Deadly Little Lessons Read Online Free Page A

others, getting saved by Adam and Ben).
    “You’ve reminded me so much of Alexia this past year,” Dad says. “I think you’ve sensed that, too. And I didn’t want you to worry.”
    Worry because Aunt Alexia has a record of attempting suicide.
    Worry because she’s been labeled by doctors as mentally disturbed and possibly schizophrenic.
    Worry because she hears voices, and because now I’m able to hear them, too.
    “We were going to tell you when you turned twelve,” he continues, “but you just seemed so darned young. And so we waited until sixteen came around, but there was such a rough start to the school year, including your aunt’s suicide attempt.…”
    “Your mother told me,” I say, focusing on Mom, finally revealing the missing piece. “She called here.”
    “Did she call just to tell you that?” Dad asks.
    “Did she tell you anything else?” Mom jumps in.
    I shake my head, feeling the urge to scream, because this isn’t about my grandmother. This isn’t about what she wanted or what I said in response. “This is about how you lied to me,” I tell them. “How I have no idea who I am right now.”
    “I may not have given birth to you,” Mom says, “but you’ll always be my daughter.”
    “ Our daughter.” Dad sits beside me and takes my hand.
    “So, is Aunt Alexia really my mother?” I ask, thinking how it was only a few months ago now that Dad looked me in the eye and said that Aunt Alexia and I were kindred spirits.
    “She is,” he says, squeezing my hand.
    I nod, fighting the urge to tear up again and thinking how it all makes sense. My touch powers, for one; both Alexia and I have the ability to sense things through our art. She and I also look a lot alike—blond hair, pale skin, emerald green eyes—even the nurse at the mental facility in Detroit said so. Did the nurse know the truth all along? Did Aunt Alexia tell her? Am I the last person to know?
    “ We’re still your parents,” Mom reminds me. “We’re the ones who’ve raised you and cared for you and been there for you every day of your life.”
    And that’s when it suddenly dawns on me—as if this could feel any more surreal—not only is my mother not my mother, but Dad isn’t my father, either. “Who is my father?” I ask him.
    Dad takes a deep breath, trying to appear strong, but he looks even more upset than me: his face is blotchy, his eyes are full.
    “Why don’t we all take a little break?” Mom says, extending her hand to Dad. “We can continue this conversation later.”
    Without waiting for Dad to respond, I head into my room and close the door, wishing that I could block out my thoughts, that I could restart my yesterday, and that I’d never picked up the phone last night.

He says he’ll be back in an hour, but how long have I been crying? My cheek is pressed against the dirt floor, and my tears have made a patch of mud; at least it feels that way. I’ve shut off my flashlight to preserve the battery.
    I almost wish he would just kill me. Thoughts and memories are like daggers in my heart. I imagine my mother, worried sick, unable to get out of bed. Then I picture the two of us stringing popcorn on the tree last Christmas. I replay the time this past fall when my father jumped up from the bleachers after I’d scored my fourth goal in soccer. And then the time he brought me a dozen roses on the opening night of Grease , when I understudied the role of Sandy Dumbrowski.
    I sit up, turn my flashlight back on, and dip my fingers into the dirty basin of water to wipe some mud from my eye. My lips are chapped. I wipe them, too, and my hand comes away with a smear of blood on it; they must be cracked. The corners burn from being stretched…from screaming. Two meals ago, I spent a chunk of time yelling, praying that someone would hear me. But no one did, not even the guy who took me.
    I’m pretty sure I must’ve been drugged on the night I was taken. He must’ve slipped something into my drink