Page 61 of Lessons in Cruelty

He seems to regret it.

I don’t. It was fucking hot.

I’m starting to sweat again. I wish I knew how to turn down the heat in this car. I could ask Bastian to do it, but I’ll stammer or blush. Probably both. So I just turn to look out the window again, trying to concentrate on the glimpses of Agony Hollow peeking through the trees.

Again, my professor seems to read my mind.

Bastian rolls down his window, turns his face into the cool wind that surges inside, and inhales a deep breath.

“I love that smell,” he murmurs. “If they could bottle this stuff, I’d swim in it.” He leaves the window open, and I silently thank him for how it cools the Tesla’s interior.

It’s shocking how quickly the temperature has dropped since I got in.

There’s a definite chill in the air. If you can’t handle the cold, move down to Riverside. Some days the woods felt more like a jungle.

I wonder where Kai lives now. We sent a few letters to each other after he moved out of Riverside, but I’ve never been to his house before. I was too busy working at the convenience store, and my dad couldn’t afford bus fare to get me all the way across town. Kai only got a car late in high school, and even then, he was too busy with his sports or his school work to come visit me.

Except for that one time⁠—

“Have you lived here all your life, Haven?”

I like the way he says my name. It sounds so smooth and eloquent on his tongue. Not at all how Kai drawls when he says it, like he’s mocking me.

“Uh, pretty much. You?”

He chuckles. “Oh no. New York originally. Then the west coast for a while. But it always felt like I was surrounded by strangers wherever I went. So many people stream past you on the street, day in, day out, but you’ll never see the same face twice. Never get to learn their stories. What makes them tick.”

“Never thought about it like that,” I murmur.

“You don’t know what you don’t know, Haven.” He inhales another deep breath, huffs it out with obvious enjoyment. “Never thought I was cut out for small-town living until I got here. But this place? All these lives, so tight-knit. Like a tangle of wool. Everyone’s connected. It’s fascinating.”

Is that why he offered to bring me to his house to pick up a textbook? Because he’s fascinated by me?

As if.

The only interesting thing about me is how I’ve managed to survive this long without slitting my wrists or becoming a junkie.

We turn onto a smaller single-lane road. This one cuts straight through the trees like an arrow shaft until a sharp turn takes us out of sight of the road.

Bastian’s done a lot to make me feel comfortable, but unease still trickles down my neck.

Nowhere to run. Not that I’ll need to.

No one to hear me scream.

Just me and Bastian.

The road takes another sharp bend. A house emerges from the forest.

Bastian stops the car, and I lean forward to take it in.

Whoever built it was a genius. Despite harsh geometric lines, gleaming reflective windows, and its pitch-black solar panels, the dark concrete seems to blend with the pale trunks of the trees forming its backdrop.

The darkening sky draws deeper shadows between those trees, helping the house blend in. Rainy days always held a strange fascination for me. They were always so intense. Moody and magical. Me and Kai would find the thickest patch of scree and hide out under its dripping canopy, playing at shipwrecked sailors, or soldiers hiding in a trench.

The shadows between those trees look so inviting.

I could just slip into them and disappear forever.