Meaning the corrections officers had been more concerned with their own safety, even as my sister’s blood had been slowly dripping from her shredded thighs into her mattress.

Another five minutes, according to the superintendent, and Shana probably would have bled out. I couldn’t tell if Superintendent McKinnon was proud of her officers’ timely intervention, or regretful. When it came to my sister, nothing was ever simple.

Shana had fashioned a shank from a travel-size toothbrush. Very small, very sharp. Not the best weapon for harming others. But, in the dark of the night, perfect for etching multiple grooves into the inside of each of her thighs. I would’ve liked to have said I was surprised, but this made her fourth suicide attempt. They had all involved self-cutting, just as all of Shana’s acts of violence had featured various homemade blades. I’d asked her once if she was really trying to die. She’d shrugged. Said it wasn’t a matter of wanting to die, as much as simply needing to cut something. Given that she was confined to solitary, sometimes a girl had to make do. . . .

Shana was drugged now. Stitched up, doped up and slowly filling up with donated blood and fresh fluids. Soon enough, they’d have her back to her cell, caged twenty-three hours a day like a feral animal, but now we got to share a moment. When, thanks to the weakening effects of painkillers and blood loss, my sister was actually talking about our family. My job was to stand there silently and take mental notes.

“Harry used to cut you?” I asked now, referring to our shared birth father, keeping my tone deliberately casual.

“Blood is love, love is blood,” she intoned now. “Daddy loved me.”

“So that’s what this is?” I gestured to her bandaged thighs. “Self-love?”

My drugged sister giggled. “Asking me if I got off?”

“Did you?”

“You can feel it. The skin bursting open, like overripe fruit. Then the blood releasing. Feels good. But then, you should know that.”

“I don’t feel pain, remember?”

“But it’s not pain, little sis. Oh no, it’s anything but.”

“According to our father.”

“You’re jealous. You don’t remember him.”

“You were four. I don’t believe you remember him.”

“But I do. I do and you don’t, which is why you hate me. Because Daddy loved me best.”