Chapter 1

I was the unluckiest kid in my family—always the one pulling the black-tipped stick from that pretty little "Fairness Jar."

In our house, red meant new dresses, Disneyland, and a goodnight kiss from Mom. Black meant endless chores, lockup in the attic, and the kind of hunger that ate you from the inside out.

Mom loved to stroke my hair in front of the neighbors. "God gives everyone a fair shake," she'd say. "Riley's just a little unlucky, is all."

I believed her for fourteen years.

Until I had an asthma attack and died on that dusty attic floor.

The moment my soul slipped free, I looked down at the overturned Jar, its sticks scattered across the floorboards—and I finally understood why I'd drawn black every single time.

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I tried to wipe the cold sweat from my forehead, terrified I'd stain the carpet and give Mom another reason to hate me.

But my fingers passed straight through my cheek like a wisp of gray smoke.

I froze. Looked down.

A skeletal girl lay on the cheap, threadbare carpet.

Her nightgown had been washed so many times it had gone colorless. Eyes shut, lips cracked like dry riverbed, skin an ashen gray that no living person should be.

That was my body.

So I was dead.

I wasn't scared, not really. What hit me was the panic of having done something wrong.

I'd made a mess. I'd ruined things again.

I'm sorry, Mom. Next time I'll try harder to pull a red stick. I'll be luckier. I'll be someone you actually like.

I drifted up like a weightless balloon, settling into the corner where ceiling met wall.

I remembered the fever, so hot the world swam. Throat like crushed glass. Stomach wringing itself dry after three days with no food.

I'd pounded on that locked door until my fists went numb, sobbing "Mommy, please help me".

But the only answer was canned laughter drifting up from the TV downstairs.

Now the pain was gone. The hunger, too.

"Riley! How long are you going to hide in there? You get stranger by the day!" My mother Evelyn's voice floated up from below, poised and measured.

I drifted to the door, passed through the heavy wood, and followed the dim staircase down into the sun-drenched living room.

The air smelled of fresh-baked apple pie.

Evelyn sat on the sofa in her floral dress, not a wrinkle or a hair out of place, pouring tea for Susan from next door.

"Oh, Evelyn, Riley still hasn't come out?" Susan glanced toward the second floor. "She's usually such a quiet girl. Is she sick?"

"Don't mind her, Susan. She's sulking over what happened three days ago." Evelyn sighed, the kind of sigh designed to communicate patience tested but unbroken.

"You know me. I treat both my daughters exactly the same. No favoritism in this house. Only absolute fairness."

She gestured toward the fireplace mantel, where a delicate glass jar sat on display.

The Fairness Jar.

My soul gave an involuntary shudder.

That jar was the source of every nightmare in my short life.

"The rules are simple," Evelyn said, preening. "The jar is filled with wooden sticks, each painted on the bottom. Red means reward. Black means consequence."

"Whenever the girls disagree, or someone's at fault and we can't tell who, they draw blind. God makes the fairest judgment. Whoever pulls black accepts the outcome."

"What a brilliant idea!" Susan gushed. "The children can't argue with that."

Can't argue with that?

My mind pulled me back to three days ago. The afternoon that killed me.

Ten-year-old Laura had been rollerblading through the living room and slammed into Evelyn's prized antique vase.

Porcelain exploded across the floor. Evelyn came rushing in, face like stone.

Laura pointed at me instantly. I'd just walked out of the kitchen carrying a glass of water.

"It was Riley! She pushed me and I hit the vase!"

I shook my head desperately. "No, Mom! I just came out of the kitchen. I didn't even touch her!"

"Enough."

She didn't look at the rollerblade tracks on the hardwood. Didn't ask a single question. She walked straight to the mantel and took down the jar.

"The Fairness Jar decides. Whoever draws black spends three days locked up. No meals."

Laura thrust her hand in without hesitation. Bright, cheerful red. She stuck her tongue out at me.

My turn. Hand trembling, I reached in and pulled.

Black.

"See?" Evelyn looked at me with ice in her eyes. "God knows who's lying. Go to your room, Riley. You don't come out until I say so."

I was shoved up the stairs, crying, and the lock clicked behind me.

That night, the fever started.

I dragged my burning body to the door and begged through the crack, but Evelyn's voice came flat and final:

"This is the consequence you drew, Riley. You lost fair and square. Those are the rules."

My whole life had been governed by the draw.

Last slice of cake. TV channel. Mountain of dirty dishes. Always a draw.

And somehow, in fourteen years, I had never once pulled red.

"Oh, that reminds me."

Evelyn checked the clock, snapping me back to the present. "Laura and I are going to Disneyland this afternoon. Her reward from last week's red stick. We won't be back tonight."

"What about Riley?" Susan shifted, uneasy.

Evelyn stood, picked up a knife, and cut away the small, charred edge of pie Laura had left behind. She dropped it on a flimsy paper plate.

"Her punishment's technically over. She can have this for dinner." Not a trace of warmth. "I'm not even making her draw this time. I'm giving it to her outright. If anything, I'm spoiling her."

I hovered in midair, staring at that scrap of pie, still wet where Laura's fork had touched it, and felt something light up in my dim, gray eyes.

Mom was giving me food. On her own.

She didn't even make me draw.

I hadn't eaten in three days.

In this house I was used to watching Laura chew and swallow all the good things, then swallowing nothing but my own spit.

Now that little piece of pie radiated the deadly perfume of cinnamon and butter.

"Thank you, Mommy!"

I swooped past Susan, reaching for Evelyn's legs the way I had when I was five. "I'll be good, I promise—I'll never make anyone angry again!"

But my gray arms passed straight through her body.

She couldn't feel me.

Evelyn simply picked up her car keys, took Laura's hand, and walked out the front door without looking back.

The house fell silent.

I floated alone in the empty air, staring at that little piece of pie, and something warm bloomed in my chest.

Mom saved me a piece. She actually saved me a piece.

But I'd forgotten—I was dead now, and the dead can't taste apple pie.