House of Hunger

by Alexis Henderson

But begrudging contentment was not the same as happiness. At best it was familiarity, and at worst defeat. It certainly wasn’t the same as true fondness.

“I’ll let you in on a little secret that will serve you well in the North: The whole world runs on blood. Who has good blood. Who has bad blood. Whose blood is shed and whose isn’t. That’s what it all comes down to in the end. And you southerners like to pretend that isn’t true, but you’re just as bloodthirsty as the rest. Blood is everything in the South. It’s everything everywhere.”

She’d never been able to understand why people who had so much fought over so little.

“I had no real fondness for the city . . . at least not the parts of it I was reared in. But I suppose nostalgia gilds everything, even the worst places.”