"Who are you?" I jump at the tiny voice echoing in the house. I spin around, crouching down, my hand hovering above my knife. A little girl that does not look a day older than 5 stands at the doorway. Those big, round, brown eyes stare at me, unblinking. Two tiny black plaits rest on her small, squared shoulders. She wears an all white dress, with small floral details on the bottom. Her dress doesn't seem to move with the wind, and her feet are so close together I'm amazed she hasn't lost her balance. Her hands are placed neatly, right over left, in front. I slowly stand up straight and lower my hand.

"Why, you are the person on the news," She answers her own question, or at least I think she did. Her mouth either moved too fast or didn't move at all. I have to look around to confirm that she and I are the only ones here.

"What news...?" I ask, pretending that I don't know what she's talking about. I hunch up my body, ready to run at any given moment.

"Aren't you the one that murdered his entire foster family?" she asks softly, yet it rings, sound wave after sound wave, throughout the entire house. Fear immediately fills my lungs, my head starts pounding so loudly I have to squint to keep my vision. I expect to see the girl look afraid, or taken aback, but she doesn't. Instead, she tilts her head, as if she had just asked me what I had for lunch.

"Yes," I say, still puzzled at her composure. "Aren't you in the least bit afraid?"

"What's there to be afraid of?" She asks, face expressionless. I'm convinced this girl does not have a single muscle in her face. Not afraid? This young child? Then it hits me. That's exactly why she is not afraid at all. She's just a kid. She must not understand the meaning of death, or what murder means. I let go of the breath I've been holding this entire time, and the house comes back into focus.

"Nothing," I say. "It was nice meeting you, go along now." I give her a smile. Or at least I think I do. I can't ever really be sure with this girl, seeing how she doesn't even so much as twitch. She has been standing so still and perfectly this entire time. If she had not tilted her head, I would have assumed she is a doll.

She's so peculiar. I have so many questions about her. Like how is her dress so stiff? How is her face so stiff? Why is she here instead of in school? But I bite back all those questions because I want her to leave. Those are questions to deal with another day. All I want to do is collapse on the wooden floor and sleep.

"It was nice to meet you too," she says, before turning around like a soldier and walking off. Even the way she walks is peculiar. Technically it's not the way she walks. It's the fact that her dress is so stiff it bends only forward or backward with her walking, so it makes her walking look so odd.

I sure hope I don't see her ever again.

God damn it. Day 1 and I've already been spotted. I don't really feel like moving. I lie down on the floor and stare at the ceiling. I don't think I can last long, I'll have to keep moving from place to place I guess.

I can help you. The sinister voice is back. I hit my own head, as if hitting it would somehow make it jump out of my brain and shut up.

"Yeah? Well look where your help has gotten us!" I nearly shout, but I quickly cover my mouth to lower my volume.

You know everything I did was to protect us. You know you need me. I can help you.

There is silence in my brain, but I can feel him watching me. His shadow is hovering around me, waiting for the chance to strike. I hesitate. He isn't wrong. Every time I've let him take control, I've ended up somewhere safe. And that's why I'm still alive.

So I close my eyes. And my eyes glint red.

...

When I'm awake, I'm in the bathroom. Does he have a thing for bathrooms, or what? But when I look in the mirror, the face that's looking at me isn't the same. It's completely different.

My hair is no longer short, matte and messy. It goes down to my shoulders, and is a brilliant Auburn to match my red toned face. My eyes have become a brilliant shade of blue, and my skin is more tan than before. I look like I sunbathed for a week straight. My jawline is sharp and defined, my freckles dance around my button nose like stars in a night sky. That's where the good things end. My skin, although tan, somehow still appears to have a greyish tinge. The scar around my right eye is still there. My eyebags are heightened. My eyes, though a brilliant blue, suck me in so deeply into their tunnels. All the insecurities I would wish away are still here, stuck to me like glue. They followed me, even when I changed from a boy to a girl.

The 5 year old me would have loved this. Now, I don't. It feels like no matter how much I'm happy with, there are so many insecurities that I don't like. As a kid, I thought becoming a girl would change all of this. I thought it would make me feel better, and make me love myself, even if I had all of these parts of me still there. But I was wrong. Just because I've changed genders, it doesn't make my insecurities go away. Like magic.

But...I don't hate it. As a girl or a boy, it doesn't matter. I guess I should try to love my body regardless of how it looks. As it is. I think my subconscious picked this appearance. Because as a kid, I always imagined what it would be like and how I would feel if I was a girl.

That's what I'm looking at in the mirror right now, only a more matured version.

"How did you do it?" I ask the woman looking right at me in the reflection. She grins.

"A magician never reveals their secrets," She winks, putting a finger to her lips. Then she's gone. And it's just me again. Staring at my reflection.

I should get some sleep.

I get up and leave the bathroom, leaving that evil part of me behind.

...

Beep beep! My alarm rings repeatedly. I groan and roll out of bed, slamming it off. Good god I need to change my alarm.

"Good morning, Avery." A familiar voice rings in my ears. "I've brought you breakfast" Her black hair reaches her shoulders and her grey eyes reflect mine.

"Thanks mother" I said, suspiciously eyeing the meal on her tray.

"Nothing to worry about, it was very simple to put together." I smile, and take the tray.

"Is it good darling?" Her stomach suddenly starts bleeding out and the surroundings flash with blood. Crash! The tray drops, but when I look down it's a sharp, shiny knife.

I quickly look back up but all I see is her sliding slowly to the floor, her eyes full of tears.

"I'm sorry..." I'm sorry... I'm sorry.... I'm sorry... I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorryImsorryImsorryImsorryImsorryIMSORRYIMSORRYIMSORRYIMSORRY

Her face grows bigger and bigger and bigger until it's just her face looking at me on that bed. Her eyes soften and irises enlarge. Her gigantic mouth moves.

"I...love...you..." Her head tilts with the clock. Tilt, tilt, tilt. Her mouth into a fixed smile and her eyes look like they are popping out. I love you. I love you. I love you I love you I loveyou IloveyouiloveyouiloveyouilouveyouiloveyouiloveyouILOVEYOUILOVEYOUILOVEYOUILOVEYOUILOVEYOUILOVEYOUILOVEYOUILOVEYOU

"AAAAAUUGGH SHUT UP!!!" Beep! Beep! Thud! I fall to the floor, my body aching from the impact. Breathe. Breathe. It was just a dream. All a dream. My breathing was irregular, perspiration all over me. My body was shaking. My eyes drift to the blood, still on my hands. It'll never go away. Never.

...

I stumble into the McDonalds, still out of it from that cursed dream. "I love you," the words send chills down my spine, and I shake my head. I should just focus on getting lunch.

"It's you," I hear a familiar tiny voice and look down. Sure enough, she is here. Same plaited hair, same stiff dress. Does she just have multiple of the same dress to wear everyday? Wait...how does she know it's me?

"How did you know it's me?" I ask, utterly dumbfounded. I look around me just to make sure. And sure enough, no one else is staring at me like they're trying to find out whether I'm the person on the news or not. No one is batting an eye.

"What do you mean?" she asks, as if I asked the strangest and stupidest question to ever exist.

"Do I look the same to you?" I ask, still uneasy about the fact she has recognised me. Still looking around and trying to see if anyone else is looking. She tilts her head to the side, her eyes moving up and down.

"No," Relief shoots through me and I finally stop hovering my hand over my boot. I don't get this girl. She still has no expressions whatsoever. She really does feel like a strange doll. It feels like if I look at her for longer, I will discover thin strings attached to the back of her body.

"Then how could you tell?" I ask, with a lot of other questions starting to swarm my mind, including those from the last time I saw her. She tilts her head slightly again, and this time her eyes pointing upward.

"I just could," she says simply. And that is all I can ask because she's the next in line.

"A cheeseburger, extra pickles, right?" A familiar old lady smiles down at her, with those kind wrinkles at the side of her eyes. She nods. The lady gives her the receipt, and she bows slightly, before moving back to her 90 degree position. It looks odd when she walks, as I've mentioned before, but this time I realise it's not just because of her dress. It's because she's standing so upright too. Even the way she sits down, she carefully brushes her dress beneath her, which I didn't think her dress would actually fold, before sitting down, placing her small hands perfectly on her lap.

"Cheeseburger with extra pickles and fillet o' fish," The waitress says monotonously, as if I'm the one holding her at gunpoint and asking her to recite our order for us. I stare at her, utterly confused why a McDonald's server would even bother. Usually they just put the tray down. But it all makes sense when I look back at the little girl, nodding her head as if it's just as expected. On top of that, the waitress puts down a carton of strawberry milk, and moves it so that the label is perfectly facing the child, and is perfectly lined up with the corner of the tray. Now that I'm looking, the cheeseburger is also perfectly in the middle. What the heck is going on...

She says nothing, even though the strawberry milk is not something that she ordered, and carefully unwraps her burger, so gently undoing the folds until the burger peeks out. I look around me again, this time expecting large cameras pointing right at us. Who the hell would be so careful and neat eating a goddamn burger? It's just a burger!

"Where are your parents?" I ask her, because she's here all alone. Which is not typical for a 5 year old child.

"I don't have parents," she says, taking a small bite into her burger. She chews exactly 5 times before swallowing it, and dabbing her mouth gently with a napkin.

"You live on your own?" I ask, biting into my own burger, letting the juice run down my fingers. "How are you paying for your food?"

"Yes," she says, taking another bite from her burger. She chews 5 times again and swallows, dabbing her mouth again before speaking. "Money appears on the table every morning. I buy food for lunch."

She spoke without a trace of emotion, as if it is normal for a young child to be living all alone, without parents, without any guardian around. Then suddenly, for some strange reason, everything becomes clear.

My eyes track back to find hers. Her mouth is still moving and chewing steadily. But the world slows down. She stops chewing for a brief moment. It is just me and her. Her eyes are mine and mine are hers. We are floating. Quietly, loudly. Quickly, slowly. We aren't anywhere. Yet we are everywhere. It is nowhere. Darkness. Pure darkness. Just me and her. Floating in the abyss. Then she looks at me, and I look at her. And she is no longer her. She is me. Eyes big, round and brown. Baggy jeans and the white hoodie, with small details of lavender sewn on the very bottom left...Hair falling into my eyes. Yet the eyes are the same. Three people. Same yet different. Different yet same. Just me, me and her.

You don't have to understand. I don't quite fully understand it myself. But within that brief moment, we came to one understanding. We are friends.

"Why du syou wef the some fing every day?" I'm talking with my mouth full, and she looks at me, still without any emotion.

"Because...I don't like change. I like wearing the same thing and eating the same thing everyday. It's not new, it's safe. It's normal." she says. Her burger is finished, and she neatly folds the wrapper into a square, placing it directly next to the carton of milk. She picks up the carton, and I've never seen anyone so carefully open a carton of milk before.

"What do you do in your free time?" I ask, chewing and swallowing my food before speaking this time. I'm the older one yet I'm the one without manners. How ironic.

"I watch the people next door," she says, having put her fingers to her lips. She had been thinking for a while.

"That's it?" She stares at me for a moment and gently lifts the carton to her small lips, taking a tiny sip.

"Mm... I also count the number of tiles that are around in my house," she says, smiling. "I've counted 1,345 so far." This is the first time she's smiling, and the first time she's beaming at me. Like she just announced she won an award.

"That's so cool!" I say, although it's not really cool at all. It's kind of...sad actually. She's bored to the point that she doesn't really know what to do with herself.

"I know!" she says, and she happily takes a big gulp of strawberry milk. My heart warms, and I resolve to protect this kid with my life.

"Next time you're bored, come over. I'll do a bunch of things with you," I say, planning on introducing her to a bunch of games that I always played with myself. And by myself I mean...

Replacing me? There she is.

Yes, I don't trust her. I haven't trusted her in so long. I stopped talking to her ages ago. But I still remember, as a young child, she was the one who had been there for me. She was the one who had consoled me and calmed me when I was stuck in that hellhole. But...everything changed. She changed.

"No, no I'm not. We can all play together," I mutter under my breath, hoping that the kid doesn't hear anything. She scoffs at me. But she doesn't protest either. That's a win.

"What did you say?" The little girl looks at me, tilting her head slightly.

"Oh, I just asked for your name," I reply, remembering that I haven't given myself a name yet, either.

"It's Issa," she says. And her little lips curve upwards again. "Isn't it nice? I picked it myself!"

I smile back at her, because now we have something in common.

"Yes, it is," I reply. "And my name is Ash. I chose it myself, too."

Ash? Seriously Avery? That's what you're going to call me?

'Do you hate it?' I think, so that this time there's no chance of Issa seeing me talk to myself.

Well, no, I guess not...

'Ash it is, then," I say. And that was that.