Page 118 of Cain
“It’s Alice. Alice Manson.”
“You took her last name?”
“Of course I did.”
“Alice Manson,” she repeats, savoring the sound of it. “It sounds really badass.”
Somehow, I don’t mind when she says it. She can’t taint it; she’s too pure for that.
“She must have been pretty, right?” she asks again.
I think for a moment. “To me, she was. Dark blonde hair, medium length, and the grayest eyes I’ve ever seen.”
“So, you got her hair color and the gray heterochromia in your eye,” she says, bright and certain.
Something so simple. It’s so obvious, and yet it hits me like a punch.
I never wondered where my eyes came from—never thought to. I always figured it was just nature. Random.
Not a memory written into my skin, like a piece of her stitched into me.
“You’re right,” I breathe quietly. I look away, swallowing the lump in my throat. “I remember she used to push my hair back and tell me I had her stormy eyes. She said it made me look like trouble.”
“If she only knew.” She chuckles.
“Yeah.”
“She had a soft spot for you, didn’t she?”
“Me and Adam. But I think she loved me a bit more.”
“Who’s Adam?” she asks, her voice becoming gruff, yet I still see excitement in her eyes.
Fuck … my tongue slips.
“No one important.”
“But—”
“No,” I say solemnly, cutting her off.
She nods as if she understands my limits.Good girl.
“Do you visit her? Her grave, I mean.”
“There’s nothing there for me. It’s just dirt and stones.”
“It’s not about what’s there.”
“Don’t!” I snap. “I know what it’s about, and it doesn’t change anything.”
Her light blue eyes cloud, and they drop to the black duvet. What is she thinking?
“At least you have good things to remember her for,” she mutters. “My parents never made me laugh. They never made me smile. I was just there—a weight they carried. I wasn’t someone they loved. I wasn’t someone they even wanted. I was an embarrassment they couldn’t quite hide, no matter how hard they tried.”
Her eyes tear up as the memories of these bastards flood her mind. However, I don’t talk. I let her relive every bitter memory until she realizes that she’s stronger than that.
“I don’t remember the first time I realized they didn’t love me. I think I always knew. They never looked at me the way parents are supposed to. Never with pride or tenderness.” The tears run down her cheeks. “You said it. We’re both the unwanted child.”
