Chapter One

When you lose someone, it feels like a part of you is gone. It’s not how the movies describe it with bursts of emotion followed by your friends and family gathering around you to help heal your heart. Instead, he felt empty, just devoid of emotions and desires, and memories. There was nothing left in him with all the accusations thrown his way and the more that came as the months went by. He was a husk of a person, a waif who wandered around his bedroom that had become a disgusting nest of self-pity. Blankly, he sat in the said room with his heart pounding weakly in his chest.

Aiden stared at his phone screen with pain, his eyes meeting the girl. His throat felt scratchy, his discomfort growing as he stared at her eyes. They were so bright and big, some would call them ‘bug eyes’ from how they were shaped. When she smiled, they creased like two moons, her dimples showing as she looked at the camera. He remembered that day, how she was hanging out with her mother after class and texted him the photograph along with a small message to brighten his day.

‘I love you silly butt. See you in class tomorrow.’

That nickname. She gave it to him a few weeks after they met and it just stuck with them when they began dating. Every day since that fateful morning he would reread that message before bed and hold it close to him. Aiden knew he wasn’t coping properly, his school counselor said that enough but he couldn’t let her go. Cassandra would never leave him, she would never turn her back on him. They were in love for years.

Every class they had together was full of surprises with the then pre-teens having their friends pass notes to one another with dates and confessions scrawled onto them. When they could work with partners, they paired up with one another and just talked. It felt like he had been dropped into a romance movie with Cassandra being that perfect love interest everyone rooted for. She laughed at his jokes, loved horror movies that people called him weird for even watching, and was fascinated with science fiction books.

Aiden had met his dream girl and their bond seemed invincible. But then the cracks began to show as they morphed into their late teens and began to find new friend groups. She changed and he changed along with her and soon breaking up was discussed. He fought to stay together, she screamed for him to listen to her worries as college came into question along with adulthood. He started to sour towards her, hating that she chose to go to school so far away without discussing it with him. This made her noticeably go back into her shell near him, becoming subdued whenever they hung out.

And then one day she was just gone, the love of his life, his best friend was missing. The teenager sniffled as his eyes began to burn and his chest tightened uncomfortably. The police looked but they didn’t give a damn, they only did it because they had to. Everyone knew it and they had to stay complacent due to it being a small town with barely two thousand people in its population. They didn’t have time to waste on Cassandra’s case or lack thereof. It made Aiden seethe with rage whenever it was brought up.

Because she was out there somewhere, lost and afraid. He knew in his heart she wasn’t dead, the teenager was too strong to go down without a fight. She would have made sure to get blood under her fingernails, to pull at her attacker's hair, to scream as loud as she could. Whenever someone brought up the possibility of her being dead he could barely control himself. Aiden couldn’t live in a reality, in a world where she was lying dead in a ditch somewhere with no one looking for her or even caring.

He forced himself to put the phone down and get off of his bed. From outside the room, he could hear his sisters making breakfast before waiting for him to drive to school. They knew this was a hard time fr him so they let him be alone for an hour or two before padding over into his bedroom. Both girls knew to knock, having walked into him crying with a blank expression on his face one too many times.

‘Avery’s making french toast and mom brought strawberry jam.’ The thought came into his head but it wasn’t his own. It was distinctly his youngest sister, Posy, delivering a message through twin telepathy.

It was a weird thing she was able to do recently. Somehow, Posy had taught herself how to speak telepathically to him. From what she said it happened on accident and at the time she thought she was speaking aloud. The confused expression on Avery’s face as he started questioning the younger of the three on what was happening, said otherwise. If he wasn’t used to having a mother who was well, his mother, he would have thought Cassandra’s loss had finally caused him to go mad.

The thought of his mom’s homemade jam made his stomach grumble. If he felt better, he’d send his mother a thank you email since she seemed to not know how phone’s work. The last time he texted her she sent him a confused jumble in response. Something about children not having them when she was young and email’s being more aesthetically pleasing to her eyes. But for now, he decided to just gather his emotions and talk to the older woman when she came back from work.

‘You don’t have to go to school today, Avery already sent in your therapist’s note.’ Posy weighed in, thankfully being able to only enter his mind instead of reading it. ‘You looked like a ghost when you went yesterday. Stay in bed.’ The last part felt like more of a command than a recommendation.

Going to school was a nightmare ever since Cassandra’s disappearance hit the news. People attacked him, claiming he must know something about her disappearance since they had been dating for so long. She was the honor roll student that was quiet and did hours of community service a week. Her parents were active members in the community who had been there for generations. And he was the kid with a mother who was caught running across the neighborhood’s lawns with her top off. A woman who acted like a child despite being married to a serious man and having three teenaged age children. His sisters had gotten into screaming matches with classmates of his who cursed their mother’s name. Avery even got suspended for breaking a tiny cheerleader’s nose for suggesting he killed Cassandra and they helped dispose of her body.

“She was going to break her jaw but Mrs. Bauma grabbed her arms before she managed to swing again,” Posy said out loud with the sounds of oils popping hitting his ears. “You should have seen the look on that bitches face when Avery tried to break free.”

Avery scoffed and he heard plates clang against the marble counter. “Her friends blew up my phone for weeks after that. What a bunch of pussies.” Both girls laughed at the comment as he slowly got out of bed and left his bedroom.

He walked into the kitchen to see his sisters had made a breakfast fit for a king. The two loved cooking though Avery was more organized than Posy who had pancake batter splattered everywhere. There was a fruit platter made out of cubed strawberries and pineapples since they couldn’t eat much meat on the table. The red-haired middle triplet had started pouring some of their homemade lemonade but stopped when hearing him stumble into the kitchen. She had a smile that quickly morphed into a frown on her face once she saw how he looked in the morning light.

His sister set down the pitcher of juice and walked over to him solemnly. The happy-go-lucky mood she had been in earlier was gone as she looked him up and down. Aiden hadn’t been showering much because every time the water hit his body he just wished he could go under and fall asleep. He wanted to disappear so much that cleaning himself and maintaining a semblance of proper hygiene was forgotten. All he could think about was Cassandra’s face that night, it taunted him whenever he closed his eyes.

“Stop saying her disappearance was your fault. You couldn’t have done anything to stop it from happening, Aiden.” Posy muttered from over by the stove as she flipped one of the eggs she was cooking.

Avery nodded with a labored breath. “I know you think since we aren’t normal we can find her without anyone’s help. But we can’t. Mom already explained to you that what happened was something even a fairy would be surprised by.” At the mention of their mother, her voice shifted into a more hesitant tone.

When they had been six years old, their father had told them they weren’t like other kids. It explained why Posy had grey eyes that appeared more silver than black the older she got. And why Avery had red hair when no one on their father’s side ever did and when they were brunettes. Everyone called them weird as children and said that their mother was crazy, that she had been in and out of psychiatric hospitals since she was in middle school. But their father explained that while this was true, their mother wasn’t crazy or human.

She was a changeling he had met in the land of the fey, a human child who was slowly changed into becoming a fairy over time. He had been kidnapped by the fey but she managed to convince his fey adopted parents to return him. Her fey family then gave her the chance to go with him or stay in the land of the fey forever. She chose to follow after their father, having grown to love him. Around the age of twelve, she was returned to humanity, swapping places again with the fey child meant to replace her. Leading to the psychiatric ward stays as her human parents didn’t trust or believe she was truly their daughter.

Still, she acted as if she were fey and clearly was no longer a part of the human world despite choosing to return to it. Their parents met again and soon fell in love all over again, but not as captives but freed individuals. This explained why his mother couldn’t wear most jewelry and didn’t eat meat, creatures from the land of the fey were a part of the earth. This meant they couldn’t eat the flesh of another unless they were in battle or if it was a grand feast celebrating the creature’s life. She began to teach them the way of the fey and tell stories about her childhood being raised without the knowledge of her true origins.

“I know what mom said but there has to be a way we can find her.” He muttered not wanting even to say that there was a possibility she was dead. It made him feel sick, his head becoming cloudy as he stumbled.

Almost immediately his sisters stopped what they were doing and ran to help him stay stable. Aiden felt bad for worrying them but he just couldn’t keep himself together, he felt like he was falling apart. Arms wrapped around him as Avery helped him sit up and checked his pulse with a pale look on her face. Posy quickly turned off the stove, put the eggs on a plate, and set it down in front of him. She crossed her arms over her chest with a stern look on her face as she stared at the two.

“You haven’t been eating so your blood sugar’s probably shit.” His little sister scowled cutting up the eggs on the plate as he opened his mouth to protest. Only to shut it with Avery squeezing his wrist tightly to the point he had no other choice but to grit his teeth in pain.

“Starving yourself to death solves nothing, eat your food, and then we’ll talk.” He wanted to protest that he wasn’t hungry, but having two angry sisters glaring death stares at him cowled any comments he had.