“No one follows the orders of a girl,” he says in broken English.
“Huh,” she says. “You better should have, now you're dead.”
And she shoots him again, in the head, turns and looks at Kat and me.
I stare at her because what I just witnessed doesn’t remind me of the girl from the catacombs anymore. She does not seem to care about it at all.
“That should be a statement,” she says, almost cheerfully.
“I think I liked the scared and pleading version of her more,” I say to Kat.
“I definitely don’t,” says Kat. “This version is so much more fun.”
“This version has killed already,” says the girl coldly. “So what’s the point. This version has studied the criminal mind and knows that an attack is the only way out when backed against a wall. And thisgirlalso knows that she has to rely on herself because you two are operating on crazy.”
13
SOPHIE
PLAYLIST: PUT IT ON ME – MATT MAESON
Iknow exactly two things. One, I won’t let life beat me. And two, the only way out of the situation I am in is forward. I will be dead if I don’t prove myself; the situation just made that clear.
Well, I may know a third thing: One day in the future, all this will catch up with me. Mentally as much as physically. Right now, I am in what psychology would describe as a dissociative state.
Although on second thought, I still feel many things. It’s not that I am completely numb, and I still have my rationality.
Maybe my mind just snapped, and I listened to too many true crime podcasts and now think I can be a criminal myself.
Which is bullshit, but I don’t know why nothing of it affects me.
I just killed a person, and I don’t care.
I, who has always been a ball of anxiety, am now this different version. Fearless, careless, provocative.
Okay. I have always been provocative. I won’t let anyone ruin my peace, least of all a grumpy bully like that woman. I hate people like her.
Maybe it doesn’t do anything to me because it’s either him or you,a voice in my mind says.
“No,” I answer. “That’s not me.”
Two pairs of eyes look at me.
“What?” I ask.
“What’s not you?” asks Kat.
“I—“ I begin. “Did I say that out loud?”
“You did.”
“Huh,” I say. “I was just talking to myself.”
“And what were you talking to yourself about in your mind?” asks Rosalia in her arrogant manner.
“Never you mind,” I say.
See, you’re going mad,says the voice. I don’t answer it this time.