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I jogged down the steps with the girls ahead of ht around to the driveway froths Pop has gone to to ance, class, andI own does the same

No one would associate the Russo children with the darkness that had basically for about my conception It is that very conception that keeps oes to, and I’m thankful for each and every one, there’s always that so this all in

My boundaries, the ones I’dcrossed They’ve been in place for so long now that they’d becootten close to the line, walked right up to the edge of it, and I still don’t knohy Soiven a chance, she’d smash that shit to pieces

I can’t let that happen, though, because I don’t have room for her or what she entails in my life I have a debt to pay There’s no happily ever after for me Once I do what I have to, ing around this shit long enough to beco other than whatsomeone else doith ly innocent as her

“Where are you going?” I snapped back to reality, not even having been aware that I’d spaced out Looking around, I realized ht away I’d subconsciously driven to her house, which hadn’t been hard to find the night before with a naeneral location And I’d done that shit with my sisters in the car; fuck me

“Just felt like taking a different route this ” Thank fuck they’d both decided to ride in back today, or ive me away

“Uh-huh!” Not good, Gabriel! I scolded

GIANNA

I woke the next day with a start It had taken the whole night for the reality of what Victoria had done to set in, and as is usual after one of our encounters, I’ from PTSD The therapist I’d been allowed to see before Becky put a stop to it when I was ten had been getting close to that diagnosis, I’m sure

Though at the ti to dad, I had no idea what that was and how exactly I’d caught it, it was years later that I figured it out and also understood why Becky had freaked and talked dad into ending my sessions Oneto myself since my seventeenth birthday Grandma Eloise had proical age of eighteen In the rim

I laid there for a few secondsmyself for whatever fiasco awaited me beyond the door My ht before and the escalation in Victoria here lately She’s always monstrous sure, but it see up the crazy

Though the charcoal drawings of mom weren’t the only ones I’d done, it was still really uess I was in tooout about hts about Gabriel Russo to pay attention, but now in the light of day, her actions see a lot

Gabriel Russo I wonder what he thinks of our encounter? How did I come across in his eyes? No doubt by now, one of Victoria’s flying iven hi theer, I was the one with friends; no one liked her because of her selfish ways and the way she used to cry just to get her way in everything

Funnily enough, I was the one who’d gone out of my way to share my friends with her Now they were all on her side, and I was the one ostracized because of the lies she’d told It’s hell going to the sa the sa the sarade till whenever you leave