27. West
Flashback
Age 16
G rowing up, I never knew what true love was. Sometimes, it feels like Grandma loves me unconditionally, despite the fact that I was the one who took her daughter away. But her love is a strange kind—mechanical, the only way she knows how to express it. We are close, but it doesn’t feel complete.
I catch glimpses of love whenever I watch Dad with my sister. The way he softens his voice for her, how he calms her when she cries over nothing—all of it reveals something I’m not a part of and never will be.
But this, too, is a twisted kind of love—rooted in guilt and obsession. Chloe, a mirror image of our mother, is a constant reminder for him. And though I carry as much of our mother’s DNA, it’s Chloe, angelic like Mom, who embodies her spirit. Dad has managed to crush anything soft in me, molding me into the opposite of what she is.
She is light, and I am a shadow.
These aren’t the kinds of love I want to give. I want something deeper, something more powerful—the kind of love people dream of in movies. I want to care for someone, to give them my whole attention and time, to let them consume me just as I’ll consume them.
I want to lose myself in that feeling—a feeling so dangerous and forbidden to me that just thinking about it feels intoxicating. I hadn’t thought of anything like this until I went on a date with Amelia. At first, I thought she was joking, setting me up for some embarrassment like everyone else loved to do.
But she wasn’t.
The date was awkward, and I couldn’t stop looking down, my feet picking at stones as if they held the answers. My face felt like it was on fire, growing redder with every passing second. Guys my age already have girlfriends and go on dates like it’s nothing, and here I was, barely able to make eye contact with a girl.
Amelia was patient with me, surprisingly so. She laughed at all my silly jokes and answered every question I asked, no matter how random or ridiculous I sounded.
I can feel myself falling for her. I know it’s too soon to say, but this feeling is too powerful to deny.
I snuck some cash from Dad’s wallet, enough to get myself headphones and buy her a necklace. The silver heart might be cliché, but it’s perfect. Its tiny blue stones remind me of her eyes, and the shape mirrors the little mole on her cheek that’s almost too faint to see.
I hope she’ll love it. She’s the kind of girl who deserves the very best, even in small gestures like this. The need to give her everything she deserves surged up suddenly, and now it’s taking over, unstoppable. It pulses through me like something electric and addictive.
If this isn’t love, then what is?
I want so much to ask her out again, but I’m afraid she’ll misunderstand, that she’ll think I want something else. In truth, all I want is to hear her laugh, see her smile, and watch her heart-shaped mole crinkle when she does. Just a movie, lying under the sky, and her hand in mine.
Every day, I find myself thinking of new ideas for our dates and new ways to make her happier. We text a lot, and although I don’t push to see her, I’ve found a way to keep the connection alive. Using a bit of hacking knowledge my dad taught me—he always said it would come in handy—I managed to access her social media profiles. I know it’s wrong to invade her privacy, but I haven’t read her messages or checked anything too personal. I just looked through the basics, like her favorite movies, colors, and things like that.
When we’re together, my mind goes blank, and I forget to ask her everything I had planned. But now, with my notes, I’ll remember exactly what I want to ask her. I can start conversations about her interests, surprising her with how much we have in common.
I feel myself coming alive.
Maybe—just maybe—my life is finally getting better.
The tip of the blade glimmers under the dim light of the basement. Dad places the knife in my palm as I look at the man sitting before us. He’s still alive—his breathing slow but steady—and I can sense the excruciating pain coursing through him. The rasp of his breath, the faint rattle of his bones, the flutter of his eyelids as his body fights to stay awake. It all feels so vivid, almost painfully real in this space. Every time I return here, it’s like I turn into some kind of fucking superhuman, every sense painfully sharpened.
“Finish him,” Dad commands, wiping the sweat from his forehead with a towel he grabbed from a nearby chair. I take a step toward the man who was foolish enough to cross my father.
“Please,” he begs, spitting out more blood as he tries to speak. “Don’t kill me.”
If I refuse, Dad will beat me up again. Each time I hesitate to finish the job, he grumbles at me to man up before starting to smash my face and body until I can barely move. With each fight, breathing becomes more difficult, and I dread the thought of experiencing that pain again.
It’s either me or them. I don’t even know who they are—though it hardly matters. If they’re here, they’ve fucked up, and my dad takes out all his anger on them.
I come closer to him, my hand steady as it drives the blade into his jugular. Blood bursts from the wound, droplets splattering across my face, but I don’t flinch. I don’t react.
It’s me or him. Me or him.
The words keep repeating in my mind, over and over, as the man desperately fights for his life. Finally, I pull the blade out and step back.
“I know about Amelia.”
Shock floods my system, erasing the blank expression I’ve grown used to putting on in this place. As Dad approaches, I turn to him, and he nods toward the corpse.
“You really think she’ll want you when she finds out what you are?”
Dread rushes through me, its heat locking me in place. I lick my lips, attempting to respond, but my mind has gone silent, leaving only a hollow feeling behind. There’s no point in denying or justifying myself. If I say anything he doesn’t like—and that happens most of the time—he’ll just beat me up again.
So I swallow my emotions and stay silent.
“I’ve been recording every single session, son,” he says, his hand slapping against my shoulder. I grit my teeth, fighting the instinct to flinch under the pressure—his touch sending disgust seeping through my shirt. “It’s straightforward. If you don’t stop seeing her, I’ll show her.”
He pauses, his dark eyes burning with malice as they lock onto mine, while I scream silently inside, my emotions desperate to break free. I can’t find the words for how much I hate this man—every inch of him, from the lashes on his eyes to the tips of his toes. I hate the way he narrows his gaze before forcing me to do what I don’t want to, the words that slip from his cracked lips, his voice, his face—fucking everything. Not a single day passes when I don’t wake up thinking of how desperately I want him to disappear.
I just want him fucking gone.
“I’ll show her what you really are.”
I blink at him in disbelief, watching as a sadistic smile spreads across his face. He nods to himself, and when his hand finally lifts from my shoulder, I can’t help but stifle a breath of relief.
“You know you’ll only break her apart,” he says. “This… relationship won’t do either of you any good. I can see how you’re turning into a weak fucking rag, always,” his hand sweeps through the air, emphasizing his frustration, while an angry scowl twists his features, “running those pathetic eyes everywhere as if you’re floating in space instead of doing your job.”
“Okay. I’ll stop,” I lie. I can’t stop seeing Amelia because I can’t bury my feelings for her. They’re too powerful. It’s too late for that now.
But I will be more careful. I can’t let anything harm her or put her in danger. I just need a better plan to keep her safe, to keep her mine.
As Dad turns and walks off, he leaves behind an eerie silence. He has this uncanny ability to drain the air from the room, making it feel emptier whenever he’s around.
His boots scrape against the floor as he pauses at the doorframe. “A person like you can’t love, West, nor do you deserve to be loved. Remember that.”
Then, he leaves, shutting the door behind him and leaving me to deal with the mess, just like he always does.