Chapter 3
three
It’s finally happening.
The thought is halting and foggy. Dream-like in its surreality. Not to mention its implications.
I’m not going to make it.
I don’t know whether I should be elated or petrified. At the moment, my body isn’t giving me much of a choice beyond paralyzing malaise.
Shallow breaths whiz past my dry lips as I lie on the one dingy cot in my “apartment.”
That word was a clever trick my “father” employed about a year ago. Pretending I would have some sort of life here—promising he’d “seen the error of his ways”—pulling me out of my fourth “omega enhancement” facility… vowing he finally believed me when I swore I was a beta…
Before ripping it all away in the cruelest manner possible.
Drugging me. Locking me in here.
And then, you know. Forgetting about me.
I should probably worry more about why. He was so single-minded in his obsession, before. No matter how many times I proved my lack of an Omega, he believed she existed. After all, he’d chosen me—stolen me or made me or whatever he did—for one purpose.
No matter how many facilities told him that I was a regular beta and nothing more, the great Dr. Brynn couldn’t seem to accept that he’d been wrong.
So instead of throwing me away or setting me free, he stuck me here. To wait. To come check on me whenever he felt like it.
He used to show up every couple of months, bringing necessary supplies and sometimes even a bribe. A book, a new pencil, a flashlight.
He was so determined that I would still be useful, at some point. What changed? Why hasn’t he been here in four months?
Is he finally tired of prodding me? Has he moved on to Briar? Is he ill—or dead?
Is it sick that I hope it’s option three?
My mind can’t work through the possibilities, at the moment. By my count, it’s been almost two weeks since I ran out of food. And the water tap in my tiny bathroom unexpectedly shut off about six days ago. I had a single bottle of water that lasted thirty-six hours or so, but I’m…
Dying.
The word dances around the edges of my laggy mind. Too depressing and impossible to believe.
After everything I’ve survived, this is going to end me?
If the pains shooting through my limbs are any indication, I’d say yes. My stomach tweaks and screeches, a desperate creature gasping for its last breaths. Demanding something.
Anything.
I can barely twitch. My stiff joints jerk, balling me into a tighter fetal position.
I’m sure whoever finds my corpse will wonder why I was here. Locked in a converted attic with pencil scribbles all over the walls. Alone. Positioned in the middle of the room, with my bed tilted just so.
They probably won’t think to peer at the storm shutters drilled over the lone window—and likely won’t realize there’s a thin strip of light along the top. Just wide enough to allow a clear view of the sky when someone lies at exactly the right angle.
Huh. When did it get dark?
Have I counted my days wrong? Has it really been longer than six nights?
I’m not sure—and something about that one bit of honest confusion finally breaks me. I can’t recall the last time I cried, but my eyes try to well, now. There are no tears, of course. Just a dry, sticky sting and a painful tingle under the bridge of my freckled nose.
I attempt to lift my hand, but it barely stirs. Another hard shudder wracks my frame. Deep, visceral pain has me gritting my teeth. They chatter as a fresh spasm pulls my legs in tighter, huddling under the only blanket I have—the thigh-length sheet of limp blonde hair draped over my side.
God, it must be so dirty. But at least it gives me some kind of warmth. And reminds me of happier times.
Ordinarily, I do everything I can to avoid thinking about the people I lost—or, really, the people who lost me. But tonight is different.
I officially have nothing left to lose.
So I let my thoughts drift. To the young omegas who relied on me, the same way my sister once did. The ones I could protect, unlike her. All the little families I managed to make for them while they endured treatment no human being should have to survive.
And then, because it’s a special occasion, I open the box I normally keep locked—the one holding precious images of the only person who ever tried to give me shelter. Even though they failed.
My memories aren’t exactly happy, but they’re all I have. The knowledge that, no matter how dark and cruel and insane my world became, I never relinquished who I was. Or who I wanted to be.
I remembered how powerful kindness could be. I sacrificed myself to save the others. I gave them comfort and someone to hide behind.
I helped.
Those two words are the only bright strand in all my misery. They come with an odd sense of peace. As if maybe I will truly leave this Earth better than I found it. And for me, that’s enough.
My burning eyes blink away the sting of suffocating emotion. With great effort, I train my bleary focus on the attic’s one strip of sky.
It is, in fact, nighttime.
I’ve never been a fan of the dark. That’s the most ironic thing about this particular prison—it may be less stressful than the facilities I spent my late teens and early twenties in, but at least those places had lights. Here, after sunset, it’s just me and my obstructed window.
I stare at it, throat thickening. Deep loneliness scrapes the inside of my chest, sinking into my aching lungs.
At the moment, more than anything, I just wish I wasn’t alone. But I’ve felt that way for half my life, and it’s never mattered. It’s another cruel bit of irony—all those “doctors,” desperate for me to be an omega and reveal another being supposedly buried inside me?
I wanted what they wanted.
I wish I had an Omega to talk to. A friend to take everywhere. Someone on my side, through it all.
Yet, despite what all the experts and my father claimed, I didn’t withhold a secret Omega out of spite or strength.
She just isn’t here.
She never was.
Since the night they took me from Briar, I’ve faced everything alone. Like the fact that this is the end of me. And—of course—it’s going to happen as total darkness swells outside.
Except… are those lights?
No. There are never any lights outside this place.
Not even a glimmer. I suspect my “father” chose a long-abandoned building in a forgotten corner of this country province for that very reason.
Still, I’ve climbed onto my one folding chair to look out more times than I can count.
There aren’t streetlamps here. Or even stars, most nights.
But tonight must be different.
Because tonight? There are lights. Glowing groups of gold. Floating into view.
They’re too far away for me to see clearly. I only know I see them, and they are beautiful. Warm and gentle, drifting in uneven clusters.
What are they? Where did they come from? Usually, those questions would thrill me. These days, a small bit of mystery to kick around is all I can really ask for—a way to break up all my hours of solitude.
Except… those hours are dwindling.
No one came for me. No one saved me.
I twitch from the deeper, more painful sting in my eyes, shuffling into a tighter ball. My hair streams off the mattress, pooling on the scuffed floor.
There’s nothing I can do, so I fix my gaze on the distant points of light, letting their gleam fill my mind. Floating right along with them. Allowing the rest of this world—the small, broken life I’ve barely lived—to fall away.
Wishing, one last time, that I wasn’t all alone.
Which is when I suddenly hear a voice, soft and faraway. You did good, it whispers. But I’m here now.