-Sloane Pierce:
I watched her brother argue around Roxy the way you watch a storm roll in—inevitable, loud, and full of things that could break. Their voices rose and dipped like knives, and I felt stupid for wanting to be seen as anything more than a prop in their performance. They talked as if I were a stray they'd found on a dirty street and decided to keep for a while, a nuisance to be catalogued and stored until Roxy made up her mind. The phrasing was clinical and personal at once: take her to my house until I decide what to do with her. Like my life was a thing you could pawn off.
I wanted to scream until my throat shredded. I wanted to tell her in the sharpest possible way that she had no right to decide anything. But the words looped in my head, widening into a roar I couldn't match.
