Chapter 12: A mistake

The walk home was quiet, save for the rustling of the shopping bags in my hands.

The bags in my hands felt heavier with every step, but it wasn’t the weight of the things inside them that dragged me down, it was everything else.

Today had stretched on endlessly, yet somehow, it had also slipped through my fingers too fast before I could make sense of it.

And now, walking home, I could feel the silence pressing in. Not the peaceful kind, but the kind that squeezed around my ribs, that left me trapped in my own thoughts with nowhere to run.

I glanced at Nora.

She walked ahead, bags in hand, her steps light. There was an ease to her movements, like she belonged here. Like she had carved out a space in this world, reshaped herself to fit inside it.

I barely recognized her sometimes.

The way she laughed with strangers, the way she carried herself… She wasn’t the girl who used to clutch my sleeve, who used to snap back at strangers, who used to need me.

And yet, when she was with me, she was still that same Nora.

The same girl who leaned into me, touched me too much, the one who had just crawled her tongue across my throat.

I swallowed hard, the memory of it creeping up my spine, cold and hot all at once.

It wasn’t the first time she had done things like that. It had been gradual, easy to brush off before, easy to pretend it didn’t mean anything. But today…

Today, she crossed a line.

And I let her.

That was what scared me the most.

Not what she did. Not the way she acted.

But the fact that I hesitated.

The fact that, deep down, in the places I didn’t want to look, I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to stop her.

My grip tightened on the bags, my knuckles turning white.

A year had passed, and she had changed. Or maybe I was the one who had fallen out of sync.

It was so different from the girl who used to cling to me like I was the only solid thing in her world.

And yet… she still was the only solid thing in mine.

Was I even needed in her life anymore?

I could still feel the ghost of her touch. The warmth of her breath against my skin.

I should reject her. Push her away. Make it clear that whatever this is, whatever line she thinks she can cross, it has to stop.

But could I?

Could I live without her?

Would she even stay if I did that?

Did I even deserve her?

The questions piled up, each one heavier than the last, pressing down on my chest until I could barely breathe. My mind was a mess of tangled knots, of things I couldn’t untangle, of feelings I couldn’t… shouldn’t have…

My eyes darted, searching for something, anything.

I forced myself to focus on the pavement ahead, on the distant glow of our home’s lights peeking through the buildings.

I told myself it was just the exhaustion messing with me, that I was overthinking things.

But my eyes kept drifting back to her.

She must’ve felt my gaze, because she suddenly turned, catching me in the act.

“What’s up?” she asked, her voice light, teasing.

I hesitated for a fraction of a second too long. Then I shook my head. “Nothing.”

She gave me a knowing smile but didn’t push. Instead, she nudged my arm lightly with her elbow before walking a little ahead.

I let out a slow breath.

The streetlights buzzed softly as we continued on, the cool night air settling around us. But even as we neared home, the weight in my chest didn’t lift.

The night air clung to us, chilly and humid. When we arrived, the distant murmur of voices could be heard from inside. Soon, it sharpened into something uglier; shouting, raw and unfiltered.

Nora and I exchanged glances.

The front door was already ajar.

We stepped inside.

The house felt colder than it should have, colder than it was outside.

Inside, Cassandra stood near the kitchen, arms crossed tightly against her chest, her face set in a look of frustration that I had seen too many times before.

Across from her, a figure swaying slightly, Dorian.

Our father.

The air was stale, thick with the cloying scent of alcohol mixing with the bitterness of an argument already in full swing.

“It’s not my fault,” Dorian slurred, his voice rough, anger bubbling just beneath the surface. “The whole damn world is trying to fuck with me.”

Cassandra let out a sharp laugh, shaking her head. “You always have an excuse, don’t you?” she shot back. “It was your boss before, then the system, then bad luck. Now it’s the whole world?”

Dorian’s expression darkened. “You don’t get it, Cass,” he snapped, jabbing a finger at her. “You never have. You sit there acting all high and mighty, but you don’t know what it’s like to have everything ripped away from you.”

“Everything?” Cassandra’s voice rose, incredulous. “You lost your job two years ago. And I didn’t say a damn thing then. Because you were trying. You were looking. I stood by you because you weren’t letting it destroy you.”

Dorian scoffed, rolling his eyes. “And now suddenly I’m the villain?”

“You stopped trying last year,” she shot back, voice shaking with anger. “You just gave up. You don’t even pretend to look for work anymore. All you do is drink and lash out at everyone around you.”

His lips curled into a sneer. “You think you’re better than me? You think just because you pull in a paycheck and have that goddamn family of moth freaks at your back, you get to stand there and act like some saint?”

Cassandra’s eye twitched at that comment. She took a step forward, her hands balling into fists at her sides. “This isn’t about money, Dorian. It’s about you. It’s about how you’ve changed. You weren’t like this before, you weren’t cruel.”

His eyes narrowed. “Oh, so now I’m cruel?”

She let out a harsh breath, her voice dropping into something almost exhausted. “Listen to yourself,” she murmured. “You don’t even care, do you?”

Dorian waved a dismissive hand, turning away as if the conversation bored him. “I don’t have to listen to this,” he muttered. “I work my ass off for this family, and all I get is grief-”

“You don’t work at all,” Cassandra snapped. “You haven’t in over a year.”

Dorian scoffed, rolling his eyes, but she wasn’t finished.

“I told you… you could be here, actually be here. Cook, take care of the kids, manage the house. You could’ve been part of this family instead of some shadow that only stumbles in to drink and disappear again.”

Dorian’s lip curled, disgust flashing across his face. “What, you wanted me to be some house husband? Cleaning dishes, scrubbing floors, making dinner while you play breadwinner?”

“If that’s what it took, yes!” Cassandra threw her hands up, exasperated. “You weren’t doing anything anyway, at least then you’d have mattered.”

Dorian took a step closer, looming. His voice dropped to something lower, something cold. “I am an independent man, Cassandra. I don’t need to rely on some moth to put food on the table.”

Cassandra laughed, bitter and sharp. “That’s rich, coming from someone who’s done nothing but take, take, take-”

“You think I’m the problem?” Dorian’s voice was rough, bitter. “You think I want to be like this? Like this whole damn household isn’t trying to screw me over too?”

“You think I don’t notice, Dorian? That I don’t see what’s been happening? You’re never home anymore! And when you are, you’re-” Cassandra’s voice cracked, raw with frustration.

“Oh, here we go again,” Dorian sneered. “I’m never home? That’s rich, coming from the woman who-”

“Who what? Who held this family together while you pissed away everything?”

I could hear the venom in her words, but there was something else… something deeper. Exhaustion. Desperation.

Dorian scoffed. “Yeah? And what exactly have you been holding together? This?” He gestured around with a mocking laugh. “Face it, Cassandra. You don’t even have a damn clue what you’re talking about.”

“I know our money’s been disappearing. Not just recently, this has been happening for years! Three damn years, Dorian! What the hell have you been doing?”

Silence stretched for just a moment too long.

“Shut up,” Dorian suddenly barked, his words slurred but cutting. “You think you’re so much better than me? You think I don’t know what you’re doing? You just want to turn me into some whipped little servant while you run around pretending you’re the hero of this family.”

“No,” Cassandra said, her voice low and steady. “I just wanted you to try.”

The words hung between them, raw and open.

Then, Dorian’s voice dropped, slow and cutting. “You really wanna do this? Fine.” He stepped closer, his presence suffocating. “Let’s talk about your kids.”

I stiffened. My grip on the bags tightened.

Cassandra flinched. “What?”

“Oh, don’t give me that look. You think I don’t see it? Nora doesn’t even have impala blood. And as for him” Dorian’s gaze snapped at her, his eyes dark and cruel.

I felt the weight of it before the words even landed.

“That little freak. He’s just a parasite.”

My stomach twisted.

“Dorian, shut the hell up.” Cassandra hissed, her voice low and sharp, like the crack of a whip.

Dorian let out a low chuckle, full of contempt. “You wanna know what’s wrong with this family, Cassandra? Look no further.” He flailed his arms theatrically, entertaining his faux audience. “That thing has been dragging us down since the day it showed up. This whole mess? It started with him.”

My chest tightened, and my throat burned.

He sneered. “Bad luck follows him like a curse. It’s no damn coincidence. You feel it, don’t you? He ruined everything. Even Nora.” He laughed, shaking his head. “That girl’s obsessed with him. You don’t find that normal, do you?”

I knew Dorian had never been kind to me. Never really fully accepted me. But this, this was something else.

This was hatred.

And it cut deeper than anything else ever had.

A gentle touch wrapped around my arm. Nora.

Her fingers tightened slightly, as if trying to anchor me, her eyes filled with quiet sadness. “Let’s leave,” she whispered, her voice barely audible over the shouting. “We’ll come back later.”

I stiffened, then slowly shrugged her hand off. My gaze met hers, despair clawing at my chest.

“I want to hear,” I murmured, my voice hollow. “All of it.”

I barely had time to brace myself before the next words hit.

“You know what? Let’s talk about how you ruined her life too,” Dorian sneered, his voice sharp enough to slice through bone.

Cassandra’s grip tightened around her arm, but she didn’t speak.

“She couldn’t even go to school because of him,” he spat, his words dripping with scorn. “A normal girl, with a normal future, and yet, she had to stay locked up in this house because you wouldn’t let that thing go outside.”

He laughed bitterly. “And why? Because you were scared? Because you thought the world wouldn’t understand?” His glare snapped to her, full of mockery. “Tell me again why you had to keep him hidden away like some kind of dirty little secret.”

Cassandra’s fingers dug into her arms, her nails pressing crescent-shaped marks into her skin. “I didn’t keep him hidden because I wanted to,” she said, her voice tight. “I kept him safe because he wouldn’t fit in. You know what they would do to him if they found out-”

“Oh, cut the bullshit,” Dorian snapped. “That’s the excuse you’ve been feeding yourself for years, isn’t it?” He gestured wildly, nearly knocking over an empty bottle on the table. “That he’s ‘too different.’ That the world wouldn’t accept him. But you know what? The world never even got the chance.”

Cassandra shook her head. “I was protecting him.”

“You were protecting your own delusions!” Dorian snapped. “He’s not some extinct ‘human.’ He’s not some precious miracle. He’s a freak, Cassandra. A freak that you let sink his claws into our daughter, too.”

The air around me felt suffocating. My stomach twisted, my fingers trembling at my sides.

“And you know what?” he scoffed. “Even now, you’re still clinging to that ridiculous fantasy. Acting like he’s some chosen relic from a dead species.” He let out a dry, humorless laugh. “That quack doctor you worship so much has been feeding you lies for years, and you lapped it up like an idiot. He’s not human. He’s not special. He’s just-”

His voice dropped lower, seething with resentment.

“He’s just a mistake.”

Cassandra took a step forward. “Don’t talk about him like-!”

He cut her off. “That doctor is a liar,” Dorian barked. “And you’re a fool.”

Something ugly swelled in my chest, something bitter and burning.

“Hell, I don’t even know why I’m pretending anymore,” he muttered, voice dropping lower. “I doubt that thing even considers what we’ve sacrificed for him.”

I sucked in a sharp breath, but it felt like my lungs wouldn’t work.

Cassandra recoiled, but Dorian only leaned in.

“He’s a parasite,” he murmured, thick with disdain. “A damn leech that’s been sucking this family dry. And you let it happen.”

A parasite.

The floor beneath me felt like it wasn’t there anymore.

“And Nora?” He let out a bitter laugh. “She’s obsessed with him. And that’s on you, too.”

Nora’s grip on me twitched, but I couldn’t turn to her.

“You let that thing ruin her life,” Dorian spat. “And now, look at what’s left.”

I wanted to move. I wanted to breathe. I wanted to turn away before the words could carve themselves any deeper.

But it was too late.

They already had.