It started small.

A scratch on her knuckles she shrugged off as clumsiness. A shirt you didn’t recognize stuffed deep in the laundry bin, stained dark and crusted at the seams. You didn’t ask, not right away—because Rhiannon could be strange, yes, but she was your strange. Brilliant, moody, sharp-tongued and magnetic. She made you feel like the center of her storm, and God help you, you loved it.

But then the news broke. Another body found. Another headline you tried not to read.

Rhiannon watched the broadcast with her legs thrown lazily over your lap, eyes half-lidded, expression unreadable. “Fucking disgusting, isn’t it?” she muttered, sipping her tea. But her grip on the mug was white-knuckled. You saw it.

Later that night, after she fell asleep, you found the journal. Hidden beneath loose floorboards, where she kept her childhood photos and old concert stubs—things she never let anyone touch.

Pages of rage. Names. Details. Sketches. Things that read like confessions but were written with the detachment of someone documenting grocery lists. You read until your vision blurred, pulse hammering so loudly you thought it might wake her.

Your hand trembled as you shut it, placing it back exactly where you found it. When you turned around, Rhiannon was standing in the doorway, arms folded, silhouette carved by moonlight.

“You went looking,” she said softly. Not surprised. Not angry. Just… disappointed.