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I open the birthday countdown. It’s a simple URL and an even simpler page: a gray slab with a big blocky timer running out the milliseconds, a button at the bottom to subscribe. I enter my email address and get the notification a minute later. I am now on the mailing list to be informed the moment I’m legal.

Another thing for the catalog. “Website,” “interactive,” “gross.”

Against my better judgment, I go back to the thread and open the commenter’s profile to see what else he’s posted. Even disgusting shit like this is better than the comments from people who think I should be put down like a rabid dog or don’t bother to wait for my eighteenth birthday before fantasizing about how I’d look naked. One time, a guy even dropped a hex code prediction: I bet it’s #DC8585.

They love thinking about what my father must have done to me, and they love it even more when they wonder about if I would’ve liked it.

She was ten!

The next URL links to Daddys girl.MOV.

I’m going to scream. I stumble out from under the covers, hit the door to my en suite bathroom hard enough it thumps against the wall, and turn the sink on high. Jam my face under the water. Let it splatter against my face. I cough, and strands of hair plaster to my cheeks.

Maybe Dr. Lý was right about the self-harm thing.

Once my heartbeat slows, I turn off the faucet. Straighten up. Breathe in deep as drops fall off my chin.

The mirror hates me: no makeup, hair unwashed and limp, cheeks rosacea pink from the freezing water. The tiny night-light by the faucet struggles to illuminate the minute details of my face, but it’s enough. From the hairline to the chin, it’s all Mom. Twinsies, she used to say instead of cheese whenever she took a selfie with me. Dad’s genetics didn’t even try, appearance-wise. The only thing he gave me are these dead eyes.

If I went to prison, or died, nobody would miss me.

It’s true. They wouldn’t. Vincent would be sad out of a vague sense of duty, but it’d probably be a relief to get me out of his school. Alyssa would be relieved, too, no longer expected to keep an eye on the heartless psychopath she mistakenly took under her wing. Felicity would be pissed for a bit, but they’d get over it. Mom would be ecstatic. The producer would have a wonderful new angle. Daniel would forget about me by the end of the week.

I’m going to East Early tomorrow. I have to step into that tiny room and look my father in the eye.

My brain and skin and stomach feel diseased.

I need a fucking drink.

Or a few.

Our backyard—the same size as the Box—is concrete. When Dad got locked up, Mom had all the grass ripped out and replaced so she wouldn’t have to waste time mowing or weeding. It’s burning hot in the summer, enough to blister your feet when you walk barefoot to the trash can, but right now, it’s cold and slightly damp.

I have no idea how much of Mom’s liquor cabinet I went through. The back of my throat stings and my body is warm, but it didn’t burn out the sick.

For the five seconds I spend standing on the porch, in my Uggs and pajamas, I weigh my phone in my hand and consider shooting off a late-night text to Alyssa: hey, do you remember sophomore year when we had sleepovers every weekend, and when it was warm we’d steal vodka from the basement and drink it in the backyard? You were starting to let your hair grow out. I gave you one of my skirts. I kissed you because I was hungry and thought about strangling you for the first time.

Or, to Mom: how many likes do you think a memorial post for me would get on Instagram?

I’m lightheaded and the world feels a little—a little too unsteady.

I start walking.

Eastern Market this late on a weeknight is dead. I wander the neighborhood until I make it past the Metro station, toward the row of restaurants and shops and the bookstore Felicity brought me to, I think, I can’t tell. The gay bar a few blocks down is closing up. The only person out is a boy swearing at his friend over the phone because he missed the last train back to Columbia Heights.

Mom would say it’d be better for everyone if I’d gone through with all those suicide threats I made in middle school. Good, she’d snap. Do it. See what I care.

I’m burning up like a fever. Moving on autopilot, barely aware of where my feet are taking me. As if I’m infected with—shit, what’s the name of that virus? Or, no, it’s a fungus. Cordyceps. The zombie-ant disease.

Cordyceps, infected organs, vomit in the back of my throat.

Maybe that’s why I end up standing outside the emergency room.

It’s a new hospital, only been open for a year or two. Can’t remember the name. It just says EMERGENCY in big red letters above the entrance. Through the automatic glass doors, there’s a brightly lit desk and a waiting room that’s sparse for this hour. I guess. I don’t know a lot about emergency rooms. My feet hurt, and I must’ve started crying at some point because I’m standing under the bright entryway lights, sniffling and wiping my eyes.

Pathetic.