When the cuts and scratches on his hands were still fresh, Sander held the only surviving member of his pack of glass dogs–a German Shepherd–and learned about the fragility of life. He had almost immediately tried to piece together the rest of them, but the only thing he had succeeded in was making a mess of blood and Gorilla Glue. 

It wasn’t as though he had ever stood a chance anyway. Once something is broken, it can never be pieced together in quite the same way again. But thanks to first aid, the cuts on his hands eventually turned to scars, and the scars faded with time–out of sight, out of mind. At least, that’s what Sander had told himself.

—

Despite having been born to an engineer and a chemist, Sander realized early on that his true calling would be writing mystery novels. He was perfect, his writing was perfect, and he knew that this was what he was made for. 

Science had never been his forte, but there was one lesson he’d retained from his upbringing: everything can be explained if you work on it long enough. He would never claim to know the answer to everything–he wasn’t that full of himself–but he firmly believed that answers were out there. That mindset was what had allowed him to survive in the hellscape that was public school, but it had also enabled him to ruminate on the mystery that had been playing him for two years now.

The dogs had lived on the top shelf of his bookcase for five idyllic years before falling to their shattering doom. They’d been a gift from his mother, along with a note that read, I’m sorry, please forgive me, you are my legacy. And of course, she had been right. Sander was perfect, because his mother had been perfect. His mother had been perfect, and that’s why she ended things the way she did and left him with the dogs, almost like she was leaving herself behind in a form even better suited to care for him. At least, that’s what Sander had told himself.

When they broke, his father had told him that accidents happened, but Sander’s favorite word had always been “why”. It was what he could never stop asking himself, even late at night when he had school early the next morning. So naturally, he searched for the answer that would quiet his mind.

He first ruled out an earthquake–all of the books on his shelves had remained where they were, and Sander surely would have noticed if any of them had moved by even one millimeter. But then something sounding suspiciously like the truth began to fester in the back of his head, and it made him sick.

Was this tragic accident really so accidental?

He’d laughed the thought off the first time. His father knew better than to enter his bedroom at this age, and the woman the old man was married to knew better than to try anything, not that she had any reason to. On top of that, his little sister Miranda was not only too small, but also not spiteful enough to try anyway. Were she a little bit older, maybe she would be, but she was ten to Sander’s fifteen, and children typically didn’t reach the peak of prickishness until about the age of twelve. She still had a couple more years to just be Sander’s cute, pure little half-sister.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

The answers he had at the time were physically impossible, beyond incomprehensible, and nowhere near conceivable.

“What really happened?” Sander had asked the old German Shepherd one night, curled up on his bed. “I wish you could tell me.”

To hold back the laughter that ensued, he’d clenched his teeth so hard his jaw started to hurt. This was unbearably pathetic. At least, that’s what anyone would say upon seeing how he was acting, if they didn’t know any better. But deep down, Sander’s reaction was perfectly reasonable, because he was perfect.

“Then again,” he’d continued, once the laughter welling within him had died down, “if you could…then what would be left for me to do?”

He had, of course, received no answer, and a part of him liked it that way. He wasn’t so narcissistic as to believe that he was entitled to being given answers, but he knew that if he ever wanted the truth, he’d have to take it for himself. People (especially living ones) lied through their teeth all the time. Teenagers, in particular, were terrible about it. The boy Sander had considered his oldest friend had been no exception. 

He couldn’t exactly blame the boy for wanting to use Sander’s perfection for his own personal benefit, but after he finally forgot that boy’s name, Sander had decided that he preferred the company of inanimate objects and dead people. Unlike the living, they were both terrible at deceiving and keeping secrets. He himself had never seen the need to tell those sorts of lies. He was perfect, and perfect people had nothing to hide.

But just how perfect was the rest of his family?

—

It was impossible to know everything, but answers were always out there. Sander had found his when he’d tucked his German Shepherd into his backpack and flew the nest for the clear skies that lay ahead.

Sander didn’t consider himself to be an uncaring person, but he was terrible at keeping in touch with people. He couldn’t help it; it was simply too easy to forget to reply to his texts or to answer calls when his phone was always on silent mode. He preferred simply to love people from a distance. It was less of a pain in his ass that way, fewer things to remember.

Even so, it wasn’t as though he didn’t try. He usually called his father at least once per week, and he tried to get back to Miranda any time he remembered to check his phone, regardless of the time of day. It worked for Sander, at least, to step closer for a moment, and then retreat in the next. It never failed to piss Miranda off, but Sander thought nothing of it. Siblings got pissed at each other all the time, but ultimately it didn’t add up to much of anything in the long run. Such was life, and Sander never considered himself and Miranda to be the exceptions. Hell, their relationship was so good that one day, Miranda even sent him an actual, physical envelope through the mail.

Picking it up, however, left him uneasy at how wrong it looked.

Despite knowing that it could have only been her who sent it, the envelope was unmarked. No return address for whatever reason, and only a stamp on the top corner. And whatever it contained didn’t feel like paper to Sander. When he opened the envelope, it seemed to speak to him, saying, “this is why”.

It was filled with jagged translucent shards.