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A knock sounds on my door

I barely hear it

King barges in “Bro, been calling you for three days Where’d you go?”

I shake my head

I can’t stop shaking it

“Maks?”

I s the heat in my throat

It hurts

It hurts like I’ve sed soe in my throat

“Maks?” He tries again

I jerk away fro the pleasure, the pain, the sickness that makes me well

“I ht,” I whisper instead He doesn’t know that it was my own reflection

“What did he tell you?” His voice treame when he isn’t even on the roster

I rock back and forth and finally whisper, “He said welcome home”

Chapter Two

“Someday, Utterson, after I a of this I cannot tell you” —Robert Louise Stevenson

Izzy

I’ve been in love with Maksim ever since he walked up to me ere ten and offered to build me an ant farm

It was a defininglife

I’d always loved insects, and yes, at one point I was guilty of doing the whole let’s grab a uys on fire thing, only to be told byand considered torture

I vaguely re blood fro a black eye and cracked tooth

Mafia

The double standard was unreal with the bosses, rasshopper Oh look, Uncle Sergio has another tally mark tattoo on his body; what does that make this? His fiftieth kill?

This discussion happened over freaking Thanksgiving the following year when I asked my twin Ash to pass me the rolls