Chapter 2

The next morning, a maid let me out of the closet. She didn' t look at me. She just pointed down the hall and said, "Your mother is waiting."

I learned the name of the boy with the cold voice that day. Alex Hayes. He was Mr. Hayes' s son, ten years old, and he was the one who had fed me like an animal. I learned it from the whispers of the staff, their pitying glances following me down the hallway.

They also whispered about his mother. She had been sick for a long time. They said my mother, Brenda, had been Mr. Hayes' s "friend" before his wife died. They said Alex believed Brenda had hurried his mother' s death along, that her presence in the house had broken his mother' s will to live.

He hated my mother. And since I was my mother' s daughter, he hated me, too. He didn' t just hate me; he wanted me gone. I heard him say it once, talking to his cousin Tiffany in the garden.

"She and her mother are parasites. They don' t belong here. I' ll make them leave. I' ll crush them until there' s nothing left."

His voice was calm, matter-of-fact. It scared me more than any shouting ever could.

After that, I tried to make myself invisible. I learned the layout of the mansion, the back stairs, the hallways the staff used. I memorized Alex' s schedule. I did everything I could to avoid him.

But seeing him was unavoidable. Sometimes, I' d round a corner and he' d be there, standing perfectly still, watching me. The sight of him sent a jolt through me, a cold splash of water that brought back the memory of the swimming pool. A few weeks after the party, he had "accidentally" pushed me in. I couldn' t swim. As I thrashed and choked, sinking into the blue water, I saw him standing at the edge, his face a blank mask. A gardener pulled me out just in time. Alex had just watched.

We lived in the same house. We ate at the same long, silent dinner table. Mr. Hayes was a distant figure, always working. My mother was busy playing the part of the new Mrs. Hayes. It was just me and Alex, circling each other in the silent, opulent cage.

One evening, my mother called me into the formal dining room. Alex was there, sitting at the head of the table, a place that was usually his father' s. A full dinner was set, but only for him. The maids stood stiffly against the wall.

"Alex wants his shoes shined," my mother said, her voice tight. "The maid is busy. You do it."

He looked at me, a small, cruel smile playing on his lips. He was deliberately picking me, the most vulnerable person in the house, to perform a servant' s task. I felt a surge of anger, a hot wave of injustice. But I swallowed it down.

I knelt. It was a requirement in this house. Submission. He extended his foot, his expensive leather shoe inches from my face. I started to polish it, my movements small and jerky. He watched me for a moment, then his foot jerked, kicking the can of polish out of my hand. Brown wax splattered across my cheap dress. Then he brought his heel down, hard, on the back of my hand.

Pain shot up my arm, sharp and blinding. I cried out, pulling my hand back. It was already starting to swell.

He didn't even flinch. He just looked down at me, his eyes empty of everything but a cold, deep satisfaction.

I learned something important that day, kneeling on the cold marble floor with my throbbing hand. To survive here, I had to be like a weed. I had to let him step on me, kick me, try to pull me out. And I had to just keep growing back, quietly, stubbornly, until I was strong enough to find my own patch of sun.