Page 4 of Ruthless Chaos

My vision grows spotty.

The heaviness is unbearable now. I crumple to my knees with a squelch, and that’s when I notice how wet my whole body is. There’s a huge blood stain seeping through my tattered shirt.

I guess I’m hurt more than I thought.

When I try to call for help, my voice doesn’t work anymore. My body gives out further, and I end up slumping against the fallen column. Dolores’ disfigured body is right next to me, but I try to imagine her the way I remember.

The pain starts to fade away.

I take it back. If this is what dying feels like, maybe it isn’t so bad after all.

As the world goes black, my eyes catch on something lying next to Dolores.

My Harvard acceptance letter—the one I carefully hid in a shoebox under my bed—is right by her shoulder, strangely undamaged despite the explosion.

It’s the last thing I see before the world goes black.

ONE

ALIZE

“This will begood for you, Alize,” Uncle Laurent’s voice pulls me out of my reverie.

I keep staring out the window. The clouds outside are big and fluffy, and the sky is bright and blue. If happiness had a look, I imagine it would be a shot of this sky. But the beauty isn’t enough to chase the darkness out of my heart.

Sometimes, I wish I could float away, like a cloud.

Maybe if I ignore him long enough, he’ll shut up about this hare-brained plan.

“You can’t keep hiding from the world.” His voice is firm. “Frankly, I won’t allow you to anymore.”

I can’t stop myself from rolling my eyes.

When I finally look at him, he’s wearing a stern expression. I know he’s trying to be intimidating, but it doesn’t give off the effect he’s going for. He just looks a little constipated.

“Take me back to the hospital,” I say, pulling the sleeves of my hoodie down over my palms. “I’d rather stay there than go wherever the hell you’re taking me.”

“We’re on our way to Switzerland,” he says.

We’ve been in the air for a few hours now. Those two sentences are the most I’ve said to him since he showed up and had me discharged from the hospital. It doesn’t even make sense. I try explaining to him why it’s so hard for me to “move on.”

He wouldn’t understand.

After being in intensive care for a couple of weeks in the US, they transferred me to another, more specialized hospital in France. The nurses and doctors there became my family. They genuinely cared about me. I felt at home there.

Now, he’s just appeared and ripped me away from the bit of normalcy I’ve gotten accustomed to. How does he expect me to be okay with that? My scars might have healed, but I’m definitely not better.

“Just give it a chance, Alize,” he says. He’s trying to look sympathetic, but it doesn’t work on me. It’s hard for me to think he has my best interest at heart.

Uncle Laurent is my godfather and calls himself my father’s best friend.

Though he’s never been unkind to me, it’s hard for me to trust anyone who calls a man like Michel Moreau their closest friend. So when he tells me that this is good for me, I read the situation for what it really is—it’s good for my father.

“I can’t just move on, Uncle Laurent,” I say. “Dolores died. I almost died.” It still hurts to even say her name. Images of her mutilated body haunt me when I try to sleep at night, and I’m plagued by the guilt of missing her funeral. “I’m not ready to move on with my life yet, much less go to some no-name college in another country.”

It’s all happening too soon.

My words seem to just filter through him because his cold expression doesn’t even falter.