a giant question mark was looming over them.

They didn’t even speak.

When they did, it was just noises or snorting.

I got tired of them eventually, and it was starting to rain, which neither of them noticed.

One of the girls tipped her head back and didn’t even flinch when fat drops of rain hit her in the face.

When the downpour started, I hurried inside.

Normally, we had to ask a teacher during recess, but I was getting soaked.

I tried to open the doors leading back into the school, but they were locked.

I found another entrance, which led into the auditorium.

I planned to go right back to my classroom, though once I left the comfort of the auditorium, I realized something was wrong.

The lights were off. The hallway, always familiar to me, had transformed into a terrifying tunnel of pooling oblivion.

There was one light, and I didn’t like it.

With it being the only thing illuminating the darkness, however, I found myself drawn toward it. An intense red glow spilled from the video room.

The door was open, and I found my steps quickening, my breath heavy in my throat.

I had waited so long to see what I wasn’t allowed to participate in, and my curiosity drove me closer and closer to the door.

I don’t remember actually seeing what was inside.

I just remember stumbling back, a scream caught in my throat.

I didn’t stop screaming until my mom arrived, but even then, I refused to let her touch me, to let any of them touch me.

I was on the ground, sobbing into the carpet fibers, clinging to them like they would protect me. I told my mom there was a monster inside that room, a monster that didn’t want me to know it existed.

When she said I was being ridiculous, I begged her to take me to the video room.

And she did. The next day, Mom took me into the video room with my teacher supervising, and I found myself staring at an empty room and an empty television.

Even the red light was gone.

Mrs. Parish told me it was a nightmare, that I’d fallen asleep and had a bad dream. But I didn’t remember falling asleep.

“There’s a monster.” I kept saying it over and over until my mother bent down and gently pulled me to her height, squeezing my fingers.

“There isn’t a monster,” she said softly, brushing my hair from my eyes. “Some things are not meant for you. Do you understand me, Freida?”

“But…”

“What did you see?” This time, her tone was hard. “Tell me what you saw, sweetie.”

I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to remember, but it was like pushing against a barrier in my mind.

“I saw a monster.”

“No, you didn’t.” Her eyes were hard. “Say it with me, okay?” She squeezed my fingers again, this time a little too tightly. “You had a nightmare, just like Mrs. Parish said. It was all in your head.”

I took a deep breath and nodded, wrapping my arms around my mother.

“I had a nightmare,” I whispered into the soft fabric of her jacket.

I didn’t believe her, though I didn’t believe myself either.

I wasn’t sure what exactly I had seen. Like a nightmare or a dream, whatever it was had slipped away, fading into nothing.

What I did remember were echoes that didn’t make sense, my own fear reduced to one giant question mark inside my mind.

I didn’t remember looking into that room, but I could recall a feeling of unease, of nausea twisting my gut, of gut-wrenching fear taking over as if I really had seen what was inside.

Part of me wondered if my teachers had somehow stolen the images from my mind. Or maybe I had been so terrified that my brain had twisted everything into meaningless shapes and colors. I tried to make sense of it.

I tried to understand it, and even conquer my fear of the video room.

But that sensation never left me, the feeling of being watched, phantom bugs writhing down my spine and filling my mouth until it shaped into an O. It lingered for weeks, and every night for two weeks, I dreamed of the video room.

I dreamed of a static television looming over rows and rows of shadows, silhouettes of my classmates who had no faces when they turned to look at me.

They watched me without eyes, without identities I recognized. Blanketed in darkness, they transformed from my friends into something unknowable, a monstrous cavern in my head that felt unreachable, as though oblivion hung above me without truly existing.

I couldn’t look my friends in the eye without a feeling creeping through me, whispering that it wasn’t really them I was looking at.

I became withdrawn from the rest of my class, as well as my younger brothers, hiding away from their faces.

I felt it whenever I was around them, a suffocating darkness eating me alive, dozens of invisible eyes boring into my back, watching my every move, choking my words before I could speak.

That sensation came back to haunt me nine years later, unwelcome and agonizing, yet familiar.

I got that exact same feeling around my boyfriend’s family.

Well, his siblings.

I was yet to meet his parents.

Spencer Delaney was a catch I didn’t think I deserved. I met him at a party, and he was the type of guy who could be both the introvert sitting with the house cat and the extrovert jumping up and down to music until he got blackout drunk.

I met him on my way to the bathroom to throw up, the two of us bonding over our love of potted plants and tragic romance.

Through my drunken vision, Spencer resembled a Hollywood star that night, a sparkling smile beneath bedhead curls held back by Ray-Bans perched on his head.

Our first conversation was just me pointing out that he’d spilled his drink, and him gleefully naming the stain on his collar.

He called it Ben.

Which, as a drunken idiot, I found far too funny.

You know what’s weird? I barely drank that night, choosing to stay mostly sober.

Before I knew it, however, the world was spinning and the lights were too bright. I could see glistening perspiration on the dancing bodies around me, bathed in colors I couldn’t name.

I emptied my guts in front of him and prayed to every god that I would never see him again.

The next day, however, I bumped into him at a coffee shop while grabbing my morning caffeine.

I was mortified because Spencer had seen everything, and I mean everything that came out of me that night.

I’m talking kneeling on the bathroom floor, bringing up what felt like my stomach lining, making noises no human should ever make.

When he instantly recognized me, though, I wondered if fate was at play.

I never believed in that sort of thing. There were dozens of cafés across campus, and somehow I’d found this boy again, a needle in a haystack.

Not really, if you think about it.

We went to the same college, so we were bound to run into each other eventually.

But I wanted to believe something was drawing us together, like we were star-crossed and destined to meet, or whatever.

In a way, I was kind of right.

Spencer didn’t have that glow from the night before. His teeth were slightly crooked when he grinned, and he was clearly nursing a bad hangover, hiding beneath his hoodie. Still, I found myself wanting to get to know him.

Spencer Delaney was clumsy, kind of a daydreamer, and clearly the weaker one out of the Delaney siblings, but I found that charming. Endearing.

Fast forward three months, and he wanted me to meet his family for the first time.

The problem?

Spencer’s family, or at least his siblings, were fucking insane.

And I don’t say that lightly.

Look, I can understand being protective of your younger brother, but these two took it to a whole other level.

Spencer was talking about dinner at his parents’ house on the walk back from class, specifying that his father liked a particular brand of soda and not to ask why his mother didn’t eat meat because it was a sensitive subject. I could barely register his words, already scanning the crowd for the Delaney siblings, who loved playing cloak-and-dagger.

Yes, I mean spying on us.

I mean ducking behind books, diving into the shadows, and watching us.

Initially, I thought their joint obsession with their younger brother’s dating life was kind of cute.

Luna Delaney would pop up out of nowhere while we were on a date and say, Oh, what a coincidence! I was going to see this movie too!

But then it kept happening.

I would be at the grocery store, and a familiar bouncing ponytail would bob behind me, her face hidden behind a book she clearly thought was camouflage.

I didn’t even have to be with Spencer. I could be anywhere, and somehow the Delaney siblings would find me.

I went to a baseball game with my dad over a long weekend, and somehow Jasper Delaney was sitting behind me.

I knew it was him.

Like I said, these guys thought they were inconspicuous, but I would recognize that bushy dark brown hair anywhere.

At first I thought it was a joke because it was almost comical, like I was playing Spot the Spy!

Neither of them were as slick as they thought. They were pretty fucking noticeable in a crowd.

But when they got progressively better at it, I got more paranoid.

“My family are kind of weird.”

That was what Spencer warned me on our second date, his joking smile twisting into something much more serious.

I laughed and said, Well, aren’t all families weird?

Now I understood that expression.

He didn’t laugh at my joke. Instead, he downed his glass of wine and changed the subject.

Throughout the date, I kept catching his eyes wandering, not because he was daydreaming like usual.

He was looking for someone.

It was while I was ordering dessert that I caught a glimpse of his brother sitting across the restaurant, pretending to be in conversation with a group of people who clearly had no idea who he was.

He was dressed like he’d rolled out of bed, as usual, a black hoodie thrown over jeans, standing out among suits and sequined dresses.

I should have realized Spencer had been struggling through the meal because he was distracted by something just out of sight.

When he threw down his napkin and quietly excused himself, I twisted around in my chair and watched him make his way over to Jasper, his arms folded and his eyes dark.

They exchanged a few words.

Jasper didn’t smile or look angry. His expression was unreadable.

Eventually, he nodded once and slipped away, disappearing into the crowd.

When Spencer returned, his smile was back, though it looked forced. His grip on the table was so tight his knuckles had turned white.

“Please excuse my brother,” he said. “I have…” He trailed off before pouring himself another glass and downing that one too. “Overprotective siblings.”

I didn’t understand what he meant until we started dating properly, and it was like dating all three of them.

We had no privacy, and whenever I thought we’d finally lost them, one of them would appear nearby, once again not being the slightest bit subtle.

I used to play secret agents with my brothers when I was little, but these were grown nineteen-year-olds.

Spencer never had an excuse beyond, “They’re kind of weird.”

And he was right.

His family was fucking weird.

Which was one of many reasons I was wary about meeting his parents.

Was the whole family obsessed with Spencer’s dating life? Were they all going to stalk my every move?

Either way, I had no choice. Spencer had already made the plans, and backing out would have been rude.

I was only half listening to him now, my gaze already scanning the late afternoon rush-hour crowds for familiar Delaney features.

All three siblings had the same dark brown curls haloing strong jaws and the same dark eyes that seemed to study every passerby.

“Okay, so let’s go through it again, just to be sure.”

“Right,” I said. “Uh, you told me not to look your dad in the eye, right?”

“Yep. He hates eye contact.”

Spencer’s clammy hand tightened around mine, and I wondered if he was trying to stop me from running away.

I’d already told him I was nervous about officially meeting his family, especially considering his brother and sister were professional stalkers.

He’d reassured me his parents were lovely and that I’d eventually grow to like his siblings.

I wasn’t convinced.

Judging by the number of times they had inserted themselves into my life, I had no doubt those two already knew everything about me, probably more than I knew about myself.

Which made them not just weird, but terrifying.

I never knew when they were going to appear, listening to my private conversations or lurking in the shadows.

It was early evening. We’d just finished classes, and I was being gently pulled toward the Delaney house, one hand tangled in Spencer’s while the other clutched a cheap bottle of wine I’d grabbed from the convenience store.

“Then I have to greet them when we arrive and smile, though not too much,” I repeated through gritted teeth.

I had no idea why there were so many rules. I was meeting his parents, not the president.

I nearly tripped over the heels I’d stupidly decided to wear, completely misjudging the uneven pavement.

“Oh, also, I have to take off my shoes and put them in the closet. Your mother is a cleanliness freak, and she hates dirt.”

I jumped when my boyfriend playfully nudged me, laughing.

“You got it!”

Spencer’s smile made my heart ache. How could he be blood-related to these weirdos? I had no idea. Spencer was the complete opposite of both of them.

Luna Delaney was like a snake, a snake I knew would backstab me the second she got the chance.

Luna was beautiful, but there was a certain contortion in her lipstick smile that sent shivers skittering up and down my spine.

Jasper at least tried to be friendly, but the grins splitting his mouth apart were too wide, like he was hiding something, like he secretly wanted, no, needed me to get away from his brother.

His teeth were too sharp, like fangs, and there was a vacancy in his eyes, like he wasn’t aware of the world around him, only his younger brother. The Delaney siblings did not deserve a brother like Spencer.

“Lastly, I can’t challenge your brother at a game,” I relayed his words from earlier. “Especially when he’s drunk.”

“That’s right,” my boyfriend said with a sigh. “I’m sorry there are so many rules. It’s just a family thing, I guess…” He trailed off. “I haven’t dated anyone before, so my family are interested in meeting you.” His lip quirked. “And why my brother and sister won’t leave us alone.”

“No kidding.” I rolled my eyes.

“They’re not that bad,” he shrugged, throwing me a smile. “Sure, they’re invasive, but every family is, right?”

He was giving them way too much credit.

I turned to frown at him, my boyfriend, who was the human embodiment of a golden retriever hiding beneath thick brown curls. I had a hard time believing he’d never had a girlfriend, but considering his siblings’ behavior, maybe he’d avoided it.

If I had an overbearing family too, I would be wary of getting into relationships with anyone, terrified of scaring them off.

The Delaney household was just as I expected as we headed up a gravel driveway, a large Victorian house surrounded by a white picket fence.

The flower garden was perfectly arranged, with a small pool around the back and a jacuzzi sitting on a wooden platform.

I found myself transfixed by the sight. Everything looked so clean and untouched.

The pool still had its cover on, and the deck chairs surrounding it looked brand new.

I expected security cameras mounted above the door, already taking full-body scans.

But the house looked like your average family home. Even so, the fact that it was far too clean and untouched bothered me.

When Spencer pulled me to the front door, I glimpsed a tag still hanging from a rose bush beside the entrance. I opened my mouth to ask what his parents did for work.

Maybe they were too busy to enjoy the luxury of their front yard.

Before I could, Spencer knocked twice before shouting, “Hey, Mom! I’m home!” He opened the door, gesturing me into a brightly lit hallway that already made me feel at home.

I found myself standing on a “Home Sweet Home!” welcome mat which, again, looked brand new. My gaze automatically found baby pictures mounted on the walls of what I presumed were the three Delaney siblings.

“Spencer!”

A voice brought me back to reality, a woman’s squeak from down the long hallway.

“Sweetie, is that you?”

“It’s me, Ma!” He chuckled, nudging me. “Forgive me, but Mom’s a little deaf, so you’re going to have to shout when talking to her. However, her hearing gets a little better when she’s drunk, so prepare to get an earful of saliva when the games start.”

“Games?” I took another step forward, slipping out of my heels.

“Yeah, my family kinda have a thing when we play Monopoly after dinner,” he said. “Whatever you do, do not take the dog piece. Luna will murder you.”

Nodding, I smiled, marveling at the architecture of the house, a mix of modern and ancient. The glass staircase in the corner of my eye was already scaring me. “Aww, are those you?” I pointed to the baby pictures, resisting the urge to roll my eyes. “And… them.”

Spencer laughed then, a full throw-your-head-back laugh, the one I particularly loved.

“Be nice! And yeah, Mom was a menace with the camera when we were kids.” He kicked off his own shoes. “I’m pretty sure she documented my whole life.”

I couldn’t help noticing that, in one particular picture, the smiling little girl waving at the camera was a redhead, even though I was sure Luna Delaney was a brunette.

Sure, she could have dyed her hair, but looking closer while Spencer dropped his bags and helped me out of my jacket, the other childhood photos stood out.

The two little boys playing in the Delaney flower garden were blonde.

I didn’t think much of it as I slipped out of my heels.

Spencer pulled open a small closet next to the door, and I ducked inside, neatly placing my heels beside a pair of battered boots.

Something stopped me from leaning back and dropping them. My fingers tightened around my shoes.

There were so many pairs.

As my gaze tracked around the closet, I saw jackets and bags, backpacks, wallets, and phones piled inside a small blue basket.

Too many, I thought dizzily. Far too many for one family of five.

It was when I found blurred, old red stains stuck to the bottom of a worn pair of Converse, rimming the edges, that a scream began in my chest, winding its way toward my throat.

I was only partially aware that my boyfriend wasn’t speaking, allowing me to take in what was in front of me.

There was something hanging overhead.

ID tags.

College ID tags. Five of them, swaying gently from the ceiling.

I couldn’t stop myself from reaching out and pulling one free, my breath caught in my throat.

California.

It was a UCLA ID, and it belonged to someone named Zach Valdez, an unsmiling college student rolling his eyes at the camera.

Somehow, I could see real expression in this boy’s face, while all Spencer did was smile his sweet golden retriever smile, charming me with a grin and a slight quirk of his lip.

Zach Valdez.

Who had my boyfriend’s face.

Before I could catch my breath, I twisted around with the intention of running, already mapping out how I would get around Spencer and dart toward the door.

But what I wasn’t counting on was finding myself inches from a gun, perfectly steady in my boyfriend’s hands, his finger teasing the trigger, aimed directly between my eyes.

His aim was perfect.

I realized I had been dating a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

He was the perfect Delaney sibling after all.

I raised my arms in surrender, and he followed the movement, his eyes drinking me in, perhaps for the first time.

Just as he was truly seeing me, I found myself staring into eyes I thought I knew, eyes hidden behind a carefully sculpted facade.

Looking closer, there was a certain blankness to his face. No involuntary twitches or expressions. If there were any, they had been practiced.

Even his smiles were just like his brother’s.

“Freida Castor,” he spoke like a robot, tightening his grip on the gun.

I didn’t see him pull the trigger, but something definitely hit me. A sharp sting, like a needle, sliced into the back of my neck.

“You’re going to tell us exactly what you know about…”

I couldn’t register the word, the shape of it razor sharp in my mind, refusing to settle.

When I managed to turn my head, my gaze found the older Delaney brother standing in the hallway, shadowed by light, a pea shooter curled between his lips and another gun pointed at me.

I didn’t have to search for the last sibling hiding just outside my line of sight.

I saw her ponytail.

Then I saw a third magnum pointed directly at my head.

The three of them spoke as one unit, one being, in perfect, terrifying sync. Their voices became something else entirely when they reached the final word.

A word I still couldn’t register.

Somehow, I wasn’t thinking about my current situation as I dropped to my knees, every breath dragged from my lungs.

I was thinking about a room drenched in red light, faceless shadows, and my mother’s desperation.

Some things aren’t for you, Freida. Do you understand me?

I remembered being paralyzed, dragged inside the Delaney household while the three of them repeated the same phrase, joined by two adult voices.

I was forced onto a leather sofa.

A television mounted on the wall flickered on, filling with buzzing static before black-and-white words appeared across the screen.

The Delaney Family! In: Hunt down and Delete every ____.

Spencer knelt in front of me, repeating those exact words at the exact same moment a woman with a bright, hypnotizing smile flickered onto the screen, her arms resting at her sides.

She reminded me of the old how-to videos you find on YouTube, the ones from the seventies with cheesy music.

Maybe it was the drugs, but she almost looked like she was bleeding from the static, her body slowly taking shape in the real world.

While her soldiers, the Delaney family, swiftly followed her orders.

Mrs. Delaney loomed over me in a fifties-style yellow dress with matching slippers.

Mr. Delaney lurked in the shadows.

The three children stood on either side of me.

Spencer Delaney gripped my arm while Luna Delaney’s fingers wrapped around my neck, forcing my head forward.

Jasper Delaney held my eyes open, forcing them wide.

I finally understood the blankness in his eyes.

I knew why I couldn’t read them.

They say eyes are the windows to the soul.

The eldest Delaney son had a deep, cavernous hole where his should have been.

Finally, I could hear it.

And somehow it was familiar.

It was home.

“You’re going to tell us exactly what you know about Sɥɐpoʍ.”

So yeah, you could say my boyfriend’s family was weird.

I grew up seeing it. At eight years old, I watched a man walk into our local café while I drank my peanut butter chocolate milkshake and killed two people dead.

There was no malice in his eyes, no hatred. He was just a normal guy who smiled at the waitress and winked at me.

Mom told me to keep drinking my milkshake, and I did, licking away the excess whipped cream while the bodies were carried out and the pooling red was cleaned from the floor. I could still see flecks of white in the red, and my stomach twisted.

But I didn’t feel scared. I had no reason to be. Nobody was screaming or crying.

The man who had shot them sat down to eat a burger and fries, not blinking an eye.

That was my first experience seeing death.

With no rules forbidding murder, you would think a town would tear itself apart.

That is not what happened.

Murder was legal, yes, but it didn’t happen every day.

It happened when people had the urge.

Mom explained it to me when I was old enough to understand. “The Urge” was a phenomenon that had been affecting the townspeople long before I was born, and there was no real way to stop it.

So, it didn't stop.

Mom told me she had killed her first person at the age of seventeen, her math teacher. There was no reason or motive.

Mom said she just woke up one day and wanted to kill him.

That specific killing became more of a bedtime story to lull me to sleep.

I didn’t like her smile when she told me about her killing. Sometimes I got scared she was going to murder me too.

Growing up, I was constantly on edge. Every day I woke up and pressed my hand to my forehead, asking myself the same question: Did I want to kill anyone?

Those thoughts blossomed into paranoia when I wasn’t sure what I was feeling. It’s not like I didn’t know what it was like.

Dad taught me how to use a knife and how to properly hold a weapon, and Mom gave me lessons in severing body parts.

Both of them wanted me to follow through with The Urge when it inevitably hit me.

I wanted to fit in.

When I started middle school, our neighbors were caught killing and cannibalizing their children, turning them into bone broth. I knew both of the kids.

Clay and Clara.

I played with them in their yard and ate cookies with them.

Clara told me she wanted to be a nurse when she grew up, and Clay used to tug on my pigtails to get my attention.

They were like siblings to me.

No matter what my parents said, or my teachers, my gut still twisted at the thought of my neighbors doing something like that.

Days after the cops arrived, I saw Mrs. Jenson watering her plants. But when I looked closer, there was no water.

She was just holding an empty hose over her prize roses.

I stood on my tiptoes, peering over our fence. “Mrs. Jenson?”

“I am okay, Elle.”

Her voice didn’t sound okay.

“Are you sure?” I asked. I pointed at the hose grasped in her hand. “You forgot to turn your water on.”

“I know.”

“Mrs. Jenson…” I took a deep breath before I could stop myself. “Did you like killing Clay and Clara?”

“Why, yes,” she hummed. “Of course I did.”

I nodded. “But… didn’t you love them?”

She didn’t reply for a moment before seemingly snapping out of it and turning to me with a bright smile. Too many teeth.

That was the first time I started to question The Urge.

It was supposed to make you feel good, acting like a relief, a weight lifted from your chest. Killing another human being was exactly what the people in our town needed. But what about killing their families and children?

Did it really make them feel good?

Looking at my neighbor, I couldn’t see the joy my Mom described. In fact, I couldn’t see anything.

Her expression was the kind of blank that scared me. It was oblivion staring back, stripped of real human emotion.

Mrs. Jenson’s smile stretched across her lips, like she could sense my discomfort. I noticed she had yet to clean her hands.

Mrs. Jenson’s fingernails were still stained a scary shade of red. Instead of replying, the woman moved toward my fence in slow, stumbling strides.

She was dragging herself, like moving caused her pain—agony I couldn’t understand.

It was exactly what my mother had insisted didn’t exist when killing: pain.

Humanity. All the adults told us we would not feel those things when killing. We wouldn’t feel regret or contempt. We would just feel good.

It was a release, like cold water coming over us. We would never feel better in our lives than when we were killing and our first would be something special.

When Mrs. Jenson’s fingers, still slick with her children’s blood, wrapped around the wooden fence, I found myself paralyzed.

Her manic grin twisted and contorted into a silent wail, and once-vacant eyes popped open like she was seeing me for the very first time. “I want to go home,” she whispered, squeezing the wooden fence until her own fingers were bleeding.

“Can you tell them to let me go home? I would like to see my children. Right now. Do you hear me?”

Mrs. Jenson wasn’t looking at me. Instead, her gaze was glued to thin air.

She was crying, screaming at something only she could see, and for a moment, I wondered if ghosts were real.

I twisted around to see if there were any ghosts, specifically the ones of her children, but there was nothing. Just fall leaves spiraling in the air in pretty waves.

“Mrs. Jenson is sick,” Mom told me once I was sitting at the dinner table, eating melted ice cream. It tasted like barf running down my throat.

I didn’t see Mrs. Jenson after that.

Well, I did.

She looked different, however.

Not freakishly different, though I did notice her hair color had changed.

I remembered it being a deep shade of brown, and when my neighbor returned with an even wider smile, it was more of a blondish white. When I questioned this, Mom told me it was a makeover.

The Urge affected people in different ways, and with Mrs. Jenson, after having her come-down, she had decided on a change. Mom’s words were supposed to be reassuring, adding that there was no reason to be scared of The Urge.

But I didn’t want to be like Mrs. Jenson and have a mental breakdown over my killing. I wanted to be like Mom and have a glass of wine and laugh over the sensation of taking a life.

Mrs. Jenson was my first real glimpse into the negativity of killing.

Dying, for example, wasn’t feared.

From a young age, we had been taught that it was a vital part of life, and dying meant finding peace.

When I first started high school, I expected killing to happen.

Puberty was when The Urge fully blossomed.

Weapons were allowed, but only outside of classes. In other words, under no circumstances must we kill each other in class, but the hallways were a free-for-all.

I saw attempts during my freshman year, but no real killing.

Annalise Duval was infamously known as the junior girl who rejected The Urge and was thrown out of school.

Struck with the stomach flu on the day of her attempted killing, I only knew the story from word-of-mouth.

Apparently, the girl had attempted to kill her mother at home, failed, and then bounded into school, screaming about laughter in the walls and people whispering in her head.

Obviously, my classmate was labeled insane, and judging from her nosebleed, the girl’s body had ultimately rejected The Urge, and her brain was going haywire.

Nosebleeds were a common side effect.

I heard stories from kids saying there was blood everywhere, all over her hands and face, smeared under her chin.

She had been screaming for help, but nobody dared go near her, like rejection was contagious. Annalise survived. Just.

I still saw her on my daily bike ride to school.

She was always sitting cross-legged in front of the forest with her eyes closed, like she was praying.

The rumor was, after being thrown out by her parents, the girl wandered around aimlessly, muttering about whispering people and laughter in her head.

It was obvious her rejection had seriously affected her mental state, but I did feel sorry for her.

On my fourteenth birthday, I confused a swimming stomach and cramps for The Urge, which turned out to be my first period. I remember biking my way home, witnessing a man cut off another guy’s head with an axe.

It’s funny. I thought I would be desensitized to seeing human remains.

I saw the passion in the man’s face as he swung the axe, digging in real hard, chopping right through bone and not stopping, even when intense red splattered his face and clothes.

He didn’t stop until the head hit the ground, and that sent my stomach creeping into my throat.

Then, it was the vacancy in his eyes, the twitching smile as he held the axe like a prize.

Part of me wanted to stay, to see if he had a similar reaction to Mrs. Jenson.

I wanted to know if he regretted what he had done, but once I met his gaze, and his grin widened, the toe of his boot kicking the guy’s motionless body, I turned away and pedaled faster, my eyes starting to water.

It wasn’t long before my lunch was inching its way up my throat, and I was abandoning my bike on the side of the road, choking up undigested mac 'n' cheese onto the steaming tarmac.

I didn’t tell Mom about the man, and more importantly, about my odd reaction to his killing. I wasn’t supposed to feel sick to my stomach. Murder was normal. I wasn’t going to get in trouble for it, so why did seeing it make me sick?

I had been taught as a little kid that visceral reactions were normal, and it was okay to be scared of killing and murder.

However, what our brains told us was right wasn’t always the truth.

Our teacher held up a teddy bear and stabbed into its stuffing with a carving knife.

We all cried out until the teacher told us that the bear didn’t care about dying.

In fact, it was ready to find peace, and it didn’t hurt him.

In other words, we had to ignore what our minds told us was bad.

Mom told me I would definitely start having conflicting feelings before my first killing, but that it was nothing to worry about.

I did worry, though.

I started to wonder if I was going to become the next Annalise Duval.

Maybe the two of us would become friends, sharing our delusions together.

My 17th birthday came and went and still no sign of The Urge.

I noticed Mom was starting to grow impatient. She had a routine of coming to check my temperature every morning, regardless of whether I felt sick or not.

“How are you feeling?” I couldn’t help but notice Mom’s smile was fake.

She dumped my breakfast on a tray in front of me, and when I risked nibbling on a slice of toast, she dropped the bombshell.

“Elle, you are almost eighteen years old,” she said. I noticed her hands were clenched into fists. “Do you feel anything?”

I considered lying, though then I would have to kill someone, and without The Urge, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to do that. “I don’t know,” I answered honestly, propping myself up on my pillows. “Most of the kids in my class—”

She cut me off with a frustrated hiss. “Yes, I know. They have all killed someone and you haven’t.” Her eyes narrowed. “People are starting to notice, Elle.”

She spoke through a smile that was definitely a grimace. “And when people start to notice, they get suspicious. I’ve been on the phone with three different doctors this morning, and all of them want to book you in for an MRI. Just to make sure things are normal.”

“MRI?” I almost choked on the apple I had been chewing.

“Yes.” Mom sighed. “We can’t ignore that things aren’t... abnormal. You are seventeen years old and haven’t had one urge to kill. The minimum for your age is one kill,” she said. “Minimum, Elle. You haven't killed anyone, and when I bring it up, you change the subject.”

I changed the subject because she started asking if I wanted to practice.

I wasn’t sure what “practice” meant, but from the slightly manic look in her eye, my mom wasn’t talking about dolls or teddy bears.

It was normal to practice killing.

There were even people who volunteered to be targets at the local scrapyard.

Most of them were old people.

Joey Cunningham started training to kill when he was twelve years old.

Five years on, Joey had accumulated a total of fourteen kills.

He never failed to remind everyone in almost every class. I could taste the apple growing sour in the back of my mouth.

Mom was just trying to help, and it’s not like I was doing this intentionally.

The idea of going to the scrapyard and killing people, even if they gave me permission to, wasn’t appealing in the slightest.

“I’m okay,” I said, and when Mom’s eyes darkened, I followed that up with, “I mean… I have spare time after class, so…?”

I meant to finish with, “Maybe,” but the word tangled in my mouth when I took a chunk out of the apple, and pain struck.

Throbbing pain, which was enough to send my brain spinning off its axis.

For a moment, my vision feathered, and I was left blinking at my mother, who had become more silhouette than real person.

I was aware of the apple dropping out of my hand, but I couldn’t think straight.

The pain came in waves, exploding in my mouth. When I was sure I could move without my head spinning, I slammed my hand over my mouth instinctively to nurse the pain, except that just made it worse.

Fuck.

Had I chipped my tooth?

Blinking through blurry vision, I knew my mom was there. But so was something else.

As if my reality was splintering open, another seeping through, I suddenly had no idea where I was, and a familiar feeling of fear started to creep its way up my spine. The thing was, though, I knew exactly where I was. I had known this town, this house, my whole life.

So that feeling of fear didn’t make sense.

The more I mulled the thought over in my mind, however, pain striking like lightning bolts, something was blossoming.

It both didn’t make sense, and yet it also did. In the deep crevices of my mind, that feeling was familiar. And I had felt it before. No matter how hard I squinted, though, I couldn’t make it out.

When I squinted again, a sudden shriek of noise rattled in my skull, and it took me a disorienting moment to realize what I could hear was laughter.

Hysterical laughter, which seemed to grow louder and louder, encompassing my thoughts until it was deafening.

Not just that. The walls were swimming, flashing in and out of existence before seemingly stabilizing themselves.

I blinked. Was I… losing my mind?

Maybe this was a side-effect of rejecting The Urge.

“Elle?” Mom’s voice cut through the phantom laughter, which faded, and I blinked rapidly. “Sweetie, are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

The word was in my mouth before the thought could cross my mind. I shook my head, swallowing. “Yeah, I’m… fine.”

She nodded, though her expression darkened. Scrutinizing. I knew she couldn’t wait to get me under an MRI.

“All right. Finish your breakfast. School starts in an hour.” Mom stopped at the threshold. “I really do think practicing killing will help a lot.

She left, and I rolled my eyes, mimicking her.

I flinched when another wave of laughter slammed into my ears.

Faded, but very much there. Definitely not a figment of my imagination.

Checking in my bedroom mirror, I didn’t have a loose tooth.

Even thinking that, though, panic started to curl in the root of my gut.

My brain wouldn’t shut up on my way to school, my gut was twisting and turning, trying to projectile that meager slice of toast.

Annalise Duval had complained of a loose tooth before she rejected The Urge.

Was that what was going to happen to me?

Was it all because of that stupid apple?

At school, I was surprised to be cornered by a classmate I had said maybe five words to in our combined time at Briarwood High.

Jonas Issacs was one of the first kids in my class to be hit with The Urge, and he almost ended up like Annalise Duval.

I don’t even think it was The Urge.

I think he was driven to kill through emotions, like so many adults had tried to tell us wasn’t real.

Jonas was a confusing case where a teenager had actually blossomed early, or not at all, and struck with his own intent.

Jonas didn’t need The Urge.

Halfway through math class, two years prior, I was daydreaming about the rain.

It rarely rained in Brightwood. Every day was picturesque.

But I did remember rain.

I knew what it felt like hitting my face, dropping into my open mouth and filling my cupped hands. I remembered the sensation on it soaking my clothes and glueing my hair to the back of my neck.

When I asked Mom if it was ever going to rain, though, she got a funny look on her face.

“Sweetie, it doesn’t rain in Brightwood.”

It never rained. So, where had I jumped into puddles?

My gaze was fixed on the windowpane, trying to imagine what a raindrop looked like sliding down the glass, when Jonas Issacs let out an exaggerated sigh behind me.

In front of him, Jessa Pollux had been tapping her pen on her desk.

At first, it wasn’t annoying, but then she kept doing it—tap, tap, tappity tap.

And then it became annoying.

I could tell it was annoying because Jonas politely asked her three times to stop making noise.

“Jessa, stop.” He groaned, half asleep in his arms.

When she continued, his tone hardened. “Can you stop doing that?"

She ignored him and, if anything, tapped louder.

I had grown up knowing that The Urge came without warning, motive, or reason.

It happened whether you liked it or not.

Jonas was different. His case was rare.

This time, he did have a motive, and despite what we were taught, that killing didn’t require a reason and wasn’t driven by negative emotion. Jonas was driven by anger.

This time, I saw it happen clearly.

When I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, I twisted around with the rest of the class to see Jonas halfway off his chair, his fingers wrapped around a knife. He was already smiling, already thrilled with the idea of killing.

The Urge had hit him.

Until that moment, he was a quiet kid who kept to himself.

Jessa knew instantly what he was going to do, even without turning around.

Like an animal, Jonas already had a tight hold of her ponytail and yanked her back.

Though in fight or flight, the girl was screaming and flailing.

She didn’t want to die, I thought.

Was that normal?

Mom always insisted that if it was our time, it was our time. If someone attacked us, even family members, we were to accept it.

I caught the moment her elbow knocked into Jonas’s mouth, just as he drove the blade into her skull.

Until then, Jonas had been consumed by a euphoric frenzy, intoxicated by the dark thrill of killing. It was as if the idea of ending a life had briefly elevated him to a state of pure euphoria.

Growing up, Mom’s stories spoke of finding a twisted pleasure in murder, and for a moment, seeing that look in my classmates eyes, I understood why she described killing like a rush.

It was a lunacy I didn't understand, complete unbridled insanity sending shivers down my spine. This was exactly what Mom was talking about.

She described it like floating on a cloud, lukewarm water pooling underneath her feet.

But just as abruptly as it had enveloped him, that otherworldly glow faded from Jonas’s eyes. He crumpled to his knees, one hand clamped over his mouth, the knife slipping from his grasp.

“That's enough.” Our teacher announced. “Jonas, go and clean yourself up.”

When he didn't respond, she snapped at him.

“Mr Isaacs!”

Then, he did, his gaze flicking to his blood slicked hands.

“Huh?”

He seemed like he was on another planet, swaying back and forth.

There was a moment when I met his half lidded gaze, and he slowly inclined his head, like he was confused. Scared.

When Jonas lifted his head, I saw thick beads of red trickling down his chin, pooling down his fingers.

It was the same look I had seen on Mrs. Jenson’s face.

Jonas blinked again, before noticing the blood.

“Fuck.” He whimpered, his voice muffled.

His eyes, filled with panic, flickered wildly. Without another word, he scrambled to his feet, stumbling toward the classroom door.

When I asked him what happened the next day, he explained it was just an "abnormal reaction" and that he was fine.

But Jonas’s words were strange.

He wasn’t even looking at me, and his smile was far too big. He got his first kill, though, so that gave him bragging rights as the first sophomore to come of age.

Jonas Issacs and Annalise Duval both had similar experiences.

One of them had clearly lost their mind, while the other seemingly avoided it.

And speaking of Jonas, it wasn’t the norm for him to be talking to me at school. But there he was, blocking my way into the classroom.

“Hey.” He quickly side-stepped in front of me when I tried pushing him out of the way.

There had been a time the year before when I considered asking him to prom.

He was a reasonably attractive guy, with reddish dark hair that curled slightly as it peeked out from under a well-worn baseball cap, a crooked smile that was never genuine, always leaning more toward irony.

But then I remembered what he did to Jessa.

I remembered the sound of his knife slicing through skin, cartilage, and bone, and despite her cries, her animalistic wails for him to stop, he kept going, driving it further and further into her skull.

I couldn’t look him in the eye after that.

Jonas inclined his head. “Can we talk?”

“No.”

My mouth was still sore, and I was questioning my sanity, so speaking to Jonas wasn’t really on my to-do list that morning.

Jonas didn’t move, sticking an arm out so I couldn’t get past him. “Do you have toothache by any chance?”

To emphasize his words, he stuck his finger in his mouth, dragging his index finger across his upper incisors.

“Like, bad toothache.” His voice was muffled by his finger. Jonas leaned forward, arching a brow. “You do, don’t you? Right now, you feel like your whole mouth is on fire, and yet you can’t detect any wobblies.”

The guy’s words sent a sliver of ice tingling down my spine. He was right. I hadn’t felt right since biting into that apple.

When I didn’t say anything, his lip twitched into a scowl. “All right. You don’t want to talk.” He raised two fingers in a salute. “Suit yourself.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, mostly to humor him.

He shrugged. “Maybe wait a few days, and then come talk to me, all right?”

Jonas’s words didn’t really hit me until several days later.

I woke up with a throbbing mouth, knelt over the corpse of my mother.

The Urge had finally come. It was something I had been anticipating and fearing my whole life, terrified I wouldn’t get it and would end up ostracized by my loved ones.

But when I saw my mom’s body and the vague memory of plunging a kitchen knife into her chest hit me, I didn’t feel happy or relieved.

I felt like I had done something bad, which was the wrong thing to think.

Killing was good, the words echoed in my mind. Killing was our way of release.

How could I think that when there was a knife clutched between my fingers?

The weapon that had killed her. Hurt her. How was this supposed to make me feel good?

My mother’s eyes were closed.

Peaceful. Like she had accepted her death.

The teeth of the blade dripped deep, dark red, and I knew I should have felt something. Joy or happiness.

Except all I felt was empty and numb, and fucking wrong.

Alone.

I felt despair in its purest form, which began to chew me up from the inside as I lulled from my foggy thoughts.

I wasn’t supposed to scream. I wasn’t supposed to cry, but my eyes were stinging, and I felt like I was being suffocated. I saw flashes in quick succession: a room bumbling with moving silhouettes, and the smell of... coffee. Mom never let me try coffee, and I was sure we never had it in the house.

So, how did I know the feeling of it running down my throat?

Just like in my bedroom, the walls started to swim.

This time, I jumped to my feet and leaped over my mom’s corpse, slamming my hands into them. They were real.

Almost as if on cue, there it was again.

Laughing. Loud shrieks of hysterical laughter thrumming in time with the dull pain pounding in my back tooth.

Blinking through an intense fog choking my mind, my first coherent thought was that yes, Jonas was right.

I did have a loose tooth, and when I was sure of that, I was stuffing my bloody fingers inside my mouth, trying to find it.

I grabbed the knife feverishly, my first thought to cut it out, when there was a sudden knock at the front door.

Slipping barefoot on the blood pooling across our kitchen floor, I struggled to get to the door without throwing up my insides.

Annalise Duval was standing on my doorstep. I had seen her in odd assortments of clothes, but this one was definitely eye-catching.

The girl was wearing a wedding dress that hung off her, the veil barely clinging to the mess of bedraggled curls she never brushed. Blinking at me through straggly blonde hair, she almost resembled an angel. The dress itself was filthy, blood and dirt smeared down the corset, the skirt torn up.

“Hello Elle.” The girl lifted a hand in a wave.

Her smile wasn’t crazed like my classmates had described.

Instead, it was… sad. Annalise’s gaze found my hands slick with my mother’s blood but barely seemed fazed. “Do you want to see the wall people?”

Until then, I had ignored her ramblings. But when I started hearing the laughing, “wall people” didn’t sound so crazy after all.

I nodded.

“Can you hear the laughing?” I asked.

“Sometimes.”

“Sometimes?”

“Mmm.” She twirled in the dress. “That’s how it started for me. Laughing. I heard a looooot of laughing, and then I found the wall people.” I winced when she came close, so close, almost suffocating me.

“Nobody believes me, and it’s sad. I’m just trying to tell people about the wall people, but they label me as crazy. They say something went wrong with my head.”

Annalise stuck two fingers to her temple and pulled the imaginary trigger, her eyes rolling back, like she was mimicking her own death. “I’m not the one who’s wrong. I know about the wall people and the laughing. I know why I murdered my Mom.”

“Annalise,” I said calmly. “Can you tell me what you mean?”

“Hm?”

Her eyes were partially vacant, that one sliver of coherence quickly fading away.

Instead of speaking, I took her arm gently and pulled her down my driveway. “Can you show me what you found?”

Annalise danced ahead of me, tripping in her wedding dress. She cocked her head.

“Did you kill your mother too?” Her lips twitched. “That’s funny. According to the wall people, you’re not supposed to kill someone until the end of seasonal three.”

The girl blinked, giggling, and I forced myself to run after her. Wow, she was fast, even in a wedding dress. Annalise leapt across the sidewalk, twisting and twirling around, like she was in her own world.

Before she landed in front of me, her expression almost looked sane.

“I wonder which season it will be. Will it be Summer? Maybe Fall, or Winter. I guess it’s not up to you, is it? It’s up to The Urge.”

Laughing again, the girl grabbed my hand, her fingernails biting into my skin.

I glimpsed a single drop of red run from her nose, which she quickly wiped with the sleeve of her dress, leaving a scarlet smear.

“Let’s go and see the wall people, Elle,” she hummed.

As her footsteps grew more stumbled, blood ran down her chin, spotting the sidewalk.

I don’t know if coherency ever truly hit Annalise Duval, but knowing she was bleeding, her steps grew quicker, more frenzied, I quickened my own pace.

“Your nose,” was all I could say.

Annalise nodded with a sad smile. “I know!” she said. “Don’t worry, it will stop when I shut up.” Her smile widened.

“But what if I don’t shut up? What if I show you the wall people?”

To my surprise, she leapt forward and flung out her arms, tipping her head back and yelling at the sky. “What if I don’t shut up?” Annalise laughed. “What are the wall people going to do, huh? Are you going to explode my brain?”

When people started to come out of their homes to see what was going on, I dragged her into a run.

“Are you insane?” I hissed.

“Maybe!”

Annalise seemed to be floating between awareness and whatever the fuck The Urge had done to her. “Don’t worry, they’re just peeking.”

“What?”

The girl had an attention span of a rock. Her gaze went to the sky. “They’re going to turn the sun off so I can’t show you.”

Her words meant nothing to me until the clouds started to darken. Just like Annalise had predicted, the sky began to get dark.

Knowing that somehow this supposedly crazy girl knew when things were going to happen only quickened my steps into a run.

“Hey!”

Halfway down the street, Jonas Issacs was riding his bike toward us, which I found odd. Jonas didn’t own a bike. He rode the bus to school.

“Elle!” Waving at me with one hand and grasping the handlebars with the other, Jonas pedaled faster. “Yo! Do you want to hang out?”

“Peeking,” Annalise said under her breath.

Ignoring Jonas, I nodded at Annalise to keep going, though the boy didn’t give up.

We twisted around, and he caught up easily, skidding on the edge of the sidewalk. When he came to an abrupt stop in front of us, his gaze flicked to Annalise.

He raised a brow. “Shouldn’t you be praying in the forest?”

The girl recoiled like a cat, hissing, “Peeking!”

Jonas shot me a look. “Of all the people you could have made friends with, you chose Annalise Duval?” His eyes softened when I ignored him and pulled the girl further down the road. Jonas followed slowly on his bike.

“Where are you going anyway? Isn't it late?”

It was 4pm.

I decided to humor him. “We’re going to see the wall people.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Do I sound like I’m kidding?” I turned my attention to him. “You asked me if I had a toothache, right?”

His expression crumpled. “I did?”

I noticed Annalise was clingier with him around, sticking to my side.

Every time he moved, she flinched, tightening her grip on my arm.

The girl was leading us into the forest, and I swore, the closer we got to the clearing, the more townspeople were popping up out of nowhere. An old woman greeted us, followed by a man with a dog, and then a group of kids from school. Annalise entangled her fingers in mine, pulling me through the clearing.

Jonas followed, hesitantly, biking over rough ground. “Once again, I think this is a bad idea,” he said in a sing-song voice. “We should go back.”

When it was too dangerous for his bike, he abandoned it and joined my side.

“Elle, the girl is insane,” Jonas hissed. “What are you even doing? What is this going to accomplish except potentially getting lost?”

“I want to know if she’s telling the truth,” I murmured back.

He scoffed. “Telling the truth? Look at this place!” He spread his arms, gesturing to the rapidly darkening forest. “There’s nothing here!”

“No.” Annalise ran ahead, staggering over the tricky ground. “No, it’s right over here!”

She was still fighting a nosebleed, and her words were starting to slur. The girl twisted to Jonas. “You’re peeking,” she spat, striding over to him until they were face to face.

“Stop peeking,” she said, her fingers delving under her wedding skirt where she pulled out a knife and pressed it to his throat. “If you peek again, I will cut you open.”

Jonas nodded. “Got it, Blondie. No peeking.”

Annalise didn’t move for a second, her hands holding the knife trembling. “You’re not going to tell me I’m crazy again,” she whispered.

“You’re not crazy,” Jonas said dryly.

“Say it again.”

“You’re not crazy!” He yelped when she applied pressure to the blade. “Can you stop swinging that around? Jeez!”

Annalise shot me a grin, and it took a second for me to realize.

Jonas was scared of the knife.

He was scared of dying, which meant, whether he liked it or not, the boy had, in fact, not gone through with The Urge.

I thought the girl was going to slash Jonas’s throat open in delight, but instead, she looped her arm in his like they were suddenly best friends.

“Come on, Elle!” She danced forward, pulling the boy with her. “We’re closeeeee!”

I wasn’t sure about that.

What we were, however, was lost.

When the three of us came to a stop, it was pitch black, and I was struggling to see in front of me. Annalise, however, walked straight over to thin air and gestured to it with a grin. “Tah-da!” Spluttering through pooling red, she let out a laugh.

“See!”

Jonas, who was still uncomfortably pressed to her no matter how hard he strained to get away, shot me a look I could barely make out.

“I’m sorry, what did I say? That we were going to get lost? That Annalise is certifiably crazy and is probably going to kill us?”

At first, I thought I really was crazy. Maybe Annalise’s condition was contagious.

I could hear it again. Laughing.

But this time, it was coming from exactly where Annalise was pointing. When the girl slammed her hand into thin air, there was a loud clanging noise that sounded like metal.

Slowly, I made my way toward it, and when my hands touched sleek metal, what felt like the corners of a door, more pain struck my upper incisors.

“Holy shit.” Jonas was pressing himself against the door, then slamming his fists into it. “The crazy bitch was right.”

His words hung in my thoughts on a constant cycle, as we delved into what should have been forest.

After all, we had been standing in the middle of nowhere. The laughter was deafening when I stepped over the threshold, and I had to slap my hands over my ears to block it out. Through the invisible door, however, was exactly what Annalise had described: wall people.

All around us were television screens, and on those screens were people. Faces.

They were not part of the laughter. The laughter was mechanical and wrong, rooted deep inside my skull. The faces that stared down at us were men and women, some teens, and even younger children.

Annalise and Jonas were next to me, their heads tipped back, gazes glued to the screens. Not the ones I was looking at.

The ones on tiny computer monitors.

When I finally tore my eyes from our audience, I began to see what made Jonas stiffen up next to me. One screen in particular, showed his face.

He was younger, maybe a year or two. No, I thought, something slimy creeping up my throat. It was from when he had killed that girl. His hands clasped in his lap were still stained and slick with Jessa Pollux’s blood.

The Jonas on the screen was far more relaxed, casually leaning back with his feet propped up on the table.

His hair was shorter, and his clothes were more formal than what I was used to seeing him in.

I usually saw him in jeans and hoodies, but this Jonas wore a crisp white collared shirt.

Something hung around his neck, a thin strip of black fabric with a shiny card at the end, reminding me of some kind of badge.

“Why exactly have you signed up for this program?” a man’s voice crackled off-screen.

"Duh." Jonas held up his scarlet hands, a grin twisting on his lips. His arrogant smile twisted my gut. "So I can get my Darkroom rep back."

He leaned forward, his eyes narrowed. "That is going to happen, right? I don’t do this shit for free, and I’ve got one million followers to impress, man. Darkroom loves me."

Jonas scoffed, crossing one left over the other. "Even if I did go too far that one time, which wasn’t even my fault. What are you guys, fucking Twitch?"

“You are correct,” the man said. “Darkroom does benefit from its influencers. Our program aims to help satisfy certain… needs by broadcasting them right here.”

He paused. “You have killed five people before signing up for Darkroom, correct? Your parents?”

“Parents and brother,” Jonas's lips pricked into a smile. “I gutted them just to see what was inside, but of course, my TikTok got taken down by all the freaks in the comments trying to cancel me.” He rolled his eyes. “They worship you, call you a god, swear they’ll do anything for you-- and then fuck you."

I flinched when he leaned forward, his gaze penetrating the camera. This guy knew exactly how to act in front of one.

The slight incline of his head, trying to get the best angle.

“Can I tell you something?”

“Yes, of course, young man.”

“Have you ever been called a God? Because it's a rush.” He laughed. “I made stupid videos, and these people worshipped me. They loved me."

Jonas clucked his tongue. “Buuuut the moment I show them my real self, they turn on me and try to end my career.”

He leaned back in his chair with a sigh, glancing at the camera. “And then I found you guys! Who pay me to be my real authentic self. Now, how could I decline an offer like that?”

“And,” the man cleared his throat, “you will keep killing? We are aware the initial implant impacted your brain quite badly. In the subdued state, you will keep killing, as the so-called ‘urge’ says. However, in reality, we will be sending signals to your brain which will make you commit murder.”

“All right, I'll do it.”

“Are you sure? We couldn’t help noticing during your first kill, you seemed to… well, react in a way we haven’t seen before. It's possible there could be a potential fault.”

He cocked his head, like a puppet cut from strings. “Did the comments like it?”

“Well, yes—”

“Good.” Jonas held out his arm. “Do it again. And do it right this time. As long as I’m getting 40K every appearance, I’m good. You can slice my brain up all you want; I’m getting paid and followers. So.” His gaze found the camera.

“What are you waiting for?”

When the screen went black, then flickered to a bird's-eye view, and finally a close-up of my house, I felt my legs give way.

As if on impulse, I prodded at my mouth and felt for the loose tooth.

“That…” Jonas spoke up, his voice a breathy whisper. His eyes were still glued to the screen, confusion crumpling his expression.

“That… wasn’t me! Well, it was me... but I don’t… I don’t remember that!”

To my surprise, he turned to me, and I saw real fear in his eyes.

“Elle.” He gritted out, “that is not me.”

Instead of answering him, I turned away when alarm bells started ringing, and the room was suddenly awash in flashing red light.

“Peeking!” Annalise squeaked, hiding behind me.

Ignoring her, I focused on Jonas.

Or whoever the hell he was.

I slammed the door shut, throwing myself against it.

“You need to knock my tooth out.” I told him. “Now.”

I'd had my beautiful long haired tabby for sixteen years. 

The sunset is a welcome distraction, streaks of late afternoon gold illuminating the horizon over the stream of  evening traffic. Callie sits in the backseat.

She's silent. I'm not really surprised, she knows exactly what's going to happen. 

It's not the first time we've been on this journey.

The last time was a checkup appointment, and the following, my decision to put her down. She screamed and howled the whole time, and I didn't tell her to stop.

I couldn't. My heart was breaking.

Sixteen was so young. I thought I'd have more time with her. More memories. 

My husband brought up the idea of evading euthanization. The law came into force two years after her tenth birthday.

Sick cats were to be humanely put down.

Canada was welcoming sick cats over the border, regardless of their condition and diagnosis.

I thought maybe I could do it— pack up everything and move Callie to Canada.

But there was logistics; my parents were law abiding.

They supported the current government, while my husband was heavily against them. He begged me to consider Canada. 

My mother sat me down and told me Callie was ready. “It won't hurt her, Elizabeth,” she whispered, grasping my hands and squeezing.  “It's Callie’s time.” 

She was right. Right? Callie was sick, she would just suffer. 

Her quality of life was already deteriorating. Letting her go was better.

That's what I told my husband when I handed him the euthanization papers, and I'll never forget his face.

Wide eyes, lips curled into a snarl, like he was going to hit me. 

He didn't respond, silently walked upstairs to grab his bag and a few necessities, and left me. 

He tried to take Callie with him, tried to justify letting her suffer. But she was my baby. “You're an evil bitch,” he told me, burying his face in our cat's hair.

He was sobbing, screaming, demanding I reconsider.

I tore my sweet tabby from his arms, and let him leave. 

Callie cried after him, yowling and scraping at the door as if she wanted to follow. 

She didn’t move from the door, hissing at me when I tried to gently pull her into the lounge. 

Callie had always liked my husband more. 

She hated my parents, ignoring them when they visited and hiding when they tried to talk to her.

I locked her in the house that night, just in case my sweet, sick kitty tried to run away.

“Callie, baby are you okay?” 

No response. She doesn't even bite me anymore. 

That's a bad sign, especially with cats diagnosed early. 

It meant giving up. Resignation.

“Callie,” I repeated, blinking back tears. I cranked the radio up. Callie loved Olivia Rodrigo. But she's silent. In the corner of my eye, she's curled up on her blanket, head tucked between her legs. “You know I don't want to do this,” I hesitated, my heart lodged in my throat. “It's for the best."

No response, again. I stab the radio on to avoid the conversation I don't want to have with her. Saying goodbye. What would I even say to make it hurt less? How could I possibly say goodbye to my long-haired tabby without breaking apart?

So, I don't.

I save the goodbye for when she's gone, and I can't show her I'm ashamed.

Pulling into the parking lot, I scan the significant amount of cars.

I don't turn around, grabbing toilet paper from my glove compartment and swiping tears from my cheeks. 

“You're okay.” I force a smile, reassuring myself more than Callie.

I jump out of the front, and gently coax her from the back seat. She's so warm, already panicking, already trying to fight back.

“Shhh,” I whisper, stroking her hair. “It's going to be okay.” 

My phone vibrates and I pull it out. 

“Beth.” Adam’s voice feels like needles in my spine. “Please tell me you didn't do it.”

His shuddery breath sent me spiraling, my heart already full of doubt.

I squeezed my eyes shut instead of speaking. If I did, I'd say something I'd regret. If I let Adam brainwash me, just like my mother said, I'd jump back in the car and tear our baby’s euthanization papers. 

“I'm just down the road,” Adam whispered. “I have enough gas to get us to the border. I've packed your bag, Beth. Just come and meet me, and we can forget all this.”

His laugh broke me. “I told your Mom to go fuck herself.” 

“Adam.” I say, my words tangled and wrong.

I swallow my words when Callie leaps out of the backseat. 

“Callie!” I shriek, as she darts into the road. 

“Is that Callie?” Adam yelled. “Beth. Listen to me. You love her? Right? You love her more than anything.” His voice cracked. “Then let her go.” 

But I'm already grabbing her. 

My mother’s words suffocate me. “She’ll suffer, Elizabeth. Do you want Callie to suffer?” 

No. 

Callie screams and yowls, trying to bite me.

“It’s okay!” I don’t know how many times I’ve said it.

Okay doesn’t feel right.

She’s not going to be okay, is she?

Callie is going to die, and I’m going to regret it for the rest of my life.

“Beth.” Adam whispers. “I’m here.” 

“I'm sorry,” I whispered, and ended the call.

Stepping inside, I tightened my grip on Callie. The waiting room was full, dogs and cats with wide, frightened eyes. I sat down, ignoring Callie’s whimpering. 

A golden Labrador came over, his gaze glued to my baby. I shooed him away, an oldish looking woman violently yanking him back. 

“Callie McLester?” Her name was called.

I stood, pulling Callie with me. 

“Mom,” Callie whimpered, as I pulled my long-haired tabby inside a room of pristine white.

My long-haired tabby.

That's what Mom told me to envision.

A beautiful, blue eyed long-haired tabby. 

Not my autistic daughter. 

I've been doing it since I was a kid. 

Ever since I was little, I've always wanted to be a mermaid. I did everything right.

Low lighting, two teaspoons of salt, and picturing my tail, my connection to the moon, the waves, the magic…

During college, I used to sit in the shower choking on my roommate’s salt, trying not to throw up.

No tail.

But I did end up in the emergency room with hypernatremia from consuming dangerous amounts of salt.

On my wedding night, I figured I'd try it again. I filled the bathtub in our hotel to the brim, added salt, and submerged myself. To my surprise, my husband climbed in with me. He thought it was a sex thing. So, we spent our honeymoon skinny dipping under the stars, taking turns swallowing salt. This time BOTH of us ended up in the emergency room. 

I had to explain why it was my second case of sodium poisoning. 

KJ, delirious in the bed next to me, nearly died laughing when I admitted I was trying to turn myself into a mermaid.

Who knew sodium poisoning was a HUGE issue? 

KJ invited his friends over to play GTA, and I had the night to myself.

But this time, I did my research, digging into actual online forums outside Yahoo Answers and Quora. It was the same ritual, with one caveat. I could feel my hands clammy, my stomach vaulting into my throat. The reason the ritual wasn’t working was because I never did the very first step. I thought it was a joke.

Child me felt uncomfortable enough to skip it and pretend it didn't exist. 

But I wanted it enough to attempt something destructive. 

And very fucking illegal. 

Step 1 of 5: 

A sacrifice.

So, I filled the tub, grabbed salt from the kitchen, and snatched a carving knife from the drawer. 

“Hey, Ree,” Eric, KJ’s best friend, nodded to me while I was attempting to inconspicuously sneak the knife upstairs.

Busted. 

He could definitely see it poking from my pocket. 

Eric saluted me with his beer, eyebrow raised. “Whatcha doing?” 

KJ leaned against the refrigerator, already slightly tipsy. He winked at me, raising his drink, and my stomach flipped with guilt.

My idea was wrong. Stupid. Probably illegal.

But I really wanted to be a fucking mermaid.

Still, my husband’s grin was sweet.

He'd always supported me, always insisted on helping me try and achieve the impossible. “Ignore my wife! She's trying to turn herself into a fuckin’ fish.” 

“A fish?!” Noah, who I classified as “the other one” was sitting on our couch mid-murder spree on GTA. Noah was the designated NEET of my husband’s friend group, and my least favorite.

“Good luck with that, babe.” He eyed the knife, shuffling back. “You’re not gonna sacrifice us to the fish gods, are you?”

Noah shot a glare at my grinning husband. “You really know how to pick ’em, bro.”

Ignoring him, I headed upstairs to finish the ritual. 

I waited until my husband and his friends were asleep, and snuck downstairs, the knife glued to my hand.

I made the sacrifice, making sure to cover their mouths when I slid the knife in, muffling their cries. To my surprise, though, the three of them were out of it. 

Returning to the bathtub full of salt, I plunged my hands slick with blood into the water, downed a teaspoon of salt, and manifested.

A tail, I thought, climbing into water diffused red. 

A TAIL. 

I sunk into the water, deeper, submerging my head, filling my mouth. The taste of metal clung to my tongue, but I revelled in the smell, the slick red beading on my hands and dripping down my arms.

A beautiful, golden tail sprouting from my torso! 

And a cute sea-shell bra! 

Squeezing my eyes shut, I held my breath, and let the water sing me to sleep, the waves lull me into their world.

I let myself smile, knowing when I woke up, I would finally be a mermaid.

I did fall asleep, curled up in lukewarm water. When my eyes flew open, the water was stone cold, and I was shivering. 

Excitement pricked me awake, and I sat up, splashing water over the edge.

I barely noticed the sickening red soup around me. Excitement, however, quickly became disappointment. No tail. 

Just my extremely wrinkly legs, and two pathetic candles bobbing on the surface. 

I didn't move for a moment, the full force of what I had done slamming into me, ice crawling through me, my breath shuddering. An agonizing wail cut through me, sending me stumbling to my feet, wading in filthy, blood-stained water.  

“Ree!” KJ’s scream rattled through me as I stumbled around, pulling on my underwear. His cry was coming from downstairs. 

“What the FUCK have you DONE?” 

“I can explain!” I choked, running down the stairs. 

My husband was in the kitchen, laying face-down on the floor, the kitchen faucet overflowing. I stopped, frozen, my words choking in my throat.

KJ was furious, cheeks blooming red, lips twisted in an almost-feral snarl.

His hair was floppy and damp, hanging over wide, panicked eyes. 

I stepped forward, my breath catching.

My husband was shirtless, soaking wet. 

A tail splicing him in half, beautiful golden fins replacing his legs. 

“I…” I tried to speak, tried to explain myself.

But instead, I was on my knees, prodding my husband’s tail. 

“Get the fuck off me,” he spat, rolling over. He thrust out his arm, and blood spurted from my nose in a rush.

My vision blurred, my words tangling, saliva splurging down my chin.

KJ dropped his hand, and it stopped. “What did you DO?” He whispered. 

A loud THUMP from the upstairs shower, followed by, “What the FUCK?” 

Followed by a “aFGHh—” from the downstairs bathroom told me everything I needed to know.

So, the ritual DID work, after all…  

Just not on me.