But I was too tired.
I fled to the bathroom and slammed the door, ripping off my clothes.
Under the dribble of tepid water, I scrubbed until my arms stung, fingernails raw.
Steam coiled around me as I collapsed against the tile floor and wept until my lungs trembled. My reflection in the mirror stared back. Eyes red-rimmed, skin blotched. I imagined bugs crawling beneath my flesh, proof that I wasn’t safe in my own body.
I didn’t deserve any of this, and yet here I was, alone. No gentle hand to brush my hair, no voice to whisper words of comfort. My mother’s love was as vanished as my father’s. Abandoned. It pressed on my chest, a weight I could neither lift nor escape.
Later that day, I faced my evening shift at the bookstore, the weight of the day still clinging to me like a second skin.
As I drove through the familiar streets, an unsettling sensation prickled beneath my skin, as though I might peel away the layers of myself at any moment.
Now, rolling up to the shop’s faded brick façade, the scent of paper and ink seeped through the cracks in the door, anchoring me.
The bell chimed as I entered, and for a moment the day’s chaos melted away.
Michelle looked up from the stacks. Concern rippled across her face. “Hey, you okay? You look pale.” Her gaze traced the dark crescents under my eyes.
“I’m fine,” I forced a smile, throat tight.
Fine.The word tasted metallic as I imagined Caiden’s mocking grin, the memory of roaches scuttling under my skin after our last encounter. The lie slipped out too easily.
I turned to the boxes at my feet. New arrivals. My fingers brushed over glossy spines.
Thrillers and memoirs, self-help guides promising salvation.
My pulse rattled in my ears. I longed to dive into one of those pages, to escape into a world where endings were happy and hope was guaranteed.
But here, reality clung to me like a shadow. No one could feel the ache I carried, the suffocating loneness that trailed me down every aisle, every street corner. If I surrendered to that darkness, it would swallow me whole.
I sliced open a box and pulled out a father memoir, the cover embossed in hopeful gold.
My lips curled.
Father. A ghost. I used to cling to the idea that he’d come back someday.
Next came a self-help guide, its bright letters promising healing.
My heart clenched at the memory of giving this very book to my mother on her birthday, she had exploded and stormed out in a rage. Lillian and I should have known better than to cornerher with care.
I learned my lesson. Never corner a druggie. Let them figure it out, on their own time.
“Hey, Amelia.”
I looked up from the battered cardboard box at my feet, my fingertips brushing over the cracked leather spines and faded gold lettering of old volumes, and saw Dante standing in the fluorescent glow of the bookstore aisle.
He had that way of appearing out of nowhere, like a shadow slipping between stacks of paper, and my pulse stuttered.
“Dante, hey.” I forced the corners of my mouth into a smile, though my chest felt tight. The scent of aged paper and dust motes drifting in the lamplight did nothing to calm my nerves. “What are you doing here?”
He shrugged, hands shoved into the pockets of his worn denim jacket. His dark hair fell into his eyes as he glanced around the quiet shelves. “Just need to pick up a book for English class.”
A low thrum of curiosity made me tilt my head. He didn’t strike me as the reading type, more a pranks-and-skateboards guy, but maybe I was wrong. “Oh? What book?”
He licked his lips, gaze flicking back to me. “And Then There Were None. Is it in stock?”
I nodded and pushed off from the box, weaving between rows of tightly packed fiction. My fingertips danced over author surnames—Austen, Bradbury, Christie—until I drew her from the shelf: a crisp hardcover clad in Christie’s name.
