Marlene continued to tidy the room, her movements stiff and robotic. She picked up a discarded stocking from the floor.

The velvet curtains of Petra’s bedroom were never drawn, yet the room remained perpetually dim, choked by the scent of expensive lilies and stale gin. Petra von Kant lay across her oversized bed like a fallen statue, her limbs draped in emerald silk that cost more than most people earned in a year.

"Clean it up," Petra commanded, her fire vanishing as quickly as it had arrived. She slumped back into the pillows, pulling a fur throw over her face to hide from the light. "Clean it all up. And then start the typewriter again. I can't bear the silence."

"You love me, don't you?" Petra sneered, though her eyes were brimming with fresh tears. "In your own silent, pathetic way. You stay because you enjoy watching me crumble. It makes us equals, doesn't it? My heartbreak and your servitude."

Petra didn’t look at the sketches. She looked at the photograph on her nightstand—Karin. Karin, with her cool eyes and her appetite for the world, who had taken Petra’s heart, chewed it into something unrecognizable, and handed it back.

Petra reached for the gin, but her hand trembled so violently she knocked the glass over. The clear liquid soaked into the white sheets like a transparent wound.

Petra sat up abruptly, the silk sliding off her shoulder. "Why don't you say something? Why do you just stand there like a gargoyle?"