Chapter 148

It’s five am, and I am walking while I ball a fist into my mouth to stifle a yawn, climbing the stairs to my room in a semi-dark house as most of the curtains are still drawn. Monique hasn’t started her day yet and won’t know I am even home. Elisa had school today, so I figured I would get out of her hair and come home to vegetate in my house while I figure out what I am meant to do about my mom and Bryan. My mom thinks I’m sick, so for now, the food runs will be on Monique, and I can hide until I know what to do.

I have barely slept and tossed and turned most of the night, so getting up this early was not exactly a hardship. I was already awake. Numb and exhausted, and when I did sleep, it was bizarrely messed up dreams about Dane being in the hospital instead of Bryan, and I kept jump-scaring myself awake in panic. Sweating and reaching for him like I was about to lose him.

Upstairs is eerily silent with zero lights or noise as my mom has been sleeping at the hospital. Dane