All I can see is Gilbert’s face.
Not as it is now—slack and empty—but as it was when I was nine.
I’m hiding in the closet, knees pulled to my chest, hands over my ears. But I can still hear them. Mom’s voice, high and desperate. “Please, Gilbert, I can’t—I don’t want—”
“You think you have a choice?” His voice is cold, controlled. “You think you get to decide?”
The sound of pills rattling in a bottle. The cap being twisted off.
“Open your mouth.”
“No—”
A slap. The sharp crack of palm against cheek. My mother’s gasp.
“I said open your fucking mouth.”
Silence. Then the sound of her crying.
“Good girl. See? That wasn’t so hard.”
I blink and I’m twelve, watching from the hallway as he shoves a needle into her arm, his hand clamped over her mouth. She’s crying silently, tears streaming down her face, and he’s smiling. Actually smiling.
“You’re an addict now, Rachel. You need me. You’ll always need me.”
I’m thirteen and Mom is so thin I can see her bones through her skin. She shakes all the time, can’t sit still. Gilbert controls the pills—doles them out like rewards, withholds them as punishment. She begs. Actually gets on her knees and begs.
And he makes me watch.
“See, Lexi? See what happens when you love someone too much?”
The memories crash over me in waves, each one sharper than the last. Years of suppressed anger, of watching my mother become a shell, of knowing that the man who was supposed to protect us was the one who destroyed everything.
And now he’s dead.
By my hand.
And it feelsright.
The right parent died. That thought crystallizes with perfect clarity. Mom didn’t deserve what happened to her. She was weak, maybe, too trusting, too willing to believe that love could fix damage that deep. But she didn’t deserve to die choking on pills he forced down her throat.
Gilbert did.
Gilbert, who was selfish enough to create addicts just so he’d never have to be alone in his sickness. Who saw love as ownership, control as affection. Who looked at his own children and saw either pawns or problems.
Fuck him.
Fuck his plans and his manipulation and his pathetic attempt to make me into a weapon he could wield.
I’m nobody’s weapon.
I’m the one holding the gun.
A sound pulls me from my thoughts—a choked sob that doesn’t sound human. I turn to find Axel on his knees beside Gilbert’s body. He’s not crying exactly, but his shoulders are shaking. His hands hover over the wound in Gilbert’s chest like he wants to touch it but can’t.
“Axel.” My voice comes out flat, emotionless.
He doesn’t respond. Doesn’t look at me. Just keeps staring at the body of our father—the man who destroyed our family, who killed our mother, who was probably planning to kill me and Axel an hour ago.
