Page 9 of Two Sides of Sin

“Don’t go anywhere,” I whispered against her temple, my voice cracking. “I’ll be right back. I promise.”

I looked at Julian and Cain. They were the foundations holding up a world that was trying to collapse on me. I felt a surge of gratitude so strong it made me dizzy, but beneath it, a cold, shiver of dread I couldn’t explain, simmered.

The hot water was supposed to wash it all away—the smell of the hospital, the grit of the park dirt under my nails, the layers of exhaustion. Instead, It just felt like it was scrubbing me raw, leaving my nerves exposed to the air.

I stood under the spray, eyes squeezed shut, trying to find one second of peace. But peace was a lie.

Through the heavy thrum of the water, a piercing, intrusive sound broke through, a phone ringing. Julian’s house phone, out in the hall.

My heart stopped. I stood frozen, the water scalding my shoulders, listening to the muffled vibration of his voice. I couldn’t make out the words, just low, muffled hums distorted by the pipes, but the cadence was wrong. It was too fast. Too clipped.

I reached out with a trembling hand and killed the taps.

The silence that followed was a thousand times worse than the noise. I didn’t dry off. I just grabbed a towel, wrapping it around my shivering body as I stepped out, my wet feet leaving frantic, damp prints on the floor.

I didn’t have to hear the conversation to know. There was a shift in the air, a sudden, heavy pressure that felt like the oxygen had been sucked out of the house. It was a physical weight, a premonition settling deep in my heart.

Julian was standing by the window, his back to me, the phone slowly lowering from his ear.

“Julian?” I whispered.

He turned around slowly. His face was a mask of controlled agony, his jaw set so tight I thought his teeth might shatter. But it was his eyes that gave it away. They were glassy, shimmering with tears he was fighting to keep back—not for him, but for me. He was trying to be the pillar, but the foundation was crumbling.

“June…” he started, his voice thick and unstable. He took a step towards me, reaching out as if to catch me before I even collapsed. “We need to get to the hospital. Now.”

He didn’t have to say the words.

I just knew.

The “I’ll be right back” I had whispered to her echoed in my head like a cruel, mocking joke. I had promised her I’d be back, and she had promised me she wouldn’t go anywhere.

We had both lied.

In an instant, my footing was gone, ripped away by a truth I wasn’t ready to face. She was gone. She was just… gone.

Chapter 7

Julian

They say time heals, but they’re liars. For June, the last few months have been a slow-motion descent into a ghost world. Her light didn’t just dim, it vanished entirely, and her once lively spirit seems to have buried itself so deep inside her, that I’m not sure it’ll ever find its way back out.

The bed is her sanctuary now, her new best friend. She exists in the space between waking and dreaming, a place where the reality of Annies absence can’t quite reach her. School is a memory she’s let go of, and her nineteenth birthday, which should have been a milestone worth celebrating, is just another Tuesday she’s dreading.

I stand in the doorway of her darkened room, watching the slow rise and fall of her shoulders. If I knew how to take this pain away, I’d cut it out of her with my own hands. It’s the ultimate irony of my existence, seeing her suffer is a deeper, more exquisite torture than anything I’ve ever endured myself.

When she finally looks at me, I see the change. Her eyes used to be a summer sky—bright, open, and easy to read. Now, they’re a winter sea at midnight, a freezing, turbulent blue that offers no shore and hides an abyss. Cold. Unfathomable. Dangerous.

It scares me.

And then there’s her grandmother. Nana is a shell, held together by the chemical haze of sleeping pills and antidepressants. Her will to live is slipping through her fingers like dry sand. She’s staying for June, trying to be the anchor, but you can see the toll of her grief in every line of her face. I worry about her, and that worry feels like a betrayal of the mission.

I feel the guilt gnawing at me, not just for the lies, but for the way I’ve started to believe them. I told myself I was putting on an act, a perfect performance of the protective, grieving friend. But I don’t think that’s what this is anymore. I let my guard down. I let June in a little too deep, and now the boundaries between the “job” and the reality of my feelings are blurred beyond recognition.

I have to force myself to remember the plans. Cain’s voice echoes in the back of my mind, a harsh reminder of why we’re really here. I have to pull myself out of this false reality I’m building, this fantasy where I’m the man she needs.

I am not her hero. I am her undoing.

She deserves the world. She deserves a life free of the shadow of death and the weight of grief. But more than anything, she deserves better than me and my brother. She deserves to be loved by someone who isn’t already calculating how to end her life.