The Book of Cold Cases

by Simone St. James

woman who was sick to death of everything,

It wasn’t that she was unfeeling. It was that she’d stopped caring,

People like that can trap you, and they’re dangerous.

I’d been in that place, spinning hopelessly between I should do something and I don’t care.

What was the difference, I wondered, between a sociopath and someone who does everyday lying to make other people feel better?

sometimes it was a relief to be friends with someone who didn’t have any emotions.

old ice-cold anger she’d had all her life, that had gotten her in so much trouble and still made her feel alive.

Then again, the fact that there was something wrong with her wasn’t news.

Because in the end, the world always turned out the way he wanted it to.

“You don’t have very many friends, do you?” I asked her. “I don’t have any friends,” Beth said, her tone blunt. “You know the reason.” “It’s been forty years.” “Not in this town, it hasn’t.”

“I can’t figure out whether to like you, to feel sorry for you, or be annoyed by you,” I replied.

“It’s dangerous to ask old people about their childhoods, Shea. Our buried things have been buried for a long time.”

“I’ve never asked. Are you married? My background check didn’t cover your love life.” I picked up my spoon, trying to shake off the cold feeling from a minute before. “Divorced.” “Smart girl,” Beth said.

And because of what happened when you were a child, you’re too messed-up

“It’s your call. Make it.”

Maybe, just maybe, he’d ruin himself for her.

It was going to be a nightmare, and it was also going to be the best thing that ever happened to her. She knew that already.

But Mariana pretended that nothing was wrong, even though everything was wrong, just like she always did.

“Being a girl is the best,” she said, “because no one ever believes you’d do something bad. People think you’ll do nothing, which means you can do anything. I’ll show you.”

this is the map of the rest of my life. This is all of it. Unless I do something.

I had no desire to live outside the city, in the unbroken darkness, where there was no one around. I needed the lights and noise of people, even if I wasn’t talking to them.