AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“A woman!” I sound shocked, which makes me laugh harder. “A woman and a bird. Who gave me the right to keep a pet? Who gave me the right to kidnap a woman and then—” I won’t sayfall for her.I’m not even going to think it. “—have any feelings at all about her? Who said I could have feelings? This is miserable.”
I wish Snowball was out here to answer, but he’s living his best bird life and isn’t awake in the middle of the night with a jackass criminal like me. The waves don’t seem to have a real opinion either way. They splash on the shore in gentle nighttime swishes.
“I hate this,” I admit to the lake. “I hate all of this. I wish I could stop, and I’m never going to stop. Look how far this has gone. Jesus. Lily could’ve had a nice life. She didn’t need to know that her grandfather is Satan. She never had to know what he did to us. She—”
It’s a clear night. We’re not far enough from the city to have country stars, but we’re far enough to see some constellations.
“What a goddamn joke. I don’t deserve constellations.” I bark more painful laughter, which the lake picks up and tosses back at me. “I’m the one who should be in a cage. Snowball should be overseas, flying around as a free bird, and I should be in a cage.”
Jameson.
I whip around, looking for the source of the voice, but nobody’s there.
Of course there isn’t. This isn’t a nightmare. I’m awake. This is the hell that is my life.
“She hugged me like I wasn’t a crime scene,” I say to the empty backyard. “That’s what I am. I’m even worse now, because of what I’ve done to her. This is the unforgivable thing. This makes me ineligible for society. I’m never coming back from this.”
You have to go back.
It’s not Remy’s voice, or Gabriel’s, or Mason’s. It’s not Lily’s, but it does sound like an angel.
“I can’t. They don’t want this.”
They love you.
“You don’t know who I’m talking about.”
The voice laughs. She laughs, and it crashes into my chest like a fist, like a car, like a boulder.
Do you think I don’t know my children?
“I’m losing it. I’ve lost it.”
You’re hurt. You haven’t lost it.
“Mom. I can hear you.”
I can be quiet, if you want.
“No.” I reach out to stop her. From what? She’s not here. She’s never going to be here. Hearing her voice so clearly only means that I’ve pushed myself too far. I’ve gone too long without sleep, then slept too long, and my brain is all fucked up. “Please. Don’t go away yet.”
I’m right here, Jamie.
“Oh, God.” Nobody’s called me that since she died. “I won’t let them call me that. It feels like being stabbed.”
Your brothers and sister?
“Yeah.”
Does it make you feel good?
“Ha.” It’s on that fake, sad laugh that I become aware of the crying. I don’t know when it started, and I don’t give a fuck. The tears are hot streaks on my face. My eyes ache. “Nothing makes me feel good.”
Lily does.
“No, she makes me—she makes me feel like a criminal, which I am.”
An unjust law is no law at all.
