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It had been almost a year since her parents died.
The locals called it a tragedy. Her headmaster called it a freak accident. Alyssa Chang called it the worst day of her life.
She was ten, now.
She’d hit double digits a few months ago, her first birthday without her parents to celebrate it with her. That night, she’d blown out the windows in her room instead of the candles on her cake and cried herself to sleep.
Grief, they called it.
It was hard getting used to a new school. A year had passed and walking through the hallways still made her hands shake.
Her classmates were mean. Kids could be mean, she learned, but she could be meaner.
They looked at her like she was a monster, as if they all weren’t monsters. Witches. Werewolves. Vampires. It wasn’t enough. Somehow, she was worse than all three combined.
They watched her, stared at her, only to look away the second Alyssa finally stared back. They were afraid of her.
The girl who killed her own parents. The dark witch who blew up her childhood home. It was a secret everyone was in on.
She has a temper, didn’t you hear? They would whisper, when they thought she couldn’t hear them. She’s an orphan, didn’t you know?
She was mean. She was angry. She was grieving. They would never understand.
A third of the school had taken a life, part of her knew, but how many of them had killed their entire family?
She was alone.
Almost a year had passed and she was still alone. The worst of winter had come and went, but the anger and grief had never left with it.
It was almost the middle of February, now. February 14th. Valentine’s Day. Her parents used to celebrate it. They’d always wake her up in the morning with a box of chocolates and a stuffed animal.
Last year, they had given her Mr. Wrinkles. Alyssa swallowed hard as she thought about the stuffed elephant sitting on her bed. It was her mom that had named him.
Mr. Wrinkles. The only thing left she had from her parents. From her home.
She used to love it, this sham of a holiday. Now, she hated it.
She was forced to watch as students confessed their crushes and passed notes in class. Witches used magic to conjure bouquets of flowers. Vampires exchanged chocolates filled with animal blood. Some of the older students even went out to town for dates.
In her homeroom, the teacher passed out conversation heart candies and taught them the history behind the holiday. The class spent the entire week before making shoeboxes to hold all their candy grams.
Alyssa had decorated hers in black and pink construction paper, with red hearts all around it. Her box was nice and pretty and...
Empty. It was empty.
She didn’t get any cards or candy. Not one.
Her classmates passed by her and her box and her anger and her grief and pretended not to see her. They gave each other love notes and chocolates and lollipops and Alyssa? Alyssa got nothing at all.
(Even Hope freaking Marshall had something in her box.)
Now, she sat in her room, in front of her empty box and her stuffed elephant. She felt a lot like crying. She didn’t cry. She didn’t.
A knock at her door and the sound of hurried footsteps made Alyssa look up. She didn’t have a roommate. She didn’t have friends.
Her first thought was that someone was playing with her. What did they call that game? Ding dong ditch, or something?
They played that game a lot with her. Yet—
Her eyes went wide as she noticed a red note slip through the crack under the door. It must have been a new game.
Alyssa jumped to open the door, not thinking. She wanted to know who it was—the person that was playing with her this time. She’d make sure that there would never be a next time.
But there was no one there. The hallway was empty.
Alyssa stepped back into her room and shut the door. Her heart was pounding so loud she could hardly hear the sound of her own breathing, but why?
She slowly looked down, her eyes lingering on the familiar note. She struggled not to read it.
A game, it was all just a game, she tried to remind herself. She should throw it away, set it on fire, pretend nothing happened, Alyssa thought, but her heart refused to fall in line.
Alyssa bit her lip and picked up the red note.
It was cut into the shape of a heart, folded into two. Black marker spelled out:
To Alyssa
From Josie
She’d even added a heart above her name.
It didn’t make sense. Josie, as in Josie Saltzman, the headmaster’s daughter? They weren’t friends. They weren’t strangers.
With trembling fingers, Alyssa opened the note. There was a heart-shaped lollipop taped to the inside.
Happy Valentine’s Day, it read. That was all.
It was nothing. Three words. A piece of paper. And the only card she’d gotten all day.
Alyssa blinked back tears and unwrapped the lollipop, sticking it into her mouth. Cherry. Her favorite.
She sat back down on her bed and shared a look with her stuffed elephant.
“What do you think, Mr. Wrinkles?” She showed him the card, then held it to her chest and imagined it was her heart.
Her lips twitched. She hadn’t smiled in almost a year.