I’d been in worse. That’s what I told myself.
The dark pressed closer, cold hands around my neck.
I remember closets. I remember blankets wrapped over my head, trying to stifle every sound so nobody would find me. I remember the way his shadow fell through the crack under the door, stretching, growing, swallowing everything.
The urge to scream rattled in my chest like a trapped fly. Instead, I pressed my forehead against the bars, breathing slow and steady, counting off numbers in my head. Anything to keep the emptiness fromoverflowing.
Was Amelia crying? I couldn’t tell. Maybe it was just the sound of her breath snagging on her ribs.
“You still breathing?” I growled.
“Not sure,” she whispered.
I let my head hang. “Start counting. It helps.”
“What?”
“Just do it. Count to five. Then start over.”
She didn’t answer, but I could almost feel her concentrating. The quiet between us buzzed.
I pictured her on the other side of the glass, hugging her knees, eyes wide and white in the dark. I wanted to punch something. I wanted to break through, just to touch her shoulder, just to prove she was still real.
The air felt like glass shards cutting my throat.
Why was he doing this? The psychopath upstairs. I imagined him sitting in the light, watching us on some hidden camera, grinning at the panic. Flicking the switch on and off, just to remind himself he owned us.
What was it about people like him, always needing to own something helpless?
The seconds dragged. I felt each one crawl under my skin and make a home there.
I pictured my father’s laugh. I wanted to be better than him. But sometimes, in the dark, I wondered if the rot had gotten into my bones too.
Would I survive this? Would she?
I started talking, just to fill the space. “He’s probably just fucking with us. He wants us scared.”
“He’s succeeding,” she said.
“What else is new.”
I heard her shift, heard her knuckles crack. “Is he going to kill us?”
I didn’t want to answer. “Not if I can help it.”
A beat. Then: “You really think you can stop him?”
“I’ll try.”
“You always say that,” she snapped.
“What do you want from me, a guarantee? Nothing in life is guaranteed.”
The words echoed, bitter as bile. My father had taught me that.
The dark thickened, pressed against my skull.
I wanted to blame her for something. Anything. Maybe if I could hate her enough, I wouldn’t care what happened in the end. But hate and fear started to feel the same, down in the marrow.
