A woman in a habit stepped into an empty bedroom. Her face was round, plump, and creased with wrinkles though she wasn’t old. Her eyes were sharp behind the round lenses of her glasses. She had her hands clasped before her, as if in silent prayer. Despite the sign above the door that ব্যক্ত MIND YOUR HEADS, she did not falter. She was so short, things like that did not apply to her.
This was Mother Helena.
Following her was a man, tall and thin. He, unlike her, had to stoop and managed to do so just in time. He moved with slightly jerky movements and had a bizarre-looking goatee. His hair was beginning to go grey but his skin was flawless. In his hands he held several papers.
The room itself was not in the best condition. The floorboards were creaking, the roof leaking, and the বিছানা lay unmade and damp in the centre of the room. The windows had bars on them and there was a single, lonesome chair in the corner which was almost falling apart. But it was the only place she could take him to talk privately. Everywhere else was crowded with mentally deranged girls.
“I realise my past indiscretions can never be forgotten. But my life before the convent was dull, only brightened দ্বারা my son. So I’m sure আপনি can see, I can’t give up on him. And if I must hand over my nun’s habit to keep him; then that I will.”
The man, business-like and proper, wore a confused expression. “Mother Helena,” he began, struggling to find the appropriate words. “What do আপনি think I called this meeting for?”
She replied immediately, “Billy.” She paused and then added, “I only assumed.”
The man nodded, considered, and shook his head. “The bank does not care for your son, Mother Helena. He is the least of our problems, if a worry at all. No, we are here to discuss… financial implications.” He shuffled the papers in his hands until he found the one he was looking for. “We believe that আপনি have an April Mercer in custody? May we enquire as to why?”
Mother Helena’s eyebrows arched in surprise. April had never been one to stand out and that was why she was one of the few Mother Helena remembered the name of. She always remembered the quiet ones, for always assumed they were quiet for a reason. And April was either quiet because she had nothing to say, অথবা she was too good at hiding what she was up to from her superiors. So Mother Helena had a lot of information regarding the girl.
“Yes…” she began, realising she had been quiet for at least ten seconds, and that was long in bank time. “Her parents died a বছর ago. She began seeing things, she wasn’t right, they said. She was mentally broken. Most of the girls here are, Mr…?”
“O’Brian,” the man told her, sounding fed up with her off-topic mind. “We are well aware of the tragedy which happened a বছর yesterday, Mother Helena. In fact, that is part of why we are here. Miss Mercer’s parents left her a large sum of money as her inheritance as well as some fine family heirlooms, no doubt. Would she be fit to… receive, I wonder?”
Mother Helena was flooded with surprise. “I had no idea,” she stammered in a flustered way. She was genuinely gobsmacked. “How large a sum?”
Mr O’Brian checked his sheet. “I’d say we’re talking about a good hundred thousand. Plus the merchandise, probably raise it into the millions. How old did আপনি say the girl was?”
“I didn’t. She’s fifteen. Sixteen in two months.”
He sounded shocked. “You really remember everything about every girl? I’d be impressed if not for your lack of প্রণয় when talking about them.”
Mother Helena seemed uncomfortable now the চুন light had been turned onto her devotion—or lack of it—to the girls. “I keep tabs on a few of them. The worst, the best… April is… well, she can seem suspicious. And she’s either good at hiding things অথবা has nothing to hide. Which makes my decision to release her all the আরো difficult.”
“You do not care, then? আপনি do not remember them just because আপনি want to help them? আপনি remember them to make it easier for you,” he concluded.
Mother Helena was flooded with fury at this remark. Yes, she maybe did not care for her girls. But she would not be able to cope without them. Despite saying she would leave them all—and her own life—for her son, that was a lie. The girls gave her purpose. Without them, why was she even here?
Mr O’Brian coughed uncomfortably. “I apologise. Maybe before I leave I could have a word with April Mercer? I would প্রণয় to meet her and make the decision on my own or, at least, প্রতিবেদন something useful back to my superiors.”
Mother Helena was just glad to have the topic of her devotion lifted. She would be happy to see April—at least she didn’t physically attack her like Martha অথবা Gloria did whenever she so much had passed them by. She could live without them—but the others, she could not leave. And April, the only girl she held much promise for but yet might be proved wrong. April could go from Mother Helena’s favourite to least favourite very quickly if she slipped up even a little. Because to make it in the world, আপনি had to be perfect. Which proved very difficult as perfection was seemingly impossible nowadays.
The halls had cobwebs in the corners and stains on the once white now grey walls. The clinic was not homely, that was certain. It was not clean—that was even আরো obvious. But it was the best Mother Helena, a nun with a son, could do for the girls. There wasn’t a big budget when it came to broken girls with no hope for a future. Mother Helena created hope from the seemingly pointless task of turning their lives around.
April’s door was at the end of the hall, to the right. Opposite her was Gloria. If it weren’t for her, the mother superior may find the chance to visit আরো often. There had been no আরো মহাকাশ for April when she had first arrived—other than the damp, miserable wet room Mother Helena and Mr O’Brian had just abandoned.
Mother Helena knocked twice on the door before opening it easily—the girls could not lock their rooms from the inside. It could only been done from the outside, using one special key which fits all locks and which Mother Helena kept with her at all times.
She did have to keep an eye on Rosie, though. Others picked locks to unlock. She could pick locks to lock them. And the weird thing was she claimed she had no control over it—that one মিনিট she’s walking past a door, the পরবর্তি she’s walking away; no recollection of what she’s done. Mother Helena, however, refuses something like this could be done দ্বারা accident and so keeps Rosie locked up আরো than the others—with the exception of maybe Martha—until she confesses the truth.
অথবা what Mother Helena believes to be honesty.
April’s room is identical to the পূর্ববর্তি one, just minus the dripping roof and some of the bars on her window are cracked—still unbreakable, but cracked. April herself was sitting on her bed, legs crossed, facing the door. Mother Helena started when she saw her.
April ব্যক্ত simply, “I saw আপনি coming,” and pointed to a peephole in her door; something which is conveniently missing from the other girls’ doors. Anyone would have thought she had been somewhere. Her knees were dirty and her cheeks were flushed, her forehead damp with sweat. Seeing how Mother Helena was looking at her, April said, “I had a dream.” Mother Helena’s eyes moved to her knees and April covered, “I haven’t washed in ages. Gloria pops out whenever I try to leave.”
Mother Helena stepped aside to allow Mr O’Brian into the room. He quickly took in his new surroundings before looking at Mother Helena. It took her a moment to realise he was waiting for her to introduce them. “Oh, Mr O’Brian here works for the bank. This is April Mercer, the girl আপনি requested?”
Mr O’Brian nodded, but April looked at her superior. “Requested?” Her face brightened. “Am I being released?”
Mr O’Brian chuckled. “Not yet, as far as I know. Now tell me, what do আপনি remember of a বছর yesterday?”
And that made April’s whole body shiver as chills engulfed her.
She suddenly felt as if she were drowning.
And there was no escape.
She was back in the past, in her own terrifying flashback.
How the car had skidded on some ice and made a terrible screeching noise as her father had spun the steering wheel left and right, trying to gain control. How she had been thrown about in the back আসন after once again refusing to wear a seatbelt in the countryside. How rabbits had jumped from under our tyres and ran in all sorts of directions.
But the most frightening thing of all was the chill that had gone through her when she saw the ground just stop and she realised they were heading right for a cliff. It was a waterfall without water. Until আপনি hit the bottom.
The horror had almost destroyed her দ্বারা the time the car jumped off the cliff edge. She had almost died from terror before she had even hit the water. Before the water came in through the windows and engulfed her.
Holding her breath, her cheeks looking like a hamster’s, she shook both her parents. Her mother’s head was bleeding, turning the water around her red. She shared a long look with her father before he drifted off. Considering opening her mouth and letting water flow into her, destroy her, and end all things her, she clambered between her parents’ seats. They were both still, their arms slowly drifting upwards the way a dead person’s would.
Climbing over her father, her back grazing the roof of the car as the water threatened to claim her too; she slipped through the open window and found herself in open water.
Her mouth slipped open and bubbles emerged but she snapped it shut quickly and narrowed her eyes against the pulsating waves. She kicked her legs and circled her arms and kept repeating those motions. She was not an avid swimmer, but she knew the basics. She had never really liked it that much anyway, so she had only swum when she had so much needed to. Not that it had ever been forced upon her.
Then she felt air. Her nose was free and, a সেকেন্ড later, so was her mouth. She breathed in fresh air, her throat burning and gasping for আরো oxygen to weaken the pain she was in. Her muscles ached and she could almost hear her অস্থি creaking under her skin. The water kept threatening to pull her back in, to the deep, but she would not let it. It had claimed her father, claimed her mother… it would not claim her too. She would not allow herself to succumb to the beast that was the sea. She kept telling herself that in her head, You’re stronger. The best will not claim you.
She had no idea that the sea actually inhabited beasts.
The first clue was a slimy, wet feeling suddenly reaching her wrist and she was pulled below. She forced herself not to breathe through her mouth, only her nose, অথবা the monster would in fact win. Only when she looked down did she see the creature which was holding her, pulling her, forcing her downwards.
It was ugly. It had white skin which clung to its অস্থি and large, distorted hands. It had no fins অথবা webbed feet to assist in its swimming—it reminded her strangely of someone she had seen before, but could not remember where অথবা who—or what, for that matter. Its face was small but its head was big. Its facial features were all pushed into the centre of its face and all minute, as if scrunched up. The back of its head—presumably where its brain was—was a huge ball shape.
It was the most distorted creature she had ever seen.
It saw her looking and hissed, bearing strange fangs and its features shrinking even more, if she had thought possible. Shadows formed around its eyes and began growing to cover its whole face. In all the shock, she let out a breath and let the darkness overcome her.
She hadn’t actually realised she was revealing every detail to her superiors until she হারিয়ে গেছে the picture of her past and was back in her room. Both adults wore confused expressions but neither ব্যক্ত anything. There was a long silence until Mr O’Brian braved it and asked Mother Helena if she had known any of this. The nun shook her head, for she had never asked. Mr O’Brian then asked April, without looking her directly in the eyes, “Are আপনি telling us আপনি died?” His words were hesitant, for he wasn’t sure if he had understood the girl correctly himself.
April looked straight up at him and the softness and resilience in her big eyes gave him few options but to look at her. “Yes,” she assured him. “But then I came back to life.”
His eyebrows raised; an automatic impulse. He could not find the right words to reply to hers. He then stammered, “You were resurrected? অথবা reincarnated?”
April stared at him. “Are আপনি suggesting I switched bodies? Took someone else’s? This is my form, my life, my skin. Nobody else’s. I was always April Mercer. I was always me. And I still am; rest what the preachers think. But I don’t know if I brought myself back to life or… I don’t know.” She bit her lip, picked at a hangnail, and shuffled uncomfortably which made the beg creak.
Then she was back in her history, now on the rocks at the bottom of the cliff, choking and gasping and sprawled over stone. She was dripping wet and her own guess was that the tide had pushed her in, but there was পরবর্তি to no wind.
After lying, stiff and sore, on the rocks for several hours, she guessed, she pushed herself up. There was nothing around, and she did not expect there to be much either. It was not typical behaviour for a person to wander around the কূল at the bottom of a cliff where there was no easy way up.
There was a possible alternative, however, evidenced দ্বারা her snooping around the crevices when she was younger. Despite this advantage she held to a tourist, she still held inferiority when it came to the task in general. It had been several years since her last pinch of curiosity to see what lurked in the rock. She was out of practice and much less agile than she had been back then, when she was also smaller and had less of herself to manoeuvre around a steep cliff face.
The harder way—the only way—was to rock climb without a helmet, harness, অথবা anyone but yourself to be responsible for your possible death. অথবা rather, impending death, as it was sort of inevitable.
Only when she put a hand on a stone that was jutting out from the rest did she see it—a mark on her right arm. She turned it over and there, on the inside of her wrist, was some sort of tattoo though she had no recollection of ever getting one. She knew she didn’t have one. Except here it was, proving her wrong.
The black mark formed the shape of two letters: AJM. Her initials. If she had been older, she would have accused alcohol of playing with her mind অথবা reducing to a personal form of peer pressure like her dad always did. But she was only fourteen. She could not use that excuse legally. The letters on her arm looked almost ornate, in old school লেখা and looking literally 3D. It should have been impossible—but it clearly wasn’t.
She reached out to touch it, wondering if it would rub off. But it didn’t. It couldn’t. It was a real tattoo.
Then, without considering anything, she thought, Good thing my parents are dead অথবা they would kill me. Only a সেকেন্ড later she realised she had just wished—no, thanked—the death that had fallen upon them. It had just appeared in her mind. There had been no formation. It was just there, and then it wasn’t. As if it were fake.
But she knew it was. She would never think it herself, not consciously.
Out of the many things she let slide, it was the one thing which truly brought horror to her morals.
Once again she was in front of Mother Helena and Mr O’Brian. Her mother superior had moved to sit on the edge of her rickety বিছানা and awkwardly attempted to comfort her দ্বারা rubbing her arm. April herself was ashamed with the final part, how she had admitted it, repeated it, to such high persons who could hand her the freedom she dreamed for. She knew she had just blown her chances of ever getting out of her prison. She was trapped for eternity; it didn’t take a genius to figure that out. She knew because, well, she wasn’t a genius.
Mr O’Brian had not moved since she had continued. He was staring at her intently. “Was it a dream?” was all he had to say to tell April what he wanted.
Proof.
April held out her arm, the inside of her wrist facing upwards, and removed the wristband she wore. Under it, concealed, had been three letters: AJM. They were just the way she had described them.
“April Jade Mercer,” Mr O’Brian murmured.
This was Mother Helena.
Following her was a man, tall and thin. He, unlike her, had to stoop and managed to do so just in time. He moved with slightly jerky movements and had a bizarre-looking goatee. His hair was beginning to go grey but his skin was flawless. In his hands he held several papers.
The room itself was not in the best condition. The floorboards were creaking, the roof leaking, and the বিছানা lay unmade and damp in the centre of the room. The windows had bars on them and there was a single, lonesome chair in the corner which was almost falling apart. But it was the only place she could take him to talk privately. Everywhere else was crowded with mentally deranged girls.
“I realise my past indiscretions can never be forgotten. But my life before the convent was dull, only brightened দ্বারা my son. So I’m sure আপনি can see, I can’t give up on him. And if I must hand over my nun’s habit to keep him; then that I will.”
The man, business-like and proper, wore a confused expression. “Mother Helena,” he began, struggling to find the appropriate words. “What do আপনি think I called this meeting for?”
She replied immediately, “Billy.” She paused and then added, “I only assumed.”
The man nodded, considered, and shook his head. “The bank does not care for your son, Mother Helena. He is the least of our problems, if a worry at all. No, we are here to discuss… financial implications.” He shuffled the papers in his hands until he found the one he was looking for. “We believe that আপনি have an April Mercer in custody? May we enquire as to why?”
Mother Helena’s eyebrows arched in surprise. April had never been one to stand out and that was why she was one of the few Mother Helena remembered the name of. She always remembered the quiet ones, for always assumed they were quiet for a reason. And April was either quiet because she had nothing to say, অথবা she was too good at hiding what she was up to from her superiors. So Mother Helena had a lot of information regarding the girl.
“Yes…” she began, realising she had been quiet for at least ten seconds, and that was long in bank time. “Her parents died a বছর ago. She began seeing things, she wasn’t right, they said. She was mentally broken. Most of the girls here are, Mr…?”
“O’Brian,” the man told her, sounding fed up with her off-topic mind. “We are well aware of the tragedy which happened a বছর yesterday, Mother Helena. In fact, that is part of why we are here. Miss Mercer’s parents left her a large sum of money as her inheritance as well as some fine family heirlooms, no doubt. Would she be fit to… receive, I wonder?”
Mother Helena was flooded with surprise. “I had no idea,” she stammered in a flustered way. She was genuinely gobsmacked. “How large a sum?”
Mr O’Brian checked his sheet. “I’d say we’re talking about a good hundred thousand. Plus the merchandise, probably raise it into the millions. How old did আপনি say the girl was?”
“I didn’t. She’s fifteen. Sixteen in two months.”
He sounded shocked. “You really remember everything about every girl? I’d be impressed if not for your lack of প্রণয় when talking about them.”
Mother Helena seemed uncomfortable now the চুন light had been turned onto her devotion—or lack of it—to the girls. “I keep tabs on a few of them. The worst, the best… April is… well, she can seem suspicious. And she’s either good at hiding things অথবা has nothing to hide. Which makes my decision to release her all the আরো difficult.”
“You do not care, then? আপনি do not remember them just because আপনি want to help them? আপনি remember them to make it easier for you,” he concluded.
Mother Helena was flooded with fury at this remark. Yes, she maybe did not care for her girls. But she would not be able to cope without them. Despite saying she would leave them all—and her own life—for her son, that was a lie. The girls gave her purpose. Without them, why was she even here?
Mr O’Brian coughed uncomfortably. “I apologise. Maybe before I leave I could have a word with April Mercer? I would প্রণয় to meet her and make the decision on my own or, at least, প্রতিবেদন something useful back to my superiors.”
Mother Helena was just glad to have the topic of her devotion lifted. She would be happy to see April—at least she didn’t physically attack her like Martha অথবা Gloria did whenever she so much had passed them by. She could live without them—but the others, she could not leave. And April, the only girl she held much promise for but yet might be proved wrong. April could go from Mother Helena’s favourite to least favourite very quickly if she slipped up even a little. Because to make it in the world, আপনি had to be perfect. Which proved very difficult as perfection was seemingly impossible nowadays.
The halls had cobwebs in the corners and stains on the once white now grey walls. The clinic was not homely, that was certain. It was not clean—that was even আরো obvious. But it was the best Mother Helena, a nun with a son, could do for the girls. There wasn’t a big budget when it came to broken girls with no hope for a future. Mother Helena created hope from the seemingly pointless task of turning their lives around.
April’s door was at the end of the hall, to the right. Opposite her was Gloria. If it weren’t for her, the mother superior may find the chance to visit আরো often. There had been no আরো মহাকাশ for April when she had first arrived—other than the damp, miserable wet room Mother Helena and Mr O’Brian had just abandoned.
Mother Helena knocked twice on the door before opening it easily—the girls could not lock their rooms from the inside. It could only been done from the outside, using one special key which fits all locks and which Mother Helena kept with her at all times.
She did have to keep an eye on Rosie, though. Others picked locks to unlock. She could pick locks to lock them. And the weird thing was she claimed she had no control over it—that one মিনিট she’s walking past a door, the পরবর্তি she’s walking away; no recollection of what she’s done. Mother Helena, however, refuses something like this could be done দ্বারা accident and so keeps Rosie locked up আরো than the others—with the exception of maybe Martha—until she confesses the truth.
অথবা what Mother Helena believes to be honesty.
April’s room is identical to the পূর্ববর্তি one, just minus the dripping roof and some of the bars on her window are cracked—still unbreakable, but cracked. April herself was sitting on her bed, legs crossed, facing the door. Mother Helena started when she saw her.
April ব্যক্ত simply, “I saw আপনি coming,” and pointed to a peephole in her door; something which is conveniently missing from the other girls’ doors. Anyone would have thought she had been somewhere. Her knees were dirty and her cheeks were flushed, her forehead damp with sweat. Seeing how Mother Helena was looking at her, April said, “I had a dream.” Mother Helena’s eyes moved to her knees and April covered, “I haven’t washed in ages. Gloria pops out whenever I try to leave.”
Mother Helena stepped aside to allow Mr O’Brian into the room. He quickly took in his new surroundings before looking at Mother Helena. It took her a moment to realise he was waiting for her to introduce them. “Oh, Mr O’Brian here works for the bank. This is April Mercer, the girl আপনি requested?”
Mr O’Brian nodded, but April looked at her superior. “Requested?” Her face brightened. “Am I being released?”
Mr O’Brian chuckled. “Not yet, as far as I know. Now tell me, what do আপনি remember of a বছর yesterday?”
And that made April’s whole body shiver as chills engulfed her.
She suddenly felt as if she were drowning.
And there was no escape.
She was back in the past, in her own terrifying flashback.
How the car had skidded on some ice and made a terrible screeching noise as her father had spun the steering wheel left and right, trying to gain control. How she had been thrown about in the back আসন after once again refusing to wear a seatbelt in the countryside. How rabbits had jumped from under our tyres and ran in all sorts of directions.
But the most frightening thing of all was the chill that had gone through her when she saw the ground just stop and she realised they were heading right for a cliff. It was a waterfall without water. Until আপনি hit the bottom.
The horror had almost destroyed her দ্বারা the time the car jumped off the cliff edge. She had almost died from terror before she had even hit the water. Before the water came in through the windows and engulfed her.
Holding her breath, her cheeks looking like a hamster’s, she shook both her parents. Her mother’s head was bleeding, turning the water around her red. She shared a long look with her father before he drifted off. Considering opening her mouth and letting water flow into her, destroy her, and end all things her, she clambered between her parents’ seats. They were both still, their arms slowly drifting upwards the way a dead person’s would.
Climbing over her father, her back grazing the roof of the car as the water threatened to claim her too; she slipped through the open window and found herself in open water.
Her mouth slipped open and bubbles emerged but she snapped it shut quickly and narrowed her eyes against the pulsating waves. She kicked her legs and circled her arms and kept repeating those motions. She was not an avid swimmer, but she knew the basics. She had never really liked it that much anyway, so she had only swum when she had so much needed to. Not that it had ever been forced upon her.
Then she felt air. Her nose was free and, a সেকেন্ড later, so was her mouth. She breathed in fresh air, her throat burning and gasping for আরো oxygen to weaken the pain she was in. Her muscles ached and she could almost hear her অস্থি creaking under her skin. The water kept threatening to pull her back in, to the deep, but she would not let it. It had claimed her father, claimed her mother… it would not claim her too. She would not allow herself to succumb to the beast that was the sea. She kept telling herself that in her head, You’re stronger. The best will not claim you.
She had no idea that the sea actually inhabited beasts.
The first clue was a slimy, wet feeling suddenly reaching her wrist and she was pulled below. She forced herself not to breathe through her mouth, only her nose, অথবা the monster would in fact win. Only when she looked down did she see the creature which was holding her, pulling her, forcing her downwards.
It was ugly. It had white skin which clung to its অস্থি and large, distorted hands. It had no fins অথবা webbed feet to assist in its swimming—it reminded her strangely of someone she had seen before, but could not remember where অথবা who—or what, for that matter. Its face was small but its head was big. Its facial features were all pushed into the centre of its face and all minute, as if scrunched up. The back of its head—presumably where its brain was—was a huge ball shape.
It was the most distorted creature she had ever seen.
It saw her looking and hissed, bearing strange fangs and its features shrinking even more, if she had thought possible. Shadows formed around its eyes and began growing to cover its whole face. In all the shock, she let out a breath and let the darkness overcome her.
She hadn’t actually realised she was revealing every detail to her superiors until she হারিয়ে গেছে the picture of her past and was back in her room. Both adults wore confused expressions but neither ব্যক্ত anything. There was a long silence until Mr O’Brian braved it and asked Mother Helena if she had known any of this. The nun shook her head, for she had never asked. Mr O’Brian then asked April, without looking her directly in the eyes, “Are আপনি telling us আপনি died?” His words were hesitant, for he wasn’t sure if he had understood the girl correctly himself.
April looked straight up at him and the softness and resilience in her big eyes gave him few options but to look at her. “Yes,” she assured him. “But then I came back to life.”
His eyebrows raised; an automatic impulse. He could not find the right words to reply to hers. He then stammered, “You were resurrected? অথবা reincarnated?”
April stared at him. “Are আপনি suggesting I switched bodies? Took someone else’s? This is my form, my life, my skin. Nobody else’s. I was always April Mercer. I was always me. And I still am; rest what the preachers think. But I don’t know if I brought myself back to life or… I don’t know.” She bit her lip, picked at a hangnail, and shuffled uncomfortably which made the beg creak.
Then she was back in her history, now on the rocks at the bottom of the cliff, choking and gasping and sprawled over stone. She was dripping wet and her own guess was that the tide had pushed her in, but there was পরবর্তি to no wind.
After lying, stiff and sore, on the rocks for several hours, she guessed, she pushed herself up. There was nothing around, and she did not expect there to be much either. It was not typical behaviour for a person to wander around the কূল at the bottom of a cliff where there was no easy way up.
There was a possible alternative, however, evidenced দ্বারা her snooping around the crevices when she was younger. Despite this advantage she held to a tourist, she still held inferiority when it came to the task in general. It had been several years since her last pinch of curiosity to see what lurked in the rock. She was out of practice and much less agile than she had been back then, when she was also smaller and had less of herself to manoeuvre around a steep cliff face.
The harder way—the only way—was to rock climb without a helmet, harness, অথবা anyone but yourself to be responsible for your possible death. অথবা rather, impending death, as it was sort of inevitable.
Only when she put a hand on a stone that was jutting out from the rest did she see it—a mark on her right arm. She turned it over and there, on the inside of her wrist, was some sort of tattoo though she had no recollection of ever getting one. She knew she didn’t have one. Except here it was, proving her wrong.
The black mark formed the shape of two letters: AJM. Her initials. If she had been older, she would have accused alcohol of playing with her mind অথবা reducing to a personal form of peer pressure like her dad always did. But she was only fourteen. She could not use that excuse legally. The letters on her arm looked almost ornate, in old school লেখা and looking literally 3D. It should have been impossible—but it clearly wasn’t.
She reached out to touch it, wondering if it would rub off. But it didn’t. It couldn’t. It was a real tattoo.
Then, without considering anything, she thought, Good thing my parents are dead অথবা they would kill me. Only a সেকেন্ড later she realised she had just wished—no, thanked—the death that had fallen upon them. It had just appeared in her mind. There had been no formation. It was just there, and then it wasn’t. As if it were fake.
But she knew it was. She would never think it herself, not consciously.
Out of the many things she let slide, it was the one thing which truly brought horror to her morals.
Once again she was in front of Mother Helena and Mr O’Brian. Her mother superior had moved to sit on the edge of her rickety বিছানা and awkwardly attempted to comfort her দ্বারা rubbing her arm. April herself was ashamed with the final part, how she had admitted it, repeated it, to such high persons who could hand her the freedom she dreamed for. She knew she had just blown her chances of ever getting out of her prison. She was trapped for eternity; it didn’t take a genius to figure that out. She knew because, well, she wasn’t a genius.
Mr O’Brian had not moved since she had continued. He was staring at her intently. “Was it a dream?” was all he had to say to tell April what he wanted.
Proof.
April held out her arm, the inside of her wrist facing upwards, and removed the wristband she wore. Under it, concealed, had been three letters: AJM. They were just the way she had described them.
“April Jade Mercer,” Mr O’Brian murmured.
