A week passes before the police stop hording the Burnsby house every morning, and another week passes before the yellow tape warning not to trespass are completely removed, leaving the tudor house bare and exposed once more. But the house doesn't look the same, at least not to me. It still stands like a landmark of Paradise, big, pearly white and luminous, but it has no identity. There isn't a dog barking on the front lawn or whimpering for an escape in the back, the windows don't light up at night like a bright invitation to the dinner waiting inside, and there isn't an Escalade parked in the gravel driveway, Mrs. Burnsby unloading groceries from the trunk and heaving them inside all by herself.

The Burnsby house is hauntingly empty, the Orc long gone to live with a relative, and it simply sits, staring poignantly over 87th street until the day of the funeral, well, funerals to be exact because Mr. and Mrs. Burnsby were having separate farewells on the same exact day.

Except no one planned to say goodbye to Mrs. Burnsby. Just her husband, whose family demanded he have a ceremony in the very house the Burnsby's American Dream had been centered around. The very house in which Mrs. Burnsby wrote a letter informing everyone that the umbrella she used to shield herself from the rain had been ripped to shreds by mighty, grey winds. And she was suddenly soaking wet and shivering from the colds of the sky, her only wish to get warm. The very house in which Mrs. Burnsby grabbed her husband's shotgun and whisked them both away to wherever souls go once they leave Paradise.

If they leave.

The funeral location was announced the day before and I lied wide awake that night. Not because The Wolf's deafening, soul-curdling howls could be heard even from the den but because the thought of entering the Burnsby's perfect utopia of a home was terrifying. That night, I dreamed of walking through the tudor house just across the street and seeing Mrs. Burnsby's ghostly form in every corner, every hall, every window.

She didn't say anything in the dream. She just stood there with a haunting smirk on her face, the smirk she wore when she was tending to the Burnsby's lawn, listening in on the daily drama of 87th street with intrigue masked by innocent loitering.

She didn't have to say anything, however. Because her very presence mirrored exactly what was in the bullets that loaded The Wolf's gun, what was in the uncertainty that embodied my trembling trigger finger, what was stopping me directly in my tracks; the very thought of not dying.

Of not dying and drifting up to the clouds where something called Heaven lay, or Hell, or just somewhere that wasn't here. That wasn't Paradise.

She was a ghost and I don't want to be a ghost.

That would mean I'd be stuck here in Paradise, in the beautiful, teal house on 87th street, in The Wolf's den forever.

On the day of the funerals, there is a black carpet rolled out on the smooth, marble steps of the Burnsby's house like a luring enticement to death itself. It winds through the intricately decorated living room to the front of the fireplace where Mr. Burnsby's casket is placed.

Which is sealed shut.

The Wolf makes me wear a suit, one of the expensive ones from TJ Maxx that he'd neglected bills just to hang in his closet, only to be worn for First Sundays and the occasional dates. The suit is a dark grey and embellished with a lined pattern that resembles notebook paper and while everyone fawned over how fitting it was on The Wolf's modest build, the suit feels like heavy, slippery cream on me. It doesn't fit and I keep tripping over the trousers as we pass the arched doorway.

The Wolf is in no hurry to sit, canine teeth hidden behind a pearly white smile as he greets the same faces that speckled Paradise; Ms. Gordon who makes a show of sniffling and dabbing at her dry eyes with a handkerchief, Mr. Tanner who can only glare at me over the shoulder of The Wolf as he speaks, and a few of the choir members who all express glumly how they're disappointed the funeral doesn't require any singing.

I get tired of holding Mr. Tanner's glare-down so I inch away until I find a seat to sit on.

I've never actually been inside of the Burnsby's house. Not even when the Orc was just Miles and spent his middle school days playing pool and complaining about bullies (his soon-to-be buddies) in The Wolf's den. Miles didn't like his parents.

"All my Mom does is talk shit and goes out of her way to make sure she never has to back it up,' he'd said between sips of Coke. "And my Dad? Pft, his life is in his law firm and World of Warcraft. Might as well not even have parents - oh, shit, sorry, Lucky. You know what I mean."

According to Miles, the Burnsbys weren't anyone worth knowing and thus, there was no point in coming over. But now as everyone ignores my existence, I study the broad living room with its large, stone fireplace, comfy, beige couches, sturdy, leather chairs to decorate large, towering windows and a bookshelf adorned with memories that everyone in Paradise could probably relate to somehow.

Everyone but me, of course.

There's a picture of the Burnsbys posing in a canoe on Lake Tahoe, the Orc and the local high school's football team with a golden trophy, and Mrs and Mr. Burnsby's wedding picture. I have to turn the wedding picture upright because someone had placed it face down.

I remember what the Orc had said about the letter his mother wrote. That she was so unhappy that even breathing hurt and I tried to find it in the wedding picture, tried to search her face for the monsters that must have made their domain inside. Because surely, she had to have been like me. She must have felt stuck, stuck in a deep pond that only looked shallow from the ground up. She must have been drowning, hands reaching for tendrils of air that wouldn't do a thing to pull her out and she knew it.

Then she must have decided that it was better to just drown.

Like I had decided back on the beach.

I wonder if she had a hard time pulling the trigger too.

"Excuse me!" Someone shouts hoarsely and I turn around to see a stony faced man in a flannel and jeans glowering at me profusely. He rips the picture out of my hands and places it face down on the bookshelf again. " This isn't a museum, this is a funeral. Have some respect." He spits in my face before stalking off.

I try to shove my hands in my pockets but then I remember The Wolf's suit doesn't have any.

The funeral drones along, like a lackluster routine of sniffling and repeated phrases to the sky above. Nearly every resident of Paradise says a few words, even some of the kids interning at his law firm. Ms. Gordon enthuses over Mr, Burnsby's intelligence and then dabs at her dry eyes before saying, "I can't," and running out of the room, Mr. Tanner recalls the games of golf they used to play at the country club, and The Wolf makes a show of singing a song that he "knew Richard Burnsby would have loved."

It is The Wolf that steals the show with his soft, melodic soprano voice that twirls through ears and embellishes the somber tudor house. He grins as he sings, blue eyes crinkling into bittersweet slits, and white teeth glimmering like bouncing reflections on blue lakes. A lone tear trickles down his face on the last note and inside of that salty tear, I could see him; the ravenous beast, dormant and sick with hunger.

However, the ravenous beast is quickly whisked away by a grieving whimper and someone puts their arms around his shoulders and guides him back to his seat.

No one else volunteers to say anything else, not even the Orc.

But he hadn't shown up anyway, although people wondered of course.

"Poor boy, I heard he's living with his uncle in Carson now, he's been too distraught to even get out of bed," Ms. Gordon informs The Wolf between rehearsed sniffles. She sits right beside him when one of the choir members helps The Wolf get back to his seat, her eyes dancing with the want for a waltz with fire. "I pity that boy. Football scholarship, impeccable talent, good looks, and now his entire life has been thrown upside down all because his mother decided to be selfish."

"You think Elizabeth was selfish?" The Wolf asks, the lone tear on his cheek has all but disappeared. He turns so that he and Ms. Gordon's shoulders are touching.

I feel something making its ascension, something irate, something doleful that makes its domain right on my chest. It's not the monsters but it rises and rises and rises...

Ms. Gordon tsks. "Not only did she decide she was going to take a mother from a son but she decided she'd take a father away too. If that's not selfish, I don't know what is."

"Well, Mary said she was diagnosed with Bipolar from the church counselor a couple of weeks ago-" The Wolf tries, but there is an impassive tone to his angelic voice. He doesn't care.

That something rises and rises and I let the sleeves of The Wolf's suit swallow my hands.

Ms. Gordon interrupts him. "That's not the point. The point is she killed herself and decided to drag Richard down with her. She's a murderer and that's why there isn't anyone at that grave of hers right now. "

"Well, can't argue with that, I suppose." The Wolf says after a moment's hesitation.

That something rises and rises and just when I think my chest is about to combust, it rises until it spews from my mouth in the form of vexed syllables. Syllables that make up words, words that mean something, words that get me in trouble, words that make The Wolf angry, words that make me the Foster scum lucky to be taken in, words that reaffirm the otherness I am. The otherness that sticks out in the field of sunflowers that graced the plains of Paradise.

"She's not a murderer, you're just an ignorant, sheltered  housewife that doesn't want to understand." I state and keep my eyes on the casket in the middle of the living room. For a moment, I could see Mrs. Burnsby floating past it.

Ms. Gordon gasps but doesn't address me, turning to The Wolf instead as she says his name.

His claws are suddenly digging into my shoulder. "Lucky, apologize to Ms. Gordon, that was very rude of you."

"I have nothing to apologize for."

He leans closer to me. Despite someone still sharing their loving experiences with the deceased, heads start to turn in our direction.

"Lucky, apologize. For me."

'For me,' he says. But I've already sacrificed the mechanism that makes up my voice. I turn away from him and pretend to be engrossed in the speaker. His touch doesn't set my skin on fire, his heavy, creamy TJ Maxx suit is protecting me.

Ms. Gordon rests a hand on The Wolf's shoulder. "I am so sorry you have to deal with that."

Someone behind us pokes his head into our space and points a jeering finger at me. "Hey, kids like that? They're a shoe-in for military school. I know one in East Hampton that really sets them straight."

"I know but I couldn't do that," The Wolf says ever so softly, his hand slides down my arm but he cannot get a hold of my wrists. They're hidden inside the suit sleeves. "He deserves a loving home and I want to give him that, you know? He's never experienced a real family before. Sending him back into the system again will rob him of that."

"Oh, the system? He's a foster child? Well, that explains it."

I feel myself stand before I even decide to. I could see myself turning to Ms. Gordon but not actually doing so. And I could hear myself sucking in a breath, to say something, before I even realized what I was going to say.

"She had a suicide note, you know," I spat mechanically. Ms. Gordon recoils in her seat and blinks. "She said life was so hard she couldn't breathe. Not everything is rainbows and fucking minivans, sometimes life sucks and sometimes our minds are eating us alive. She found a way out and maybe she didn't do it the right way but that was her escape. And if you don't understand that, if that's too deep for you, then shut the fuck up."

I don't actually realize I've said anything until it is out there, hanging in the air like hands holding on to the edge of a cliff.

The poor intern who'd been sobbing over Mr. Burnsby fell silent, the entire funeral having come to a startling halt...because of me.

Their eyes are like holes, the eyes belonging to the people nestled in the wooden dining chairs of the tudor house. Their eyes are like depthless holes that lead down winding, dark paths, paths that twisted and turned until they lead right back to where I never wanted to be. At the center of my mind.

The monsters dance and twirl out of the group of eyes watching me disdainfully. They sing and jeer as they make an ongoing circle around my head, scratching, screaming, howling, tearing.

I'm fair game now. My sketchbook is missing, my happy pills suck, and all I have is a sword to rescue me.

But I can't duel in front of watching eyes, that would be my demise.

I can only crumble.

I can feel myself crumbling, crumbling into every moment, every touch, every burning shower, every pull of the trigger, every scream, every cry. I crumble into my bed, crumble into the Wolf's lullaby that had replaced the one I couldn't remember, crumble into the sun girl conjured from manic haze, crumble into the Orc's fists, crumble into the words adorning Jack Reynold's card, crumble into the casket where Mr. Burnsby rests.

I crumble, I'm crumbling, until I am crumbling into my feet.

I crumble into my feet that drag themselves to the bookshelf of the Burnsby's tudor house.

Everyone is watching as I mechanically stop near the bookshelf once more and place the Burnsby's wedding photo upright again.

Then I walk out.

I don't run, I just walk. The monsters are pursuing me and if I run, they'll grow even more ravenous and hungry. I just need to make it to the beautiful, teal house, to the sword hidden in the bathroom medicine cabinet.

I only make it to the porch, however, before I break out running.

I start to run because when my eyes observe the beautiful, teal house across the street they collide with two identical pairs of heterochromia eyes in one of the windows. They belong to Lucky Grant who stares solemnly at me as I breathe in the polluted, suburban air.

And I realize he is finally dead, a ghost. He is a ghost just like Mrs. Burnsby and yet he still lingers in the Wolf's den, the very place he'd wanted to escape.

So I hold in a strangled scream and run.

I was suddenly being swallowed whole by a shallow grave of pins and needles, a thought bearing down on me like persistent debris ready to bury me in the one overwhelming question I prayed was rash.


If death isn't real, then how do you escape?


Or was there even an escape at all?

-----------------------------------------------------------

I make it inside the teal house, creep cautiously around the suburban fortress and tiptoe up the stairs but the boy I'd saw in the window is long gone.

However, the monsters are still following me, quiet, calculating, anticipating. They're much nicer this time, giving me enough time to lock myself in the bathroom, open the medicine cabinet, and unsheathe my sword.

They taunt me, circling me like a hunter zeroing in on its prey. I am their unwilling warrior, fighting with faintly drawn sketches was easier than swinging a sword that was so small but yet so heavy, weighing down on my wrists with each swing, each slash, each cut. But they like me reluctant.

One lunges for me abruptly and I swing, cut, and slash.

Then another slithers towards where it hurts and although I kill him, I still feel it. Still feel where fangs embed in my skin, leaving lines and lines of words, people, and days.

This is always the catch. Even if I win, I'm still wounded.

Two catch on to the hem of my trousers, crawling up my legs and I swing, cut, and slash again. Except I am far too messy this time, their blood sleeps on to the floor, staining the grey tiles.

I set down my sword and grab for the roll of toilet paper, yanking it off its handle. The monsters do not lunge for me anymore as I fall to my knees and start to clean, simply watching me from their many perches in the crammy bathroom with beady, white eyes. For a moment, I pretend I don't know why they're so calm. Even though I can hear the heavy footsteps and creaking floorboards as someone makes their ascension up the stairs.

I am not theirs to ruin. At least not today.

I stand up and dab at the wounds before opening the medicine cabinet again and hiding my sword once more.

And just as I let the mirror slip from my fingers, slamming shut with a comforting thud, The Wolf storms into the bathroom.

The monsters disappear.

Paradise is The Wolf's forest and I am the rabbit constantly caught between his canine teeth.

"What the hell was that back there?" He snarls, no longer the charming man who'd shed a tear at Mr. Burnsby's funeral. The Wolf has transformed to his true form, tie undone and white dress shirt wrinkled. His glasses have slid down to the bridge of his nose and he whips them off as his face contorts into a growling sneer.

He takes a menacing step closer.

The Rabbit freezes.

"You wanna explain to me why you did that? Why you spoke out of turn?" He barks and holds out his arms as if to ask another question. "What's going on, Lucky? Why are you acting like this? Haven't I done everything for you? I took you in, gave you a home, took care of you. Why are you doing this to me?"

The Rabbit doesn't move. He just stares at the tile floor, deciphering the new tone that had been uttered from The Wolf's lips. A tone that only spun across stages, performing, twirling, singing for every soul that happened to watch. The Rabbit is confused, drowning in all the deciphering, all the puzzlement. But he still remembers to hide his bloody wrist.

"Are you going to explain yourself?" The Wolf asks and then he takes a step forward.

The Rabbit stiffens, shuts his eyes, and waits to be devoured. He waits to be stabbed by the clutches of The Wolf and dragged down to the den. Because that is the inevitable, an unwavering building made of brick and stone that stands tall over tsunamis and earthquakes.

Yet instead of digging his canine teeth into the Rabbit's neck, The Wolf takes a step forward and snatches his bloody hand. My bloody hand, causing goosebumps to spring on my skin and shimmer their way up my forearms but not from the inevitable, not from The Wolf's den waiting below, but from the cold kissing my wounds. The wounds only the Orc had seen when he was just Miles, the wounds that hid under sleeves, the wounds that the monsters had inflicted and danced over for their spontaneous rituals.

And now The Wolf knows the Rabbit is injured.

The Rabbit closes his eyes - I close my eyes and wait. I try to fight the tears but they come anyway and I focus on my hatred for them as The Wolf inspects the marks the monsters had left in their wake.

Then he sighs and pulls me close - no, the Rabbit close.

He pulls the Rabbit close and although the hug feels warm, the Rabbit feels piercingly cold.

"You keep making things hard for yourself," The Wolf chides, rubbing circles in the Rabbit's back, preparing the feeble hare for slaughter. "It doesn't have to be like this, Lucky. It doesn't have to hurt all the time. Aren't you tired of hurting?"

The Rabbit is supposed to answer, I'm supposed to answer. But I can't come back, I am in a dark corner of Paradise where light never breathes and darkness falls like a blanket over my head. I don't come out from under it.

The Rabbit stays silent.

The Wolf holds the Rabbit's face in his hands, dark eyes glimmering. "I love you, Lucky. I care about you and I always will. And something is bothering you - something has been bothering you for a very long time, you are hurting, and you can tell me, okay? I hate seeing you like this."

His voice travels to my dark corner, creeping up my shoulder and whispering in my ears. 

I cover my ears and bow my head.

So the Rabbit stays silent.

The Wolf's eyes narrow and he pulls the Rabbit close once more, regret adorning his terrifying snarls. "But that's not excuse for you to slander Ms. Gordon.  I'm sorry, Lucky, but you have to be punished."

'Punished,' I hear the monster cry from brightly lit corners as they parade towards me. They are smug as they slither around me, the word slipping into my head until it is jumbling up my thoughts and throwing them into a midnight sky, letting them blend with the stars so that I am left with the word, 'punished.' 

It's time to come back.

The Wolf begins to lure the lifeless Rabbit and I wait to be sucked out of my corner, wait for the monsters to drag me by my arms and legs back to the den, their ravenous laughter ricocheting off the smoky wooden walls.

However, the monsters never come, the Rabbit firm in The Wolf's clutches. 

The monsters enjoy watching me sit and so they pull me further under the dark blanket until I am no longer being, I am struggling, pulling, crying. Except they cover my mouth so that The Wolf cannot hear a single word, so that no one can.

It is the Rabbit that is lead down to the den, having offered himself to hang from the sharp ends of The Wolf's fangs.

It is the Rabbit that dies for the seventh time, that imagines the Leo Carillo beach, imagines loading the gun and pulling the trigger.

But it is me who  crawls out of the den , the Rabbit still caught in the snare, and packs a bag. 

I had promised I wouldn't do this; pack a bag, walk out of the beautiful, teal house and run. But the Rabbit was still inside the den and Lucky was a zombie, haunting the shuttered windows of the house on 87th street.

And I?

Maybe I am tired of hurting, maybe there is something wrong, maybe I didn't want to end up like Mrs. Burnsby still haunting her tudor house.

I am still struggling in my dark corner, the monsters pulling me further and further under until I am suffocating but I don't scream. I don't cry. I don't panic, even if there was a glint of a chance I wouldn't come back up.

I just pack a bag, The Wolf's howls in the distance, and start to run.

Maybe if there are three of me, one of us can leave.  

xxx

Just out of curiosity, is the ambiguity in this book confusing to understand? Because I felt like it might have been in this chapter.  If it was, please let me know! Thank you to all who reads!

P.S. the next few chapters are a spark of hope *sighs*