Thin Ice (Thornhill University #5)

1. Maya

Maya

The nightmare is always the same.

I’m in the bathtub. The water is cold now, has been cold for hours, maybe and my wrists ache with a pain that doesn’t quite reach through the fog in my head. There’s red in the water. So much red and somewhere far away, I can hear Carter screaming my name.

But in the nightmare, I can’t answer. Can’t move. Can’t do anything except watch the water turn darker and feel relief that it’s finally ending.

Then I wake up.

My alarm goes off at 5:30 AM, pulling me from the dream, into the too-warm darkness of my dorm room. For a moment, I can’t remember where I am. Can’t remember if I’m seventeen and dying or nineteen and trying to figure out how to live.

Then it comes back in pieces: Thornhill University. Freshman year. Carter’s campus. A second chance I’m not sure I deserve.

My hands are shaking. They always shake after a nightmare.

I sit up slowly, my wrists, the ones they stitched back together eighteen months ago, aching with phantom pain that my therapist says is psychosomatic.

Doesn’t make it hurt less. Doesn’t make the scars disappear, thin white lines that I hide under bracelets and long sleeves and the careful lie that I’m fine now.

I’m fine now.

Everyone keeps saying it like if they say it enough, it’ll be true.

My roommate, Alexis, is still asleep, her retainer whistling softly with each breath.

She’s a theater major who keeps vampire hours.

We barely overlap, which is exactly why I chose her when the housing office asked for preferences.

No questions. No bonding. No risk of friendship that might require me to explain why I flinch at sharp objects or why I can’t take baths anymore or why some days I wake up crying and can’t remember why.

I slip out of bed, muscle memory guiding me through the dark.

Shower. Dress. The uniform of invisibility, jeans, oversized hoodie, beat-up sneakers.

Nothing that draws attention. Nothing that screams “Carter Lynch’s sister” or “that girl who tried to kill herself” or “be careful what you say around her.”

My phone shows three texts from Carter that I didn’t hear come through.

Carter

Morning check-in. You up?

Carter

Don’t make me come over there.

Carter

Text me back or I’m skipping practice.

I respond quickly.

Maya

I’m alive. Calm down. See you at breakfast?

Carter

Java Junction. 7am. Don’t be late.

We do this every morning. Have done it every morning since I arrived on campus two months ago. It’s the deal we made, I come to Thornhill for college, stay close where he can keep an eye on me, and in exchange I prove I’m okay. That I can handle being here, that I’m not going to fall apart again.

Some days I believe it. Other days I’m just really good at performing.

The campus is still dark as I walk to Java Junction, the coffee shop where Carter insists we meet before his morning practice.

October in New Hampshire means frost on the quad, my breath fogging in the pre-dawn air.

Students are starting to emerge from dorms, early risers and insomniacs and athletes with practices that start before the sun remembers it has a job.

I used to love this time of day. Before. When I was just Carter’s little sister, not Carter’s little sister who tried to die. When I had a future that looked like something other than just surviving until tomorrow.

Java Junction is warm and bright when I push through the door. Carter’s already at our usual table, still in workout clothes, his hair damp from the quick shower he always takes between weight training and our breakfast meetings.

“You look terrible,” he says by way of greeting.

“Good morning to you too.”

“I’m serious, Maya. Did you sleep?”

“Some.” A lie. Maybe three hours total, broken up by the nightmare and the subsequent hours of staring at my ceiling wondering if this is just how life is now, fractured sleep and constant anxiety and the exhausting work of pretending everything is fine.

Carter studies me with those big brother x-ray eyes that see too much. “You had the dream again.”

It’s not a question.

“I’m handling it.”

“That’s not the same as being okay.”

“Close enough.”

He sighs, the particular sigh of someone who wants to push but knows it’ll just make me shut down further. “You’re seeing Dr. Williams this week, right?”

“Thursday. Same as always.” Weekly therapy is part of the deal.

Carter pays for it now. Dad cut off all funding when Carter refused to break up with Lennox, when he chose his own happiness over our father’s control.

I’m on scholarship here, working part-time at the library, living on a budget that makes ramen look gourmet.

But I have therapy. I have Carter. I have a second chance.

I’m supposed to be grateful.

Most days I am.

“How’s the freshman experience going?” Carter asks, switching topics with the skill of someone who’s learned when to push and when to let things go. “Making friends? Joining clubs? Doing normal college things?”

“Define normal.”

“Maya.”

“I’m fine, Carter. I go to class. I do my work. I’m passing everything. Isn’t that enough?”

“You know it’s not.” He leans forward, voice gentle but firm. “You can’t just exist here. You have to actually live. Make connections. Try things. The whole point of you coming to Thornhill was so you could have a fresh start, not so you could isolate yourself in a different location.”

He’s right, and I hate it.

“I’m trying,” I say quietly. “It’s just… hard. Everyone here already has their groups, their friends, their lives and I’m the weird freshman who nobody knows except as ‘Carter Lynch’s sister.’ I’m either ignored or interrogated, and I don’t know which is worse.”

“So find people who don’t care about hockey. Join a club that has nothing to do with athletics.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. What are you interested in?”

What am I interested in? I used to know. Used to have hobbies and passions and dreams. Used to think about the future in terms of possibilities instead of just survival.

“I don’t know anymore,” I admit. “I used to like art. Photography. But I haven’t picked up a camera in over a year.”

“So pick one up again. The university has a photography club. I can get you the info?—”

“Carter, I can’t just—” I stop, swallowing the panic rising in my throat. “What if I’m not good anymore? What if I lost that too?”

“Then you start over. You learn again. Maya, you can’t let what happened take everything from you.”

But it already has, I think. I just haven’t figured out how to explain that the girl who tried to die eighteen months ago didn’t fully survive. Some essential part of me stayed in that bathtub with the cold water and the red and the relief.

The girl sitting here is a placeholder. A performance. Someone going through the motions of living while waiting to figure out if she actually wants to.

My phone buzzes. Unknown number.

Unknown

Hi Maya, this is Dr. Williams’s office. We need to reschedule your Thursday appointment. The doctor had a family emergency. We can fit you in next Monday at 3pm or the following Thursday at your regular time. Please let us know which works.

I stare at the text, feeling something crack in my chest.

Thursday is in two days. Monday is almost a week away. A week without therapy. A week trying to handle the nightmares and the anxiety and the constant weight of pretending to be okay.

“What’s wrong?” Carter asks, reading my face.

I show him the text.

His jaw tightens. “Take the Monday appointment.”

“I have class.”

“Skip it.”

“Carter—”

“Maya, you need your therapy. Class can be made up.”

“It’s fine. I can wait until the following Thursday. It’s only two weeks instead of one?—”

“No.” His voice is firm. “You’re not going two weeks. Not with the nightmares back. Take Monday or I’m calling Dr. Williams myself and demanding they find an emergency slot.”

“You can’t do that.”

“Watch me.”

We stare at each other in the kind of sibling standoff that used to end with one of us backing down. But Carter doesn’t back down anymore. Not since he found me. Not since he spent three hours in an emergency room waiting to find out if his little sister would survive.

“Fine,” I say. “Monday at three.”

“Good.” He relaxes slightly. “Now eat your muffin before I do.”

I pick at the blueberry muffin he ordered for me, knowing he won’t stop watching until I eat at least half of it.

This is what our relationship has become, constant monitoring disguised as concern, careful conversations that dance around the truth, the exhausting performance of convincing him I’m okay so he doesn’t worry himself sick.

“I should go,” I say after forcing down enough muffin to satisfy him. “I have an eight AM.”

“What class?”

“Intro to Psychology. Very ironic given my life.”

Carter actually smiles. “Learn anything useful?”

“Apparently I have every symptom of major depressive disorder with some PTSD sprinkled in for fun.”

“Maya—”

“I’m kidding. Mostly.” I stand, grabbing my bag. “Go to practice. Score some goals. Do the hockey thing.”

“The hockey thing,” he repeats, shaking his head. “You’re lucky I love you.”

“I know.”

I leave before he can see my eyes filling with tears.