Page 74 of The Reckoning
If so, that makes everything I’ve done for nothing. It opens the door for an emotion I’ve refused to allow myself to feel for anyone but Lilian. There’s no room for guilt when it comes to my brother, but now I wonder if I spent so much time blaming him when I should’ve been blaming someone else all along.
Richard.
“They told me you knew exactly where I was,” I say to the darkness. “That you visited the facility and laughed about how pathetic I was.”
“If I had been given the chance to visit, I would’ve done whatever I could to get you out of there.” His voice is a broken thing beside me. “I didn’t even know the place existed until you locked me in that facsimile of it. I never said it out loud or thought about it too much for fear that Richard would find out some way, but I always…hoped maybe you were out there somewhere.”
We lie side by side, blood cooling on our skin, breath coming in harsh gasps. Identical bodies, identical faces, lives split by a single moment of cowardice and calculation.
“Fuck,” he whispers, the single syllable weighted with horror. “All this time, all these years, we were pitted against each other. Fed lies, conditioned and manipulated for others’ control.”
“Yeah.” I laugh, the sound hollow.
His voice cracks. “And it worked. They made us hate each other, made us enemies.”
“There was never going to be enough room for both of us in the Hayes world.”
“That’s not true,” Aries whispers. “We can’t change the past. That’s water under the bridge, but on my fucking life, I want you to know that I thought you were dead.”
“Some days, I wished I was.” The confession slips out before I can stop it, torn from some dark place I’ve kept buried. “Early on. Before I learned how to survive. How to hate.”
He turns his head to look at me, his face—my face—a bloody ruin in the moonlight. “I wasn’t lying when I said I would have come for you if I’d known. I would have burned that fucking place to the ground.”
I want to reject his claim, to call him a liar again, to cling to the hatred that’s defined me for so long, but I know better now. The weight on my chest is a little lighter.
“They made me believe you were a monster,” he continues, words spilling out like infected pus from a lanced wound.“That you’d always been unstable and violent. They showed me records going back to when we were toddlers. Photos of injuries you supposedly caused.”
“Of course. Like I said, not enough room for both of us. He needed one golden child and one scapegoat. Luckily, you drew the winning ticket.” My laugh tastes like blood and broken teeth.
“I didn’t win shit.” He sits up suddenly, wincing as something in his chest makes an audible grinding sound. “I wouldn’t call eight years of manipulation and control winning? Of never knowing who I really was? Of being molded into his perfect little puppet? None of it was fun or enjoyable.”
“At least you weren’t being electroshocked in a fucking basement,” I counter, but the anger has burned away, leaving only exhaustion in its wake. There’s no point in comparing each other’s torment and trauma. We both suffered in different ways.
“No. Just beaten until I couldn’t stand whenever I showed a hint of independence.” He runs a shaking hand through his bloodied hair, grimacing as his fingers catch on a matted clump. “Different methods, same goal. Break us down and remake us into the image he wanted.”
We remain silent for a short time, but there are no words needed, when the truth is practically screaming in the air between us.Neither of us won.Both of us lost—our childhood, our identity, our brotherhood. Everything that mattered.
“The cell where I kept you,” I eventually speak, forcing the words past the tightness in my throat. “It wasn’t just revenge. It was…familiar.Safe, in a twisted way. The only home I knew for years.”
“It wasn’t a rescue,” he replies, understanding dawning in his battered features. “Just another prison.”
“Different jailer, same cage.” I push myself into a sitting position, every muscle screaming in protest. Blood drips from numerous wounds, seeping into my T-shirt and painting my skinred. I know tomorrow the pain I feel will be much different, but today it doesn’t feel like pain. It feels like freedom. “I’m not sorry I kidnapped you or took over your life. What I am sorry for is the person I became because of them.”
He nods slowly, accepting the non-apology for what it is. “And I’m sorry I didn’t remember sooner. That I believed their lies.”
It’s not forgiveness—notyet. Maybe it never will be. I don’t know. But it’s something. An acknowledgment of shared victimhood, of manipulation that ran deeper and longer than either of us realized. Slowly, he climbs to his feet, wincing at what must be a spectacular collection of bruises. His face is a mess—eye swollen shut, lip split in two places, blood matting his hair where I slammed his head into the ground.
No doubt I look just as bad. I can feel it. The swelling, the bruises forming beneath my skin.Twin disasters.
“We should probably go find Lilian.” He extends his hand to me.
I stare at it for a moment, this unexpected olive branch. Before I can think of a reason not to take it, I do. I let him help me to my feet. Pain ripples through my body, every cell screaming in protest with the movement.Yeah, my ribs are definitely broken, not just bruised.My left eye is swollen almost completely shut, and something’s definitely wrong with my shoulder.
Worth it.All of it is worth it for this moment of terrible clarity.
“Let’s go findourgirl,” I say, testing the wordouron my tongue. It tastes strange but not entirely wrong. “We can’t erase the past. But we can try to move forward.”
“As it is, she’s going to be pissed.” He spits blood out onto the grass.
