Contents
Chapter 55
Overview
In a BEFORE chapter from Ella’s perspective, she meets her biological father and chooses to live with him, finding the safe, clean home she lacked. He introduces the “infinity promise.” Years later, Ella confesses she burned her abusive mother’s house, and her father endorses vigilante justice—shaping Casey’s moral code.
Summary
Ella rides with her social worker, Amara, to meet her biological father in New Hampshire. Anxious but hopeful, she notices the small-town calm and steels herself for the introduction. Her father looks strikingly like her, confirming their bond. Inside his spotless apartment, Ella immediately prefers staying with him to returning to the group home.
Her father welcomes her warmly and introduces the concept of an “infinity promise,” joking that breaking it causes dysentery. Ella agrees to stay, feeling, perhaps for the first time, genuinely cared for. Over time, he provides stability—food, cleanliness, and eventually a two-bedroom apartment—and expresses remorse for his past and for not rescuing her sooner.
As trust builds, Ella shares increasing details of her abuse: hoarding, starvation, and being locked in closets. She keeps in touch with Anton in juvenile detention by letter. At seventeen, she finally reveals she burned the house with her mother inside. Expecting horror, Ella instead receives her father’s approval—he calls her “Good girl, Casey,” and frames the act as justified.
Her father explains his own incarceration came from assaulting a man who was sleeping with Ella’s mother, reinforcing his belief that some people deserve retribution. Ella internalizes this lesson: when institutions fail, it may fall to you to dispense justice. The origin of the “infinity promise” and Casey’s vigilante ethos are cemented.
Who Appears
- Ella (later known as Casey)Narrator; abused teen who meets her father, gains stability, learns the infinity promise, and admits to arson of her mother’s house.
- Ella’s fatherEx-con, caring and orderly; takes Ella in, makes an infinity promise, condones her arson, espouses vigilante justice.
- AmaraSocial worker who escorts Ella to meet her father and facilitates her placement.