I leave June struggling with the rope and go to the ax. I’ve never moved anything so big before. I focus all my strength on it, call on every bit of will I have, and then move myself as forcefully as I can right at the inanimate object. I may be imagining it, but I think it slips just slightly. If I can get it to fall over, it should make enough noise for her to notice.

Behind me June starts to cry softly. She’s scared, sure that she’ll die in this fire all alone. She’s thinking about her girls and Leo and how badly she wants to get back to them. I feel all of it.

I push in against the ax again, but nothing happens, so I start a swinging motion, moving back and forth over it as fast as I can. I feel it pass through me each time, the wood, the cold metal. The windows blow out, sending a shower of glass into the living room. The flames quickly find their way through the windows and start to lick up the wooden wall to the ceiling.

June screams and slides down to the floor, cowering awkwardly, her hands and feet still tied. I can feel the draining start to happen. I’ve used up almost everything I have. I stop swinging; it’s not doing anything.

So instead I think of all the things I love about my sister—her throaty laugh, the set of her face when she’s trying not to cry, the way she looks at her girls when she thinks nobody is watching, how her body folds into mine each time we hug, her scent, her jokes that people can’t always tell are jokes, her pain and her strength. I think of it all and then fling myself at the ax with the power of all those things.

It topples and falls forward onto the floor. Better than I’d hoped for. June looks up and sees it sitting there and starts to shimmy across the floor on her bum. I see her slide it between her knees, blade side up, and start rubbing the rope stretched taut between her wrists.

This is why I’m here. Why I’ve been here all along. To save her at the very same place where I caused the end of my father’s life. The thought floods me with peace and calm. June will be okay. Somehow I know this to be true. The fading comes on slowly; I don’t fight it. I finally know that I’ve done what I was meant to do.

JUNE