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Chapter One
Present
Funerals aren’t for the dead. They’re for the living.
Think about it. Why would the dead care what color their casket is or how many people showed up to see them off?
They wouldn’t––because they’re dead. They can’t care about anything.
Funerals were merely social gatherings, just like church was a place to be morally judged and condemned. The people around me were unknowingly proving my point.
I was positive the woman three rows back––the one in a tight red dress––thought she was going to a nightclub instead of a cemetery. People were whispering amongst themselves as the reverend spoke. A few were even playing on their phones.
My closest friends––my only friends––sat in the row behind me–Italian heiress Melody Belluci, and the brilliant hacker/software genius Peyton Ross. They were only people in the entire cemetery who knew what was happening.
I kept my gaze trained straight ahead on the two identical cream caskets sitting side by side. One contained someone irreplaceable and dear to my heart.
The other was a painful illusion, nothing but an empty vessel because there
was no body to go inside.
The ache in my chest had me physically and mentally worn down, but I kept it together. Being strong was the last thing I wanted to do––which made it my only option, if not for myself, then for my family.
Though I was beginning to wonder what the point was.
The blatant disrespect openly displayed was a harsh reminder that the Rias family wasn’t the powerhouse it once was. My parents’ would be disgusted themselves if they were alive to see this.
This wasn’t what my father worked his ass off to achieve. This wasn’t what he and my mother died for.
It didn’t take long for the ordeal to be over. I’d say it only lasted twenty-minutes tops, but I couldn’t be entirely sure because I’d zoned out thinking of all the things I still had to do.
There were no passionate speeches, lying of roses, or last-minute sobs of despair it was just over and done with.
My aunt was forgotten before the first mound of dirt hit the lid of her casket. The dead stayed dead ten feet under, and the world continued to turn without sparing them a moment’s solace.
It was proof enough that the statement every life matters––held no bearing to the truth. All lives are meaningless.
I uncrossed one sticky leg from the other and swiftly stood up, smoothing down my black asymmetrical dress. It was so hot there was sweat gathering between my breasts.
My uncle, Samuel, stood with me, leaning down to ask, “How are you holding up?”
I hated that question. Were people ever really expected to answer only good, fine, or okay? Giving him a tight smile to appease the nosey masses, I responded quietly–“Peachy.”
He picked up on my sarcasm with a hint of irritation written on his face. I didn’t care.
Molly may not have been my aunt by blood, but she was still family. We butted heads constantly, but she didn’t deserve the cruel death bestowed upon her. And my sister should have been here beside me instead of god knows where.
Her little Honda Civic was found just outside of town, totaled––a mass of twisted metal at the bottom of a deep ravine. There was no sign of her anywhere.
The whole situation boiled my blood. It took everything inside me not to scream until I was hallow. This killed a part of me I wasn’t even aware I was at risk of losing.
I wanted to lash out at everyone around me. It was my sister who was the sweet and loving one, which shocked the hell out of people.
I got my mama’s wicked tongue, my papa’s volatile temper, and looked as sweet as an angel. Appearances were always deceiving.
These people made me want to embark on a psychopathic rampage. It was the fucked up clandestine world that they lived in that continued to take everyone I loved away from me.
Up until this point, I’d been holding onto the naïve belief that the world still had kindness left in it. What a way for the universe to prove me wrong.
