Seeing the heirloom meant to shackle me breaks the spell that’s been gripping me.
“But you’re free now—you’re free, and you set them free. They won’t suffer the same fate.”
“W-w-i-i-shy?” my mother splutters, screeching in pained, uncontrollable sobs, forcing my attention away from my doubt, as if she doesn’t already know the goddamn answer.
This fucking question—this fucking one-word question.Three fucking letters that flip a switch.
My eye twitches, hearing it again, as a memory from earlier, jackhammers against my skull, jolting me into the scene from earlier tonight.
“Are you sure we should do this?”
Three sets of eyes land on me as Griff’s question hangs in the air like a beacon of light at a crossroad, waiting for your decision—ready to consume us if we don’t make the correct choice.
Before I can tell the dummy it’s too late, a whoosh of air tickles my unmasked face. “What are you, fucking stupid?” Rick asks, his Freddy Krueger mask still affixed to his face.
Fredrick choosing to be Freddy is both hilarious and corny. But like his namesake, he has a penchant for haunting children—the sick fuck.
The glee on his face when I explained the plan should’ve been enough to put an end to this ridiculous idea.
But it didn’t, did it?
Refusing to argue with myself over an option that is no longer on the table, I swivel my head to the asshat in the Ghostface mask splattered with the blood of Leigh—my baby sister. Her four years on this earth—cut short because she was born into the wrong family.
A flicker of guilt begins to tug at the ends of my heartstrings, determined to loosen the intricately woven resolve pumping through my veins.
They had to die.
Why?
The stupid question rattles around the part of my brain, desperate to give a reason for my descent into madness.
Why—
It’s a bit late for these questions, but that doesn’t stop the bombardment.
Was there no other possible solution?
Could I have spared my siblings?
Why did I enlist my friends’ help?
Why did I start with my siblings?
Why did their deaths have to be so brutal?
The whys gnaw through the lining of my gut, traveling to my blackened heart before they’re swiftly snuffed out. And with it, the sliver of compassion I possess disintegrates in the vat of acidic rage coursing through me.
You saved their innocence.
I chuckle at the voice that pretends I’m the antihero in this story.
You did it to save them. It tries to whisper. But I know the all-consuming truth. Its nails burrow—deep—deeper, flowing until I’m shrouded in its darkness.
I am no hero…
There are no heroes in this story—just villains in capes, masking as the superhero while vying for total and utter destruction.
Huffing, I drown out the whispers, refocusing on the idiot before me. “Should we do this?” I hiss. “Don’t you think it’s too fucking late for a should-we-fucking question?”
