MoboNovels
Chapter 1 - Shattered Dreams
Emily Miller’s life goal was simple: get the hell out of Havenwood. And step one? Buying a new house.
For someone who’d grown up in that dead-end town, taking her parents to pick out a place in Fairview – even a basic one – felt like the ultimate dream. Nothing fancy, just a decent 1200 square foot place. Three bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen, and a bathroom – no moldy walls, no leaky ceiling, and definitely no cockroaches or mice.
That’s all she wanted.
To make that dream a reality, Emily had worked her ass off, hustling every job she could find, completely writing off the idea of dating. Relationships meant investing time, energy, and a crapload of money. And if you got unlucky and hooked up with a total loser? You’d end up broke and heartbroken. No thanks.
Now, at twenty-four, the Millers had finally saved up the forty grand for a down payment. Emily was buzzing with excitement, ready to tour open houses, when her parents, John and Diane, got caught in a bank robbery downtown.
It all happened so fast. They’d just withdrawn the forty thousand in cash, stuffed it into a duffel bag, when some masked dude with a sawed-off shotgun burst in. Bank robberies weren’t exactly common in a town like Havenwood. Everyone inside froze, totally freaked, not daring to resist. They all just crouched on the floor, handing over their wallets and purses to the robber.
Except for John and Diane Miller.
They clung to that duffel bag with everything they had, shielding it with their bodies. Even with the barrel of that shotgun pressed against their heads, they wouldn’t let go. To everyone else, they looked like total morons. Was money really worth dying for? To John and Diane, it absolutely was.
That forty grand was their family’s entire nest egg, every single penny they had. Losing it would be like losing everything.
So, the robber shot John first. Then, as Diane lunged at him in a panic, he shot her too.
In the end, the couple couldn’t protect a damn thing.
The robber grabbed the blood-soaked duffel bag, hopped on his motorcycle, and sped off. The whole thing was over in ten minutes, tops.
At that very moment, Emily was checking out the model homes they had on display, gushing to the saleswoman about the granite countertops. She was also half-annoyed that her parents were at the bank and hadn’t come with her to see this new house.
The saleswoman gave her one of those polite, practiced smiles. “You can always bring your folks next time!” But there wouldn’t be a next time.
The police were surprisingly efficient. They ID’d the robber the very next day. But when they found him, they found only fragmented remains. Turns out, the guy had blown the stolen money on his kid’s medical bills, then promptly jumped off the roof of the hospital.
The Millers’ hard-earned forty grand was gone. Every last cent. Emily had to beg her relatives to loan her the money just to pay for her parents’ funerals.
Kneeling at their graves, Emily couldn’t even bring herself to cry. Instead, she sincerely hoped her parents would come back as vengeful spirits and drag her down to hell with them.
Just wipe the whole family out.
After the funerals, Emily holed up in her parents’ bedroom for days.
She hadn’t slept much since she’d heard the news. But even now, she felt wide awake. The mice in the ceiling kept skittering around, as if they were taunting her or offering her some kind of messed-up company.
On the nightstand, there was a stack of clothes her mom had folded the day before everything happened. Under the bed, there were her dad’s old, beat-up work boots he’d worn for years.
Only a rickety old closet separated her bed from her parents’. Growing up, she’d hated how she never had any privacy, not even the freedom to stay up late without getting nagged. She’d always dreamed of having a bedroom that was all her own.
Now, the room really was all hers.
Huh. With her parents gone, the place actually felt kinda spacious. Emily smirked, managing a laugh that sounded more like a sob.
She held out her hand, tracing the calluses on her palm.
Her hands bore calluses: some from scrubbing toilets, others from hauling boxes, and still more from clearing tables and washing dishes. What kind of twenty-something gal has hands like this?
Emily was a hard worker, sure, but hard work didn’t necessarily guarantee you a high-paying job in Havenwood. In school, Emily was always the star student. She was the first one in class, the first to turn in homework, a straight-A student who took meticulous notes, stayed up all night studying, aced all her tests, and was on student council, even receiving tons of certificates of merit. But eventually, she didn’t even finish high school. After junior high, she went to vocational school for three years before hurrying off to the factory where she’d later start her long working life.
Back then, she was too young to realize how much that choice would screw up her life.
Years later, whenever she saw high school or college kids walking down the street, looking so full of energy, so free and bright, she belatedly realized what she’d missed out on.
But life didn’t have a rewind button.
Some people can work hard and become millionaires. Others just work hard to wash a few more dishes.
How many years would it take her to save up another down payment? And even if she did, her parents wouldn’t be around to see it. Her parents were gone. She didn’t have a family anymore. Thump.
Thump. Thump.
Someone was knocking at the door.
It was late, and pitch-black outside.
Emily shot to her feet, suddenly hoping the knocker was just another robber, one who would discover her family was broke, get pissed, and blow her brains out right there. That way, she could finally experience the same horror her parents had. Dying sounded pretty good right about now.
Death would be a release.
She yanked open the door to find a thin, wiry teenager standing there.
His eyes were red-rimmed, his body tense, tears streaming down his face. “Sis, why didn’t you tell me what happened?”
He stared at her, his gaze filled with sorrow, tenderness, and reproach. Emily suddenly remembered that she did, in fact, have someone left: her foster brother, Ethan Carter.
Chapter 2 - A Beautiful Day
Surviving was Ethan Carter’s sole goal.
At the tender age of three, under his father’s guidance, he successfully swiped a pack of cigarettes. With a cigarette dangling from his lips, Daniel patted tiny Ethan’s head with satisfaction. “Not bad, kid. You’ve got potential.” By seven, Ethan was a pro, capable of smoothly snagging a bottle of beer from the corner store. Daniel, however, wasn’t entirely thrilled. “One bottle? What’s that gonna do?”
Sarah Carter just gave him a sweet kiss. “Next time, be a doll and help Mommy lift a gold necklace, okay?” Not long after, Daniel and Sarah landed themselves in jail for theft.
A kid needs grown-ups to make it. So, seven-year-old Ethan, like a worn-out rubber ball, was kicked impatiently from one stranger’s house to the next, bouncing between foster homes. He went through several in just one short year.
Ethan tried his absolute best to fade into the background, eat the bare minimum, do the most chores. At night, he’d curl up quietly in a corner with a blanket, never daring to take a bed. But he couldn’t escape the dirty looks and the feeling of being unwelcome. After all, he was the son of thieves.
At meal times, they’d conveniently find chores for Ethan, and by the time he finished and came back, the table would be wiped clean. On rainy days, they’d intentionally toss his backpack outside, drowning all his schoolbooks. If he was outside, they’d deliberately lock the door, ignoring his knocking and shouting, leaving him to squat on the doorstep through the night.
A year later, not a single family was willing to take him in. The person who finally stepped up to claim Ethan was Emily Miller’s mother.
From the same little place, Crane Creek, Diane Miller and Sarah Carter were neighbors and old schoolmates to boot.
Sarah’s version of the story went like this: She and Diane grew up together, leaning on each other, practically inseparable. Not related by blood, but closer than family. All her best childhood memories involved Diane. If Diane liked camellias, Sarah would pick Diane loads. When Diane was unfairly accused of something, Sarah would be right there by her side, unwavering, defending Diane. Even when they went their separate ways as adults, the bond between their hearts never lessened. Sisters forever and always.
Diane’s version was a little different: Sarah was annoying from the get-go. Not a single kid in the village wanted to play with her, so Sarah latched onto Diane, the easy target. Sarah would bum off Diane’s lunch, steal her stuff. Those flowers Sarah gave her? Totally swiped from someone else’s yard. Sarah was the reason Diane got mistaken for a thief once, nearly scarring her childhood. Once they both left Crane Creek, Sarah dropped Diane like a hot potato, only bothering to call when she got married or had a kid and needed a wedding/baby gift.
Hearing no one wanted to raise Ethan, Daniel simply waved a hand. “Let him beg on the streets then! My son can handle himself!”
Still clutching onto a sliver of motherhood while in jail, Sarah called every friend and relative she knew, one by one, only to be hung up on repeatedly. Finally, she used her last call credit to reach Diane. When Diane answered, Sarah broke down, sobbing uncontrollably.
Most people in that spot would have flat-out refused. It didn’t matter how close you were; you couldn’t just take on someone else’s kid for free, especially when you hadn’t seen each other in seven or eight years and weren’t really ‘besties.’ The Miller family of three was already crammed into a tiny, run-down house. Where would they even put an extra kid?
But Emily’s parents weren’t most people. They were kind, poor souls, too good for their own good.
That ‘too good’ nature was why they kept getting conned and taken advantage of, ultimately ending up in the poorest part of Havenwood.
“Sarah, don’t worry. Our whole family will take good care of Ethan. When you and Daniel get out, we’ll hand him back safe, sound, and hopefully, a little chunkier.”
That was Diane’s promise on the phone.
Dunking a piece of stale bread into thin rice porridge, fourteen-year-old Emily rolled her eyes hard. Poor people helping poor people? The only likely outcome was everyone starving together.
She tried to get her Dad to join her in criticizing her Mom’s saintly behavior, but just sighing heavily, John Miller, said “Poor Ethan. How did he end up with such deadbeat parents! Looks like we’re the only ones who can look out for him now. Your mother is right, we gotta raise him properly!”
Emily: ?
So, the only one in the entire house who wasn’t a saint was her.
And just like that, eight-year-old Ethan moved into the Miller house, known around Havenwood as the famous ‘House of Saints King of the Dumpsters’. Famous, of course, because the Millers were the poorest, most rundown household in town, an eyesore on the neighborhood.
While other families were fixing up houses and building new additions, the Millers were still collecting rainwater in basins under leaking patches in the roof. The family of three squeezed into their small, broken-down house, eating and sleeping in the same area, separated only by a few fabric curtains. The bathroom was only for showering; they kept a chamber pot outside and had to walk through a long alley to reach the town’s only free public toilet and a small patch of woods.
Stepping through the Miller’s door for the first time, and following Diane, Ethan peeking out shyly and his eyes met Emily’s.
“If you think our place sucks, beat it,” Emily said flatly.
She didn’t need to guess; the kid was totally crashing in her tiny bed tonight, and there wasn’t enough room for another person.
Her parents glared at her simultaneously. “Emily! Is that how you talk to your little brother? Be a sister!”
Ethan immediately walked up to Emily, tilting his small face up, giving her a pure, compliant smile. “Nice to meet you, Sis!”
As a kid used to being tossed around and living on borrowed time, this was Ethan’s signature move. Before this, every time he was dropped off at a new family, he’d immediately size up the person with the gloomiest face and figure out how to win them over. Only by tackling the toughest character first could he make his life easier down the road.
And Emily, obviously, was the toughest cookie in the Miller house.
This wasn’t the first time Emily had seen Ethan. The year he was born, Diane had taken her on a seven-hour train ride to visit the Carter family to attend his Christening Party.
Daniel and Sarah, back then, were swamped collecting cash gifts, casually leaving the bassinet in a corner of the back room, completely ignoring the crying baby.
Only Emily noticed the faint cries. She put down her bowl, tiptoed into the back room, stood on her toes, and peeked into the bassinet. A wrinkly, yellowish infant, skinny as a monkey, squirmed hard in his swaddling blanket, looking both creepy and comical.
She couldn’t help but giggle.
Hearing Emily’s laughter, the tiny baby seemed to finally settle down. He stopped crying and stared at her intently, his bright black eyes filled with curiosity.
At the time, little Emily frowned, marveling that such an ugly baby existed and secretly worried about this stranger baby’s future, unaware that his future would become intertwined with hers.
Now, frowning again, fourteen-year-old Emily, sized up the clear-eyed boy in front of her. She seriously wondered if the ugly baby from back then had somehow been swapped.
Getting closer, Emily was shocked to see a lot of white hairs on Ethan’s head. He was only eight! She immediately pictured a horror movie scenario of a ghost possessing him and quickly backed away to put some distance between them.
Diane’s voice broke through her thought spiral. “Ethan has premature graying. It’s from malnutrition and too much stress. Poor kid, he’s been through so much for being so young.”
Yeah, he was definitely pitiful.
But no matter how pitiful he was, Emily couldn’t accept some random kid she wasn’t even related to suddenly showing up, living in her house, eating her food, and sleeping in her bed.
So, he had to go.
That night, she stuffed a dead mouse into Ethan’s backpack.
A poor kid couldn’t afford a rebellious phase. Most of the time, Emily was a sensible daughter.
Her parents hadn’t noticed. Their goodness was so ingrained it blinded them to much, constantly leading them to be taken advantage of or simply struggle in their poverty because they couldn’t say no.
The exception was when there was an outsider in her home.
When Ethan found the dead mouse, he didn’t react with the horror Emily expected. He just quietly zipped up the backpack, leaving the dead mouse inside.
He left it there for three days.
Luckily, it wasn’t summer, or maggots would have been crawling out of the backpack seams.
Finally, Emily couldn’t stand it anymore. She snatched his backpack, pulled out the now-smelly dead mouse, and flung it into the trash bin by the side of the road.
“Why’d you throw it away?” Ethan seemed genuinely confused.
“Do you even know what that was?” Emily was stunned.
“It was a gift from you, Sis,” Ethan said, smiling pure and compliant.
This kid was something else, Emily realized. She’d hit a tough nut to crack.
Enduring humiliation, toughing it out, with a wolf’s ambition lurking beneath—he was going to be a ruthless one someday. Keeping such a scheming little guy around felt way too dangerous.
Just as she was racking her brain for the next trick to mess with him, she saw him on her way home from school. Some boys from his class were kicking him, stripped bare, into a stinky ditch. The other boys joined in eagerly, laughing. “The poor guy was resisting at first, but then we said we’d give him ten cents a kick, and he went right along with it.”
Impressive business sense, Emily thought, startled. Only eight years old and already figuring out how to make money off brute force.
Ten cents a kick. Ten kicks would be a dollar.
Little by little, maybe one day he could scrape together fifty, or even a hundred.
He was naked because Ethan himself had suggested it. The stinky ditch stuff would ruin his clothes, so it was better to let them get their kicks, then clean himself off and get dressed again.
He’d found a way to turn bullying into a business, easy-peasy.
Emily silently admired his cleverness. She stopped walking, her gaze falling on Ethan lying in the stinky ditch.
Bony as a skeleton, every inch of his skin was covered in black sludge that smelled vile. People on the bank gagged and covered their noses, but he acted like he couldn’t smell a thing. Without a sound, he climbed out of the ditch, stood straight by the bank, and let the kids laugh and kick him back in, all over again.
After who knows how many times, the boys finally got bored. They picked up their backpacks, ready to split. Ethan, covered in muck, held out his hand to them. “Money.”
The chubby kid leading the group doubled over laughing. “You actually thought we’d give you money?”
Emily kicked him right then and there.
The chubby kid, totally blindsided, flew back and landed flat on the ground. Now he really couldn’t double over. Ethan paused, turning to look at Emily, his expression unreadable on his dirty face.
Emily put her foot down on the chubby kid’s back. She yanked open his backpack and dumped all his books and school supplies onto the ground. She picked out nine dimes. “You kicked Ethan ten times. Subtract the one time I kicked you, so you owe ninety cents. Got a problem with that?”
Even the cockiest elementary schooler had to back down in front of an older, stronger middle schooler. Especially one with more muscle. The chubby kid lay there obediently, tears welling up in his eyes, not daring to utter a word.
Emily looked at the other boys, who were frozen stiff with fear. Her expression was calm. “The one in the black hat, five kicks. Blue jacket, three kicks. Buzz cut, one kick. Now, get in line, pony up the cash. Not a penny less.”
Ethan never believed there were gods in the world.
If there were, why would they just watch the poor suffer, the bad guys get away with it, and the schemers live it up?
If everything was just ‘fate,’ then what was the point of a worthless life like his even existing? Ethan didn’t like Emily.
He ignored her challenges, smiling at her over and over, calling her “Sis” sweetly, all just so he could stay in the Miller house. He was used to fawning over people all the time, wrapping his exhausted, numb heart in smiles. That kind of fawning wasn’t about liking someone.
He didn’t like anyone.
Even the saintly Diane and John Miller—Ethan was always wondering if they’d eventually get tired of him and abandon him. Relatives had tossed him aside like trash, let alone strangers with no blood ties. Even the kindest, most selfless people, if they only had half a loaf of bread left, would give it to their own daughter first. That was just how people were.
He never expected the Millers to keep him for long.
But when Emily, not caring about the mud and grim covering him, took his hand and walked steadily, openly, through the crowd, Ethan suddenly felt that this sister, who seemed to have a bad temper, was perhaps more trustworthy than any god.
That day, Ethan earned $1.80.
Fifty cents of it, Emily took to buy spicy candy sticks. “That’s my deserved protection fee,” she said.
“Okay,” Ethan agreed without argument.
“So, you see, with some people, you just gotta fight fire with fire.”
Emily munched on a spicy candy stick, holding Ethan’s clothes in her arms.
“Okay,” Ethan squatted by the water faucet, carefully washing the mud off himself.
He had to get clean before going back, so they wouldn’t worry.
The cold water felt freezing splashing over him. Ethan, his back to Emily, shivered constantly. When he finished washing and air-drying, Emily instinctively walked over to help him put on his clothes.
“I can do it myself,” Ethan lowered his head, his eyes darting away.
Just thinking that Emily had seen him completely naked, looking ridiculous and pathetic, made his fists clench and his ears burn hot.
At eight years old, he already understood shame.
Emily just threw his clothes over his head, scoffing. “What’s there to be shy about? We’re sharing a bed tonight.”
It was a little tight, but thankfully, he always huddled himself up tight on the edge, not even letting a corner of his shirt touch her, so he didn’t take up too much space.
Ethan’s face turned even redder.
“Next time you get hit, fight back,” Emily said, adjusting his collar. “Being a meek poor kid is worse than being a poor kid with a temper. The second one is cheaper in the long run.”
Ethan nodded softly. “Okay.”
On the way home, Emily pulled out a spicy candy stick and held it towards Ethan’s mouth.
“Here, pay-up,” she said.
Ethan opened his mouth obediently and took a bite. It was his first time eating spicy candy sticks. A little spicy, a little sweet.
He chewed it thoroughly, swallowed hard.
His back, kicked nearly twenty times, covered in large bruises, bones aching, felt less sore because of that bite she fed him.
The Millers’ rule was never to waste a single cent on useless things. Spicy candy sticks were definitely on that list.
While other kids in the world were recording their first time at an amusement park, a zoo, or a burger joint, Emily and Ethan were seriously, earnestly, almost reverently sharing the same bag of spicy candy sticks.
They reached the front door with only one stick left.
“You eat it, Sis,” Ethan offered sensibly.
Emily bit off half and put the remaining half into Ethan’s mouth.
“Okay.” Ethan smiled. “This is our secret, just between us two. I won’t tell anyone, not even if I die.”
“Well, let’s not go that far,” Emily said.
Ethan kept smiling.
He smiled so wide his teeth showed.
It wasn’t the calculated fake smile anymore. It was just because he was happy.
No amusement park, no zoo, no burger joint.
But for him, it was an incredibly, incredibly beautiful day.
Chapter 3 - Sycamore Shadows
Life in Havenwood was the definition of small-town boredom. But kids always found a way to stir up trouble.
The Millers lived closest to the Old Sycamore Tree, which to the adults meant poverty and being out in the sticks, but to Emily, it meant instant access to the woods. It was one of the few times she felt like she could literally stand taller than everyone else. One time, she slipped and broke her leg, bawling her eyes out, but as soon as she healed, she was right back to her old tricks, climbing as if nothing had happened.
Diane couldn’t figure it out. “How did that child not develop a phobia?” Emily would just laugh, “‘Cause your daughter is ‘Wonder Woman’!”
That day, same as always, she headed to the woods, only to find a woman sprawled out at the base of the Old Sycamore Tree.
At first, Emily thought the woman was just catching some Zzz’s.
She should have just turned around and walked away, but the woman was wearing this drop-dead gorgeous velvet dress, and Emily couldn’t resist getting a closer look.
For a poor fourteen-year-old who’d never owned a dress, it was just too tempting.
The only clothes Diane ever bought Emily were oversized shirts, baggy tees, and even baggier sweatpants. “Loose clothes look cleaner, crisper,” she’d say, but really, it was so Emily could wear them for years as she grew, saving them the expense of constantly buying new sizes.
But when Emily reached the Old Sycamore Tree, she saw a face ruined beyond recognition.
Mutilated, pale as a ghost, and definitely not breathing. A stranger she’d never seen around Havenwood before.
With eyes wide open and staring blankly, the woman seemed to look right at Emily, an expression of horror or accusation fixed upon her face.
The branches overhead swayed.
The woman’s wide-open eyes seemed to lock onto Emily’s, and time just froze.
Emily didn’t know how long she stood there, but she finally snapped out of it and let out the loudest, most bloodcurdling scream of her life.
The cops showed up before you could say “small town gossip”, and the news of a Jane Doe rippled through Havenwood faster than a bad rumor on Facebook. Everyone, young and old, was talking about the case.
John and Diane rushed Emily home, trying to soothe her, but the image of the dead woman was seared into her brain.
She just couldn’t shake it.
Turns out, even Wonder Woman had a breaking point. She was left with a trauma that would follow her forever.
Sure, Emily could handle a dead rat or kick some grade-schooler’s butt, but she wasn’t even fifteen yet. This was the first time she had ever seen a dead body.
Fear, but more than just fear.
A dull ache of sadness and pity.
Later that night, lying in bed, Emily couldn’t stop picturing that pale face. The features were actually pretty.
Without the injuries and the blood, she would’ve been exceptionally beautiful.
Emily thought she was losing it, spending half the night dissecting a corpse in her mind. All of a sudden, Ethan got up, tiptoed out of bed, and snuck out the door. He’d been under the weather lately, and his stomach hadn’t been happy. He was always running to the bathroom in the middle of the night.
Bold of him, though. A murder in broad daylight and he was already brave enough to go to the public restroom next to the woods at night.
Whatever. Not her problem. Emily rolled over and tried to sleep. The public restroom was empty.
The light in the men’s room had been out for a couple weeks, and no one had bothered to fix it. The only light came from the dim streetlamp outside.
Clutching his toilet paper, Ethan gritted his teeth and walked inside. Don’t be scared.
There’s no such thing as ghosts. He told himself.
When Ethan came out of the bathroom, he spotted Emily leaning against the wall by the entrance. Her hair was a mess, she was wrapped in a jacket, and she was gazing up at the bugs buzzing around the streetlamp. “Emily?” He was caught off guard.
“Done? Let’s go home then,” Emily yawned, turning to leave.
Ethan followed her, stunned. The coldness in his chest melted away, replaced by a wave of something warm and overwhelming.
The restroom, the streetlight, the chilly air.
Everything was the same as before, but somehow, everything was different.
“You know what?” Emily said as they walked down the dark street. She glanced back at Ethan. “More than ghosts or dead bodies, you know what’s really scary? It’s the killer.”
“Right now, he could be hiding in some dark corner, waiting to strike again. Maybe some eight-year-old boy.” she finished, trying to scare him.
But Ethan heard something else.
She was worried about him, and that’s why she came out here.
The woman who was traumatized by a dead body all day was the same one who ran to the public restroom in the middle of the night to wait for him.
She cared about him.
Ethan made a show of being scared and ran up to grab her hand. As far as Ethan could remember, this was the first time he and Emily had ever held hands.
He didn’t hate it.
Feeling the warmth of her fingers, following her lead, they walked hand in hand, slowly moving towards home.
Quiet and ordinary, but it filled Ethan with a strange sense of peace. As far as Emily could remember, this wasn’t the first time they had held hands.
At Ethan’s Christening Party, as Emily wrinkled her nose at his ugly mug and reached out to poke his face, the little baby waved his hands and grabbed one of her fingers.
It took Emily forever to yank her finger away, and Ethan immediately started crying, like she’d stolen his favorite toy. Diane chewed her out for it, telling her not to be mean to her little brother.
Of course, Ethan wouldn’t remember any of that.
The memory made Emily roll her eyes.
“Did you wash your hands? she asked.
“Yeah,” Ethan said honestly.
His hand was still damp and cold from the water, clinging tightly to hers. Emily just started to complain when she spotted a figure slowly walking towards them at the end of the street.
Their steps were slow, silent.
More like floating than walking. And the person was all in white.
Emily shivered and instinctively grabbed Ethan, freezing in her tracks. Behind them, it was the public restroom and the woods. Ahead of them, a ghostlike figure. She was paralyzed with fear.
In those frozen seconds, Emily imagined her parents crying at her grave. To save money, they’d probably bury her and Ethan in the same plot. The tombstone would read: “Here Lies Emily and Ethan.”
Ethan noticed the figure, too. Weird. When he was alone in the bathroom, he was scared out of his mind, but now that he was really seeing some creepy figure, he didn’t feel afraid at all.
Probably because Emily’s arms felt so warm.
Even though she was trembling, she was holding him tight, trying to protect him with her frail body.
When things got dangerous, her first instinct was to protect him. Even his parents never treated him like that.
When the debt collectors came knocking, Daniel and Sarah would just shove Ethan in front of them to buy themselves time to escape over the back fence. One time, the collectors kicked down the door and the door hit Ethan right in the head, drawing blood everywhere. The collectors scattered like cockroaches, and they didn’t come by for a while.
As a reward, his parents gave him a chocolate bar. It was the only chocolate he’d ever had. It was so sweet.
Sweet enough to forget the scar on his head. Would Emily like chocolate?
Ethan shook off those random thoughts and studied the figure, realizing it was just a young guy in a white bathrobe.
His eyes were blank and empty, but he was definitely alive.
Emily recognized him too. “Michael?” It was someone they knew.
Michael Anderson was the son of the richest family in town.
Emily had always admired Michael. He wore different new clothes and shoes every day, and he had this rich-boy air about him. Michael was always the center of attention, like some prince straight out of a movie.
In Emily’s mind, being born as Michael was the luckiest thing that could happen to a person. Michael stopped in front of them. “What are you two doing out so late?”
He smiled warmly, like he hadn’t been a zombie just a second ago. Emily said embarrassedly, “Uh, going to the bathroom. What about you?”
He had all the fancy bathrooms in town. Michael shook his head. “Just taking a walk in the woods.”
A walk in the woods at night? Emily didn’t buy it. Neither did Ethan.
But Michael didn’t give them a chance to ask any questions. He reached out and touched Emily’s head, saying softly, “Emily, take your brother home and go to bed. Good night.”
Then he turned and walked away, heading towards the woods.
During the day, it was breezy and peaceful, a popular spot for couples. But at night, it was nothing but darkness, coldness, and death; no one dared to go near it.
Now, with the murder, it would always be tainted by the shadow of the Jane Doe. And Michael was heading right towards it, without any fear.
Even though she saw him as a sophisticated ‘big brother’ figure, Michael was only eighteen. Still just a kid.
Emily watched Michael’s tall figure disappear into the shadows. When he touched her head, she thought she saw a bunch of scars on his wrist.
Like he’d cut himself.
Must’ve been her imagination. Emily shook her head.
Then she realized that Michael was carrying a rope. The rope he carried looked thick and sturdy, heavy with dark purpose.