At the time, I thought being lonely wasn’t scary. It was controllable. Preventable.
I was wrong. Now that Emma isn’t here, I know loneliness is the most painful form of torture. It’s terrifying. Soul-crushing.
It’s a sadness, rotting away inside you.
But what hurts even more is knowing I failed to keep my promise to her. I let her be lonely.
I let her push me away when she needed me most.
Tears pool in my eyes as I lie awake at night. The room iscold, the bed is hard. I haven’t slept well in over a year, and now it’s only worse.
I’ve cried so much I’m numb and my throat is raw.
She’s not supposed to be gone. She was supposed to find her sister and be happy again. That’s all I wanted.
Every time I close my eyes, I picture her lying on the pavement, and I can’t breathe.
I should be mad at her for jumping out of Sam’s car, but I’m not. I blame myself for telling her to look into the bridge when she wasn’t emotionally ready to do it. I should’ve helped her—
The bridge.
I sit up as a new thought comes to mind.
Emma isn’t the only person who can jump.
“I didn’t do it,” I say.
My attorney sits across from me, wearing a crisp black suit and blue tie. His hands are clasped together in front of him. “You pleaded guilty.”
“But they found Mallory’s body. It’s impossible for me to have done it,” I say.
I’ve heard the news. Everyone has. The body was discovered a year before Mallory jumped off the bridge, but DNA testing confirmed it was hers.
“You do realize how peculiar this case is, right? It has everyone working overtime to understand the truth.”
“But I wasn’t even in town when her body was discovered, so shouldn’t that be enough to get me out of here?”
He scratches his head. “The problem is you pleaded guilty and overturning a conviction doesn’t happenovernight. There’s a process and sometimes that process is long even if you didn’t do it.”
“Just tell me what I need to do to get out of here, and I’ll do it,” I say.
My only hope is outside of this place. Being in here is what saved Emma the first time, but getting out of here is my only chance at saving her now. I have to finish what she started. I have to jump.
34
MYLES
April 2nd, 2026
I walk out of the prison, quietly. I didn’t tell anyone this was the day because I didn’t want to alarm them with what I’m about to do. I couldn’t have my mom or Sam trying to talk me out of it. I couldn’t watch the happiness on their faces from me being released only to rip it away from them.
I fought for this day. No, I begged for this day. This is the last possible day to get to Emma before she falls off the bridge. But saving Emma isn’t enough. I need her to be happy. I have to give Emma her life back and the only way to do that is to save Mallory too.
As soon as my feet hit the pavement, I take off running.
I’ve spent months thinking about every possible solution to this puzzle. I’ve agonized over every detail of my time with Emma from our childhood to the moment she left this world.
And the time loop.
