Cassie is self-sabotaging, a dry sense of humour, a sultry melody, a sarcastic remark. She's a dead gaze, smudged eyeliner, a garden of withering red tulips, and... an addict. 

Etienne is indecisive, anxious, classically handsome, a teller of great stories. He's a smile that doesn't reach the eyes, a lit cigarette, an alternative rock song, and a bad friend.  

It all started when they were only six years old. And it hasn't stopped. It keeps happening. They weave in and out of each other's lives, with their strange connection to blame. Their bond is both strengthened and weakened by their shared traumas. Their relationship is a ballad about codependency and the electricity of first love. 

Their lives are an unmanageable mess that sees them dwell in the world of drugs, depression, and the multitude of young women being found dead in the Merseyside Area. They each must confront their faith in second chances, fate, and circumstance. 

                                                         ― ― ― ― ― 

 And he's somewhere in the middle. But you can also find him at the beginning, and he'll be waiting for you by the end. He's everywhere. He is good with ropes, great at sketching, addicted to pornographic content. He hates his wife, hates his son, knows how to avoid leaving fingerprints on his victims.

ON MOUNT EVEREST WITH YOU.

"You were a risk, a mystery, and the most certain thing I'd ever known." 


SHE'D spiralled again. It was impossible to miss. If only my conscience would've allowed it, I would have sought refuge in the comfort of indifference. But, unfortunately, I cared. 


 She was a very peculiar woman, my mother. When I was a child we would read books about brave travellers, daredevils at heart, who ventured out into sea and sky, out into the unknown, hoping to solve some of humanity's most precious mysteries. Then we would play the part, we would be pirates and aviators and Sherlock Holmes and his dear Watson. 


 But then there was a side of her that wandered dangerously on the polar opposite of this audacious woman with fire in her heart. And at some point, one I cannot zero in on, this polar opposite became her default state of being. 


Chapter Twenty-Two.