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Not rich and … pleasant-looking. That’s the best thing people said about Caleb, as if reassuring him that he wasn’t ugly was the most anyone could offer.

“Just let it go. Be friends, but accept that it’s not going any farther.”

Caleb took that advice halfway. Accept friendship and accept that it might never be more than friendship, while still hoping.

After the accident, he’d felt so guilty. Joining that study group had been his idea. And he’d been the one driving. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t at fault and everyone said his last-minute swerve saved Noemi’s life. He was still the guy who put her in a hospital bed.

He’d visited every day. His friend said that was creepy, Caleb making his move while Noemi was vulnerable, but that wasn’t it. Caleb was checking to see if she needed anything, because her parents lived in California, and while she had friends, they were only doing text check-ins. If Noemi had given the slightest indication that she didn’t want him stopping by, he’d have stayed away. She hadn’t, and their friendship had strengthened and then bloomed into the kind of love he’d only dreamed of.

So whenever something goes wrong, Caleb sees his luck running out, Noemi slipping away. She’d wanted to go check on that old guy, and Caleb said no. What if she decides that means he isn’t the kind of guy she can spend the rest of her life with?

Noemi is a good person. The best he knows. He’s a decent guy, but now he feels as if he’s been tested and failed.

So when Ravi goes through the window, it doesn’t matter if the guy should be dead and buried. What matters is that he’s right outside, bleeding to death, and Caleb can’t actually save a dead man, but he can show that he was willing to try.

While the others argue, he slips out the door. He’ll grab Ravi and haul him back inside before anyone notices he’s gone.

Caleb hurries down the steps and runs around to where Ravi lies on the ground, clutching his throat, blood gushing between his fingers. Caleb won’t let himself see the man who hurt Noemi. He hates that guy. Hates him like he’s never hated a human being in his life. To help this man, he must pretend it’s a stranger. Just another person caught in the accident.

Caleb drops beside Ravi. His plan was to drag or carry him indoors, but he realizes he can’t do that, not with the bleeding. He yanks his sweatshirt over his head and starts tying the sleeves around the man’s throat, even as a voice inside his head whispers, “Really? You think that’s going to help?”

Caleb ignores that and keeps pulling on the sleeves. He does sneak a look up at the window because, let’s be honest, he’s hoping to see Noemi there. To see the woman he loves watching him try to save this man. But the window is dark and …

He doesn’t hear any noise from inside. That’s weird. They’d sure as hell been making noise when he ran out, all that arguing. He’d been focused on his own thoughts, so he hadn’t seen what happened, but it seemed as if the older guy—Raymond—fell down, presumably his injured leg giving way. There’d been a lot of shouting. And now the bar is silent? Sure, the bartender said it was soundproofed, but the window is broken. Surely, he should hear them.

Is Caleb actually concerned? Or just disappointed that Noemi isn’t watching his heroic efforts?

He returns his attention to Ravi, who moans and writhes, which really doesn’t help. Caleb does seem to have stopped the bleeding, though. Now to get the guy inside …

Is Ravi’s cheek pulsing?

Shit! Is that a convulsion?

As if on cue, Ravi’s whole body spasms. His eyes open and roll back to the whites.

Seizure.

Caleb runs to the open window. “Hey! Henry!” Then louder, “Henry!”

He needs the paramedic. Ravi is having a seizure, and maybe that’s from shock? What the hell does Caleb know? He fixes computers, not people.

When there’s no answer from inside, Caleb grabs the windowsill, just barely over his head. His finger comes down on broken glass, but he still heaves up, shouting for Henry and then seeing him …

Just standing there. Henry stands beside Raymond, who’s on the floor, and Henry seems to be about to crouch beside him, but he’s stopped at an awkward angle. Ellie is rushing over, but she’s frozen mid-step. And Noemi stands with one hand to her mouth.

They’re all motionless.

“Noemi!” he shouts, but she doesn’t move.

He jumps down and turns to run inside. He needs to get to Noemi. Something’s wrong and—

A garbled moan comes from the man on the ground, and as Caleb looks over, Ravi’s neck seems to … lengthen?

Caleb stares, blinking, certain he’s seeing wrong. But Ravi’s neck keeps stretching and stretching, and then there’s a horrible tearing sound, and it rips open.

His neck rips open.

Caleb’s mind seems to short-circuit, refusing to comprehend what he’s seeing. Ravi’s head rises, the flesh jagged, as green tendrils shove his head away from the stump of his neck. Ravi begins to scream, somehow screaming despite his head no longer being attached to his body.