Page 13 of Catch the Sun

I see the instant regret on her face, but I don’t want her apologies or backpedaling, so I change the subject. “School was fine. We’re reading a book calledMonster. It’s interesting,” I explain. Drumming my fingertips along the top of my hand-me-down desk, I glance out the window when I hear the guttural rev of a lawn mower being started.

Max.

He’s shirtless, angry-eyed, and already slicked with sweat from the ninety-degree heat.

I pull my attention away from the window and continue speaking. “My math teacher cuts his sandwiches into four pieces, instead of in halves. It’s really weird,” I tell my mother. “And this girl in P.E. had her period while we were running laps today. Our gym uniform is white.” I drag my index finger along the desktop, resting it on the leather cover of a book I bound myself. “And…I miss the horses,” I finish quietly. “I miss Phoenix.”

I miss everything.

I don’t say that part. In fact, I don’t tell her anything of real importance. My day sucked, thanks to Andy, Mrs. Caulfield, and Dr Pepper. But telling her that won’t change anything; it will only make her day suck, too.

When I swivel toward the window again, I watch as Max dumps an entire bottle of drinking water over his head and shakes his mop of wet hair like a dog in the rain. I’m sure the gesture would cause ovaries around the world to abruptly fertilize, but luckily, mine are immune.

I move away from the window and collapse back down to my butt in the center of the bedroom, tugging my backpack toward me with the heels of my feet.

Mom’s eyes follow my movements, filling with a look I recognize. She’s about to say something sentimental and I’m not going to appreciate it.

“Who knows, Ella…maybe you’ll find happiness here,” she murmurs, a wistfulness tingeing her words. “I fell in love here once. Maybe you will, too.”

I freeze.

I fiddle with a keychain on my book bag as my eyes skip away from my mother’s to focus on the beige carpeting beneath me. This town is where Mom and Dad first met. It’s the town my father brought me to during the separation, and now it’s the town I’m forced to call home.

When I don’t respond, Mom finally releases a sigh. She sighs with sadness, with regret, with knowing. The wistfulness is long gone.

She knows I’ll never fall in love. Not after what happened with Dad.

Not after what happened with Jonah.

Sitting cross-legged on my floor, I listen to her footsteps retreat into the hallway as the door softly closes.

Click.

Only then do I glance up, my eyes watering with trapped emotion.

One week before the murders, my brother told me something that has remained lodged in the back of my mind like a pesky headache I can’t seem to shake.

He said, “Ella, listen to me, and listen good.” His sage-green eyes glittered with affection as he pressed a hand to my shoulder and squeezed. “I don’t know much, but I do know this: love conquers all. Love conquerseverything. If you’re ever feeling low—and I mean, rock-bottomlow—remember that, okay? Remember that I love you. Always. And you’ll get through it.”

Love conquers all.

I’d heard the saying before, but I never gave it much thought. It bled into all the other cliché quotes out there, like, “Take the road less traveled,” or “Life is a journey, not a destination.”

Insipid words for thirsty minds.

Turns out, he was right—lovedoesconquer all. But I don’t think he understood what those words truly meant at the time.

Love conquers your common sense, your good reasoning, your sound logic.

Love conquers your heart until it’s a mangled, stomped-on, barely beating organ.

Love conquers your carefully assembled dreams and puts them in the hands of someone else.

Love conquers.

Consumes.

Kills.

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