Ethan
Lucky’shouselookswrong.
The day is too bright for how wrong her house feels. Birds are going off in the trees, sun glinting over the lake, everything deceptively peaceful — and Lucky’s home looks like a boarded-up crime scene.
It makes the hair on the back of my neck rise. Houses don’t go still like this unless something’s happened. Someone’s hurting.
And Lucky doesn’t do stillness. She avoids silence the way most people avoid fire.
It’s barely past noon, and she’s usually out on the deck by now, legs kicked up on the railing, coffee in one hand, guitar in the other, hair messy as hell and beautiful for it. But today the place is sealed tight. Curtains drawn. No lights. No shadow passing in front of the windows.
Her rental is parked exactly where it always is, so she didn’t leave.
I stand on her steps with a knot twisting low in my gut. Something happened after yesterday's phone call. Something she’s not telling me.
I knock once, lightly.
Movement. A flick of the curtain. Then an eye, wide, frantic, unmistakably terrified.
Christ.
“Lucky?” I keep my voice steady, soft, the way I used to talk men down from panic overseas. “It’s me.”
She hesitates, then the deadbolt turns. The door cracks open just an inch.
She’s pale. Not makeup-pale, but fear-pale. Eyes red like she’s been up all night. Hands gripping the door so tightly her knuckles are bone white.
“Hey,” I say gently. “Can I come in?”
She hesitates like the question itself hurts, then swallows hard and steps back.
Inside, the air hits me first. It’s stale, warm, wrong.
There’s a smell in the air, sweat, old fear, the sour edge of adrenaline drying on skin. I’ve smelled it in tents overseas. On the backs of uniforms after night terrors.
She’s been panicking for hours.
Curtains shut, lights off, not even a crack of sun in the room. Her usual morning chaos — mug somewhere on the deck railing, music spilling from her speakers, barefoot footprints on the wood floor — none of it is here. It feels like someone pressed pause on her life the minute that phone call ended.
My eyes sweep the room automatically, out of habit and concern. Her little music corner, the one she always swears she hates but refuses to tidy, is frozen. Not a single thing has moved since yesterday. Pages of lyrics, usually tossed around like confetti, sit untouched on the coffee table. The cap of her pen is exactly where I noticed it lying around before I left. Her guitar is still sprawled across the sofa like she meant to pick it up and never did.
Nothing has been lived in since I left.
She hasn’t eaten either — I can see it the moment she steps into the dim light. She’s pale, too pale, cheekbones sharper than they should be. Her hoodie hangs off her like she’s lost weight overnight. Christ.
When was the last time she ate? The dinner I made her two nights ago?
Her lips are colorless. Her hands tremble like she can’t keep them still. She won’t look at me as her eyes dart everywhere else, shoulders tight, breathing small and rapid.
Like prey.
“Talk to me,” I say, keeping my voice level. “Yesterday — after the call — you changed. You shut down. I thought maybe you needed space, but now…” I look around again, taking in the sealed-up house, the dark, the untouched chaos. “Now I’m worried something’s wrong.”
“I’m fine,” she says too fast, voice sharp and brittle.
My jaw tenses. “You’re not.”
I step closer, slow, non-threatening. Her whole body jerks. It’s tiny, but unmistakable. Like she’s bracing for impact that isn’t coming. It hits something deep in my chest.
