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And finally it was too ures found enough of their senses to piners, a silent screaer fell

I don’t like recalling how that felt I don’t like rewinding to that night and bringing back the sensation of coldatfurther, deeper down as it cut its way throughwould be an understate table, a patient under soling to free e that every buck and twitch ofbody meant that the knife would only have a chance to bite deeper, faster

That night I learned that the coolness of ainst heat, say, when it’s sheathed in hu blood Tears blurred ling with the sweat on e that my dad and I had an altercation over ht This was ainst the pain, at the sensation of agonizing fullness stuck inside

At some point, I knew that the tip of the blade had entered ht have been around the ti heat of my own blood pooled across my body cooled to ice The room felt like the inside of a freezer, the stone at my back like a slab of frost It went dark, and for the very first time, I knehat it meant to die

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Chapter 3

And as clarity and stillness follow the storh darkness Draive ht I was Who survives a knife in the heart?

Me, as it turned out Me, as the Lorica gently explained

It was scorchingly brilliant when I openedI was in heaven So Of course, that gave uy by any stretch of the iel, either

But she was

For a u the word as soon as I realized what soundto form Mom

It was i noas there when they buried her, and dad was too This woman could have almost passed for her in the murk of the filter betakefulness and sleep, but as I forced my eyelids to lift, I saw the starker differences

She stood against the light, the pale perfection of her short-cropped hair like a halo bathed in florescence Her lips were tight with concern, but her eyes solden, peering out of a face as sel, and not at all the woht would be my future boss

She sht

I openedfroood second before I remembered what it was to speak, but even when I found the words to say, they ca slur