Chapter 3
Pure panic flooded my system.||
1 lunged forward, grabbing Adam’s sleeve so
“Dan“]
so hard my knuckles turned white
My voice came out as a desperate crnak ||
“Please don’t look at it…..
please…]]
I knew what would happen. That cursed viden had turned everyone against me. Everyone ||
Adam looked down at me, confusion written all over his face.]]
“Babe, it’s okay,” he said, squeezing my hand. Tve got you. She can’t hurt you anymore.
But I couldn’t let go of his sleeve, I just couldn’t risk it ||
Adam. I’m literally begging you. Don’t go over there.-]
Adam.
The more freaked out I got the more I could see his curiosity growing
Despite my pleas, he gently pried my fingers from his arm and walked toward my mother.||
Whatever mind game you’re playing,” he said, “I wanna see what the hell kind of video could make anyone okay with beating their kid half to death-
He took the phone from my mother and started watching.
I stared at his face, clinging to this pathetic line hope that maybe just maybe he’d be different. That he’d still love me even after seeing whatever it was.
I silently pleaded to any god who might be listening, but the universe had ghosted me long ago.
As the video played, Adam’s expression morphed from angry to shocked to something the entirely. His eyes grew wider, his face paler. In less than two minutes, everything about him changed.||
He said nothing, just stared at my mother in stunned silence.
My mother gave him a knowing nod.]
When Adam finally looked back at me, the love and concern had vanished from his eyes, replaced by something cold and distant. Something that didn’t recognize as the same person anymore.
He handed the phone back to my mother and turned to the cops with an apologetic smile
“officers, I’m so sorry for wasting your time. This was all just a big mi
The officers exchanged skeptical glances, then turned to me.
misunderstanding. There’s no abuse happening here.
My heart felt like it was being crusland in a vise. The pain was beyond anything physical my mother had ever inflicted. I looked at Adam–the guy who’d sworn to protect me knowing that his tho meant po one would believe me new
“It was just some roughhousing that got out of hand, Adam continued smoothly. “Tamily statt, you know? We can handle this ourselves.
In the end, with no witness willing to testify, the police unruffed my mother and fed out of the room, shooting me concerned but helpless glances.||
Adam turned to fare me, his expression now as cold as my mother sa chill that cut straight to my sou
Then, lua move that shattered everything I thought I knew about him, he dropped to his knees in front of my mother.
“My Mitchell,” he said, voice trembling with emotion. “I su sorry I didn’t understand before. You should have finished what you started
she… slie’d be better off dead
Teus reed down my
(my fare. “Adam…… why? Why are you doing this?”||
Adam wouldn’t even look at me. His voice was flat, emotionless.|||
deserve everything coming to you
Something inside me died in that moment
Audan–tive same guy who’d found me crying in a campos bathroom three months ago after my mother had “accidentally pushed me down the stairs–had abandoned me just like everyone else who’d seen that video|||
I priembered how he’d gently cleaned the blood from my face that day, promising to protect me no matter what.]
Will you really never up on me asked him, hardly daring in hope||
gaze
t
He’d smiled, that dimpled smile I loved so much.[]
“Of course not. If your family treats you like nothing, then I’ll just have in treat you a hundred times better to make up for in-
He’d pressed to be my knight in shining armor,
Instead, here he was, begging my mother to finish the job ||
As I lay there, drowning in despair, a question that had been nagging at the back of my mind suddenly pushed its way to the surface
What the hell was on that video that could make everyone absolutely everyone want me dead?
