by Elle Park
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
CHAPTER ONE
I’LL CLIMB OUT the window if I have to.
A rope ladder has been secured to my bed for months now, and though this isn’t the exact scenario I imagined using it for, I feel more at ease knowing it’s here at my disposal should I decide I need it—which is looking more and more likely as the seconds tick by with no hint of the situation downstairs resolving.
I’ll give it ten minutes.
Whether through the front door or my bedroom window, after ten minutes, I will be leaving.
I’ve never once been late for my shifts at the diner, but given my boss’s temper, my perfect record won’t mean a thing if I’m not there and ready to work by exactly nine on the dot.
Being a waitress is neither glamorous nor particularly fulfilling. My job mostly consists of cleaning up after kids who think it’s hilarious to dump their drinks and empty the napkin dispensers, listen to the surprisingly entertaining gossip that runs between the dry mouths of the elderly, humor the teens who love to make it obvious that they’re hungover, and pretend to not notice the wandering eyes—and sometimes hands—of men who think they’re funny and charming and utterly irresistible.
But at the end of the day, it is a job I’ve had for the past two years, and the tips make it well worth hanging onto. This is especially true right now, as the school year is finally over. More families coming into the diner means more tips from parents who try to compensate for their children’s behavior—which works for me because I need to earn as much as I can before the summer ends and I move away for college.
I can’t wait to be free from this place.
A quick glance at the clock tells me I also can’t wait any longer for the house to clear.
I’ve spent the past hour or so listening to the violent symphony of bangs and thuds and a tangled string of profanities. He must have had more to drink last night, as the distinct sound of shattering glass penetrates the impressive decibel of his anger, and I know it wasn’t fine bone china that just broke into a thousand tiny pieces.
Just as I’m about to roll the ladder out my now open window, I hear the front door slam shut. Peeking my head out, I watch him walk away until he’s no longer in sight, breathing a sigh of relief before tucking the thick rope back under my bed and hurriedly leaving my room.
Locking my bedroom door behind me—a precaution I installed myself—I make my way downstairs, greeted by the stench of stale beer, body odor and days-old grease, and I’m sure my face would be scrunching in disgust if I weren’t already used to it. I do rush my steps, though, because while I might not mind smelling it, I certainly don’t want to smell like it.
Fortunately, Anna isn’t in the living room when I carefully tread through it, but the sound of a running tap tells me she probably has an open wound somewhere on her body—most likely a bleeding nose or a split lip. Whatever injuries she’s half-heartedly nursing, I don’t have the time to find out what—not that I would even if I could. We may share a roof, but our lives are very much separate. We prefer it that way.
The images of my aunt’s past and present—specifically, the men in them—play through my mind like a jumbled film reel, clashing and blending simultaneously. They’re different in many ways: Jack was a cop, Manny’s a drug dealer; Jack was brute strength, Manny is thin muscle. And although Jack never got high, he, like Manny, had a close relationship with alcohol—it’s ultimately what got my uncle killed.
One drink becomes two, two becomes three, four, five, and soon enough, they become too drunk to count the bottles at their feet. Anna’s usually sober during the binges, though, which means she’s able to count every hit she receives. It’s only after Manny tires himself out that she numbs the pain, losing herself to whatever high she can get.
I don’t think there’s any of her left to lose.
Abuse has become Anna’s norm; it’s all she knows. She believes that she is nothing. She is not a woman, not an individual, not a human being. When she looks at the men in her life who have treated her like an object, all she sees are the men who make her into something.
She’d rather be an object than be nothing.
But I don’t want to be something—I want to be someone.
My somber mood is mirrored by a grey, cloudy sky as soon as I step outside. I know an impending storm when I see one, and I’ll be lucky if I can show up at the diner without looking like a drowned rat. And thanks to Manny’s longer than usual tantrum, I’m going to have to take a shortcut if I want to make it to work on time.
Despite the reputation that precedes the Bronx, it’s really not the ominous hellhole that many believe it to be. Still, there is a course of alleys I’d rather not go through. I’m not naive enough to believe the daylight will ward off danger—trouble has a way of being persistent when it wants to be—but the risk is mostly reduced to the occasional catcall, which I remind myself of as I hurry on my way.
The closer I get to the stretch of alleys, the more fine-tuned my hearing gets. Loose debris of dirt, brick and gravel jump and tumble near my feet, stunted drops of water are sliding down rusty pipes, and the occasional blare of a car horn has me flinching each time, my body too on edge to not react to every little disturbance.
Then I hear a voice—two, actually. They’re hushed and mumbled, but similar to how a tiny squeak might as well be a boom of thunder in the middle of the night, everything sounds exponentially louder when away from the hustle and bustle of the borough.
It also helps that one of them is familiar.
Slowing to a stop, I peek around the corner of a building, holding my breath as I do so. The hidden glimpse lasts for less than a second, but it is more than enough to confirm my suspicion.
With his thick black curls, off-white tank and low, scruffy jeans, it’s definitely Manny. A scrawny teen wearing clothes about three sizes too big is standing next to him, both their heads ducked as they hunch toward each other. I don’t need to wait for the not-so-sly handshake to guess what they’re doing.
Aware that it’s in my best interest to get the hell out of here, I immediately spin around to make my escape, almost falling over in the process.
It wasn’t my own two feet that made me trip.
Miraculously choking down a scream, my wide gaze lowers to the little boy in front of me.
The smooth bangs of his short, sandy hair just barely graze his brows, and the vibrant colors of his clothing contrasts sharply with his peachy skin, the dinosaur on his red shirt matching his green velcro sandals. Clear brown eyes take up about half of his freckled face, and they’re currently staring up at me with the sort of lost look only a child can achieve. I doubt he’s more than six years old.
Wit
hout much thought, I grip his small hand, ushering him through corners and into an alley a few buildings down. The distance is enough to not be overheard, but it won’t be for long—especially if he starts crying because a complete stranger decided to drag him into the shadows. Really, I should have left him alone and went on my way. Now I’m mentally berating myself for not doing what Manny would have done: ignore him.
Returning my attention to the kid, all the while wondering just what I’m supposed to do with him, I nearly faint on the spot when I look back at his face.
He was just a little boy.
His cheeks were flushed, his lips were rosy, and his eyes were warm and sweet.
I don't know where that little boy went.
The deep, chocolate brown that gazed up at me like a flower does sunshine has shriveled up into the void of nothing. His pupils are completely blown, obliterating every last trace of white and filling his sockets with a bulbous, glassy black. Coupled with his flared nostrils and his sharp, jagged, piranha-esque teeth, even the wildest, most feral animal does not compare to the beast within this boy.
He pounces, tackling me to the ground with impossible force. In no mood to get my skull bashed in, I twist my torso so that my back and shoulders brace most of the impact, but the momentary blindness tells me I wasn’t as successful as I’d hoped. However, my vision is not my immediate concern. Simply getting myself to breathe is a challenge I seem to be failing. I'm doing all I can to squeeze crumpled ribbons of air out of my lungs, and I'm using what little strength I have to fight off the small body shackling me in place. But it's hopeless. No matter how much I try to writhe and push and thrash and struggle, he doesn't budge—and neither do I.
Too weak to overpower his hold, all I'm really able to do is dazedly study his transformed appearance. Black ink is bleeding from his nail beds and oozing from his thick, slimy tongue, the sinister substance dripping hotly onto my skin.
The sound of his throaty hiss assaults my ears, and a chill scratches my spine when he licks the base of my neck. Hungrily sinking his teeth into my wet flesh, he begins to devour the life out of me, quickly moving his feast to my arms, my chest, my thighs. I can feel him breaking through skin, chomping through muscle, scraping his fangs against my bones as though they are toothpicks.
I can't move, I can't scream, I can barely even think. There’s an inferno raging inside me, boiling my blood and blistering my skin, the pain far beyond anything imaginable.
Abruptly flung to the side, I roll over in a confused haze. My eyelids are heavy and my sight is darkening, but the animalistic cries encourage me to blink away the fog.
It's not me who's on fire.
Kneeling in a crumpled heap not far from me, he's clutching his veiny head in a death-grip as wild, electric blue flames eat away at his pale flesh. Even his ear-shattering screeches have reduced to drowning gurgles. No longer with arms and legs, the next to go is his torso until, finally, his bulging eyes and clenched jaw fade to a grainy pile of black.
Cold, liquid pellets cascade down from somewhere above me. I would check for the source if I could, but my body seems to have turned into lead—and with my cheek sinking into the newly puddled asphalt, my eyes would have to roll out of their sockets before I could look toward the sky.
The previously rapid beating in my chest is now slow and faint. Every cell in my body is burning up, but I don't feel any sweat clinging to my skin, as if I skipped that stage altogether and went straight to toasted flesh.
Somewhere in the distance, I can hear the approaching wail of sirens. At least, I think that's what this sound is. It might just be the ringing in my own ears.
How long has it even been? Everything happened so fast but... surely no more than a few minutes? I can't tell. It's as though I've been transported to a world where time bends and flows in rhythms too complex to understand or measure.
I feel like I'm watching a movie in slow motion, observing the surrounding disarray as if it were safely encased in a screen and dimension unrelated to my own. The rain hasn't stopped, but I can now see every little drop as it falls in front of my eyes and splatters, hitting the ground in gentle pops. Ashes have disintegrated from the pile, some floating atop the liquid glaze, but most sinking to the bottom like wet sand.
I can’t decide whether I’m burning or downing.
There are so many thoughts jumbling my mind, getting tangled in microscopic knots that can only be destroyed, not untwined. I try, anyway. And it's during my futile efforts that I realize they've been this way for a long time—years, maybe—and it took me dying to recognize the turmoil that is churning my brain to mush.
I'm being wrung in every which way, torn between the havoc that is me and the mayhem that surrounds me.
I've always thought there was an undeniable beauty to be found in the midst of chaos—a certain serenity that exists just under the surface of disorder, where you're able to appreciate everything that once was and watch, entranced, as it becomes damaged and broken. The reflexive urge to fix and heal drifts away as easily as dandelion fluff does with a soft breath of air, allowing you to simply sit back and let things run their natural course.
In this case, I'm on the fast track to death.
And it's a race I'd do anything to lose.
At least I don't feel pain anymore. I don't feel much of anything, really. My whole body is numb, and I can't remember the last time I felt this relaxed. Or tired.
You either fight for your life or die trying—I know this, I do. But this fight has been dragging on for about as long as I can remember, and I'm just not sure if I can do it anymore. The prospect of rest is too enticing, and considering I can't even wriggle my fingers, it's a temptation I wouldn't be able to resist if I tried.
It's during my last breaths that I feel I can finally breathe. I almost want to laugh at the irony, but the best I can do is quirk my lips. That's what people aim for though, isn't it? Dying with a smile on your face?
There is a voice somewhere in the distance—or it might be right beside me, for all I know—but the words are indecipherable, as though I'm deep underwater. Maybe I am. Has it stopped raining? Has the day passed without me? It's like a blanket of darkness has been pulled over my head, and I'm all alone in a night without stars.
As my senses begin to completely shut down, there's a single thought on the stage of my mind, begging to be seen and heard before the curtains finally close.
I was going to be someone.
CHAPTER TWO
I MOVE WITH the current of a steady, even staccato, drifting toward a lazy consciousness. It's the place that borders between dreams and reality, where everything is nothing and nothing is everything. I like it here, I think. If I'm ever to be afforded a forever, I wouldn't mind spending it in this realm, where I don't have to worry about life or death, but rather fall numb to a state of simple existence.
I can feel myself falling under again—slowly, rapidly, then slowly again. But I don't kick my legs or flap my arms. I don't attempt to wade through the depths, to rise above the waves. I let myself drop, sink and tumble, riding the tide that will take me wherever it is I'm supposed to be.
Frustratingly—infuriatingly—something halts my descent.
I instinctively blink, then blink some more before I'm able to pry my eyes open. A blinding light instantly makes me go from angry and irritated to timid and wary, forcing me to get a sense of my surroundings through barely open slits. It doesn't take long to figure out where I am when I see a red IV hooked to my arm. A cardiac monitor stands to the side of my stiff bed, making its presence loudly known, and pastel green curtains encase the makeshift room. My body has been dressed in a polka dot gown, the paper-thin material only tolerable thanks to the blue blanket covering me from chin to toe. I'm about to lift the covers, hoping to assess the damage, but am interrupted by a sudden swish.
A man appears and hastily shuts the curtains before smoothing the lapels of his white coat. Turning around, he visibly jumps when our eyes me
et, evidently surprised to find me awake. He recovers quickly, though, and, flashing a smile worthy of a toothpaste commercial, reaches my bedside in only a few rushed steps.
Up close, I can see that he looks more like a boy than a man—or somewhere in the middle, really. His muddy brown hair is slicked to the side and away from his face, and the blue of his eyes is a shade I'm not sure I've ever come across. They're extremely pale and clouded, yet somehow bright and pigmented. And his smooth, almost delicate features are sculpted in a way that make him look more pretty than handsome—even his light dusting of freckles manage to give off a dainty feel.
"Miss Riley, I'm Dr. Bond," he says loudly, speaking with the most pompous British accent I've ever had the displeasure of hearing. Looking strangely eager, he continues, "Do you remember what happened to you?"
Do I?
I don't know. The boy who attacked me—his eyes, his teeth, his tongue, his nails—the pain, fire, rain, the blue flames and drowning ashes—there's no way any of that actually happened, is there?
For what it's worth, the images are vivid, the sounds are sharp, and the feelings of fear and panic, the sensations of pain and cold are all raw and real. But I can't expect any of it to be more than a product of my imagination. I could have slipped and hit my head, dreaming this whole thing up through a fresh concussion or a dose of morphine. That would be an acceptable explanation, at least.
Testing the waters, I feign ignorance. "I... I don't remember," I say weakly.
His face falls. "Are you sure? Maybe if you try harder—"
Another man walks in, stopping at the foot of my bed. He's staring down at the tablet PC in his hands, either unaware or unconcerned with our presence. When he finally looks up, he does a double-take at the alleged doctor, eyeing him up and down with obvious incredulity.
"Nolan, what are you—"
"Just checking on our patient," the doctor, Nolan, says, directing both their attention to me. "You know, since we're doctors."
"Right," he nods slowly, brows raised as if in question, "well, my name is Arturo," he says to me.