Page 48 of Peak Cruelty

Vance

I sleep like I’ve been drugged. Maybe I have.

The next morning—or what I think is morning—I wake to the sound of eggs hissing in a pan and a voice low-singing a song I don’t recognize. Something old. Southern. Not nostalgic.

She doesn’t greet me when I shuffle into the kitchen. Just points to a chair with her chin like it’s an arrangement we agreed on.

I sit. I breathe. I try not to wince.

The notebook is still in my lap.

I’m not sure when I took it out, or why I’ve been holding it all night, but my knuckles are still white around it like I thought someone might come for it in the dark.

She sets a plate in front of me. Biscuits with burned edges, everything over-peppered. I eat anyway.

“You keep looking at that thing like it’s gonna offer you absolution,” she says, not facing me.

I place it on the table beside the plate. “It won’t.”

“Didn’t think so.”

She’s not wrong. But she’s not right, either.

It’s just names, theories, pieces of other people’s lives that stuck out enough to warrant attention.

Women who fit the pattern. Munchausen by proxy, or something close to it.

It’s more than a pattern now. It’s pathology.

A trail of kids whose lives are at risk.

Rachel’s name is still on the third page. Circled, not crossed.

I run my thumb across her name. Not just because I want her to pay for what she’s doing, but because she’ll know how to get to Marlowe.

“You gonna sit there and stare or actually do something?” the woman asks, wiping her hands on a towel.

“I'm not ready yet.”

She pours herself a cup of coffee. Stares out the window. “No one is. But you look like a man who doesn’t get to stay broken.”

I almost laugh. Almost.

Instead, I set the fork down. The pain’s shifted now—less fire, more glass. Every breath comes with splinters.

“You want to tell me her name?” the woman asks.

I glance up. Don’t answer.

“You say nothing, but you keep that thing on your lap like a photo album. I figured she’ll be in there. Dead center.”

“No.”

She nods once, like that tracks. “Some names don’t get paper.”

“No. They don’t.”

She sips her coffee. She doesn't pry.

I move to the couch.

“Here,” the woman says. “I charged your phone.”

I power it on and then open the app. Click on Rachel’s profile. A post with a caption saying she’s taking a break from social media to reconnect with family. Go figure.

I flip through recent posts, looking for something I missed—some clue, some overlooked thread that could tell me where Marlowe ended up. Where they took her.

But nothing pops out at me.

“I fucked up,” I say.

The woman looks at me. “You saying that for my benefit?”

“No. I think I’m trying to admit it to myself.”

I click the phone off. Set it on the cushion beside me like I’m scared it’ll detonate if I move too fast.

My side seizes. I double forward and cough. It’s deep and wet, but there’s no blood this time.

Progress.

She crosses the room. Drops two pills in my hand. “Muscle relaxer. You’re going to end up worse if you don’t.”

I take them dry.

“I’m sorry to overstay my welcome,” I say. “This wasn’t the plan.”

She cocks an eyebrow like she’s waiting for the punchline. “I can’t imagine it was.”

“It’s a long story.”

She tilts her head. “And it’s eating at you.”

I don’t answer right away. Just press a hand to my ribs and let the silence draw out until it stops being awkward and starts being honest.

“My mother used to take me to the hospital,” I say finally. “Said I had seizures. Said my immune system was fragile. Said I needed tests.”

The woman doesn’t move. Just listens.

“I was fine. But she needed me to be sick. Made her feel needed. Special. The nurses used to compliment her—how attentive she was. How selfless. One even gave her a pin. Some survivor thing.”

I shake my head once. “She wore that pin like a badge of honor. Like being the cause of the chaos made her immune to it.”

The woman crosses her arms, leans against the counter. She doesn’t ask questions. Smart woman.

“Eventually, someone caught on. CPS got involved. I ended up with my dad for a while. Then a string of places after that. Clean houses. Empty rooms. Nobody touching me at all was somehow worse.”

I tilt my head back, stare at the ceiling.

“Guess I thought if I found the others—the ones like her—I could do something with it. Warn someone. Intervene. Be the guy who stepped in when no one had for me.”

I gesture vaguely at the notebook, still open in my lap. “That was the idea, anyway.”

“And?” the woman asks.

“And I fucked it up.”

I don’t elaborate. Don’t have to. We both know some fuckups don’t need explaining.

She studies me for a beat too long. Then: “You’re not just talking about your mother.”

I meet her eyes. “I know.”

“Or the women in that book.”

I let out a short breath. Almost a laugh, but not quite. “She’s not like them. Wrong place, wrong time, kind of thing. Just close enough to confuse me.”

“She the reason you’re hurting now?” she asks, voice low.

“Not in the way you mean.”

She nods once. “Still worth the pain?”

I don’t answer.

Because she already knows.

Neither of us says anything for a long while. Not until I pick the notebook up. Let it rest against my good thigh like an anchor.

I flip past Rachel. Past the others. I think about what I’m going to need—cash, movement, a car. I’ll start with Rachel.

They came for Marlowe, so there’s a line from there to somewhere. And I’m done pretending I’m not going to follow it.

“She didn’t deserve what happened,” I say.

“No,” the woman agrees. “But that’s not the same as being yours to fix.”

I look up at her.

“I’m not fixing anything,” I say. “I’m finishing it.”

She nods. Then walks to the sink and turns the water on like the conversation’s over.

It is.

I stay on the couch until the light changes and the ache in my ribs becomes familiar. Then I put the notebook in my bag, zip it, and shakily pull myself up.

The pills wore off hours ago. My body hurts like a motherfucker, but my mind’s clearing.

And I know exactly where I’m going.