Chapter 1

After the truck sped past, all that was left on the ground was a pulp of flesh that used to be me.

An old woman out for her morning walk nearly had a heart attack at the sight, and the police finally rushed over a few minutes later. Looking down at what was left of me, no longer recognizable as human, one of the officers sighed.

"Looks like this one's going to be a tough job for Ms. Sullivan."

Ms. Sullivan was my mother, Diane Sullivan, the finest mortician in the city. People said her hands could work miracles, turning ruin into something whole again. No matter how gruesome the death, she could restore the victim's face to exactly how they'd looked in life.

I just didn't know, this time, whether she'd manage it with me.

While I waited anxiously, my mother finally arrived at the scene, out of breath. She'd seen more gore than most people could stomach in a lifetime, but one glance at my body was enough to make her frown. She grabbed a water bottle from an officer nearby and took a sip, just barely keeping herself from throwing up.

"How did this happen? Look at the state of this."

The officer beside her nodded in sympathy. "Judging by the clothes, it's a young one. Can you imagine how devastated the parents must be? Nothing worse than burying your own child. Makes anyone with kids of their own sick just looking at it."

My mother didn't answer. She simply opened her toolbox and pulled on her gloves, same as always. She knelt beside me, wiped the blood from my face, and tried to set my features back into place. But after only a few passes, her hands, the ones people called infallible, trembled.

Her fingers had found the bridge of my nose, and the scar running across it. I'd gotten that scar as a kid, after Kyle Bennett deliberately shoved me out of a tree. I'd cried to my mother about it more than once, and every time, all I ever got back was a slap.

"What are you crying about? Your cousin didn't do it on purpose! Are you really going to make a big deal out of kids roughhousing? And so what if you've got a scar now? You're already so plain, it's not like it'll make a difference."

From that day on, the scar had stayed with me, a permanent mark on my body, just like the gloom that had shadowed the rest of my life.

My soul watched a flicker of doubt cross my mother's eyes. She kept working to smooth out my features, but a phone call cut her off mid-motion. She glanced at the screen, saw Kyle's name, and her eyes instantly softened.

"Hey there, Kyle. I'm coming right home. What's wrong?"

On the other end, Kyle's voice came through choked with tears. "Aunt Diane... I'm scared. Every time I close my eyes, I see Sophie coming to hurt me. Can you come home and stay with me?"

My mother was already pulling off her gloves, snatching up her toolbox, and heading for the door. "Don't be scared! I'm coming right now! I'll tuck you into bed. Nobody's going to lay a hand on you while I'm around."

I watched her back grow smaller as she walked away, and looked down at my own body lying there on the ground.

A single tear slid down my cheek. "Mom, why is it always me who gets left behind whenever it comes down to him or me?

"See? You've gone and left me alone again."