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.

AT the end of Millfield Road, some seven blocks down from our apartment building, a kid named Fred had once made me cry by calling my mother a whore. . 


 I'd been on a winning streak for this silly little game we'd been playing, which left Etienne unamused but deeply wounded Fred's feelings for a reason that likely had to do with the fact we were only seven years old. That's when, with eyes already dampened by unshed tears, he referred to Sophie as a whore. 


 I gasped because I'd never heard a kid my age use that word so freely before. There was a moment of discomfort for Etienne, just one single beat of hesitance before he stood up with the nerve of that assertive little boy I knew so very well. 


 "I-I-I won't! I-I-It's t-true! Everyone kno-kno-knows it!" 


 "I'll knock your teeth in if you don't take it back, Newell." 


Chapter Thirty-One.