Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 91847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
I pick it out now and get back into the bed. After propping the pillows, I set the book on my lap, and my mind conjures up Camilla’s image. She’s strange. Beautiful and wicked but also just a little off. But I guess being the Commander’s daughter will do that to you.
I turn the book over and wonder what she did to it. Drop it in water then trample it? At least it’s not one I loved. I read it years ago, and I have to agree with Camilla that it wasn’t as good as I’d hoped, but there isn’t anything else to read. So, I open it and immediately stop. Because I see what she’s done. Why the book looks so warped and actually feels heavier than it should. It’s a hardback but still.
She’s printed out a photo on plain paper, crudely cut it out and taped it into the book. She’s basically used my book as a photo album. What the hell?
I look at the first photo. It’s a house—well, a mansion—and I can see palm trees in the garden. Miami? Maybe their house in Miami. Santos said that’s where the Commander lived, right? In front, too small to see their faces, is a woman and a very young child at her side. He’s holding her hand. He’s maybe two. It’s too blurred and small for me to make out who it is, and Camilla didn’t provide a caption. Well, I guess she did in the highlights of certain words and letters. I set the book aside and get out of bed to cross to the small writing table against the far wall. From inside the single drawer, I take out a pencil and a pad of paper, which I carry back to the bed.
Settling on the bed, I write out the letters she highlighted in order.
Miami. Home. Mom and T.
The T must be Thiago.
I have no idea what she was doing or what her intention was, but I flip to the next page. This one is of three cats, but there are no highlights. Just a collection of hearts drawn around the cats forming a heart themselves. It’s something a child would do. I turn the page.
Some of them have random pictures but they do seem to follow some timeline because soon I see one labeled twins. In this one Thiago is older, maybe seven or so. He’s standing at his mother’s side, again, and she’s holding both babies, one in each arm. He looks miserable, and I wonder if he ever smiled growing up.
I set the book aside for a minute because I recall that night on the catwalk. Recall his face as he was pushed. I hear his scream. He didn’t deserve what happened to him, but I am holding on to hope that he’s alive, that he somehow survived.
After a few more of these pages, I try to recall the part she said she liked. Page seventy something. As soon as I get to the one she referenced, I know it, and it makes my heartbeat pick up because there is Santos. He must be eighteen, and he’s miserable. He’s thinner than he is now, less muscular, and I can see the shadows under his eyes even in this grainy, poor-quality print. His shoulders are slumped, and his appearance overall is unkempt, but he is looking at the camera. It’s just that the look in his eyes is vacant, like the man is absent even though he’s standing right there. Beside him is a young Camilla. She’s holding onto one of Santos’s hands and beside her is her twin, Liam. Thiago stands on the other side of Santos. The only person smiling is Camilla.
I write out the highlighter letters. Santos the day he came into our little family.
It’s hard to look at the next few pages but the years progress quickly. Santos grows older, his expression fiercer. He loses the face of the mourning boy and becomes the man to be reckoned with—a man I’d cross to the other side of the street to avoid, especially when he and Thiago are pictured together.
There’s one caption beneath a photo of the two together that spells out besties. In this one, horns have been drawn coming out of Thiago’s head and a sticker of a pistol has been added to Santos’s hand. It’s weird, and she’s weird, and this book makes me feel icky in a way. Is she trying to send some message or just being an asshole? I’m going to go with the latter.
I flip to one more page before I close it. This one is a clear image. A photograph. And I can feel the evil coming off the man pictured. I know without a doubt, without having to read the highlighted letters, that this is her father. This is the Commander.