From Chapter 3...

At once, I’m transported back to the night when the image of what I thought was our perfect family erupted like a raging volcano. We were seated at our dinner table for Sam’s fifty-fifth birthday. The smell of freshly baked lasagna floated through the air like a scrumptious cloud atop our laughter, and the aroma of my spiced apple tea greeted my nose with its irresistible fragrance.

Up until a few months prior, Sam and I were having our fair share of marital issues as well as intermittent difficulties from his untreated PTSD that lingered on, so we decided to restore our love for each other to get our relationship back on track and inject some happiness back into our bond. Except for a few hiccups, which were to be expected, I truly believed we were on the path to regaining what we’d lost.

Filled with a renewed commitment to strengthening our marriage, I anticipated his birthday with such eagerness that year. To that end, I commissioned a surprise gift specially made just for him. I purchased a watch he had been ogling, and had it engraved with the words, “When I met you, time stopped,” with the date of our marriage underneath.

We sang Happy Birthday, and when I went to the counter to cut his birthday cake, instead of placing a slice on his plate, I positioned the box with the sparkling bow on it instead. With zeal, I requested he open it. He unwrapped the dazzling box, his robust hands deftly undoing the multicolored ribbons. As he revealed the treasure, his eyes lit up brighter than a star in a glittering night sky. When he read the engraving, a smile emerged like gold on his face. I fastened the watch on his wrist and kissed his lips, which tasted of red wine.

Just as our celebration was winding down, there was a knock at the door. I opened it with the plate in my hand that housed Sam’s precious present a short time before. A younger woman with luxuriously long brown curly hair and emerald green eyes was on the other side, wearing a little purple dress with sunflowers and white stiletto heels. When I gazed at Sam to discern who this woman could be, his eyes glazed over, and the blood drained from his face, rendering him as white as a ghost.

“Sam, who’s this?” I asked as my eyes searched his, my heart beating out of my chest.

“I’m so sorry, Katrina,” was all he could say, guilt and remorse plastering his face, mixing in one ugly heap.

“Sorry for what?” I gasped, but deep down I knew, and everything I thought was true crashed down around me like meteors striking at my heart.

“Tell her who I am,” the woman bellowed as she shoved herself into our home, the aroma of her cheap perfume gagging me.

“Gloria, what are you doing?” Sam moaned plaintively, and life as we knew it shattered all around us into irreparable pieces.

“You’ve been telling me you were going to leave for years. It’s just excuses after excuses. Be honest with your family. Be honest with yourself,” she shrieked, the veins bulging out of her neck in a fit of rage, her words punching me in the gut, knocking the wind out of me.

“How could you do this to me, Sam, to our family?” I howled as the glass plate that held bliss and love moments earlier slid out of my hand, crashing onto the floor into a million pieces like our life together. My body went numb. “I thought you loved me.”

“I do, Katrina,” he protested, but the words were hollow, and I felt nothing except ice and emptiness.

“You’re such a phony, Sam. He tells me how much he loves me all the time, and how he wants to leave you,” Gloria bellowed, spitting in my face.

Billy shot up out of his chair like a blazing rocket ship.

“Get the hell out my house you pathetic whore,” he screamed ominously, in a pitch I never heard before.

“I’m your father’s whore, and he loves every minute of it,” Gloria declared with a caustic snicker.

“Enough, Gloria,” Sam retorted viciously, his eyes ablaze with anger that his secret had been unleashed into the world.

“Don’t talk to me like I’m some submissive and docile woman with no backbone like you tell me she is,” she spewed, her perfectly manicured index finger pointing in my direction. “This is it, Sam. You either make up your mind, or I’m done, and this time I mean it. Oh, and happy birthday. I hope I made it a special one,” she screamed, slamming the door behind her.

My legs buckled, and I fell to my knees in despair, plummeting into the glass shards from the broken plate that sparkled like gems, cutting my skin as I tried to push myself back up. Tears streaked down my face like a raging waterfall. I couldn’t catch my breath. I was drowning, sinking into hell. Disbelief suffocated my brain, disorienting me as I realized what I was living before was a lie. Billy helped me to my feet as Sam sat motionless in his chair, his face expressionless and vacant, a stranger to me now.

In the months that followed, I realized that I was weak. I was submissive and docile. I couldn’t let go. Instead of hating him, I started to loathe myself for not being able to leave, for loving him so much that I was willing to accept the lies, the deceit, and the infidelity. I despised my powerlessness, and in turn, I detested myself.

***

Excerpt from All That Was Left Unsaid by Danielle Dragona. Copyright 2026 by Danielle Porciello. Reproduced with permission from Danielle Dragona. All rights reserved.

PROLOGUE

EVERY MARRIAGE EVENTUALLY reaches a decision point. A moment of truth when you either need to trust your partner completely or believe you will be better off on your own.

For Rachel Farrell, that moment is now.

As she lowers her eye to the scope of her rifle, this untimely realization hits her with sudden clarity. Those familiar vows, recited almost two decades ago, constrict her lungs now with the full weight of their significance. To have and to hold, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health—they all amount to being there, always, no matter what. Doing whatever it takes. Even if that means putting a bullet in someone’s head.

The last week has put those vows to the test. Revealed the cracks that have been growing for years in her marriage to Caleb. After the euphoric whirlwind of falling in love, their relationship survived the trials of parenthood, the stresses of two high-powered jobs, the financial burdens of raising a family. But instead of pulling closer together, they’ve been drifting apart without even knowing it. Differences that once seemed so small have come to feel irreconcilable. Rhetoric that was once so supportive has become laden with microaggressions, harbored grievances, mutual suspicion, strained silence. And yet, their marriage has endured, adapted. They have kept their family together.

Rachel wishes these thoughts weren’t running through her head, not now when she needs to concentrate. But isn’t that what this moment is really about? Does she trust her husband? She knows she must decide. Knows she has put it off. Dreaded the implications, especially for her children. But marriages can’t survive in stasis. They need affirmation, renewed commitment, reinvigoration. Maybe that’s what’s happening. Maybe what seemed like a final straw is actually a newfound spark. Maybe she won’t know what she has until it’s gone.

With tears blurring her vision, she squints through the eyepiece and locates her target. At this close range, his head takes up most of the viewfinder. He’s sitting still, exposed, facing away from her. Then she sees the gun pointed at Caleb’s head. She can’t wait any longer or the decision will be made for her. She has to take the shot. But what if she misses? What will happen next? Whatever it is, she knows her life will never be the same after this moment.

Rachel suppresses her inner dialogue of self-doubt and steadies her breath. Chest pressed into the dirt along the ridge. Elbows propped against a rock. Hands clenched on the stock and grip. Shoulder nuzzled against the butt, braced for the recoil. Beads of sweat streak down her face, but she lets them drip onto the dry ground. Her hand stops trembling as she aligns the back of his head in the crosshairs. Then, she counts her exhale, holds her breath, and squeezes the trigger.

CHAPTER 1

Seven Days Earlier

“I KNOW IT’S HARD, but you have to tell him how you feel,” Rachel says into the screen of her laptop.

Easier said than done, she thinks to herself as she adjusts her camera angle. She has been sitting here all afternoon, parked in the same chair at her dining table, holding back-to-back Zoom sessions. Carrie, her last client of the day, is running up against the end of the hour, but Rachel’s best efforts to politely steer their session to a logical conclusion are proving too subtle.

Part of her feels sorry for Carrie. Her husband stopped attending long ago. It’s not a good sign when the husband—or either spouse, but usually the husband in Rachel’s experience—refuses to participate. That’s the whole idea of couples therapy, that it requires with both partners. That it’s a safe, supportive environment for discussing and resolving issues in a constructive manner. When one spouse taps out of the therapy, it usually means they are tapping out of the marriage. The next step is the domain of Rachel’s previous ten-year profession as a divorce attorney, before she found her calling as a couples therapist.

Rachel can tell that, on some level, Carrie knows her marriage may be over, despite complaining about her husband’s lack of affection, short temper, long absences as if those are root problems rather than symptoms. The fact of the matter is, once again this week, her husband isn’t here. Clear evidence that he’s done trying to save the marriage, if that was ever his intention.

Rachel glances at the clock in the upper corner of her screen, hoping Carrie won’t notice—or maybe that she will and finally realize their time is up. Rachel’s butt is getting numb. She’s running out of time to make anything for dinner. Another night of carryout is the likely solution. Without breaking sympathetic eye contact, Rachel slides her phone just underneath the camera’s view and composes a text message to Caleb.

“Last session running long. Can you pick up dinner at Lost Dog? The usual.”

The Old Town Alexandria restaurant isn’t exactly on Caleb’s way home to the Virginia suburbs of Washington, DC, but close enough. Plus, Rachel has a low-grade obsession with their bacon-feta pizza that always overrides her latest attempt at a diet. She’ll kick herself later for gorging on carbs, but screw it—it’s been a long day. Hopefully, Caleb won’t be taking clients out to dinner tonight. She knows he spent the day doing the lobbying rounds on Capitol Hill with one of them, some polyethylene manufacturers’ association or something. She needs that pizza. Rachel notes the time on her phone, 6:04 p.m., then covertly places it face down so she won’t be distracted by it again.

“I just really don’t know what else he expects me to do,” Carrie says, abruptly ending her monologue with an expectant look. Rachel snaps out of her pizza lust and forces a compassionate smile.

“Look, Carrie . . .” Rachel begins, choosing her words carefully. “We’ve been working together a long time, so I feel like I can be honest with you. I’m never going to tell you what to do, but the behaviors you’ve talked about just . . . don’t seem to be getting better. In fact, they seem ingrained. It’s very hard to change another person. And the fact Todd is no longer attending these sessions isn’t a good sign of his commitment to making this marriage work.”

Carrie doesn’t respond, but her expression is the definition of despair. Rachel immediately worries that she’s gone too far. “I’m sorry, I’m probably overstepping my bounds as your therapist, but I . . . Carrie?” Mid-apology, Rachel realizes it isn’t Carrie’s expression that is frozen; it is the entire screen. “Carrie? Hello? Can you hear me?”

That’s perfectn, Rachel thinks, pushing a strand of hair aside as she clicks around in aggravation. Just when she finally delivers her tough-love message, their connection drops. The internet service at their suburban house has been so spotty lately, and calling customer service is a joke. Did Carrie hear any of that? Rachel types into the chat feature: “You froze on me. I think we lost our connection.” But nothing happens. Everything is frozen.

“Crap,” Rachel says, drumming her fingers on the table. Hopefully, a bad connection is all it is. Not Carrie getting so offended by Rachel’s candor that she left the meeting. Maybe Carrie’s phone number is in her contacts, Rachel thinks. Just as she picks up her phone to check, it buzzes—most likely with Caleb’s reply, telling her why he can’t pick up dinner, that he’ll be home late again, that they shouldn’t wait up for him. Anticipating her aggravation, she flips the phone over to see the screen, but it isn’t the message from Caleb she expects. Instead, it’s just one simple notification. “Message failed to send.”

***

Excerpt from Outage by Mike Trigg. Copyright 2026 by Mike Trigg. Reproduced with permission from Mike Trigg. All rights reserved.

Chapter 1: Dangerous Den

Murphy recoiled in horror as the creature landed on his neck. He screamed when it flopped onto his face and omitted a high-pitched squeal next to his ear.

Frantically swatting the darkness in his panic, he twisted and lurched to get away, but his body was wedged in place. He dropped his phone and covered his face with one hand, flailing in the darkness with the other. To his relief, he was able to knock the beast off his head. He breathed heavily. He could hear his assailant flopping and scuffling nearby and he feared another attack. His body shivered involuntarily.

It’s just a bat . . . calm down, breathe.

Inhaling deeply, he counted to three as he drew air into his lungs, then he slowly exhaled to the count of three and repeated it. It was a technique Coach Troutman taught him in Junior wrestling class. It helped calm his panic when he was caught in a tight hold.

He wasn’t afraid of bats per se, but alone in the dark in a tight space was a whole other thing.

What if it’s a vampire bat? They don’t live in Alaska. But what if?

Tentatively running his hands over the ground in search of his phone, he still was not completely convinced the bat didn’t want to suck his blood.

Where’s my phone? Did the light go off? I hope I didn’t drop it down the . . .

At that moment the bat flapped its wings. Murphy shrunk away as a leathery appendage brushed his cheek. He listened as it gained flight. The sound grew fainter and he realized the bat had flown straight down into the chasm.

He gazed after it and noticed a faint glow of light. Pushing closer to the edge he peered over the rim. What he saw gave him hope. His cell phone was sitting upside down on a small ledge about an arm’s length away.

He dug the toes of his boots into the hard-packed earth and inched closer. Juniper branches dug into his back as protruding rocks pushed into his ribs. He stretched toward his phone. His fingers clutched at the air a few inches from it. With his free hand, he blindly searched for something to hold onto. His finger found a thick branch of the Juniper bush and he grasped it tightly.

He shoved with his feet and pulled with one hand, holding tightly to the juniper with his other. His body gained a few inches of progress so he tried for his phone again. His fingers touched it, but he couldn’t grasp it. He pushed and strained with all his might, only needing another inch.

Suddenly his brain registered a loud cracking sound, like you hear when a limb is torn from a tree. Murphy’s body suddenly jolted forward.

“No!”

The juniper branch tore loose in his hand. His body lurched again, his shoulders hung over the chasm. He was slowly slipping over the edge and there didn’t seem to be anything he could do to stop it.

His hands desperately sought purchase on the smooth rock at the top of the opening. His fingers worked feverishly at every small bump and crack, but they couldn’t find a safe purchase.

Gravity steadily pulled his body into the black void while he tried desperately to dig his toes into the hard earth.

Abruptly, he fell headfirst into the abyss. For a brief moment his boots hooked the rim but immediately slipped off. He plummeted into the unknown.

“Nooooooooooooo . . . ”

* * *

An hour earlier, Murphy and Katrina had stepped from the Mount Roberts tram at its terminus nearly two thousand feet above the historic streets of Juneau, Alaska’s capital city. With the sun high in a cloudless sky it was a rare and perfect day to launch the season.

It was fast becoming a tradition for the locals to take advantage of the first week of tram operation before the multitude of cruise ship visitors overwhelmed the tiny city and the tram itself. Many came to hike the trails, some came to photograph the spectacular scenery and wildlife, others came only to admire the astounding panorama and to enjoy a picnic lunch.

Hogan pulled hard at his leash. Murphy leaned back to slow him down but was forced into a slow jog to keep up.

“Slow down, Hoge, we just got here. We have all day.”

Hogan wanted to sniff everywhere at once. His pushed-up black nose worked feverishly as his bulging eyes darted in every direction and his white feet pranced impatiently.

Murphy pulled on the leash and raised his voice. “Hogan, calm down.”

At the mention of his name, Hogan wagged his stubby tail and circled back to lick Murphy’s hand.

“Do you smell the flowers?” Katrina called as she began skipping to keep up.

“Yeah, it’s awesome up here in the spring and the tram is always cool anytime. A bit scary, but worth it.”

“It is a pretty good adrenalin rush for six minutes. I always imagine the floor dropping away.” She adjusted her round-lensed, red-tinted sunglasses and smiled.

Murphy gulped. “Great, thanks for that thought, we still have to go down.” He had managed to slow Hogan down to a walk. They walked side by side for a moment, neither talking until he said, “I like it.”

“Like what?”

“Your hair.”

“Oh, okay, um, thanks.”

“What do you call it?”

“What?”

“The color.”

“Indigo.” Katrina’s hair was tied high in a single ponytail that seemed to erupt from the top of her head. The sun glinted off the luxurious deep blue color.

Modern Pebbles chic.

Murphy smirked.

“Can I ask you something?”

She was silent for an uncomfortable pause. “I guess.”

He smiled before asking, “Where did you find neon green hiking boots to match your neon green leggings, or was it the other way around?” He snickered and stepped away quickly.

“At least I don’t order my clothes from Outdoor Nerds are Us.”

“Mean.” He couldn’t help looking down at his tan cargo shorts, plain brown hiking boots, and navy T-shirt.

She smiled and batted her eye lashes.

He grimaced.

I should have known better.

Changing the subject, Katrina said, “Sorry your mom has the flu and couldn’t come. It was nice of her to send us anyway, but I am feeling a bit guilty. Maybe we should have stayed home and helped her out.”

Murphy was surprised it made him happy that she had referred to his home as her home. She stayed with them so often people thought they were siblings. The two of them found it easier to say they were cousins. It was basically true as their fathers were lifelong friends and the families were extremely close.

“My dad’s coming in this afternoon,” he told her. “He said he will nurse her back to health.”

“Your dad sure travels a lot.”

“What about your dad? He’s out crabbing all season.”

“Not the same, but I guess.” She stopped skipping.

Murphy glanced at her and noticed a distant look in her eyes.

They made their way to an observation deck close to the tram’s terminal. From there Murphy could see his home across Gastineau Channel in Douglas, Alaska. He could see most of Douglas Island and the snowy tops of the Chilkat Mountains in the distance to the west. They enjoyed the vast and beautiful scenery in silent reverie. Even Hogan seemed taken with the amazing vista. He sat quietly beside Murphy. The pink tip of his tongue protruded from his mouth and wiggled slightly as he breathed.

They eventually tore themselves away from the spectacular view and began walking. They passed a gaggle of first graders coming down the path. They were all holding onto a rope and were led by a harried Mrs. Harper. Murphy knew she was new to the Grade School, and this may have been her first field trip. Mr. Able, Murphy’s friend Mikey’s dad, was at the tail end of the rope. Daisey, Mikey’s little sister, was second from the end. As they passed Murphy waved at Daisey and smiled at Mr. Able who rolled his eyes and slumped his shoulders. Mr. Able was a building inspector during the day and he coached a men’s boxing club after work. From his gestures, it was apparent he’d met his match with a half dozen six-year-olds.

They passed the gift shop, the theater, and the bar and grill. The tram had delivered them approximately halfway up the nearly four-thousand-foot-high mountain.

They stopped to read the large sign mapping the hiking trail routes. Mount Roberts has a number of trails from easy to difficult. They chose a moderate three-mile trek that would take them through spruce forests, boulder-strewn alpine pastures, moss-covered rock glaciers and ending at a small glacier-fed lake in a picturesque mountain valley. They would wind their way back by a different route, one that followed the bubbly brook that drained from the lake.

After choosing their route, they set out. Strolling leisurely they following the wide gravel pathway through an alpine meadow. Small streams and waterfalls dotted the landscape. Murphy had a permanent smile plastered on his face.

Hogan stopped suddenly, woofed and stood erect. “What is it, boy?” Murphy reached down and scratched his ears.

A blur of red fur exploded across the trail a few feet in front of them. Hogan bolted, jerking Murphy from his feet and ripping the leash from his grasp. Murphy landed on his shoulder and his face at the side of the path but immediately sprang to his feet and brushed himself off. His cheeks exploded with a red bloom in his anger and embarrassment. He glanced about frantically and was just in time to see Hogan’s bouncing rear end and stubby tail disappear around a tall rock outcropping in the middle of a nearby meadow.

“Hogan, come.” Murphy called but Hogan didn’t come. Murphy repeated his command again and again but there was no Hogan.

“Wow.” Katrina appeared to be in awe and somewhat amused by the madcap spectacle she had just witnessed. She repeated herself. “Wow!”

As Murphy inspected a small cut on his knee, she plucked a chunk of fuzzy green moss from his hair.

He glanced at her and said, “Don’t start.”

“I know not of what you speak, oh graceful one.” She smiled demurely and took a step back.

“Very funny,” he sneered. “Just help me find the jerk.”

“I thought he always did what he was told,” she questioned. “Like, come when he’s called.”

“He usually does, but maybe he can’t hear me. Wait here. I’ll go get him.”

He didn’t look back and began jogging toward the stone obelisk where he had last seen Hogan’s white rear end disappear from sight.

He ran across a grassy meadow strewn with boulders and crumbling spires of decaying rock. At first, he tried not to step on the wildflowers, but there were too many and he cringed as he trampled through a patch of mountain crocus. The meadows were covered in a vibrant blanket that represented a kaleidoscope of color.

Murphy rounded the outcropping where Hogan had disappeared and was immediately confused. Stretched before him was a small sloping valley covered in nothing but moss-covered rocks and a vibrant carpet of flowers. There was absolutely nothing for a dog of Hogan’s size to hide behind.

“Hogan! Come, boy! Come now.” He called repeatedly but still there was no response. Murphy wandered the tiny valley calling Hogan’s name. Eventually he retraced his steps and arrived back at the last place he had seen his dog.

Murphy examined the craggy monolith. It was three times the size of his dad’s big SUV and twice as high as the monkey bars at school. The surface was cracked and porous, but he didn’t see any caves or fissures big enough for a full-grown Boxer to enter. As he circled it, he ran his hands along its surface as though searching for a hidden door. Low Mountain Juniper bushes grew along the base of the north side. He lay down on his stomach and peered under the lowest branches. There he saw an overhang and a space big enough for a fox or a dog. Far back under the shelf, he saw a black hole in the ground.

Could this be the fox’s den? Did Hogan follow it down there?

He peeled off his backpack, set it against the rock and squeezed his head and shoulders under the pungent branches. He inched toward the dark opening. It was a tight fit and he inched forward, struggling as the low branches dug into his back and tugged at his T-shirt. Grabbing the base of the bush he pulled while pushing with the toes of his boots. Slowly he neared the hole in the ground.

Repeatedly calling for Hogan he eventually got close to the darkened void. It was a struggle to retrieve his phone from his back pocket and turn on the light, but when he did, he was faced with a steep-sided deep opening about the size of a bicycle tire.

No way a fox went down there. How would it get out?

There was another recess on the other side of the hole. It was a wide crack in the rock that immediately turned a corner that he couldn’t see around, but he spotted a small tuft of reddish fur caught in a tiny crevasse where the opening disappeared around the corner. Both openings were small, but he realized Hogan could have fit in either.

Did he follow the fox? Did he fall?

“Hogan!”

He yelled into the breach. Then he yelled into the cavity across from him. He held his breath and listened. Nothing.

***

Excerpt from Murphy and the Mystery of the Outlaw Gold Mine by Bradford D. Smith. Copyright 2026 by Bradford D. Smith. Reproduced with permission from Bradford D. Smith. All rights reserved.

Prologue

No one likes to be kept in the dark.

In the dark, everything is murky, even the Los Angeles sky.

But the day of Nicola’s accident, I had a pretty clear view of things. It tends to be that way—clear—when Nicola isn’t.

Nicola, Ben, and their daughter, Emmy, were walking holding hands, something the three of them hadn’t done since Emmy was a little kid. I felt the itch in Nicola’s palm, like she didn’t want to hold hands. But Emmy insisted. She was between them, arms outstretched, making that little humming sound she sometimes made when she was nervous or lost in thought. Ben walked on slightly ahead, his head down, eyes focused on the phone in his hand. I could almost hear his teeth grinding.

Up ahead, the road was clear. The sun covered everything in butter-yellow light. Crows perched in the bare-barked trees and made long, scratchy cries like a group of smokers laughing. They rustled leaves and crossed the pavement before them. But the trees were still, like the air had been sucked out of the city. Up ahead, the road was clear.

The three of them approached the corner, Emmy and Nicola chatting aimlessly. Ben narrowed his eyes and squinted at the screen as if the sky was too bright. He stepped out into the road first. Emmy, next. She skipped slightly—braids flying—and pulled her mom’s arm.

Nicola looked up and saw one of the crows overhead, its beak open, making a dreadful sound. When she looked back at the road, her gut pinged with a horrible dread she couldn’t place.

Then she—we—saw it.

From the middle distance, something large and white hurtled into view, its body glinting in the sun. Emmy screamed. Nicola tried to pull her back, but one by one, her fingers slipped out of her grasp.

It was too late.

Nicola’s body collided with the big, white thing, and in the next moment, she was airborne, tumbling through the air as if she had been taken by a tornado. Her thoughts spiraled with her, spinning out of control.

I’m going to die.

I’m going to live.

Don’t let me die.

I’m going to die.

She kept spiraling, around and around, until I stopped her with a simple suggestion: Breathe, Nicola. Breathe. We have this power, those of us who live in the darkness.

The asphalt grated her spine. It must have hurt, but Nicola did not cry. Perhaps because the air was too full of Emmy’s screams.

She rolled to her left, her left arm pinned against her chest like a piece of limp fabric. Her left leg lay stretched out before her perfectly straight, but dead. Cold. Frozen in place. She rolled to her side and saw Emmy, blood coating half of her face as though she were wearing a mask. Five feet away, Ben lay in the road unmoving, his body contorted, his face turned away.

Overhead, the stretch of blue sky angled down Beverly Boulevard and went on forever. Cars passed, some honking, others slowing to stop and help or to get a better look. Nicola grunted and heaved herself along the ground, her jaw gritting with pain. She reached for Emmy, reached for Ben.

The white body of the car stirred. A door opened. A black polished shoe emerged onto the asphalt as the driver leaned out, then disappeared again as the door shut. I heard the engine as the car started and rolled backwards, slow at first, then picking up speed until it was gone.

Chapter One

Nicola

Snap. Prick. Burn.

The pinch of electricity in my dead leg wakes me from the dream of the accident, Emmy’s scream still ringing in my ears. Perhaps I’ll always hear it now, I think as I roll to my left side—the dead side, useless as a doornail—and slap feeling into my thigh, but there’s nothing. If you took a needle and jabbed it in, I would probably twist it a few inches deeper to see if I could feel it tickle.

A groan escapes me as I heave myself from the bed and stare at the nightstand cluttered with six months’ worth of post-accident prescription bottles. I stand with prickling tendons, the burn of an aching, underused muscle, my whole left side from my shoulder to my toes as limp as if I have novocain in my limbs.

I snatch a bottle from the dresser—the usual cocktail to start the day—painkillers, anti-anxiety medication that does next to nothing, and Topamax. Sweet, beautiful, woefully expensive Topamax—the anti-seizure medication that happens to work for migraines too, even if doctors don’t quite understand why. My mind races as I swallow the cocktail, thinking back to the first day I took it and couldn’t recall how to make oatmeal—a stunner of a brain fart. I stood there at the stove, paralyzed, unable to count to three, like an Alzheimer’s patient grappling for a memory. Everything was blank, my brain ticking silently away but coming upon blank numbers, blank time.

And then there is Imitrex, the migraine abortive—easy, cheap, always available. My reliable old friend. I take her, and like magic, my migraine slowly fades to the background.

And the foreground? That’s where Anger resides. Anger is my constant companion, a vampirish love connection I cannot seem to part with. It’s with me even as I make the bed and get dressed, my feet stumbling along the floor, left foot dragging from the nerve damage. My hands fumble in the dark for clothes in the pit of my closet shelf, and I pull out clothes for my shift at the Whitmore—yoga pants that are designed to look like trousers, a black tee shirt, and a cardigan with a curious dark stain on the sleeve, so I tuck it under and hope no one will notice, especially Emmy.

Emmy will be grossed out by it. She’ll wear an entire perfectly clean outfit like she does every day. We’ll fight about it. I’ll tell her, “Just wear stuff twice! It’s not so bad!” And she’ll say, “Mom, do you know how disgusting you sound?” And for a second, I’ll agree with her in my head that it is disgusting. The whole thing is disgusting, but what it comes down to is this: Our home isn’t ours anymore. Neither are our washer and dryer. Our apartment building has precisely one washer and dryer that cost $2.00 a load, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to do laundry every week with my shift schedule. Truth be told, I’m in no shape to be hauling eight million loads of laundry around until kingdom come, even if I wanted to.

Down the hall, limping, limping, I bang on Emmy’s door, her laptop squawking away with the sound of a teenage girl with a British accent talking about some celebrity’s latest plastic surgery.

“Get dressed, Em!”

She’s into something on YouTube called CelebrityStalkShow, run by a Hollywood-obsessed kid who seems to beat all the paparazzi to the punch. She yells something at me through the door, my signal to disappear from her area, and I depart down the flight of stairs at the speed of a centenarian.

At the landing, I sense something wet on my bad foot and look down at it in the center of Scotch’s cold pee puddle. The foul smell hits me, and I curse.

Not “fuck.” Not “shit.” The bad one. The one my mother would hate to hear me say. Rhymes with hunt.

“Classy.”

I look up. Emmy is behind me on the landing. Isn’t it funny how teenagers have this tremendous gift of sneaking up on you precisely at your worst possible moment?

“Scotch peed,” I say lamely.

“I can see that.”

“Let him out, Em, will you?” I ask, my voice tired and insistent.

“I think he’s already relieved himself right here. In our kitchen. Where we eat.”

I release a long, exasperated sigh, and Emmy pushes down the stairs past me, her hair matted in place, showing the pink crest of her scar. I try not to stare and pinch the spot on my hand that Dr. Constance said would be calming in moments like these. But it’s 7:32 a.m., and I don’t feel calm. I feel angry. And tired. And like I want to be teleported out of my own life for even a brief minute.

I give Emmy the look, the one my mother gave me and that her mother probably gave her. The one that lets her see a little into the quiet, grieving parts of me. Lately, I’ve been peeling back the layers often and letting her see more than usual. Maybe too much.

Emmy opens the back door to the shared courtyard and takes Scotch outside. I mop up his mess, then peel the pee-soaked black sock off my bad foot and dump it in the trash. One stair at a time, I haul myself back up to wash off my foot and leg in our tub—the one crusted with brown rings and white soap stains still because I don’t have the strength to scrub it, despite what the physical therapist tells me.

I hobble back downstairs. Emmy is still with Scotch outside, wandering around with his plastic bag, trying to figure out what to do with it. His little white body shakes and shivers as he follows Emmy and sniffs at the ground. I never wanted a dog, or a Westie for that matter. Scotch—including the name—was Ben’s idea.

Ben. Our good Ben. Dead Ben …

For a moment, I think that if I can just close my eyes, more details will emerge.

The car—so brilliantly white it hurt to look at it.

Those shoes. Black and heavy.

The scent of freshly applied cologne.

A single tattoo around the man’s middle finger, like a wedding band.

He was that close, and yet, for some reason inexplicable to me, I cannot remember his face.

My ears ring for a moment before I snap out of it. I go to the window over the kitchen sink and silently mouth, “Garbage can. Don’t bring it inside,” and then put breakfast out on the counter. Cereal and the last of the milk, but not the organic kind like we used to get. I place Emmy’s pills beside her bowl on a paper towel. There are things we still haven’t found a way to talk about.

When I look up, Emmy has pulled open the sliding glass door, no bag of shit in her hands.

“Relax, I threw it away.”

“A+,” I say sarcastically and instantly regret it. Why can’t I just say thank you?

“You’re welcome.”

She washes her hands, then hops silently up onto the breakfast stool and turns to gaze outside at the shared courtyard of our apartment complex. Her hair is still growing back over her scar, but it’s patchy, uneven, and it looks awful. I reach for her arm, but she flinches. She turns. Her eyes are cold and blank.

“Can I stay home today? I don’t feel great.”

“Em. It’s your first day.”

“So?”

“So you know this isn’t a good start. You have to go. It will be fine …”

She glares at me. “I really don’t feel like I can face it.”

I take her in, a million micro-signals at once. Her hunched shoulders, the marks on the back of her hand—ballpoint pen, drawn by her, but who could guess? The friendship bracelets that were on her wrist from the summer before last, faded and fraying, now bombarded by dark leather bands and multiple hair ties. Her nails bitten down to short nubs. Her head, shaved at the side where her scar is, parted unintentionally along where her braid used to be. I feel a jolt of grief in my core before the usual wave of rage rises up inside me, a hot, ruthless tide. I force it down again.

“You know, Em, it’s okay to feel the way you do. You’ve been through a lot. We’ve been through a lot.”

I try for genuine emotion without anger. It’s so much easier to be angry. Anger is my default. Anger is a nice, easy substitute. Anger gets the job done.

Emmy turns, her face bright, like she’s realized something. “It’s okay. You’re right. I’ll go.”

A forced smile spreads across her face. She ducks her head low and finishes her cereal with three whopping bites. Her scar seems to wriggle while she chews.

“I’ll go,” she repeats quietly.

“Honey,” I start. I pause, searching for the words. “It’s okay to hate it. I hate it, too.”

She smiles that same weak smile, like there’s something I’m missing, something I just don’t get. Outside, a siren blares from the main road, and Emmy jumps. I try to make it seem like I don’t notice.

Emmy jumps in her sleep now. Her body jolts like she’s being electrocuted. It’s like when you’re falling asleep, and you dream you’re actually falling, and your body twitches. That’s what Emmy does, except she does it over and over again. I asked her if she was dreaming of that day. She said she wasn’t, but it didn’t start until six months ago.

I scoop some kibble into Scotch’s bowl. The tiny brown pebbles ting ting ting against the cold steel. He nudges toward me and sits, waiting until I finish. Emmy sets her half-eaten bowl of cereal in the kitchen sink and runs the water over it.

“Can we get soy milk next time?”

“Yeah, whatever you want.”

“Good,” she says, looking pleased. “Ready to go?”

Upstairs, I quickly brush my teeth and hear my stomach growl. I hear it but don’t feel it. That’s the thing about Topamax. You know you’re hungry, but you never feel like eating. I pull up my tee shirt and examine my frame. I can’t tell if I look different, except for the hollowness that’s formed around my cheeks and under my eyes. The scale says differently. Thirty pounds fell off me over these past six months. And I haven’t even been trying.

In the bathroom, I pry open the mirror door to the medicine cabinet facing me and reach for the day’s setup: a Topamax and a couple of Imitrex. Imitrex, my old faithful, goes into my pocket for the migraine that will return later, just as it does every single day. I also know that aspirin or over-the-counter fare won’t cut through the fog, the nausea. The sensitivity to light, sound, and smell—and the blinding, throbbing pain. It’s not if I’ll get a migraine, but when.

The tap runs cold for what feels like an eternity, and I swallow the extra painkiller, then wash my face in freezing cold water that lightly smells of chlorine.

Technically, I’m considered an “eggshell claimant,” which means there was something considerably wrong with me before the accident. A “migraineur,” or a person who suffers from chronic migraines. They got a lot worse after that day, after I rolled off the hood of the Rolls-Royce. The police didn’t believe me, but I knew it was a Rolls-Royce that had sped through the stop sign, taking the turn at a whipping pace, accelerating into the three of us without a hint of braking.

Rolling off a Rolls. It’s almost comical now. For a quick moment, I peer down near my navel and rub the small circular scar where the hood ornament—a lady with wings—punctured my left side and sliced into my pelvis, leaving the slight impression of a pointy feathered wing on my skin.

The thing is, only a Rolls-Royce makes a hood ornament like that. I know because Ben wanted one for a long time. He said the Mercedes didn’t have the same feel now that Mercedes-Benz started embedding their hood ornaments on the front of their cars, making them all nice and flat. I guess they knew their drivers drove fast and their Mercs were hitting a lot of people. Maybe Rolls-Royce doesn’t care that its status symbol is basically akin to a deadly weapon.

The strangest thing—I haven’t seen a white Rolls-Royce since that day.

From the medicine cabinet, I take out the bottle of bright blue mouthwash and gulp a mouthful.

One swish. Don’t think about it.

Two. Don’t picture it.

Three. It’s all in the past.

Four. You don’t have to be afraid.

Five. It won’t happen to you again.

Spit. But it might. It could.

My mind starts to buzz as the painkiller takes effect and dulls my thoughts, a shade pulled down over the window of a sunlit room. The thinking stops for a little while.

I watch the blue liquid swirl around in the sink, tinting the porcelain as it goes down, slowly, slowly.

It’s not the same sink, or the same house, as that wretched day from before, when Emmy was a baby … but my brain doesn’t know that. It thinks the thoughts it wants to, drugs or not. I’m a hostage.

And what do I think about?

Death, of course. How near it was and may still be. I think of how death seems like that nice, clean break, but it leaves so much behind. The seeping, oozing wound of loss, regret, and confusion. The questions unanswered. The things unsaid.

But I also think of that day and finding him, the man behind the wheel. He’s out there somewhere. Alive. Untouched. Carefree.

Or perhaps careless.

I’d like to be as careless as he.

The blue swirl of my saliva and mouthwash moves round and round, and I turn on the tap to make it run clear again. When I look up, my own face catches me off guard. The dark circles. The abrupt pointed end of my nose. The blotchy, colorless yawn of both cheeks that used to be full, that used to make me pretty. Below, small, accented lines strut toward my mouth. I rub my forefinger across my lips and try to make them disappear. I don’t enjoy looking into my own eyes, but I do it anyway, just for a second.

A thought appears, quick and sharp, a tack pressing into my temple. I resist, but it swells, unstoppable, an ocean inside me …

You are not who you thought you were.

***

Excerpt from Dark Ugly Places by Ashley Mansour. Copyright 2026 by Ashley Mansour. Reproduced with permission from Ashley Mansour. All rights reserved.