Chapter 16
Scarletta
I'm six years old and Daddy is building me a kingdom made of cotton flannel, and polyester blend, and rayon puffer sleeping bags—the softest materials in the whole house, all gathered up and draped like royal tapestries.
The walls of the kingdom are chair backs standing sentinel, cushions stacked like fortress stones, and broom handles propped at careful angles to hold everything together.
There's a moat—because every princess castle has a moat to keep the Dereks away.
The blanket fort stretches across the entire living room, swallowing up the coffee table and the ottoman and half the couch. The fabric glows amber from the flashlight he tucked inside somewhere, the beam diffused through layers of sheets and quilts, turning everything soft and golden and safe.
It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.
"This one goes here, Lettie-bug," he says, his voice distant and warm. His hands are huge, pinning the corner of Mom's good bedsheet to the bookshelf with a stack of encyclopedias.
I'm holding the other corner, standing on tiptoes, trying to reach.
Everything moves slow. Like underwater.
The sheet ripples and sways even though there's no breeze. Dad's face blurs at the edges when I try to look at him directly. But I know he's smiling. I can feel it.
"Will it be strong enough?" My voice sounds small. Far away.
"Strong enough for what, baby girl?"
"To keep the monsters out."
He laughs. The sound echoes and multiplies, bouncing around the dream-memory until there are a hundred versions of his laugh surrounding me.
"Ain't no monsters getting through this fort," he promises, crawling inside on his hands and knees. "Come on. Let me show you."
I follow him in.
The space inside is bigger than it should be. Impossibly big. The sheets stretch up and up like a cathedral ceiling, and the flashlight beam doesn't have a source anymore—it's just everywhere, golden and safe.
Daddy pulls me into his lap. He smells like coffee and Old Spice. "See?" He wraps his arms around me. "Nothing can hurt you in here. This is yours. Your space. Your world."
I lean back against his chest. His heartbeat is slow. Thump... thump... thump...
But it's not true.
Things can hurt you everywhere.
The world is filled with Dereks who slither under the water looking for cracks in your cushion foundation.
I'm going to tell my dad this. As a grown up now, not as a child, but when I look over my shoulder, he's gone.
I'm alone.
Like always.
And the moment this thought hits, the blankets start dissolving. Becoming transparent.
Wake up.
The thought cuts through the dream like a blade.
Wake up, wake up, WAKE UP—
The world comes back in pieces.
Sound first. A faint humming that feels familiar but I can't place it.
Then weight. My body pressed into something soft. A bed. My bed. I feel like I was in a car accident. My whole body is sore.
I want to look around and see where I am, but my eyes won't open. Way too heavy and crusted with bits of sleep that act like glue.
Move. Come on. Move.
The voice in my head sound panicky. Like something is happening in the present—
Oh, shit!
Oh, shit, oh shit, oh shit!
Something is happening in the present—I'm being drugged!
I force my eyes to open—the crusty bits pulling on the sensitive skin of my lashes until finally, the tension breaks and… light. Too much light.
I turn my head away, blinking against the brightness, and wait for my vision to clear. A ceiling. Specifically, my ceiling. I'd recognize it anywhere. Ugly popcorn. Cobwebs. That little water stain in the corner that looks like an eyeball.
I'm home.
What—
I push myself up on my elbows. My head swims, vision tilting sideways before it corrects itself. My mouth is dry. My body feels... wrong. Like I've been asleep for days.
How did I get here?
I look down at myself.
Clothes, not naked. The sage green ribbed leggings I love to death, but haven't seen in months because they got swallowed by a dirty laundry pile.
The soft sweatshirt—my favorite. The one with the embroidered flowers on the front that's been in the corner of my bathroom because I was too lazy to pick it up and wash it.
I'm wearing them.
But they're clean.
I didn't do laundry. I haven't done laundry in—
Something glitters in my peripheral vision.
I turn my head too fast. The room spins again.
There's a Christmas tree.
A small one on the little table in front of the window that used to have seven dead potted plants on it the last time I was here. It's about three feet tall. Real pine. The scent is… amazing.
It's decorated. Handmade felt ornaments hang from every branch. It's a garden theme. This year's theme. I do a Pinterest board every year called "Perfect Christmas Vibes" and fill it with the most dreamy Christmas decorations I can find on Etsy.
This year's them is Spring Garden Christmas.
I know these ornaments.
The little brown mole with an armful of pink and yellow tulips clutched in his tiny felt paws. The Rabbit family wearing pastel waistcoats in mint green and lavender, each one clutching hand-stitched carrots with delicate embroidered tops.
A cheerful yellow rain boot overflowing with more tulips, their petals individually cut and layered.
There's a beekeeper in a tiny white suit with a miniature honey jar, and a garden Santa with a watering can instead of a sack, and a flower angel with wings made of layered petals and a daisy halo.
And felt ball flower garlands in soft pinks, creams, and yellows drape around the edges of the tree like a dreamy, whimsical daisy chain.
Each ornament is impossibly detailed. Hand-stitched.
They're also impossibly expensive. Handmade by a shop in Vermont called SuzieStiches.
I know this because I've been looking at these ornaments since July.
Sometime around mid-summer, when the heat made everything feel unbearable and I needed to escape into something soft and magical, I started my annual Christmas Pinterest board.
Every couple of weeks since then, I'd find myself scrolling through SuzieStiches' shop at two in the morning, adding these exact ornaments to my cart one by one.
The mole. The rabbit family. The rain boot. The beekeeper. All of them.
Then I'd stare at the total—sometimes seven hundred dollars, sometimes nine hundred if I really went wild—and feel my stomach twist with something between longing and shame.
I'd leave them sitting in my cart for days, reopening the tab just to look at them, imagining how they'd look on a real tree in a real home where someone like me actually belonged.
Then I'd delete them. Every time.
I've lived the past four Christmases vicariously through my Pinterest board, curating perfect holidays I'll never have, saving images of homes that will never be mine.
But here they are.
Every single one of them.
On a tree.
A real tree, with real pine scent filling my apartment.
My apartment.
This isn't real. This isn't—
I swing my legs off the bed, then look back at it.
I was sleeping in it.
For a minute, I'm grossed out because those sheets have not been changed since… I can't even admit that in my own private thoughts.
Too long, let's just say.
But they're not the same sheets. They're flannel, and yellow, and I don't own yellow flannel sheets.
I stand. Too fast. My knees buckle and I catch myself on the edge of the mattress, breathing hard.
That's when I notice something else.
My apartment is clean.
Not clean like I picked up a little. Clean like someone came in and sorted through every single thing I own.
My books are stacked neatly on the shelf instead of scattered across the floor. The empty ramen cups are gone. The pile of laundry that's been sitting in the corner for three weeks—gone. It even smells good.
My apartment hasn't been clean since… well… ever.
It's just… not a priority when you're depressed.
This is when I notice my blanket fort is gone.
Gone, as in.. been replaced.
It's a glamping tent now.
An actual miniature glamping tent. The kind you'd buy for a kid. Canvas walls printed with moons and stars. A peaked roof. An arched doorway with a rolled-back flap. Fairy lights string across the top, glowing soft white.
I take a step toward it. Then another.
My hand touches the fabric. It's real.
I crouch down and look inside.
The space is bigger than it should be. A child-sized tent but with room to sit up, move around. The floor is covered with a plush rug—white, furry, soft and thick enough to sink into.
In the center sits a wooden crate. Small. Perfectly sized to be a table.
My laptop is open on top of it.
The screen glows.
I crawl inside. The fairy lights cast everything in gentle shadows. It feels safe. Warm.
This is wrong.
I kneel in front of the laptop. The document is still open. The same scene I was writing before—
Before.
Before what?
My hands start shaking.
Think. Think.
The eviction notice. The auction. The helicopter.
The man in the mask.
The exam table.
His cock inside me. His fingers. The wand vibrator. Coming so hard I—
I blacked out.
And then I woke up and ran.
He chased me through the snow.
The syringe.
He drugged me.
I press my hands against my face. My skin is warm. Real.
He drugged me and brought me back here.
I crawl back out of the tent, stumbling to my feet.
My phone. Where's my phone?
I scan the room, pulse hammering.
There. On the kitchen counter.
I lunge for it, grab it, press the home button.
Unlocked. Fully charged.
The date stares back at me.
December 25th. 12:04 PM.
I sink onto the edge of a dining room chair that's actually by the table where it should be, instead of supporting my blanket fort.
He drugged me.
That's when I see what else is on the counter.
A plate of cookies.
Sugar cookies. The kind shaped like snowmen and Christmas trees. Frosted. White icing with red and green sprinkles.
One has a bite missing. A perfect half-moon carved out of the snowman's head.
Santa was here.