Page 90 of Brazen Criminals

What skills do I have?

Not a damn thing that matters. I can’t cook, I never learned how to iron.

I have no criminal skills. I’ve always followed the rules. I’ve never even skipped class.

God, the only things I can do are run moderately long distances and color-code my notes. Oh, and apologize. I’m great at begging for forgiveness.

Fucking useless skills. I can’t use them for a damn thing. Not a damn fucking thing. I can do nothing.

I’m nothing.

I drop my head, my hair a tangled mess over my shoulder, my clothes clinging to me, uncomfortable and rubbery against my skin.

And I hear it, a voice I’d hoped had left, the one I’d run from. But it’s there, buzzing in my ears, its words and my words melding into a mess of recrimination.Clara, baby, you know you’re not good at this stuff. I know you try, but it’s just not good enough. Bryce’s voice hums inside my head.

I know, I know, I’ll try harder next time, I promise,my own voice answers, always pleading, always agreeing, always begging to be forgiven.

Forgiven for what? For not cleaning the dishes immediately after dinner when I had a paper due the next morning? For washing and drying the laundry, but not folding it while it was still warm? For a batch of cookies with burned bottoms meant as a gift for Bryce’s mom?

Those damn cookies. Bryce insisted I do some super complicated patterned cookie that required refrigeration and rolling pins and shortening—I didn’t even know what shortening was until I went to the grocery store looking for it.

I bought all the ingredients, hauled them home, made the dough. Up until that batch, I’d only ever made cookies that came in a tub, ready to be spooned onto the pan.

I’d warned Bryce that I didn’t know what I was doing, but he insisted I’d be fine. I knew I was messing up as I made them—I asked twice if we could just go buy some fancy treat for his mom, but he insisted I make the damn cookies. He said that if I didn’t make them, he would know exactly how much I respected his mom.

So I tried my hardest. I rolled the dough, I cut the pieces, I watched a YouTube video.

I cried.

Bryce sat in the living room playing a video game, relaxing after a week of work.

I made it to the last step, but as the first batch cooled, I realized they were underdone. The second batch I overcompensated. They burned.

The cookies weren’t inedible—just brown at the bottom.

Bryce lost it. He stormed around the living room, furious at my disrespect for his mom, livid that I’d failed at such a simple task.

You can’t even make cookies, Clara. I know some things are hard for you, but cookies? How are you a failure at making cookies?

And what did I say?

I’m so sorry, Bryce. I’ll do better next time, I promise. We can find something else to give your mom. Please, I’m sorry, please, can you forgive me? Please, Bryce, please.

I gaze up at the building, watching his shadow pass in front of the sixth-floor window. I shiver, cold, wet, remembering.

He never hit me, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t break me.

I tap my thigh—one two three four five.

If he were here, in front of me, right now, what would I say? What would I do?

Would I still cower, cry, beg for him to forgive me, to love me, to tell me, just once, that I hadn’t fucked everything up?

Are burned cookies really so bad?

I stare at his back, willing him to look down, to meet my eyes.

Instead, he pulls out his phone and strolls out of sight, farther into the apartment.

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