Shifted #Wattys2016

LII

Greyson's birthday is coming up in a few weeks, and that worries me. I can't help but think about Felix and Max's side of things. As soon as Greyson turns eighteen, Felix will turn eighteen, and Felix and Max will lose the ability to be intimate in the way. They have the same problem I have now—except I'm perfectly fine not getting "intimate" with Greyson.

This shouldn't be such a big deal. We're dating. We've been dating for a while now. I should be itching to move to the next step in the relationship.

There's just too much to be thinking about.

I sat on the bed watching Greyson smoke. He smiled at me as he tried to make smoke rings.

"What are you going to do about the little girl?"

"What do you mean? I'm not going to do anything. There's nothing to do."

"Greyson, you murdered her. You raped and murdered her."

Greyson blew a smoke ring. "Yes. I did. What are you going to do about it? Call the cops?" He put out his cigarette. "Go ahead and try."

I bit my lip and crossed my arms. "Goodnight." I pulled the sheets over my body and laid down, shutting my eyes but never really falling asleep.

I remember them, even from such a long, long, long time ago. My parents. They died when I was young but I still remember them clearly. My mother had blonde hair, my father had strawberry blonde hair. Which is weird that I ended up with as dark brown hair that I have.

They died so randomly.

My mother had a skyrocketing fever that caused my father to take her to the hospital. Her brain boiled, her body shut down. On the way home, my father's car malfunctioned—we still don't know how—and he slammed into a telephone pole, splitting it and causing it to land right on top of my dad.

Two birds with one stone.

Two parents in one day.

And just like that I became an orphan.

I was tossed into the system, jumping around from house to house, family to family. And then I landed at Emmett's neighbor's house. I was sixteen-ish.

It was around eight and something felt off inside my body, almost like an extreme growth spurt. I stumbled across the lawn into Emmett's. I fell onto my knees and yelled, such a pain going through my body.

I fell onto my side and curled into a ball. Leaves crunched under someone's feet and I looked up. This kid, maybe a year or two younger than me, stood over me. I was crying, tears falling down my face.

I croaked, "Help me."

The kid held out his hand. "Come on."

Something about this kid, here and now, made me feel like I should follow him into his house, and nothing bad would happen. So I took his hand, my hand slowly covering in hair, and I followed him.

Emmett sat me down and explained to me what I was and what had happened. The First Shift. It hurts the most, and if you have no idea what is going on, it scares you the most. I met Emmett, and Felix, and Bloom all that night. They adopted me, and for the first time in forever, I had a home.

I'm curled up into a ball, my back to Greyson, thinking about that night now, and I can't help but wish for Felix and Emmett and Bloom and Caven and Wane.

And I want to go home.