She didn’t fight this time. She walked to the cake, took the silver knife Katie offered, and raised it high. Everyone cheered. Sarah smiled behind the stitches, eyes already flickering black. She plunged the knife not into the cake, but straight through the dining-room floor, hacking like a madwoman. Wood screamed. Frost exploded upward. She carved a perfect, bleeding X through every level of the house at once. Black candle-wax blood gushed from the wound, eating walls, floors, faces. The families shrieked as they melted into streamers and confetti. The children reached for her, mouths stretching into one final scream. Sarah whispered through the stitches, “Party’s over.” The house folded in on itself like a burning photograph.