The Sky is Everywhere

Chapter Thirty-Two

My little bird lies on the floor, its wings snapped off.

It will never fly now.

All I can do is look up at Cole. The weight of her casual cruelty presses down on me, so heavy that I don't even have the strength to climb to my feet.

There's no fight in me now, just grief.

My heart is a ball of ice, crushed in a fist.

"Why?" I whisper.

Cole says nothing.

My eyes blur with tears, until she's nothing but a vague shape in front of me.

"Why do you hate me so much?" I choke out, around the awful knot in my throat. "I've never done anything to you."

"I don't hate you," Cole says, very quietly.

"You killed my cat."

She flinches. She actually flinches.

"I'm sorry," she says.

It feels like a slap.

What use is an apology now?

It won't bring Boots back.

"Fuck your sorry. How could you do that?" I say.

I think her expression is wobbling, but it's hard to see through the tears.

"I didn't want to . . . I . . ." She squeezes her eyes shut. "I know you won't understand –"

"Of course I won't. How the hell could I ever understand someone so completely sick and evil and twisted –"

"I did it for you," she suddenly shouts. "That stupid cat was making you weak and you need to be strong. You have to be strong."

"What are you talking about?"

"I know you can do it. But all these attachments – the cat, your friends, this stupid bird – they are all making you weak, and you can't afford that."

My head is reeling. I'm starting to think that Cole is completely mad.

She stares down at me, her chest heaving, her eyes a little glazed.

"My friends do not make me weak," I say.

Of course someone like Cole would view it like that. Of course she would see me caring for and sticking up for my friends, and decide it was weakness rather than kindness. Or maybe, in her twisted mind, kindness is weakness.

"Those friends do," she insists.

I reach for the broken pieces of my bird, and fresh tears fill my eyes.

I know it's only a thing, just a possession, and it's nothing compared to the loss of Boots, but it was important to me. I don't understand how anyone can take such pleasure in hurting other people.

"Why did you take it?" I ask, cradling the broken wings.

"Because it was an attachment."

"That doesn't make any sense."

She clamps her lips together, and this time I am sure there are tears in her eyes.

"Please just trust me."

"Trust you?" I spit the words at her. "Why in the hell would I ever trust you?"

"Because I am trying to help." She makes an exasperated sound and runs her fingers through her hair, then winces, touching the area where I pulled her hair out.

I'm exhausted with this – exhausted with her – and all I want to do is get out of this horrible room. But I can't. Cole killed my cat and I am not leaving until I know why.

"Why did you kill him?"

She averts her eyes. "I've already told you."

"No, you haven't."

She says nothing.

I climb to my feet and advance on her, and now she meets my eyes again. Her face is defiant, but her eyes are hollow, fractured.

"You'll understand one day, and then you'll thank me."

"Tell me. Why. You killed. My cat," I say, slowly and deliberately.

Nothing.

I grab her shoulders, my fingers digging in. "Tell me."

Still nothing.

I shake her, the anger rising in me again, hot and red. "Stop this cryptic bullshit. Tell me what you mean. Why do I have to be strong?"

"Because your life depends on it," she cries at last.

I let her go.

It feels as if there's ice beneath my feet, and it's cracking under my weight.

Is this to do with the Trials?

A bone-deep, chilling fear in my gut tells me that it is, and suddenly everything changes. The Trials are supposed to test us to see if we can offer anything of value to society. They are not supposed to be a threat to anyone's life.

And if they are, then I cannot wait until they happen for Rosie and Roan to get the information they need.

"What does that mean?" I say, but Cole has pressed her lips tightly together.

She didn't mean to let that slip out, and clearly she has no intention of saying anything else.

So I'm left with no other choice but to leverage the one thing that I have over her.

"I know about you and Fletcher," I say.

Her eyes shoot wide, flaring with panic, and her mouth opens but nothing comes out.

Time pulses between us.

"You . . . I don't know what you're talking about," she blusters.

"I know that you want to be a Predator. I know that you want Fletcher to believe in you. I know that he tells you to be a good girl and he gets angry when you're not."

Her eyes gleam with tears, and her mouth is a trembling line. There's nothing left of the smug bully now, and I should feel some satisfaction about that, but I don't.

I'm just tired and sad.

"If you don't tell me what I want to know, then I will tell Ripley everything," I say.

"But if you know about the Trials then you know why I had to kill the cat. Don't you want to be a Predator too?" she says.

"I don't know about the Trials."

Confusion registers on her face.

"I know that we're all being marked as Predator and Prey, but that you're marked as Undecided. So am I. But I don't know what that means. You do though, and you're going to tell me, otherwise I will go to Ripley."

Her eyes flicker with defiance, but it's barely a shadow.

"I'll deny everything. So will Fletcher."

I give a thin, cold smile. "I have proof."

"I don't believe you," she says, but we both hear how uncertain she sounds.

"Can you take that risk?"

I'm gambling here, but I'm left with no other choice. I don't have any proof of the affair, but I will still tell Ripley, and I will embellish the story as much as possible if necessary.

Cole is silent for a while.

"Tell me about the Trials," I say again. "What are you afraid of? Why do I have to be strong?"

"Because," she says at last, in a small, tired voice, "if you're not strong enough, then they will kill you."