Page 3 of These Vile Hearts

My dark ginger hair is piled in a messy bun on top of my head, held in place by a black velvet scrunchie. Tucked in the bun is a capped syringe filled with insulin—a backup for when I’m not wearing pockets or don’t want to bother with the whole process of drawing insulin from a vial when I’m in the middle of doing something like packing a moving van full of the brightest part of my life.

I slide the syringe from its hiding place, remove the cap with one hand, and jab the needle into my bare thigh, emptying two units into my bloodstream to cover the carbs I’m about to devour.

Javen watches with half-lidded eyes. “You’re going to accidentally stab someone doing that shit, you know.”

“If I’m stabbing anyone, it’s not going to be an accident.”

His eyes open all the way now. “You’re a bit vile sometimes, you know.”

A bit.

Shrugging, I pluck a handful of chips from the bag, trying not to make it too obvious that this is the first sustenance I’ve had all day. Between rationing insulin and saving money, food has become a bit of a luxury the last few weeks.

“Any luck with job applications?” he asks, trying and failing to sound casual.

I swallow and take a long drink of cider, buying myself time to figure out an answer. Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I place the bottle on a box labeledSmut. “Not yet, but I was going to talk to Twanna about working at the bar again for a little while. I’ll save up some money and be right behind you. Then we can live out all our most chaotic dreams in the city.”

It’s a lie, but maybe it will stop him from worrying. The only local bar in Arborfell just hired a new girl after the guy who replaced me moved to Eugene to work at a bigger bar.

The problem with living in a dying logging town on the coast isthere aren’t enough jobs to go around. Businesses are closing left and right, and it’s not as though we have an abundance of tourists traipsing through our little town. The second a position opens that doesn’t involve operating feller bunchers or fishing boats, it’s snatched right up like a piece of bread tossed at a flock of seagulls.

When I was younger, I used to look at twentysomethings like me and think,God, I can’t wait to be like them. Able to make my own decisions. Live where I want. Do what I want. Be free.Now? I’d give anything to go back to my sixteen-year-old self. Grounded and sent to my foster room for sneaking out again. Pissed at the people who weren’t my parents, blissfully unaware of how easy I had it with my “free” insulin and a roof over my ungrateful head.

Sucking his teeth, Javen presses the mouth of his bottle beneath his chin. “I could murder your fucking boss. I swear to all the gods.”

“Same.” If it meant I could afford a home, food, insulin, and all the other supplies it takes to manage this disease, I would sincerely consider it. The worst part about that corporate job was that it gave me a taste of what life could be like if the Fates had been kinder. New car, clothing, and spending money,andI got to see how easy life with type 1 diabetes can be if you have enough money to manage it.

Cordless insulin pumps and continuous glucose monitors. The ease of being able to dose for food without injections, to check my blood sugar on an app rather than prick my finger and feed it into a test strip. Those few months made me feel like I could actually breathe again. Gave me that sense of control I’ve desperately searched for ever since I was a child. But all of it was snatched away with a single email.

All I can afford now are vials of insulin and syringes, and even those have me pinching pennies and skipping meals. And ever since those days of luxury, I swear the needles sting more going in.

Javen sighs, tossing another chip into his mouth and pulling outhis phone to scroll social media, pausing on a muted video of a man gesturing wildly at the sky. In the subtitles, I spotUAPs and ORBS. Without looking up, Javen says, “Well, you know, if looking for a job here doesn’t pan out, you could always make a deal with a dryad.”

I roll my eyes at him, though he doesn’t see. “Fuck off.”

Dryads have been a part of Arborfell’s local lore for decades, perhaps even centuries. Like Bigfoot, the Jersey Devil, or the Loch Ness Monster. The rumors were probably started by someone else who had the Sight, warning everyone about the forest creatures with antlers and blades made of wood. Even Javen, someone who listens to hours of podcasts about the existence of aliens, has never viewed dryads as anything more than another silly cryptid fable.

When I first met him as a terrified ten-year-old in a cramped social worker’s office, I wouldn’t shut up about the fae creatures who’d killed my parents. No one believed me. They pitied me, of course, but dismissed my ramblings as a fairy tale my brain created to shield me from the trauma of watching my parents’ slaughter.

The police questioned me several times, trying to get a composite sketch of what they thought was a human killer on the loose. I was adamant about what I saw, describing the dryads in detail, down to the gray-green shade of lichen on their antlers, the rough bark of their horns. Eventually, the investigators gave up on me, recommending I receive intensive therapy.

And when Javen and I were placed in the same foster home years later, he asked, “So, whoreallykilled your parents? I know you don’t believe it was dryads.”

I couldn’t blame him. It’s not easy believing in something you can’t see with your own eyes—though I’m fairly certain he’s never actually seen a UAP or extraterrestrial before. It didn’t take me long to change my story fromMy parents were killed by dryadstoI don’t remember. Must’ve blocked it out.

To this day I still haven’t shown Javen the journal I scooped upfrom beside my dad’s stiffening body. I haven’t dared ask him to help decipher the pages and pages of cryptic notes my father transcribed about dryads and other fae.

Don’t drink the wine.

Mortal music enchants them.

Ironfae presence increasing in Sylveris. Deforestation? Expansion?

Teach Mads self-defense. Axe? Knife?Gun?

No. Those scribbled secrets stay with me alone, locked away with the rest of the shit I keep in that haunted attic of mine.

I bring the cider to my lips, gulping until it’s gone before tossing it into our recycling bin.