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I don’t eat it.

The first timeI saw Wicker, I knew he was going to be mine.

I didn’t understand yet, six years old and coming out of a group home situation that the social worker explained ‘isn’t going to work out for you’. I just remember seeing him and thinking that I’ve never seen anyone so pure and clean andpretty, and if life is about obtaining the very best things, then little Whitaker Ashby just became number one on my list.

And then he opened his mouth.

“Who the fuck are you?” he asked.

Just as snottily, I replied. “I’m Pace. Who the fuck are you?”

“Your worst nightmare.” With his blue eyes narrowed, he buried a fist into his palm, and I laughed. The more I laughed, the more menacing he tried to look. He was just too cute to take seriously. As rosy-cheeked as the cherubs in the paintings lining the walls.

It was easier with Lex, who, even at eight years old, looked me up and down and said, “Hey. I guess I’m, like, your brother or something.” And he’s never been anything less than that, as if protecting me was never a question for him. It’s almost like whatever I felt when I looked at Wicker, Lex felt it about me. That I belonged to them.

Just like that.

I’m pretty sure it’s the only reason Wicker decided to give me a shot. By my second week there, all of that bluster was gone, replaced with the eyes of a boy whohurt, but didn’t want to show it.

I smile dimly at the memory, braiding three frayed threads from my shoelace together. “Your worst nightmare,” I mutter, snorting.

And then I think of her.

Rosilocks.

Verity.

Because I got the same feeling the first time I saw her. Somehow, I just knew she was going to be mine.

If life is about obtaining the very best things…

Slowly, my smile fades. It was different when I was six and clueless, distrustful but fragile. Now, I think of Verity and I don’t see something shiny and unique. I see danger.

Because lately, Wicker’s begun looking at her without any of the bluster.

Lex has started protecting her.

I’ve let myself find comfort and solace in her.

Our worst fucking nightmare.

When I wake,it’s dark again.

There are three slashes on my arm. One is scabbed over. The other is gummy with old blood. The third is vivid and still bleeding, marking the third day. It’s important. I learned it long ago, scratching hash marks into the wall beside me. Of course, over the years, it got confusing. Old marks, new marks–they all started blending together. Sometimes it was hard to know if I was on my fourth or fifteenth day. In prison, skin was just easiest. No one to steal it or smudge it, force me to clean it away.

When I rise from the fog of slumber, my senses are heightened to the smallest of sounds.

“Who’s there?” I ask, disoriented, and confused. My stomach rumbles. I rejected dinner, and then another breakfast, and now I’m starting to feel it in a bad way. Sleep is my only respite down here and I ignore the ache in my gut, rolling to my side.

Then light blinks on, glaring and bright, and I slam a palm over my eyes, wincing as I peek through my fingers.

“Jesus Christ!” I jolt upright, squinting through the burn of the brightness. “You scared the shit out of me!”

“Get up.” Lex’s voice is gruff, his form looming above where I’m curled up on the floor. I see how he takes me in, eyes landing on the fresh cuts. Only three. The most I’ve ever had from a punishment was seventeen, but those scars are hidden under the tattoos now.

“Effie?” I ask, knowing it’s stupid. The question I should be asking is why Lex is down here and not Father. Father is the one that releases me, no one else.

He doesn’t answer, just says, “You need to get showered and change.”