He’d rather let me die on this island than take me back.

Just because a monster has a gentle touch doesn’t mean he isn’t a monster.

I’ll do well to remember that.

The water splashes against my feet, sand sticking to my grimy, sweat-stained skin. The fabric of my dress feels like matted cardboard. I’ve turned into a slab of meat for the nearby mosquitoes to feast on. I’d kill for many things right now. A shower is near the top of that list.

I need to find the silver lining in this, right? That’s what Dad always did. Oh, I got seven out of ten on my spelling test? At least I passed and learned from my mistakes. Burned dinner? Once you shave off the char, the inside is edible.

He was an optimist, a yes-man through and through. He wouldn’t hurt a fly. He’d say I was enough of a pessimist for the both of us. Well, he only said that once I started seeing Tommy.

So, silver lining? The Gallaghers can’t reach this island.

I squeeze my eyes shut against my plummeting blood pressure and sugar levels that send my body on a toxic tailspin where I want to discard the nonexistent contents of my stomach.

My body sways with the gentle breeze, eyelids drifting open and closed.

The sea isn’t giving me any peace like it usually would, but still, if there were ever a place for me to die, it would be here, overlooking the ocean as the water cools me down. Because when all is said and done, my corpse will be mine alone. I’m trapped on this island where no one will ever find me here. The Gallaghers can’t turn me into a warning if they never find my body.

With that thought, I weakly dart my eyes to the trees in case one of the Gallaghers magically teleported here. For a second, I see a glimmer of Tommy’s ghost, but I know he isn’t there. It’s been…nice not looking over my shoulder every minute I’ve been outdoors, waiting for the Gallaghers to be around the corner.

My fear of them isn’t at the forefront of my mind. Paranoia isn’t choking me. Natural survival is the only thing I’m thinking of. That, and Ordus, who’s left me to my own devices, watching me slowly wither away.

Movement sounds behind me. I don’t bother turning. I know who it’ll be. I have no desire to give him more attention than he deserves.

I hate that I flinch when he raises his arm, that I instinctively tuck my chin up against my collarbone to brace for a strike that never comes. I never used to be like this. I was a stranger to hurt until pain became all I knew.

What I hate even more is watching Ordus’ fingers curl into fists, how my heart hammers in my chest at the memory of what knuckles feel like against soft tissue.

Maybe somewhere deep down, there’s a part of me that believes he’d never raise a hand against me, but that’s what I believed about Tommy. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and I paid for it with my life and a screwed-up arm.

Ordus lowers himself to the ground and very intentionally hunches to seem less imposing. The silence stretches for long minutes as I watch the water draw his tentacles in and out of the shore.

It’s on the tip of my tongue to open my mouth and demand the same thing I’ve been demanding since I got here, but he beats me to it. The monster clears his throat, offering me his hand. “Come, female.”

Of all the things to be mad about, that sets me off. Maybe it’s the exhaustion. Maybe I just want to argue to feel something other than hopelessness.

“Don’t fucking call me that,” I snap, my voice a garbled rasp of shards of glass that tear through the fibers of my throat.

“Female?” Ordus questions, bewildered.

“Woman,” I correct.

It’s a stupid argument, a waste of my precious energy when I should be conserving whatever moisture is left in my mouth and throat. But I don’t want him to have a moment of peace. I want him to hate me as much as I hate him for putting me through this.

My eyes heat once more. Exhaustion. Frustration. Despair. It hits me, spilling down my salt-burnt cheeks into my lips.

“Or Cindi.” I almost say Kristy, because I might as well let someone else know my real name, since I’m going to die anyway. But Kristy is already dead—even if her ghost is insistent on haunting my every waking moment.

I ignore his outstretched hand and jump to my feet, hating that he towers over me either way.

“Do not lessen my person to the organ between my legs,” I yell. That’s what Tommy did. His family. Every other person I came across during the three years I was with him. I was nothing more than a thing to hang off his arm, a toy for him to throw around when no one was looking.

If I’m going to die, I want to do it without feeling less than human, even if the kraken sees me as nothing more than an object of fate.

“I’m a person. A human being with feelings. Emotions. Needs.” I don’t know why I bother. He’s not going to change his tune. I doubt he’s capable of it. He’s a monster through and through. Being humanoid doesn’t give him humanity. “And you’re a monster,” I seethe.

He says nothing, staring at me with eyes I can’t read. Muscles bunched. Lips twitching. Arms stiff.

I’m torn between cowering away and doubling down. Tommy would have hit me before a sound could come out.

I hate Ordus, but not in the same way I hated Tommy. I hated my husband with a force that moved mountains and raised hell to my feet.

I hate Ordus because he looks like Tommy in certain lights. He’s giving me the same clouded look Tommy used to give me before he twists his words until they’re sharp enough to puncture an artery.

Except Ordus doesn’t speak. He’s looking at me like he wants me to say more, to lay everything out at our feet in the hopes he can pick at the words to see them from a different angle and figure out how it works out of plain curiosity.

“You’re killing me,” I croak, tears stinging my burnt cheeks, vocal cords like sandpaper.

A look of pure torture crosses his eyes. Then, a flash of guilt, followed by unbridled desperation. Every hair on my body stands on end, though not out of fear. I just… I don’t know how to react to him.

He doesn’t want me to die, but he won’t do what needs to be done to keep me alive. He doesn’t want to hurt me, but he’s letting me starve.

“I need water, Ordus,” I whisper.

He motions to the sea. “The⁠—”

“Water,” I repeat. “Drinking water. Human water. Fucking mineral water. Aqua. Air,” I say in Indonesian, in case that registers in his thick skull. “And I need to wash and cook the fish.”

No one ever fucking listens to me. It’s like I’m mute to everyone, and I’m screaming at a brick wall.

I can feel his distress oozing off him. Well, if he’s upset about this, how the fuck does he think I feel?

“I…I do not understand.” His eyes dart toward the sea once more.

“Take me back! Take me back. Take me back. Take me back,” I chant. Scream. Heave. Hit. Cry. Drop to the ground and sob some more.

I feel like a petulant child throwing a tantrum. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop where he starts yelling back, berating me, or exerts some level of force to make me stop seeing any semblance of good in him.

He says nothing, staring into the distance as I try to get my breathing under control. Over and over, one of his tentacles comes toward me, and another snatches it away, as if each of his limbs has a mind of its own.

It’s…nice having someone there. I’m too tired to think of a better word to describe how it feels to have another person beside me as I let go of the restraints on my emotions. To not be touched. To simply sit in the silence.

Even if he is the cause of my meltdown.

This is the most fucked-up situation any person could imagine. It’s nice when it shouldn’t be.

It could be worse. It’s not the metric I should use to judge my situation, but there’s no escaping the truth.