The One Without Words

❀ chapter thirty-eight | back to juvie ❀

Back in juvie, she'd told me the same thing.

"Do you think it's true?" I asked.

"I'm not sure. She lives with her mother in a farm house in Bremerton now."

"Is her mom really the chief of police?"

Anika scoffed. "Did she tell you that? I wouldn't feel comfortable staying with them if that were the case."

Now this was like old times—comparing notes with her, trying to sift through Penelope's stories for the truth.

"She told me you've had visions of archangels," I said.

Anika stared into the mirror, but she wasn't looking at the scarf anymore. Her entire form was quiet and still, her posture impossibly perfect. The other juvie girls had conspiracy theories about her being a government experiment, a robot hiding under a human suit, a soulless clone who'd come to spy on them. But honestly, I thought they gave her way too much of a hard time.

"I haven't been on the right path," she sighed.

"When did you realize?"

Anika continued to stare at her own reflection, the intensity of her gaze reminding me more of Penelope for a second. Even her sigh, the flair in her walk—their mannerisms were so similar. She put the scarf away.

"We were roaming through the fields around her house," she began after a brief silence, her voice a whisper I had to lean closer to hear. "The night of a full moon. I was not prepared to be ripped out of this reality. To see her for who she truly is. Her mask uncovered to reveal the chasm within her. Like the empty space in the pits of hell."

"Um, wow," I said. "That's... intense."

Eli probably would've found it poetic.

"I once thought good and evil was subjective. Human-determined. But the sense of evil that permeated my spirit felt beyond anything human. I felt afraid. Afraid for everything we've tried to summon. Afraid of God." She paused. "I couldn't explain this to her. She would've laughed and told me, isn't that obvious? But I didn't want to be manipulated into this path anymore. Most of it has not been my decision. I've suppressed my will. I've gone along with her whims."

My jaw dropped. "Okay, now that actually sounds horrifying."

Anika didn't blink. "I saw the vibration of love as a tangible thing. From the archangels watching in the light of the moon. And then from her. Contractive. Negative. Finite. I was used to the way she made me feel small. But from above? I was endless."

How did that even look like? I thought of Jack and how he claimed the citrine stone was magical and would help us out of the forest. Maybe it had. Maybe Anika was on to something. Maybe magic and evil and divine love did exist. Or... maybe her and Penelope had taken some serious drugs and didn't tell me.

"What did you do after?" I asked.

"I decided I could accept it for another night. We ran through the fields for hours and laughed. We rolled down the grass hills like children. I was free. Human. But not because of any illusion of power we shared. We were more connected than ever, and it was only because in my spirit, I'd already left her. Because it was hurting me." Anika looked away. "We were hurting one another."

"You accepted it," I said quietly. "Instead of pretending to be invulnerable?"

I was dying to know more, but maybe this was pushing it already. I never expected Anika to be so... open. Was it more out of a commitment to truth—comparing notes and all—than her truly confiding in me? Did it matter?