Chapter 21: It’s Okay

That weekend passed in an oddly quiet haze. I stayed inside.

After spending nights locked in a cell at the sheriff’s office, I know it was strange to then just stay inside a small apartment the whole weekend, but being home again felt unreal—like I’d stepped out of someone else’s life and back into mine too suddenly. Susan kept the bookstore running with Andrew, and Hana stopped by a few times just to check on me, but mostly I stayed tucked away, letting the silence settle around me.

It turned out to be the right choice. The downtime gave us space to figure out a schedule that worked for everyone.

Thursdays, Fridays, and weekends, I’d be at the bookstore with Susan, giving Andrew the time he needed to help his dad.

Mondays through Wednesdays, I’d return to the sheriff’s office.

Working with Hana had taught me more than I ever expected. And by the end, people had seen me around so much they’d started assuming I was on some kind of work-release program. When I suddenly disappeared this weekend, Hana told me folks had been asking about me—curious, concerned—so she talked the sheriff into hiring me officially. She said it might help keep rumors from spreading—or at least keep them from spreading more than they usually do.

The pay wasn’t much, and they still had to treat me like any other detainee. The restraints didn’t change; they were part of my days no matter what. But at least now there was a little money coming in. After losing my job at the department store, even a small paycheck mattered.

And if I was going to be bound either way ... I preferred earning something for it.

There wasn’t much I could do with my wrists cuffed to my waist, but I managed the basics—answering phones on speaker, greeting visitors, sorting paperwork one sheet at a time. Functional enough, I guess. But I knew how I looked.

When people walked through the door, the first thing they saw was me: skirt, heels, hands locked tight at my waist, taking small, careful steps in stilettos because the short chain between my ankles didn’t allow anything else. It didn’t matter how professional I tried to act. The sight stopped people cold.

Double takes. Thick, uneasy silences. Stares that lingered too long.

The men were the worst. They never said anything, but they didn’t have to. I could feel it—the way their eyes slid over me, assessing, amused, curious in that detached way men look at something they’re deciding whether to pick up or leave on the shelf. I wasn’t a person to them; I was a scene. A novelty. An object. A pretty thing trussed up for someone else’s purposes. And they included the deputies.

I’m not naïve. I understood exactly what I was projecting: that tightly controlled, submissive kind of attractiveness that men pretend not to notice or even like, but do. The same vibe Susan gave off at the bookstore—and the reason I kept half an eye on her when certain men wandered in. I knew that look, and now I lived it.

But outside the few who were into this kind of thing—the ones who liked women displayed the way I was—I knew the town already had opinions about me. They’d heard what happened. Or rather, they’d heard pieces, and filled in the rest with whatever made the most dramatic story.

And of course, that made people think the worst.

Anyone hearing about my case could put the pieces together in the most convenient direction: I had threatened those girls, therefore maybe I’d done more than threaten them. Why else would the court keep me chained up, supervised, treated like a walking risk?

Threats alone didn’t justify these restraints, the deputy shadowing me everywhere, the way I had to move through town like a package under guard.

So, people filled in the blanks. They decided it must have been something violent—something dangerous enough that keeping me bound was just common sense.

What unsettled me most wasn’t the suspicion. It was the acceptance.

People saw me—saw the steel around my wrists, the chain at my waist—and they just ... went along with it. No questions. No outrage. No whisper of its necessity.

It was as if the whole town had silently agreed that this was exactly where I belonged.

“That’s one of the Vail girls—the older one,” they’d hiss, pretending to whisper but loud enough for everyone to hear. “You know, the one with that aunt. That whole family’s rotten. They’ve got her chained up like some wild animal—did you know that? Can’t be around people without causing trouble. And the sister? Same exact thing. Figures, doesn’t it? With blood like theirs, what else were we expecting? That apple didn’t just fall near the tree—it clawed its way back up the trunk.”

And somehow that made it acceptable.

As if labeling me—us, really—as dangerous, made everything simple enough for them to quit thinking.

I think Becca had a lot to do with that. Not on purpose, not directly—just by existing the way she had been forced to for so long. People got used to seeing her bound, escorted, monitored. It became familiar, and familiar things stop being shocking. Especially here. They just blend into the scenery.

Even Sophie wore restraints now. She told me herself.

When Becca couldn’t do it anymore—pregnancy making it unsafe—Sophie stepped into the role at the museum without a word of complaint. As if it were part of the job description. As if it were a uniform she had to put on.

And once something like that happens here, it turns into ... a practice. A quiet, unspoken custom no one in town will question—because questioning it would mean admitting how strange it is. How wrong it’s always been.

So, when it came to me—my restraints, my ever-present deputy—no one questioned the reason. Or rather, they constructed one. But no one stopped to consider whether the court had gone too far.

Because the pattern had already been set.

Women in restraints weren’t an emergency or an injustice.

They were just part of how things worked now.

And that meant no one asked, no one pushed the matter.

And me? I just slipped into the routine built around me.

Days at the bookstore with Susan and Hana—teaching Hana how the book world worked, how to keep the business running.

Or days at the station, where Hana taught me the basics of law enforcement—at least the administrative side. The business side.

Always in restraints. Always with Hana or someone else watching.