Aaron used the opportunity to attack. He lunged at me, his knee in my kidney, his forehead banging into my bruised nose.
I groaned, stumbling back as he hit me.
“Aaron, please.” Lexi was there, pulling at his ripped dress shirt. “I think you all need to just talk this out.”
My brother shoved Lexi out of the way.
I saw red and sprang at him.
Aaron blocked the first few punches. He’d clearly been training how to fight since the last time we’d gone at it.
And so had I.
I could let him hurt me—I deserved it, after all—but he could not touch Lexi.
Our younger brothers swore as we grappled with each other.
All the hate, anger, and resentment that had been building probably since we were born spilled out. Aaron jammed his foot in my knee, causing me to go down to the floor. I punched him in the gut and staggered upright then ducked when he threw a lamp at me. It went wide and struck the TV hanging over the fireplace.
Aaron picked up one of the side tables by the couch and slammed it over my back.
I yelled in pain and tackled him to the ground. He punched me in the ribs, but I slammed him back against the slate floor, now covered by a rug that we were smearing in blood.
“I know you’re a liar,” Aaron screamed, jumping up as the heel of his hand connected with my jaw. “It’s a lie you’ve been telling yourself for the last eighteen years, that you did it to save us. It’s not true; it’s not true because I tried to take him out.”
He hissed out the words through blood-specked teeth as we circled each other again. “I waited until our father came downstairs. I had a slingshot I’d made, and I hit him right in the eye. He was on the ground and Ihad him. Wecould have had him, but instead of helping me, you betrayed me. You hit me in the mouth then threw me to the floor while Stuart laughed. Then you helped him up.”
“Because Dad knew you were weak,” I barked out.
“You were smiling when you beat me,” Aaron screamed. “You just jumped and did what he ordered. You’re a fucking”—his fist slammed into me—“piece”—his elbow in my neck—“of shit.” His forehead banged into my jaw, rattling my teeth.
I hooked my leg around his, sending us crashing to the floor.
“You’re just like him. You even call him Dad.”
“Because that’s what he is.” I slammed Aaron back into the ground.
“Stuart’s not my father.”
“Yes, he is!” I screamed at him, my hands clenched around his throat. I released him when I realized what I was doing. I didn’t want to hurt Aaron, not Aaron who would curl up next to me when we were little, and I would tell him stories about cities on the moon and flying to outer space.
“Yes, he is,” I repeated quietly. “There’s nothing you can do to change it.” I stood up off of Aaron.
“You were weak,” I said quietly to him. “You were weak. Sure you took the shot, but you hesitated. You didn’t go for the kill. I knew you weren’t going for the kill; Dad knew you weren’t going for the kill. I had to hurt you. I had to. You were going to ruin my plan.”
“You had no plan,” my younger brother said darkly as he slowly rolled to his knees.
“I did have a plan. I was the only one of us who had the wherewithal to do what had to be done,” I hissed out through the pain. “I was the only one.” I took a shuddering breath.
“Run away, Lexi,” Aaron said. “Run away from him. Grayson’s a monster you can’t control.”
“It was my eleventh birthday,” I said, turning to Lexi, needing her to understand. “My father liked to play benevolent family patriarch. He came down into the cellar with a single cupcake. I remember how sad my mother looked, how pleased, almost smug my father was. The TV was blaring, playing rerunsofGilligan’s Island. That’s all Dad would let us watch on the TV, old shows, probably because he didn’t want us to know about the outside world. They were stuck on this islandagain. It was that episode, the one with the radioactive carrots, and I remember thinking, my god, these people will never get off the island, and we will never get out of the cellar. We were all doomed—me, my brothers, my mom, and even if we tried, it would be just like the gang, forced to stay on the island forever and ever. But then I thought, at least Gilligan and his friends tried, you know? They tried to escape. But had I ever tried? No.”
I pressed a hand to my aching ribs. “And so I made a plan. Right then and there, and it started with the cupcake. Normally our mothers wanted us to share. But when my mom told me to let the others have a bite, I told her to make me. She yelled at me, and I slapped her. My father laughed and told me to hit her again to make sure the lesson stuck, so I did. Then I ate the whole cupcake by myself. Dad was gleeful. He lapped it up. That’s when I knew my plan would work.”
Spencer looked at the floor. Lexi’s eyes were wide with horror.
“I calculated that it would take a year to earn Dad’s trust. I did it in three months. You’re right, Lexi,” I said harshly. “Compliments really do go a long way to manipulating people.”
