Cloud003: Is that why you keep watching me from across the room when you think I’m not looking?

Reina-Ellis: Fuck you.

Cloud003: I would rather fuck you.

Cloud003: Get your ass to the same room in five minutes. When I walk in there, I want you fully naked on your back, your legs spread wide apart. Don’t turn on any lights or I’ll go.

Cloud003: Leave the mask and the heels on.

Reina-Ellis: What makes you think I want to fuck you?

Cloud003: Four minutes, Reina.

Reina-Ellis: Jerk.

Cloud003: One who’ll be fucking that tight pussy all night.

A day later, there’s a message from me.

Reina-Ellis: You still don’t want to meet?

Cloud003: No.

Reina-Ellis: Why not?

Cloud003: Don’t you have a fiancé?

Reina-Ellis: He doesn’t matter. I’m your slut, remember?

Cloud003: And that’s all you’ll ever be. Don’t ask for more or you’ll regret it. See you next year.

I stare at the words as if I’m learning to read. The evidence of my infidelity stares back at me with ugly, disgusting words.

What the hell have I done?

No more messages were exchanged between Cloud003 and me until a day before my accident.

Reina-Ellis: I won’t meet you again.

Cloud003: Nice try, my slut.

Reina-Ellis: I mean it. I’m turning the page and you chose not to be part of it. I know you’re blocking any feelings you have for me and I understand. I probably should’ve done the same. I’m sorry and goodbye.

He didn’t reply. The only other message is the one I just received.

How does he know I was bound to the roof last night? My first knee-jerk reaction is to ask him if he’s the one who did it.

I stop myself at the last second. He could be a psycho. Scratch that, he’s most likely a psycho.

It’s better not to engage with them. Besides, I clearly told him goodbye.

My heart somersaults in my chest as my screen lights up with another message.

Cloud003: Be careful, my slut. Someone is after your life. I’d hate to see those beautiful eyes vacant.

I lean back in my seat and watch her rosy cheeks through the camera.

The way she bites her lower lip as she stares at the phone.

The way her slender body straightens, her tits straining against her cotton T-shirt.

She’s beautiful and she knows it.

Maybe that’s why she chose to be a bitch queen.

I reach for my dick and readjust it.

Blackwood will soon have another tragedy.

Reina will play the main role.

For the next three days, I go to college, but I barely concentrate on anything. I keep watching my phone, expecting Cloud003 to send me another text.

He doesn’t.

I should be thankful, but the unknown is killing me. At night, I re-read our exchanges and contemplate reaching out to him. He probably doesn’t know I lost my memories, and I could indulge him to get information.

But what if he knows and I put myself in danger?

My self-preservation instinct is better than that.

I push the door open and sigh heavily.

“Hey, Izzy.” I greet her as she carries grocery bags into the kitchen.

“Oh, you’re back,” she says with a bit of surprise in her tone.

“Am I not supposed to be?”

“You usually spend as much time as possible out before coming home.”

The squad did invite me to go out, but I wasn’t feeling it. I went with them yesterday, and it ruined my mood instead of lifting it.

“What are you going to do?” I motion at the grocery bags.

“Bake.”

My mood brightens. Finally something out of the ordinary. “Can I join?”

She completely freezes as if I just drove a knife into her heart. She blinks three times. “You…want to join me.”

“That’s what I said.”

“To bake?”

I nod.

“In the kitchen?”

“Is that so weird to ask?”

“It’s just you never step foot in the kitchen.”

“Well, that’s Old Reina. I’m a new person now.” I say the words louder than needed, as if I need to convince myself.

Every day I spend at college, I discover the atrocities the old me did. Even if I want to change, I can’t possibly undo what I did in the past.

Or can I?

Redemption is so hard when you don’t know where or how to start.

With a deep breath, I follow Izzy to the kitchen. The vast area is filled with stainless steel appliances and white marble.

“Must be a bitch to clean all this white,” I tell Izzy as she busies herself behind the counter.

“Tell me about it.” She pauses. “I mean, I’m fine with it.”

“You don’t have to watch what you say, Izzy. I swear nothing will get back to Alex.” I make a motion of zipping my mouth, locking it, and tossing the imaginary key out the window.

Her kind eyes crinkle on the sides with a smile. “It’s like you’re an entirely new person.”

“A better one?” My tone holds so much hope, it’s pathetic.

She nods. “Well, yes. You’re more vocal, and less…”

“Snobby,” I finish for her. “I know. I kind of figured that out.”

She smiles awkwardly, and we silently agree to let the subject go.

We get to work. Izzy prepares the dough and speaks about Jason and the NFL draft. It’s their dream coming true.

My heart warms at how proud she is of him, but also at the sacrifices she’s made to get him here. When her husband died, leaving Izzy with a toddler, she moved from the south to escape her conservative family after they tried to force her into marrying a man ‘to take care of her’. She worked several jobs until she got to Alex’s house.

“Jason is lucky to have a mother like you,” I tell her as I shape the cookie dough with her.

“I’m lucky to have him as my son.” She grins.

“Izzy?” I don’t meet her eyes as I ask. “Since you’ve been here for a long time, have you ever met my mom?”

She shakes her head in my peripheral vision. “When I came to work here, your dad was your only parent.”

“Then have you ever heard anything about her?”

“I think she died during childbirth? That’s what I heard from the servants around here.”

That’s the only information I know.

My hands falter around the dough, trembling. I even killed my own damn mother.

“What is wrong with me?” I murmur, not meaning to say it aloud.

“Hey.” Izzy pats my hand with an affectionate expression. “It wasn’t your fault. No one’s birth is wrong.”

I smile a little. Considering my bitchy nature, I doubt I was ever good to Izzy, so I’m beyond thankful she’s trying to cheer me on.

“What about Alex’s wife?”

Her features fall and she seems in deep thought, as if choosing her words carefully. “She died in an accident when Asher was about ten.”

Oh.

On some level, Asher and I share a tragedy. The only difference is, I didn’t know my mother, while he did.