I wasn’t.
Finally, we turned off the main road and drove up a long gravel driveway lined with trees, and at the end of it stood the biggest house I’d ever seen. Gray stone. Tall windows. Too many chimneys and big gates. A man in uniform waved us through, and I saw his gun.
We passed under an archway built into a wall. Above it was a large stone cross the same as the one on the kitchen wall at home, except ours had a bleeding Jesus.
Dad parked near the steps. A woman in a black dress, hair covered in more material, stood at the top, waiting. A silver cross hung at her throat, and she didn’t smile as we headed toward her.
I saw three other children peering out of a window, watching the car.
There was also a man standing behind them.
He was tall. Broad across the shoulders. His head nearly brushed the top of the window frame. He didn’t react when I stared at him, simply watched with the same motionless attention the boys had.
Each boy wore a collar.
Not like the one the woman in black wore. Hers was white and soft against the black of her dress. These were different.
Thick bands around their throats.
Mom knelt, whispered church words, her eyes red. She mentioned God and the Devil, but I ignored most of it. Her mouth moved, her breath faltered, her tears smelling of salt. I watched the pulse at her throat, proof of life, steady and exposed. It would have been easy to make it stop.
I wondered if she’d scream like my brother.
“We can’t handle him,” Dad said, and Mom sobbed. “He’s not safe.”
The woman in black stared down at me and said, “We can fix him.” She said it as if she were promising to mend a cracked plate or one of Dad’s model planes laid out in pieces on the kitchen table. I pictured plastic parts, glue, and careful hands putting something back together.
I wasn’t broken into parts.
I don’t get it.
“…every month, and contracts signed…”
Dad was talking, and I tuned back in as he handed her an envelope. Then I stood on the steps with my blue suitcase beside me, watching them drive away under the cross.
They didn’t look back.
My hand lifted a few inches, automatically, the way Mom said I should when Dad left for work.
The lady in black crouched in front of me.
“I’m Sister Mary Agnes,” she said, staring down at me as if I were a bug she had under a glass. “And you’re a silver-eyed devil.”
I tilted my head. “I’m not.”
Her hand clutched at me. She opened the front door and dragged me past the big man, who seemed even larger up close. He grabbed my neck and forced me to the floor. His weight pinned my shoulders before I could react. My cheek struck the cold tile. His knee pressed into my back, forcing the air out of my lungs.
A collar snapped closed with a hard metallicclick. The sound reverberated through my jaw, sharp enough that it felt like it echoed inside my teeth. For a second, the band’s pressure made it hard to swallow.
Then the pain started.
It punched through my neck and along my back. Every muscle locked at once. I scrabbled at the stone floor, searching for leverage. Vision pulsed at the edges. My tongue was too big for my mouth—thick, useless. My body seized. I tried to breathe and failed.
The man hauled me upright by the collar, and the burning faded slowly, leaving my heart beating fast and my limbs shaking, and I gasped for air.
He dragged me forward and forced me onto my knees in front of the other boys.
Sister Mary Agnes flicked something that hung from the collar, and it made a metallic noise. “This is Francis,” she announced.
