Her mean eyes fall to me. “I had the opportunity to get rid of you before you were born. My greatest regret is not taking that opportunity.”
No, no, no, no, no, no.
My tummy sours, and the tears I tried so hard to hold back come falling down. Why does my mother hate me so much? I’ve tried being good. I’ve tried doing everything she told me to.
Does she tell Ella this?
The second I think it, I know the answer is no. Mom, Dad, Ah Ma, Grandma—none of them would talk to Ella like that. Just me and the red monster they must see growing inside me.
“Since the day you came into this world, screaming bloody murder for so long that the doctors were worried, you’ve been nothing but a disappointment.”
“But—but I wasn’t the one watching TV. It was Ella! She—she did it. She said so! I was in bed asleep. I never left!” I’m a blubbering mess.
Mom hates blubbering messes.
“It’s not just about the TV, Sable,” she hisses.
I flinch. The monster snaps its teeth.
“It’s about how you can’t do a single thing right, and because we’re good people, we’re still stuck taking care of you. I could have given you up when you were a baby, and not once have you ever thanked me for letting you keep living in my home.”
“I don’t know what you want from me!” I’m yelling—the monster is making me.
Her face twists into an ugly scowl that she’d call unbecoming of an Eldrith lady. “I want you to be like Ella.”
The monster doesn’t like that. “I hate her, and I hate you!”
A gasp sounds from outside the door, right before fire burns across my face in time with the slap that rebounds inside myskull. The tears fall even faster, and all me and the beast can do is imagine burning the whole world to the ground.
“Nobody could ever want you, Sable. I want you to remember that.” Mom’s eyes are almost bulging out of her head, and steam practically pours from her nose. But she doesn’t once raise her voice.
“There will never be anyone who will come save you or choose you, because everything bad that has ever happened in your life is because you areyou. You will forever be insurmountable.”
“Why do you hate me?” the monster and I ask through clenched teeth.
She looks at me like I’m one of the animals that snuck onto the patio from the forest, and she’s about to call the groundskeeper to make sure it never comes back. “You’ve never given anyone a reason not to.”
30
Lynx
Sable is a strong woman. A fucking special, beautiful, smart woman who deserves more than what I’ve given her. A lifetime of misery, trapped as a ghost with unfinished business, tethered to a house she grew up in with a demon-turned-human desperate to get her back.
Hell is no place for someone as amazing as her.
I was sent there because of my sins. Because I was a thief trying to save my little brother from poverty—regardless of the reasons, I stole.
All Sable did was steal the heart of her killer, and in return, she’s now in the very place that drove me to insanity.
No matter what, I need to get her back. Not for my own selfish reason of not being able to live without her anymore, but because Hell will ruin her.
They’ll be torturing her.
I know it. And by the expression on Tony’s face and the way he keeps pacing in front of me, he knows it too.
“You need to take me back.” A demand. Not a question. There are no ifs, buts, or maybes in this reality. I need to drag my ass back to Hell and save her.
“Wait, wait, wait.” He steps back. “You’re free to leave and go have the life you should’ve had years ago. But you want me to take you backthere?”
