Chapter 4

Over the next two nights, the memories flooded back.

Lila arriving at our house at age ten, freshly orphaned. Me holding her hand, saying, "You live with me now. If anyone bullies you, I'll protect you."

Later, my crystal music box shattered on the floor. Lila crying, claiming I pushed it. Mom just sighing, "Ellie, she just got here."

My homework scribbled over. Harry snatching the notebook from my hands. "She has nothing. Why do you have to fight her on everything?"

Then, Lila tumbling down the stairs, sobbing and asking why I pushed her.

Me standing at the top of the landing, completely stunned. "I didn't even touch you."

But everyone was looking at me. "Ellie, be the bigger person."

Then, a night in October when I was fifteen. I opened my bedroom door to find Lila holding my X-Acto knife.

"What are you doing with my knife?"

She gave me a flat look. The next second, she dragged the blade across her own wrist, shoved the bloody knife into my hand, and ran out into the hallway screaming.

"Help! Eleanor is trying to kill me!"

When my parents rushed upstairs, I was holding the knife. She was at the other end of the hall, her wrist bleeding.

She looked at me, and in her eyes, there was a tiny, victorious smile.

They argued downstairs all night. I laid on the floor by the stairs, listening. Harry's voice was the loudest. "We have to send her away!"

Mom was crying. "She's only fifteen."

No one came up to ask me what happened.

Two weeks later, at 5:00 AM, two strange men broke into my room and dragged me out of bed. I fought like hell until a massive hand clamped over my mouth.

"Mom... Mom!"

No one came upstairs.

I later learned they were "teen transport" goons, hired by parents to legally kidnap their kids and haul them across state lines to the Troubled Teen Industry.

Cedar Ridge was in the middle of the Utah desert.

On the first day, someone asked me, "Do you admit to harming your sister, manipulating your family, and having violent tendencies?"

"No, I didn't do it."

Three staff members immediately tackled me to the ground, driving a knee into my spine. They locked me in a windowless isolation room.

The second time, I learned not to talk back.

The third time, I learned to obey the whistle.

Eventually, I learned to keep my head down. I learned to say sorry. I learned not to struggle when they pinned me down. I learned to let the needle pierce my arm, and when I woke up, I learned never to ask what day it was.

They told me, "You have to admit you're toxic. If you don't, you'll never graduate."

Over those three years, my parents visited once a year. Lila always tagged along. She would rub her red eyes and say, "Get well soon, Sis. I'll be waiting for you to come home." But when she turned around, the corner of her mouth would twitch up.

On graduation day, a transporter shoved me from behind. I lost my balance, and my forehead smashed into the iron door. Blood poured into my eyes.

When I opened them again, I was in the hospital.

The night all my memories returned, I sat on my bed. Tears streamed down my face, but my hands had stopped shaking.

I pulled up a name in my contacts: A. Coleman, Family Trust.

At 3:00 AM, I stared at the number for ten minutes before hitting dial.

"Coleman." The old man's voice was sharp, completely unbothered by the hour.

I gripped the phone tightly. "This is Eleanor Ashford."

Dead silence on the line for two seconds. "Ms. Ashford? Your parents mentioned last week that you were discharged."

I closed my eyes, watching the sky outside my window slowly begin to lighten.