Scarlett & Ethan

Hospital

I open my eyes in the hospital yet again. I'm not complaining in any shape or form. Seeming fragile is a huge part of the plot, and being this fragile is getting on my nerves. It's good that I get to recover before entering the doors of hell.

That said, they should have come to get Hajya by now. Are they onto me? Perhaps they are. But then, why keep me alive? I haven't checked to see if they have any suspicions, just in case I'm being watched. I shouldn't do anything that would confirm their suspicions, so I've been lying here, recovering and mimicking some mental trauma. It took me longer than I'd like to memorize all the mannerisms of a traumatized person. It's a little tricky because they are usually unpredictable, so I looked for similarities in cases and figured out how they act and why they behave the way they do. At this point, I should have been a psychiatrist.

The door opens, and I flinch, my eyes wide as I scan for whoever has come in. It's second nature these days. Kazimir walks in, eyes hunted, hands in fists with a frown as if he's capable of grief. But if he cared, wouldn't he have come sooner? I tense as he approaches. Technically, Hajya hasn't seen them since they were fifteen—she shouldn't recognize him, even without the amnesia. I lower my gaze and stop breathing.

Kazimir raises his hands, backing off, and Idris steps forward instead. "You're safe, Hajya. We're not here to hurt you."

Yeah. Right. Shove it.

"We're your brothers," Kazimir says. "We've come to take you home."

I cry then. Why? I haven't decided yet. Maybe it's relief. Maybe it's because I don't trust them. Maybe this is all a front, and they're here to take me right back to where I started. Hajya herself wouldn't know what's going on, amnesia and all.

So I cry. I decide that Hajya wouldn't be so quick to trust—not if she's been abused for six years and remembers none of it. Kazimir and Idris glance at each other, lost and unsure what to do. Figures—they're better at causing pain than fixing it. I'd love to play the broken wreck, if only to mess with their heads.