“Your forever? You think someone like you will get a happily ever after? You think you won? I always knew you were a fool.”

My heart dropped into my stomach as I opened my eyes. I was in the kitchen, my old, childhood kitchen, staring at my father sitting at the table reading the newspaper—my dead father. “You shouldn’t be here,” I told him, but even as I said it, I knew I was wrong. Of course, he should be here. This was his house. I was the one out of place here, always out of place.

Dad smirked and shook his head. Setting his newspaper down on the table, he gave me a hard stare. I shivered, my heart racing; I knew that look, knew it very well. “I shouldn’t be here? And tell me…son…who should be here? How about Denny? That hardworking, good-hearted boy who we took into our care, took into our home. The boy you callously stabbed in the back. Because you wanted something that was never yours.” His gaze scanned me, contempt and disgust evident in his cold, gray eyes. “You’re so selfish…just looking at you sickens me.”

“I’m sorry.” The words instantly slipped from my mouth, unbidden. Like I was freezing, my shivers increased to visible shaking. How could he still do this to me, after all this time?

As I stood there, waiting for my father to approach me—to reprimand me—I was suddenly smacked in the back of the head with a hard, wooden spoon. A burst of pain shot down my spine, making me gasp. I snapped my eyes to the side, where my mother stood, glaring at me. How stupid of me to forget that my father wasn’t the only threat here.

“I can’t believe what you did to that boy. Your best friend…I always knew you never really cared about him.”

My eyes watered as the venom in her words seeped into my bones. I almost wished she’d hit me again instead of talk. Physical pain didn’t cut as deeply as words. “No…I do care. I didn’t mean for any of that to happen. Denny meant everything to me…he still does.”

A tear rolled down my cheek, and my mother’s pale blue eyes grew colder as she tracked its movement. “He means nothing to you. You used him to take what you wanted, because you’re a monster…just like the beast who created you.”

I violently shook my head. “That’s not true…” Or maybe it was. Maybe it was the only truth I had. Maybe she was right…maybe I was a monster. Denny would probably agree.

While my denial died on my lips, I heard Dad’s chair screeching in protest against the floor. “Are you talking back to your mother? Do I need to remind you whose house this is?”