“Lena? Are you okay?” he asked, his voice coming through the speaker, warm and comforting. It almost made me cringe.
“I…I umm cut myself by accident, and it’s bad,” I told him, worried he’d ask more questions than give solutions.
“Fuck! Like bleeding a lot, bad? How long have you been bleeding for? Where did you cut yourself?” Questions that brought solutions it was…got it.
“Yes, bleeding a lot. I bled for about three minutes, and it’s on my wrist,” I explained, hating how nothing about my answers sounded like an accident. I hoped he wouldn’t realize that.
“I need you to get a thick towel, press it down on the area, and keep it that way for about ten to fifteen minutes. Put enough pressure so the blood isn’t gushing out. Can you do that?”
“Yes, yes I…”
“I am coming to stitch you up, no excuses,” he stated, not even giving me the chance to protest before hanging up.
I sighed. “I’m coming, Max,” I whispered to myself. “I’ll stay alive long enough to see you and say goodbye before I end it for good this time,” I added, looking at my once white towel that was now soaked crimson red.
I couldn’t help but laugh loudly. I was leaving the place where I almost died, headed toward a house full of ghosts.
Chapter Two
Elena
The car swayed like itwas trying to rock me to sleep, but sleep wouldn’t come, and I couldn’t blame it. The voice in my head was louder than usual, mad I was still walking among the living. The sky was black with rain, the kind of storm coming that didn’t fall, but pressed down, slow and steady, until the whole world drowned under its weight. I welcomed the familiar feeling, watching as water streaked the glass in crooked lines. I traced one with my fingertip, wondering if it would outlast me. Deep down, I hoped it wouldn’t.
I kept touching the old photo in my pocket, and I couldn’t help but think of him. Since the call, I had thought of him more than I wanted to admit. My stepbrother. The way he used to chase me through the halls, both of us breathless with laughter. The way his hand brushed mine once; too long, too warm. The silence afterward had been louder than the laughter before it. I hadn’t known what it meant back then, only that it made my stomach twist in ways I couldn’t name, or was too afraid to acknowledge.
I chuckled to myself now. No wonder Mom and Dad would joke and say I was a lost cause. Maybe they weren’t wrong.
When the cab finally turned down the dirt road, my chest tightened. The house came into view like a beast crouched in the dark. Ivy strangled the walls, its shutters sagged, and the stone bones groaned under the years of neglect. The maze still stood behind it, its hedges overgrown and black with rain, taller now than I even remembered. I used to play in that maze until my legs gave out. Max would carry me out, laughing and pretending to be the hero rescuing the princess, just like he had done again a few days ago. Now the maze looked like it had teeth, and I wondered if I went in there, if I could be saved again.
I stood at the gates with my bags in my hand, staring up at the house. It was the same, yet being here felt almost wrong, like a photograph smudged at the edges. The storm made the windows weep, shadows shifting behind the curtains like the house was breathing, and I found that unfair. How dare a non-living thing live, while the owners didn’t? How cruel!
The air inside the house was stale and heavy as I stepped inside. Furniture smothered under white sheets greeted me, like corpses waiting for a burial. My footsteps echoed on the floorboards, and each creak sounded too deliberate, too alive. I kept expecting Max to be there, leaning against the doorway, smirking like he had every right to call me back into this tomb of a place. Instead, there was nothing but silence and my breathing, the painful reminder that I was still alive when I hadn’t meant to be.
Then my phone buzzed, and his name lit up the screen.
“Hey,” I answered.
“Hey, troublemaker.” His voice came in deeper now, but still the same somehow. It was still that thread that tied me to him, no matter how much I wanted it severed.
“You’re late.” My voice cracked, half-angry, and half-relieved.
“I know. Work held me up.” He sounded exhausted, guilty…and somehow strange. “I’m sorry, but I might not be there today.”
“What?” I almost shouted.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. But if I leave now, I’ll lose my job.”
“It’s the holidays, Max. You shouldn’t even be at work. How do you expect me to stay here alone for…wait, how long will you be?”
“Two days, I promise. Just two, don’t kill me for it, alright?” My body went still at his words, and that made me weak. I already had no fight left.
“Fine, two days, Max. You’ll be lucky if I don’t strangle you with my bare hands.” Despite myself, I snorted.
He laughed, and God, it hit me right in the ribs. The years between us flooded forward for a second, and it was like I was back in that maze, running until I couldn’t breathe with him chasing me like a predator. I hated myself for letting myself feel something more at just the thought of his laughter.
“I owe you one,” he chuckled. “Or maybe ten. I’ll make it up to you.”
“You better,” I murmured, softer than I meant to.
