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There are some things cosmetics cannot fix.
Some things should leave scars.
Maybe Bitter should be one.
I spent days wondering whether the man beneath all that anger was better than he claimed.
Today he stood in front of everyone who mattered to him and told me I meant nothing.
Maybe he lied.
Maybe he didn't.
Either way, I am done trying to translate him. Done searching his actions for meanings his mouth keeps denying. Done waiting for the better man to win.
If Bitter Adams wants me to believe he is exactly what he warned me he was, fine.
I finally do.
And this time, when my heart whispers that he looked devastated while he destroyed me, I tell it to shut the fuck up.
Chapter Eleven
Sweet
By the time the School of the Dead starts winding down for the day, the garage has finally cleared enough for Mercy to go after my things.
She has been gone less than five minutes when my phone buzzes.
I ignore it.
That feels like progress.
I am standing at the long stainless-steel sink, washing the last traces of restorative wax from a brush while Lark argues with Junie about whether a corpse can technically have bad eyebrows.
“Of course they can,” Lark says. “Death does not cure poor grooming.”
Junie stacks clean palettes beside me. “The dead do not care.”
“The family cares.”
“The family always cares about weird shit.”
Petal unwraps another emotional support cookie. “My aunt made them redo Grandma’s lipstick twice because the first shade made her look cheap.”
I glance over. “Was Grandma cheap?”
“Extremely.”
“Then maybe they were honoring her truth.”
Petal points the cookie at me. “See? She gets restoration.”
A laugh almost escapes me.
Almost.
My phone buzzes again on the counter, and the sound slides under my ribs.
