Amelia made a soft sound across the glass. Not a sob. Not a word. A sound like her breath caught on something sharp.
I looked up fast.
She was staring at the corner of the room, eyes wide and glassy, shoulders drawn tight.
Hallucinations. Again.
The basement loved those. It fed them. It cultivated them like mold.
I watched her for a long second, my chest tight, and told myself not to move. Not to react. If I reacted, it became real. If I reacted, he won.
Amelia whispered something to the corner, barely moving her lips.
My stomach turned.
I stood up, slow, controlled, because if I moved too quickly my body would show how scared I was that she was slipping. I stepped closer to the glass, staring hard at her until her eyes flicked to mine.
“Stop,” I said.
Her brows knitted together.
“Stop talking to whatever the fuck that is,” I said, voice low. “It isn’t real.”
Her eyes flashed with anger, immediate and defensive. “I know.”
“You don’t,” I snapped.
She sat up straighter, fury giving her a brief spine. “Don’t tell me what I know.”
I leaned forward until my forehead nearly touched the glass. “Then actlike it,” I said.
Her lips pressed tight. Her eyes were wet with rage, not tears. “You don’t get to act like you care,” she said, slow and deliberate, like she wanted each word to land.
My stomach clenched.
There it was. The truth she kept throwing at me like a rock. I deserved it. I also hated it.
Because caring was not some noble thing I was choosing. It was a weakness that had crawled under my skin and made itself at home. It was a craving I hadn’t asked for, a hunger that made the rest of my hungers feel simple.
I forced my face colder. “I don’t care,” I lied.
Amelia stared at me like she wanted to believe it because believing it would hurt less. Then she looked away, shoulders slumping again.
The lie tasted like ash.
I backed away from the glass and sat down hard against the wire, letting my head hit it once. The impact sent a dull pain through my skull. It felt deserved. It felt like punishment.
A few days in this cage and I was unraveling. Not with tears. Not with dramatic speeches. With this quiet rot inside me, this slow realization that hatred had been my shield, and without it I didn’t know what the hell to do with what I felt.
What I’d always felt, buried under my father’s orders.
I remembered a night in high school, after practice, walking home alone.
I’d seen Amelia down the street under a streetlight, hair catching the glow, face tilted up like she was thinking about something far away. I’d stopped behind a tree like a creep and watched her for a long minute.
Not because I wanted to hurt her.
Because I wanted to walk up and say her name like it meant something.
