“I get it now,” she said. “How you’re disgusted by me, how you feel betrayed, the hate, the pain. Crystal clear now. I felt it, realized what it was and that it was all real, and I pulled my hand away like it was a hot stove. I did use my power, but it was like pulling my hand off a hot stove. Pushing you away, into unconsciousness, while I pulled back.”

My skin crawled.

She sounded mournful, subdued. Her hands clutched one another in her lap. The imp Dot had climbed out of her hair and had a lock of Amy’s hair in her teeth. Her tail swished as she glared at me.

“Amelia,” I said. I properly lifted my head.

“I guess you’re going to call me that. Okay. What?”

“Those feelings are mine. You’re not supposed to read me like a fucking book and ‘get it’. You’re supposed to read my fucking lips and hear the fucking words I’m saying and believe me.”

“Okay.”

“Then fuck off and die somewhere.”

“I do get it,” she said, instead of following the instructions. “The anger. I definitely felt that. The hate.”

“I’ve been working on that,” I said.

She nodded, shoulders relaxing a hair. “I’m glad. For your sake I mean.”

“Cultivating it, channeling it. Stoking that fire a bit whenever there’s a good excuse.”

I saw her face fall, and it hadn’t been ‘up’ in any way. Just… not guarded.

I went on, “The anger, it hurts others, you know. It drove me to maim or thrash Nazis and people who’d try to coerce fifteen-year-olds into prostitution. Scum of the earth. But there’s too much risk. Too much collateral damage.”

“You don’t have me to clean up the mess.”

I shrugged. “Hurts too many people for me to have anger as an outlet nowadays. I find myself saving it up and then shattering Valefor’s jaw or something. Fear, though? Fear… it just kills me inside. Sucks up all my energy. Eats me alive. And I’ve been scared every day since what you did. Really fucking scared.”

Emotions were leaking into the words, when I wanted to lay it all out.

She nodded.

“Self-loathing, hating my own skin? Not feeling like I’m me? It eats at my identity.”

“This is why I want to talk. So we can address these things, work on fixing them.”