Voice Like a Hyacinth

by Mallory Pearson

Personally, I thought I had been hiding it decently well. But I always assumed no one was looking at me and found myself shocked when they’d been watching the whole time. Apparently, Finch had been alert. Tuned into a frequency I hadn’t been aware I was putting off.

I knew that we were alike in a million ways, but it was the ways we were different that made us quiet.

But I was so tired. The corners of my life were crowded with phantoms.

“I’ve always loved winter.” She coughed once and cleared her throat. “I like how clean the air feels.”

If I never turned around, I had nothing to fear.

There was possibility in ritual.

Somewhere along the line, I transform from a frightened kid to the crone herself. I haunt my own forest.