I’m going to die.

This is it.

I’m going to die with blood on my hands. I’m a killer now, for real this time. There is no Lily with me, no force of will. I pulled the trigger. Killed Bella. And now I’m going to burn to death.

I feel a hand touch my arm and the last thing I think is: Well at least I’m not going to die alone. I have Lily hear with me.

* * *

When I open my eyes again, I’m lying out on the front lawn and my mother is with me, along with River. I pass right back out though and I come in and out of conscience for the next couple of days. When I finally do wake up, I’m in the hospital, my arms wrapped in bandages from the fire. There’s a brief moment where I think everything that has happened was a dream and that I’m just ten year old Maddie, lying in a hospital bed, saved after days of her father kidnapping her and her sister and ruining them, but then my mother walks in and I can see in her eyes that it’s not the case.

“How are you feeling?” she asks tentatively and she looks like she’s aged ten years overnight.

“Okay, I guess,” I tell her, listening to the monitors beep, my heartbeat so consistent, so steady, so strange considering the circumstances.

“Can you… remember what happened?” she asks, taking a seat in a chair that’s beside my bed.

I shrug, fiddling with the clamp that’s on my finger. “Vaguely.” Actually, at this point I can remember almost everything.

“Oh Maddie.” She takes my hand and her skin feels so cold… or maybe it’s mine. “I’m so sorry you had to go through that. I didn’t even know Bella had gotten out of jail, or I would have tried to protect you more.”

“You could have just told me the truth,” I tell her coldly. “Then I could have at least protected myself better.” I try to sit up, but I’m too weak. I loathe the feeling and can’t wait until I get better. “And you should have told me that Lily was still alive. That would have been nice… did the police find her?”

Her face drains of color, her hand tightening on mine. “Sweetie, your sister died in the fire with your father…” Tears well in her eyes. “I’m so sorry I never said anything to you about it... I’m so sorry I lied to you, but I just wanted to help you.”

“But you said she was bad,” I say, searching her eyes for the truth. The truth? The truth doesn’t exist. “You talked about her like she had been around afterward and was bad.”

“No, I was referring to the before… even before you guys were taken… she still had problems… I think your father was doing stuff to her, even then… And when you came back, you were so much like her… rebelling… violent… cold…”

Maybe that’s because you’re her.

“But it all changed after the accident. You were you. And I thought…. Well, I just hoped, I guess that things would be different.” She starts to cry, her head falling forward as she mutters, “I’m going to make sure we get you some help—I won’t let this ruin you even more. You’ve had such a traumatic life.”

What she’s saying about Lily, it’s not sitting well, emotions stirring inside me almost violently—I have to ask. “The fire at the cabin… the one that my father and Lily and… Evan died in… did they find all there bodies?”

My mother nods, grabbing a Kleenex from a box by my bedside and dabbing her eyes. “There were three… bodies…” Tears pool her eyes again and she’s about to lose it.

I, however, am calm as a revelation sinks into me. I feel myself changing into someone else, someone I’ve been before.

After my mother stops crying, she gets up and places a kiss my cheek. “I have some paperwork to fill out, but I’ll come back and check on you in a little bit.”

As she walks out of the room, shutting the door behind her, I reflect on what happened. Even if I wasn’t a killer before, I am now. I killed Bella. Pulled the trigger. Blood is now on my hands and maybe the stench of gasoline too. The thoughts that haunted me have become real—Lily is real—and for some reason I don’t feel frightened about it.

I listen to my heart beating on the monitor, the sound not quite matching the rhythm in my chest. It’s steady, less afraid, carries more strength, as if I’m someone else now.

Epilogue

Two months later…


“Maddie, you have a visitor.”

My hand gives a jerk and I glance up from my notebook that’s drenched with my thoughts. There’s a nurse in front of me, a warm smile on her face as if she’s looking at a child. I nod, put the pencil down, and close my notebook filled with ramblings that I can never remember writing, but that might be because they’re her thoughts. Then I wait for my visitor with my arms crossed on the table, poised as can be—in control. Moments later, he enters the large but seeming small room because it’s full of tables and chairs. It also has this sterilized scent in the air, as if someone is constantly scrubbing the floors and walls with cleaning products. But it’s definitely better than the place I was before. Much, much, better. And no one’s trying to get me to go away.

A smile almost touches my lips as River enters through the door on the far side. He’s wearing a plaid shirt, faded jeans, and his glasses, stands of his hair dangling in his eyes. He looks good, healthy, smiling, yet there’s a hint of uneasiness in him, probably because of where we are.

“How are you doing?” he asks me as he pulls out the chair across from mine and takes a seat. He glances around room, at the patients, nurses, and other visitors. If only they knew.

“Good,” I say, my smile broadening. He’s been visiting me off and on since I came here two months ago and I still haven’t figured out if it’s because he wants to or because he finds me fascinating, but I’ll take either one just as long as he’s clueless about what’s going on.

He’s nervous, fidgeting with the sleeves of his shirt. “Your mother said you were doing better.”

I nod. “I am… and I feel a lot better. Not so much clutter in my head, which is always a good thing… makes it easier to see things for what they are.”

“That’s good,” he says and then wavers. “So I have some good news.”

I rest back in the chair. “Oh yeah. And what’s that?”

“The cops are saying that Bella is the one that killed all those people… that she was trying to set you up.”

“I still wonder how she managed to do it—how she managed to trick me so much.” The idea still nags at me ever day, that she played me like a fool.

“Well, I think she was having help drugging you.” He swallows hard. “Leon was helping her at one point, then she killed the poor bastard when she was done with him. I guess they were friends since high school and were into some heavy shit, even back then.”

That wasn’t what she told me, but then again, everything she said was a lie. In a way, I envy her flawless ability to weave lies—maybe one day I’ll get there too.

River continues, “The police have a lot of proof against Bella, so they’ll probably be closing the case.”

“Just like that?” I ask “They’re just going to close it?”

“Well, there’s not much more they can do since she’s…” He looks at me worriedly, like I’m fragile glass about to break. God, if he knew, how unbreakable I am.

“Dead,” I say for him. “You can say it, River. It’s what I’ve been working on here. Talking about what happened… and accepting it without turning to… well, her.”

He nods, thinking he knows exactly what I’m talking about. “So that’s good then, right? It means you can get out of this place soon?” He shudders as he glances around the room. “This place is so… unsettling.”

“It could be worse,” I say, but I can almost taste my freedom. So close. “But yeah, hopefully within the next few weeks or so I’ll be able to leave.”

“Good.” He pauses, considering something, then reaches across the table and grazes his finger along one of the pinkish white scars on my arm, one of the leftover wound from the fire. “I’m glad you’re getting rid of… her.”

I want to ask him if he’s sure about that, but I don’t. I learned Lily is a touchy subject for him when I asked him if he remembered her being at the house that day, just to see what he knew about what happened. He’s immediately tensed and then said something along the lines of, “I saw that she was close to you that day, but I don’t think she was controlling you completely.”

How wrong he was and is.

I decide to keep my lips sealed, not wanting to make it so I stay in here any longer, and sit back and listen as he starts chatting lightly about other stuff, like school and work. I study him the whole time, wondering why he doesn’t fear me after everything that happened. How can he not fear the madness within me and it makes me wonder if maybe, somewhere down the road, he and I can perhaps be together. He does have some potential.

I hardly say anything during the rest of the visit and then give him a hug before he leaves. When he pulls back he gives me a quick kiss on the cheek, then on the lips, surprising me. “When you get out, you can always stay with me until you find a place,” he says, brushing a strand of black hair out of my eyes and tucking it behind my ear.

“That sounds nice,” I tell him and then kiss him again, leaving him a little stunned but dazedly happy and I can’t help but think about how much fun this could be. He and I when he’s like this.

After he’s gone, I go back to my room, a small space with a single bed and a dresser, but it’s better than any of the other places I was locked up. After I shut the door behind me, I glance inside my notebook, seeing what she wrote today. The pages are filled up with I’m not a killer, over and over again.

I chuckle at her attempts, then put the notebook and pencil away and go up to the mirror on the wall. I stare at my reflection; short black hair, unfamiliar eyes, the strangeness of my smile. I wish I could change my looks, but I can’t, at least right now.

“Please stop doing this,” my reflection says to me. “Please, this isn’t right—they’re going to find out I’m not me.”

“You really think so,” I say, smoothing my hands over my hair. “Personally, I think I do a good job being you.” I pause as Maddie shouts at me, banging her hands on the mirror, wanting to get control of her body again. “I don’t know why you’re so upset,” I say as she breathes fiercely. “I killed to save you—everything I did was to save you. And besides, I’ve been trapped in there long enough. It’s time for me to come out again, like before.”

“You’ll do it again.” She starts to cry. “I can feel it… how much you want to hurt people… now that you have control.”

I shrug. “I’m not sure yet what I’ll do, but just remember, the people I hurt, always hurt us first.”

“Lily!” she screams, trying to claw her way to the surface and take control of her body, I step away and block her out, knowing that if I let it go on for too long, she’ll get control of me again and then I’ll be stuck inside her.

And I’m not going to lose control again.

Ever again.