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Crosby came to find me. And find me he always did.
I didn’t know he went to a mental institution. I didn’t know I would end up at the same one years later.
It was nice for a few months, until I got the text again. And then my life became hell.
Crosby became my roommate. It was odd. At the sanctum, he never reverted back to Perry. He remained Crosby. Hateful and angry.
The old rumors about the missing people were suspicious to me. Lanston had that odd Clue game. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was… peculiar that they went missing at the same time Crosby was at this institution.
I collected articles about them, hoping they would turn up somewhere someday, but they never did. Jericho left his keys on the front desk one evening and I happened to notice during my nightly walk. The guard was doing his rounds and I was completely alone.
I opened the filing cabinet and searched for my brother’s name. It wasn’t until I came across it that I realized I’d forgotten his real one. Perry Waters. He was here. And in my heart, I knew he’d done something to them.
Maybe that’s why he decided to wrap things up with me that night.
“Deeper,” he hissed at me.
I shoved the knife deeper into my ribs and jerked the blade so it’d cut. My hands were trembling and the blood made the handle slick. Crosby pushed it further since I was incapable.
I thought it might be the last of my punishment. It hurt more than the rest ever had.
Then Lanston found us. Oh God, I felt my soul shatter when he did.
Crosby fled. I went to the hospital. I didn’t die. My punishment would continue.
But then I saw her.
And for some reason, I thought maybe I didn’t need to be punished anymore.
My cure.
33
Liam
Lanston’s eyeswiden with horror.
The way he looks at me has shifted. The monster is my brother, my flesh. Born of the same damned mother and heartless father.
“But… he—” Lanston’s eyes brim with tears as he glances down to my side where Crosby made me cut myself so deeply, helped push the blade in.
That night was hell and the limit I found to my punishment. I’ve never bled so generously in one sitting, bathed in my own blood and felt that deep cold in my bones.
“He’s sick. I’m sick too,” I admit with clenched fists.
Crosby’s words echo in my mind.“You need to be punished, Liam. You survived so that you could be punished for Neil’s death.”
Lanston’s grip tightens around my wrist and he pulls me in for a hug.
I’m shocked for a second before I smile weakly and embrace him the same.
“You’ve been suffering for long enough. You’re my best friend, Liam.My brother.We need to get away from this place, find somewhere he can’t find you again. You, me, and Wynn. The three of us can make it.”
I hesitate.
A vision of the three of us, happy, walking the streets of Boston like him and Wynn talk so much about draws a painful smile to my lips. We look so relieved and… fixed. Wynn’s pink hair is curled and her wrists are covered with fresh tattoos, quotes from books she loves. Lanston’s too, with dragons and skulls. I look happy. Weightless. We walk beneath the spring foliage and warmth spreads to the darkest chambers of my heart.
But we can’t run from Crosby.
