I’ve left The Eights.  I’ve left my home.  I’ve left my betrothed.

Shawn, Harlow and I came to Arklay together…..this bond of survival we said would keep us together as long as we lived, but the truth is, nothing lasts forever.

It was never love between the three of us, but there was affection, and a mutual need for each other that saw us through horror after horror.

But here in Arklay, the need just isn’t there anymore.  I’ve grown stronger, become something different than that scared little girl they first met who was so useless I could have gotten us all killed plenty of times over.  Now it’s me who is looking after others, at The Dollhouse; girls like Shay who remind me so much of who I used to be, unable to fend for themselves. Or Mina who is having a baby and needed a roof and somewhere warm and safe. Or Kylie or Linda or Natalia.  Strays who had nowhere to turn but I opened up the doors to them and have welcomed them in, and given them that most precious of things….another bond, a family.

No…. more powerful than that.

A sisterhood.

We might only have our bodies to give to survive, but survive we will.

Thrive even.

Right now you’re asking yourself, what makes this different? What makes us anything more than a bunch of girls being picked off one by one?

I don’t know what’s coming next. But I do know it’s gonna be just like this — hard, painful. But in the end, it’s gonna be us. If we all do our parts, believe it, we’ll be the ones left standing.

Here endeth the lesson