To my dearest Dex,
My heart does this stupid lurch thing. Every time she writes that, I feel seen. Yeah, my standards are low.
Thank you so much for the birthday letter; you have no idea how much I needed it. Robert forgot my birthday. Not just refused to celebrate, like in the past, but he never said a single word about it. I thought maybe today he’d let me have something fancy for breakfast, but no such luck.
What’s your favorite breakfast food? I bet you’d eat half a dozen eggs and a stack of chewy bacon. Maybe one day, when you get out of there, I can cook your favorite meal for you?
Tonight was actually a pretty strange one. I might have had my first date.
What. The. Actual. Fuck.
She’s twenty-six! How the hell has she never been on a date? And more importantly, who the hell is this guy? I grip the paper tighter, scanning for more clues as to who the dead man is.
Robert made me have dinner with his friend, Ivan. He sort of implied it was a date, but I’m not sure. The guy is older than my brotherand gives me the creeps. Although Robert tells me that my gut instincts are off, so maybe he’s not so bad? Is it wrong for me to wish that it were the four of you here with me instead?
I bet you wouldn’t make my skin crawl with unease just from a look. If you kissed my hand, I don’t imagine I’d spend ten minutes scrubbing it clean—and yes, I did do that tonight. Is that weird?
Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I snuck out and came to see you. Would I get in trouble? Would you turn me away? I don’t think I could handle that. The letters from you and your friends are the only thing I look forward to.
Am I broken, Dex? What’s wrong with me that I don’t care about playing the piano or ballet? All I think about is you, lying there in your cell, only a few hours from here.
Even now, as I write this, it’s ten p.m. on my birthday, and I wonder if you are sitting on your bed like I am.
Can you see the moon? No… You told me you have no window in your cell. I’m gonna draw one on the top of this page. You need to hold it at night, three nights from now, and look at the moon I drew, knowing I’m looking at the real one and thinking of you.
Take care, Dex.
Your Wren
XOX
Yeah. I’m a goner.
My chest squeezes so hard I might actually keel over. I trace my finger over the moon as Pete jumps down between us, having read his letter above me in his own bunk.
“Who the fuck is Ivan?” Pete blurts out, his eyes wide as he scans his own letter.
“He’s a dead man,” Sly says, calm as hell—but his hands are clenched so tight the paper crunches, ruining his usually pristine letter. His eyes shine bright with murder.
Jagger jumps down, letter in hand, teeth clenched with pure rage. He’s not just mad, he’s seething. Something about this news has affected him to his very core.
“She told me Robert made her go on a date with him. That hekissedher hand.”
Pete practically foams at the mouth. “The fuck?!” He growls, turning to look at me. His eyes burn holes in the back of my letter as if he wants to know exactly what’s written there. But we’ve all come to an understanding with the letters. We never touch or read each others, and it’s up to us if we want to share anything.
We know we all care about her—obsessed with her more accurately—and that she seems to like all of us. That’s enough for us. The letters are too crucial for what’s left of our sanity to give up.
“She made him dinner,” Sly grits out.
Pete runs his hands through his messy blond hair, pacing. “What are we gonna do?”
“What can we do?” I mutter, shoulders slumping. If there were a way out of this place, I’d be at Ivan’s throat already—probably her brother’s, too.
“We can ask Mugs to do some research,” Sly suggests, referring to our next-door neighbor who has the internet privileges we lack.
“We don’t have his last name, unless you guys do?” Pete asks, looking at us hopefully. I recheck my letter before shaking my head. “No.”
“Me neither,” Sly says with a sigh as Jagger just stares at the wall silently.
