I could never discern what I was to Celeste. I wasn’t sure if she even saw me as human, as animal, as bug. Which made little sense because we were always told – by everyone – how alike we looked. In the mirror I saw her black-brown eyes under glasses, her blonde shock of hair. I hated it. I wanted to pluck out each hair that reminded me of her. I wanted to scrape away at my skin to the bone, till it could grow back new.

But even now, feeling my body hum beneath me, I know, deep down, that no amount of dyeing or peeling or scraping will ever separate me from her. It’s just DNA. She’s family.

What do you do when these people you’ve been designated to have in your life are the worst thing that’s ever happened to you? I suppose you hope they go missing.

I pinch myself for the thought but it happened, so there’s no point in backtracking now.

I kept a secret part of me that not even she could touch. It was small, and quiet, and I only brought it out in places I knew were safe – three in the morning under the covers, when she was out with her friends, when the house was quiet and still. But it isn’t enough to have the option, to know it’s there, to have the assurance that that part of you will always be there when you want to return to it – because it won’t. Nothing will always be there. Parts unused will grow weak and shrivel and die. They will be unrecognizable and you’ll try to fish them out and you’ll realize you can’t even feel them any more when you dive into the murky waters and reach for them. Those muscles of selfdom, of personhood wither away if neglected.

And I’m angry now, mostly. Most things make me angry. Most people. I find it hard to make friends. Maybe I’m cruel sometimes. I don’t intend to be.

But we all try to hurt people on purpose at some point or another. Sometimes it’s revenge. Sometimes it’s petty cruelty, dangling tadpoles between our fingers because we haven’t learned the value of life, and everything that breathes exists for us.

Some never learn the value of life, except their own.

I don’t want to be this way but I will if I have to.

But it occurs to me – all the Seasonals know about the investigation. Word’s got around now. Someone could find out about the podcast. All it would take is one person saying the wrong thing and this would all fall apart. I should have been more careful. But how did people even find out about it in the first place?