Page 83 of Slayer

Cast aside by the woman who bore me,

I learned safety in your arms.

The world hunts me, but you are my shield.

Where my childhood fractured me, you made me whole again.

I would follow you into a vampire den, even if it meant my own destruction.

Molly

The last line made my chest ache. It was tragic in hindsight considering he’d been turned. I set the album down and opened the third.

A gasp tore from my throat as Harper and Luna rushed to my side.

“What’s wrong?” they asked.

Harper leaned over my shoulder.

The photo showed my mother, sweaty and pale, tears streaking her face, smiling through exhaustion as she held a newborn.

Me.

I glanced over my shoulder at the small bed in the corner of the room. The pale pink bedspread and chipped paint over steel behind the bed were in the photo.

“Holy crap, you were born in this storage unit?” Luna placed a hand on my shoulder.

Harper frowned. “Why? Why wouldn’t she have gone to my mom? Were they fighting?”

I didn’t know, but the fact that my mother labored and birthed me alone in a storage unit in Veil Haven made me feel sad and a little sick. I flipped a few more pages to find they were blank.

“I think I’ve had enough for one visit.” I closed the photo album and tucked it under my arm along with the one of my mom’s fiancé in case I wanted to look at it again later.

“Yep. Let’s roll,” Harper agreed, turning off the light and grabbing the album I’d given her to give to her mom.

The car ride back to campus was awkwardly quiet.

“You guys freaked out that my mom had me in a storage unit?” I asked nervously, preparing my heart for the end of their friendship. Everyone always left when things got hard. That was my experience anyway.

Harper pulled into a spot near our dorm and faced me as Luna reached out from the back seat and grasped my shoulders.

“No way,” Harper said.

“I feel bad for you and for your mom. She must have felt scared and alone,” Luna told me while she squeezed my shoulders.

I nodded, feeling my throat tighten with emotion. “I mean, it’s weird, so it’s okay if you guys think I’m like…I dunno, a liability.” I didn’t even know what I was saying but I wanted to give them an out of the friendship if they were freaked out.

Harper scoffed. “Stop it, Stella. You can’t get rid of us.”

“Nope.” Luna popped the P in my ear from behind. “Especially not after you gave me this vintage corset.”

“Vintage is from 2001?” Harper laughed.

“Yeah, obvi. That’s, like, hella old,” Luna agreed.

“Oh, my mom is going to hate that you said that.” Harper moved to pull out her phone, and Luna snatched it from her hand.

“Don’t tell her I said that. She’ll think that I think she’s old!”