I unlocked the door and gestured inside with a flourish. “Welcome to my personal purgatory.”
She stepped in, sniffed, and immediately wrinkled her nose. “Why does it smell like a church and chlorine had a baby?”
“Bleach and disapproval,” I said flatly, tossing a bag onto the bed. “The ambiance is very ‘failed boarding school for the emotionally stunted’.”
She flopped on the bed, limbs splayed like a starfish. “Wow. You really know how to live.”
“That’s why I never invited you over. That and the risk of my aunt interrogating you and reporting back to your dad about the delinquent you were seen with.”
“Aww. You were protecting me.” She clutched her chest. “Sin has a heart after all.”
“Fuck off.”
She grinned, then started flicking through her phone and I started packing.
It didn’t take long—I didn’t have much. A few clothes. My beat-up iPod. The new black jersey sheets I’d ordered and never opened. Everything else stayed. None of it was really mine.
By the time I was done, Thalia was watching me from the kitchenette, cigarette smoke curling around her. “You sure about this?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but was interrupted.
“Leaving, then?” The voice was sharp, clipped.
My aunt stood in the doorway, perfectly ironed as always. Every strand of hair coiled into place. Not a smudge of eyeliner out of line. A mannequin with teeth.
“I am,” I said without looking at her.
She scanned the room like she was tallying up the damage. “You walk out that door, you are no longer part of this family.”
“Cool. Should I leave my collar and chain on the bed, or…?”
Her eyes narrowed, but her voice stayed ice-cold. “You’re lucky I took you in after your parents were done with you.”
That hit harder than it should’ve. I shouldn’t have cared about the people who brought me into this world. Not when they’d never cared about me.
I clenched my jaw. “Why did you? Huh? It’s obvious you didn’t want me.”
“I had a duty to my family,” she said, coldly. “I tried to fix you. But you’re beyond repair. I don’t hold out any hope. From what I’ve heard, you won’t keep that job much longer.”
The floor felt like it shifted slightly beneath me. My stomach dipped. That was the first I’d heard of my job being in jeopardy. Timothy was an asshole, sure—but did he have that kind of pull?
She didn’t scream. Didn’t make a scene. Just delivered each word like a scalpel, slicing skin with practiced, painless precision.
Once she’d finished, she turned and walked away. No hug. No goodbye. That was her answer. The final tether with my family was severed.
The apartment was nothing like the antiseptic white hell I’d just left. It was loud. Lived-in. Still half-unpacked from Thalia moving in. A third-floor walk-up in an old building that creaked like it had stories to tell. The hallways smelled like old books and curry from the family downstairs. One of the windows had a spiderweb crack in the corner that caught the light just right.
The ceilings were high. The walls were white brick. A sliver of the skyline peeked through the window in my room, and I could just barely hear the hum of the city. Not the rich part. The other part. The real part. One where I felt like I might actually fit in.
Claire had lit candles everywhere. Sage and bergamot and something floral I couldn’t place. Thalia had strung up fairy lights in the kitchen even though half of them didn’t work.
My bedroom was small—barely room for a bed and a narrow dresser. But it was mine. The floor was uneven. There was chipped paint along the windowsill. It had character. I loved it.
The silence that settled around me wasn’t peaceful once they’d left me to unpack. It was echoing, like everything inside my chest had spilled out and left behind a hollow.
I sat on the edge of the bed, duffel bag at my feet, fingers twitching. I pulled out my phone. Theo’s name glowed on thescreen. My thumb hovered before I tapped. He picked up on the third ring.
“Hey,” he said, voice warm, familiar. “Everything okay?”
