CHAPTER 3
The Kane Family Legacy is twenty acres of shitty scrubland and a trailer that's more rust than metal.
Home sweet fucking home.
And when I crest the hill and it comes in to view, it doesn’t welcome me back, just reminds me of why I left. The aluminum siding's peelin’ off in strips, like it’s a snake instead of a trailer. Shedding its own skin. The front steps sag worse than before, wooden boards warped from decades of weather. Weeds as tall as my knees crowd the walkway, and a tumbleweed has wedged itself between the propane tank and what’s left of the skirting. The mailbox tilts sideways, mouth hanging open like it gave up years ago. Nothing but spiders living there now.
Three years, and it's aged twenty.
Proof that time doesn’t heal all wounds.
Sometimes it just makes them uglier.
I stop ten feet from the steps, listening as the wind pushes through the tall grass. Metal creaks somewhere—roof or siding, hard to tell.
No human sounds.
"Mercy?"
Nothing. And in a place like this, silence is its own kind of scream.
The windows are intact, which surprises me. Expected them to be broken, or at least cracked. Destiny must have kept things together for longer than I thought.
I take a step toward the porch, and that's when I hear it—the soft metallic click of a BB gun being cocked.
I freeze. Not because I'm afraid of getting shot by a BB. But because I know exactly who's holding it.
"That you, Mercy?" I keep my voice easy, hands visible at my sides.
There’s a rustle from the overgrown juniper bush to my left and then, she emerges like some wild thing with tangled hair and a dirty face with eyes that burn with something between fury and fear.
My baby sister. Nine years old and pointing a Red Ryder at my chest like she means business.
Children shouldn't have to be their own army, but where we come from, we don’t get a choice.
She's thinner than she should be. Jeans torn at both knees, t-shirt faded to nothing. Her dark hair's a rat's nest, hanging past her shoulders. No one's been brushing it. No one's been taking care of anything.
But it's her blue, feral eyes that gut me. They are old, and watchful, and don’t belong on a nine-year-old. Some kids lose their childhood. Others have it stolen. Mercy had hers murdered.
"You plannin’ on shootin’ me, or you just sayin’ hello?"
She doesn't answer. Doesn't lower the gun either. Just stares at me with those eyes that mirror mine—Kane eyes, our mother called them. Too sharp for their own good.
"Where's Destiny?" I ask.
Nothing. Not even a blink. Which is fair, I guess. Trust isn't given freely when survival depends on keeping strangers at gunpoint.
"You been here alone?"
The BB gun wavers slightly. Her knuckles are white around the grip. I crouch down slow, getting to her eye level without coming closer. "I'm back now, Mercy. For good. You can put down the gun."
She shifts her weight, bare feet in the dirt. She thinks I’m a liar and there’s not much I can do about that thirty seconds in.
So I tell her, "You don't have to talk. But I'm stayin’."
The gun lowers an inch. Her expression gives nothin’ away. A perfect poker face.
It’s clear now, what three years inside cost. Not just me. Her. The price she paid for my loyalty to Badlands. That’s life, though. One way or the other, every choice we make writes itself on someone else's skin.
