Casita
A Komorebi World short story
I'm fifteen, and the whole country watched my story play out on the news. Running from it lands me in a pink semi with a trucker who doesn't ask questions.
CB doesn't push. She hands me turmeric tea, does yoga poses with names like Drunk Frog, and says "mm" in what I'm pretty sure is four different languages of "mm." It's the first quiet I've had in longer than I can remember.
Then a routine stop puts three kids in front of me. A boy who'd bet his own shoes. A six-year-old with lights in his sneakers and no idea what he's carrying. A girl who counts exits before she counts anything else. I used to
run that kind of math myself, just with a different set of variables.
Someone's holding these kids in place with a promise. I know exactly how that leash works.
Casita is the origin story of two fan-favorite characters from the Komorebi World: Angel, who readers first meet in The Dollhouse, and CB, who drives straight through the rest of the series. This is the story about how they found each other, and the three kids who needed them both to stay.
A standalone short story. No required reading order.
Trigger warning: references to child endangerment (non-sexual) and drug trafficking.