It had been nice to have a place to crash when she’d first purified, with her sibling and what she could only describe as her sibling’s extra family. And, like, Sadie had seemed really happy with those people, all settled in and making a life for herself with her best friend and some other really supportive people.

Misty didn’t think that was what she wanted for herself long term, though. The room that they’d put her in, in the basement, was as homey as they could make it, but it was still pretty much functional and that was about it. Some other person who’d purified had been in here for a few months before her, and then he’d moved on. She’d known from the beginning that she was gonna do the same, as soon as she could. It had never been a question.

She wanted the freedom to blast music, and to come home at three in the morning without having to worry about waking someone up. She wanted to feel like she was independent, too. That was a big part of it.

Sure, she wouldn’t have been able to do any of this on her own, and she was grateful for what she’d been given, but she’d always been really big on, like, being her own person. Not being treated like a child.

She hadn’t accepted money from Michelangelo for motorcycle, or a house. She had let the Mauvians help her, and had managed to get a job back at a gym. It wasn’t quite as much as what she’d been making before, but then it wasn’t like even the Mauvians could get her the business connections back, from when she’d been half working for the gym and half freelancing.

She was being very good, though, and anyway not having a motorcycle to take on random trips across the country was very helpful when it came to forcing her to save money.

And, a few months later, all of it was ready. She took Sadie with her to tour the apartments. They were smallish ones, studios, but they had the big modern windows and enough wall space to put all of her posters on. She didn’t see any rats skittering across the floor, and if it smelled like anything, it was bleach from recent cleaning and fresh paint.

She went down to that office that afternoon and signed all the paperwork.

And that night, when she came to her new home for the first time and collapsed onto the crappy air mattress, while she brought out her laptop and blasted early 2000’s rock at top volume, she felt the most like herself that she had ever since she’d purified.

She stayed like that for a long time, curled up on the ground, a few cheap blankets thrown over her shoulders. Then she turned off the music, closed her laptop, and smiled at the way that she could watch the streetlights through her new window.

She could do this, she thought. She could do this.