He’s right, I do.
But this isn’t a sunrise—it’s an ending.
A closing, a soft kind of goodbye dripping in oranges and purples.And something about that sits wrong in my chest.
“C’mon,” I nudge him with my shoulder, trying to keep it light.“We’re gonna get in trouble.Nora’s probably losing her mind.”
He doesn’t laugh.
Doesn’t turn, doesn’t even flinch.
He just stands there—too still.
“I can’t.”He whispers
“What do you mean you can’t?We just have to walk back throu?—”
“No, Nate.”He swallows, and something inside him seems to break on the way down.“I can’t go back.”
The joke on my tongue dies because suddenly the air feels wrong.
Then I see it.
The dark smear beneath his nose.The sluggish, wet shine of red trailing down his upper lip.The bloom spreading across his shirt, right over his heart.
And everything inside me drops like my ribs cave inward.
Like my organs forget what they’re supposed to do.
My mouth fills with the metallic taste of panic—copper, sharp and choking.
“Jake,” I choke out.“You’re?—”
He shakes his head, eyes glassy.
“I can’t go back, Nate.”
“No.Don’t say that.Don’t—Jake, come on, we just run back the way we came.It’s easy.”
But he’s already stepping backward.
Already fading at the edges in that way memories do when you try to hold onto them too tight.His face goes pale and his smile softens into something that breaks me even now.
“Please,” I hear myself whisper, even though I don’t know who I’m begging.
Him.
The universe.
Anyone.
Because this can’t be happening—not to him, not like this.
Not my brother.
“Jake, wait—stop?—”
I reach for him but my hand goes right through.
