Page 2 of Double the Dilemma

When dinner was finished, Lizzie and Karissa did the dishes, with Shawn heading for his room. Karissa kept half an eye on Sena, who watched him walk away, but she didn’t follow him. Instead, she went into the living room with Darren and sat on the couch next to him. Karissa fought back a snarl of disgust at the way Sena fawned over him, rubbing his arm in the way she did. Darren mostly ignored her, and Sandy just stared into her phone, oblivious to it all.

“Sena seems mad,” Lizzie said so softly that Karissa wasn’t sure she heard her at first.

Karissa gave a subtle shrug. “When isn’t she?” she asked calmly.

Lizzie let it drop, but she also looked worriedly over her shoulder. Karissa could feel Sena’s eyes on her almost instantly, but she didn’t turn around. She needed a couple more minutes of peace before she faced whatever was coming her way.

She didn’t have long to wait.

Lizzie left the kitchen and Karissa reached into the fridge to grab a soda. When she turned around, she saw Sena in the doorway watching her with a cold expression. Karissa silently held her gaze, letting her know she wasn’t afraid and wouldn’t be backing down. Something flashed in Sena’s eyes, but she was too far away to decipher it. Sena turned and headed into the living room, never once looking back.

Karissa didn’t move for a moment, unease settling in her stomach. Finally, she continued on to her room, where Lizzie was working on her homework. Lizzie looked at her from her top bunk and gave her a small smile. “I hate math,” she said softly.

“I hate all school, so I have you beat,” Karissa said lightly as she laid down on the bottom bunk and grabbed her book to read.

Neither of them spoke for a while, until finally Lizzie asked, “Why is Sena so nasty?”

Karissa didn’t answer for a moment. It was a question few could answer, and she only had guesses. Still, she didn’t want her response getting back to Sena and having to deal with her reaction. “I don’t know,” she finally answered. “We’re all fucked up somehow though.”

“You don’t seem messed up,” Lizzie remarked. That was another thing Karissa had noticed about her. Lizzie hated to use any kind of foul language.

Karissa snorted. “Trust me, I’m messed up. My mother was a whore and my father was a gambling drunk. They spent more time drinking, doing drugs, and screwing around than being parents.”

“Is that why you ended up here?”

“Pretty much,” she answered vaguely. In reality, her father was in jail for killing her mother when she refused to give up her drugs. But she didn’t want that blabbed around.

“I miss my parents,” Lizzie said sadly. “The social worker said that we have an aunt out of state that’s willing to take us in. So maybe we won’t be here much longer.”

“Good for you,” Karissa said absently. She didn’t have that luxury, but she wasn’t going to waste energy on being jealous. At most, she might be able to get out of this foster home and into another one, but she doubted it. Which meant a few more years of Sena. Something she wasn’t looking forward to.

The next few hours were quiet, and Karissa spent most of it reading and eventually helping Lizzie with a math problem, before taking a shower to get ready for bed. When she emerged, she headed for her room and saw Lizzie was already ready to go to sleep. Karissa wasn’t quite sleepy, but she didn’t say anything as Lizzie turned out the light and plunged the room into darkness.

Surprisingly, she fell asleep almost right away. But it wasn’t long before she startled awake, everything in her telling her to run. To be ready. Carefully, she turned her head, and that was when she saw the movement outside her door. Just a small shadow from the nightlight that was only just down the hall for Shawn.

Karissa froze, barely breathing. She didn’t so much as twitch a muscle as she waited. The door of the room opened with barely a sound, and Karissa watched Sena slip inside closing it softly behind her Once again plunged the room into darkness. She didn’t need the light, though, to feel the danger that seeped through the space.

Looked like she was right. Tonight was the night she was going to die. The question was, was she going to give in or was she going to fight?

Determination burned in her belly and she lowered her eyes enough to give the appearance that she was still sleeping, relaxing her breathing even as her body coiled, ready to spring.

Sena’s footsteps were barely a whisper across the carpet, but Karissa could hear the shuffling, and the excited sound of her breathing. She was enjoying this, and that scared Karissa most of all. She waited, tracking each step and breath, her entire focus narrowing to those two sounds.

When Karissa sensed Sena standing over her, she shifted subtly, and carefully fluttered her lashes, giving the appearance she was starting to stir. That’s when she saw the knife. Karissa’s heart sped up, but she stayed still. Then, Sena whispered, “Bye bye, cunt.”

Karissa was moving before Sena’s arm could come all the way down, her arm connecting with Sena’s as hard as she could manage, sending the butcher knife flying. Sena screamed in pain, and Karissa was on her. They fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs and Karissa fought with everything she had. She vaguely heard Lizzie scream, as Sena bucked Karissa off, throwing her a few feet away as she moved with lightning speed to grab the knife.

“You’re going to die, Krissy,” Sena taunted as she picked up the blade. “And I’m going to enjoy every second of watching your blood spill all over the floor.”

Karissa rolled and jumped to her feet, never looking away from Sena. “I don’t think so,” she panted, winded. She heard footsteps pounding behind her, running down the hall.

Sena grinned wickedly, and then she lunged forward. Karissa pivoted on her feet, feeling the knife slide by her, and she brought her elbow down on the back of Sena’s shoulder, making Sena scream out and start slashing wildly.

The door to the bedroom flew open but Karissa was too close to it; it hit her in the back, sending her sprawling. Sena was on her in seconds and Karissa didn’t have the time to stop the knife, but she was able to shift so it punctured her side and not her heart. She cried out in pain, but she still fought.

Sena wrenched the blade out and brought it down twice more, laughing the entire time, before she was yanked away. Sena screamed and fought while Darren struggled to subdue her. Karissa lay on the floor bleeding, surrounded by Lizzie and Sandy. Both were white as ghosts, and Sandy was on her phone calling for help.

She had known today would be the day she died, and as her eyes closed, she only wished it was quick.

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