Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil

by V.E. Schwab

And here is the awful thing about belief. It is a current, like compulsion. Hard to forge when it goes against your will, but easy enough when it carries you the way you want to go.

It is easy, isn’t it, in retrospect? To spot the cracks. To see them spread. But in the moment, there is only the urge to mend each one. To smooth the lines. And keep the surface whole.

The dreaminess, the languid grace. The colors, like a sunrise just before it starts. The promise of a day. Imagine a cabaret, only the tempo has been slowed, the volume dropped by half, rendering the whole thing softer and more intimate.

Why does Charlotte stay? That is like asking—why stay inside a house on fire? Easy to say when you are standing on the street, a safe distance from the flames. Harder when you are still inside, convinced you can douse the blaze before it spreads, or rushing room to room, trying to save what you love before it burns.

“Why are you being so kind?” she asks, even as she begins to sink. Antonia’s voice follows her down. “We grow together in this garden.”

Charlotte knows she will gladly starve if it means letting Giada walk her home.

“The woman took so little and gave so much. She offered the girl friendship, offered her pleasure, offered her everything she ever wanted. And in the end, all she asked for was her soul.”

“She didn’t know it then, but it turns out a soul is what makes the sun feel warm against your skin, what gives food taste, what makes you feel full.

Charlotte turns her stained face into the pillow, and screams. Screams until her lungs give way. Until her heart shatters in her chest. Until there’s nothing left.