noel fray. one.

We were hungry, that's all. I never meant for this to happen. God how I'd spent years loathing the likes of the Frays, months stealing from their neighbours' trash cans, weeks buckling up the courage to break in and days slipping in and out of windows.

("How old are you?"
"Nine."
"Me too!")

Tarver Fray's a jackass, but the worst thing is he's smart too. Wicked smart. That's fuckin' frustrating. You know how humiliating it was, sitting there in a chair in his office as he convinced me to stay? He figured out that Leon existed without me saying a word. Pulled at all of my heartstrings. I think he still suspects we're not actually twins, but when you tell yourself a lie long enough it becomes the truth. Leon is my twin.

It's the only reason I had to swallow my pride and accept defeat in the hands of the Frays.

("When's your birthday?"
"August 24th."
"Mine too!")

Tarver said like calls to like. Said he saw something in me he'd not seen in any of his kids, not for a long time. Street smarts, sick of his spoiled children thinking they can get away with murder because of their last name. Ruined children, a handful of graves and one dusty crown. Volunteering with swagger and overconfidence or not volunteering at all - two extremes, both sides of the same obnoxious coin. But Leon and I have something you can't breed, can't teach in a classroom, can't slap a surname on and will it to be. We've got fight, the good kind. The rare kind.

And we've got me. Leon's got me.

("I think we're-"
"Twins."
"Me too.")