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ALEX

Fifteen Months Earlier

With every flicker of the lightbulb, my fingers twitch. My pulse speeds like a building drumbeat. It doesn’t matter how many months pass; I still feel the hum of electricity like a current running through my veins.

Crawling.

Eating away.

After a year of physical therapy, it still doesn’t take much for the dull ache to radiate through my arm, reminding me of everything I lost.

Of everything that put me in Montgomery Psychiatric Ward.

With a flex of my fingers, I work the joints.

They're stiff from the resistance of my taut, scarred skin. It still hurts too much to write more than a sentence, much less grip a basketball, but it’s getting easier to move them every day.

The mobility is slowly returning, even if my grip will never quite be the same.

I never thought much about moving my fingers before. They worked like my lungs drink air. Effortlessly.

Now they barely curl without fire shooting through every nerve. Raging so hot I swear I can smell my flesh begin to burn.

I clench my fingers and let the pain soothe me now. I let it act as my reminder.

I hold my aching fist until my entire arm shakes.

My teeth chatter.

Exposure.

My doctors are set on medication and physical therapy, but I’m not trying to get better. I’d rather be numb. I’d rather hurt so deeply that I stop feeling anything at all.

I clench my fist and embrace it. I hold it as tightly as possible until pain radiates all the way to my shoulder. Until I physically can’t hold my fist any longer.

My fingers ache when I stretch them back out. My knuckles are brighter as blood returns to my hand.

It doesn’t even look like my hand anymore.

Did it ever?

Or have I always been this phantom existing within bone and skin? A careful design to hide the monster clawing at a flesh prison in my chest?

A beast they didn’t realize they were letting out that night.

One there's no putting back.

The lightbulb overhead flickers, and I climb off my bed, moving to the window seat. After my Sigma House initiation went sideways and I was brought to Montgomery, my parents paid to have the prior patient inhabiting this room moved elsewhere.

Only the best for their sadistic golden child, I suppose. The nicest room in the most expensive wing in the psychiatric ward. Like it matters when there’s no amount of money that can hide what I’ve been turned into.

Nothing that silences the rumors spread around town. I’m a warning. A monster. One more reason to fear Sigma House. My father can throw every penny—every hint of influence—at this problem, and the fact remains: this is what they’ve turned me into.

Voices raise in the hallway. My sister is arguing with a nurse as she heads to my room.

Her tone is flat and cold, and I try to remember the last time there was life in her heart.

She hasn’t been happy in years, but with every passing month I’ve been locked in Montgomery, the light in her pale, golden-brown eyes dims.

At least now she’s living in a dorm at Briar Academy and no longer at our parents’ house. An act of rebellion as much as a statement to our mother that someday she intends to be more than her puppet. Her marionette on strings while she tugs on the cross.

Patience still has fight.

Hope .

Someday she’ll see that’s pointless.

When Patience turns the corner, I drop my chin and avoid her gaze, focusing on the pattern in the curtains. It’s too dangerous to look into her eyes when she still thinks I’ll leave this place someday. It’s bad enough she believes that if I did, it would be a good thing.

“I brought you more books.” Patience tempers the irritation from her conversation with the nurse for my sake. “It’s nice and warm in here today.”

She tightens her long white-blonde ponytail, but the smile on her face is forced and fake.

From the corner of my eye, I watch her set my father’s books on the nightstand. Proof she’s not the only Lancaster refusing to believe how far gone I am.

If I were smart, I would have accepted the light at the end of the tunnel when my heart stopped. I don’t remember much from that night, but I remember death. The cool indifference of the other side stared back at me. A testament to just how little the universe actually cares.

Why did I walk away?

Patience arranges the books into a neat stack. “I hope you don’t mind that my new roommate is meeting me here. We’re grabbing a bite to eat.”

She moves through my room, fixing the blankets on my bed next.

They’re half on the floor and a mess from the nightmares.

But if she guesses that’s why, she doesn’t say anything.

She continues her sweep. Cleaning and organizing like she always does when she feels like things are spinning out of control.

“We were going to go see a movie later, but I need to study. The Psychology of Violence course is kicking my butt. And I swear, Briar Academy built the thinnest walls because it’s so loud in the dorm that it’s almost impossible to focus.

If I don’t pass this test tomorrow, I might need to find a way to get extra credit. ”

Patience never used to ramble. Each word is another thin crack webbing through her carefully practiced facade. She’s nervous. It’s the only explanation as to why she continues talking to me, like someday I might suddenly respond.

“Is it hurting today?” Her gaze drops to my clenched fist.

I hadn’t realized I was gripping it tight. Maybe that’s a good sign.

Exposure .

Enough pain and I’m bound to stop feeling anything.

“I can have the nurses bring you pain medication before I leave,” Patience continues her one-sided conversation.

I wish she wouldn’t bother. The expectations are stifling.

“Oh, there she is.” Patience stops at the window beside me, her voice lifting.

I follow her gaze down to the parking lot, where a dark-haired girl climbs out of her car. Even on an overcast day, the red streaks in her chestnut hair shimmer. The soft waves reach midway down her back, blowing in the slight breeze.

Her tan, sun-kissed legs are on full display in the white dress that hugs her petite frame and accentuates her every curve. She’s perfectly polished, from how she smooths her hands over her skirt to her head held high.

The girl slams the car door shut, finally turning to fully face the building. She pauses, taking it in, and when her gaze moves up, my heart stops.

At this distance, I can’t make out the green in her eyes, but I remember the forest that haunts me every time I fight sleep. The music that rattles with her gaze.

She angles her chin, scanning the building, expressionless. There’s not a flicker of emotion on her heart-shaped face. A breeze blows a strand of dark-brown hair across her cheek, and her thin fingers wipe it away.

Maybe I’ve died. Maybe the angel of death has finally come to drag me into the afterlife. It’s the only explanation because she can’t be here.