Chapter 18
EIGHTEEN
LANI
By all rights, today should feel like relief.
Five double shifts in a row after having so much time off will do that to anyone – dragging myself out of bed before sunrise, feet aching by mid-morning, smiling through customers and noise and steam and heat until everything blurs together.
I’ve been counting down to this day off like it’s a finish line.
One full day where no one needs anything from me.
No alarms. No apron. No pretending I’m not running on fumes.
So I don’t understand why I feel worse.
I wake late, tangled in sheets that smell faintly of clean laundry and something else I still can’t place, my body heavy and wrong.
Not the good kind of heavy – the earned exhaustion after hard work – but the kind that pins you down from the inside.
My limbs feel thick. Weighted. Like gravity’s been turned up just for me.
I lie there for a while, staring at the ceiling, waiting for it to pass.
It doesn’t.
When I finally sit up, the room tilts. Not enough to send me back down, but enough to make my stomach clench. I breathe through it, slow and careful, like I’m talking myself down from something skittish and unpredictable.
You’re just tired, I tell myself. Five doubles. Of course you’re tired.
Except I slept. Properly slept. No alarms, no interruptions.
And still my skin feels tight, oversensitive, like every nerve ending is humming just below the surface.
There’s a heat sitting under my ribs that doesn’t belong there, spreading slowly, insistently, as if my body’s forgotten how to regulate itself.
I swing my legs out of bed and stand.
Another wave of dizziness rolls through me – stronger this time. I grab the dresser, knuckles whitening as I wait it out. My heart is racing, but not in panic. More like anticipation.
That thought makes my stomach drop.
“Nope,” I mutter aloud. “Absolutely not.”
I force myself through the motions of the morning. Shower. Clean clothes. Toast I barely manage to swallow. Tea that tastes wrong, too sharp on my tongue. I keep expecting the fog to lift, for my body to catch up with the rest I’ve finally given it.
It doesn’t.
By mid-morning, I’m curled on the sofa with a blanket pulled tight around me, scrolling mindlessly on my phone just to give my hands something to do.
Every few minutes, a shiver ripples through me despite the warmth.
My head throbs faintly, not quite a headache, more like pressure building behind my eyes.
I consider calling a doctor.
The thought barely forms before anxiety clamps down hard in my chest.
I’m not registered here. Silver Sands isn’t my home – not officially. And even if I could get an emergency appointment, I’d have to give details. Address. NHS number. Paper trails I’ve spent years making damn sure don’t intersect in the wrong places.
Calling my old GP isn’t an option either.
The idea of my father’s name appearing anywhere near my records makes my skin crawl. He has ways of finding things out. Always has. It only takes one misplaced flag, one curious question, and suddenly my carefully constructed distance collapses in on itself.
No doctors. Not unless I’m dying.
I swallow hard and set the phone aside.
You’re fine, I tell myself again. You’ve been worse than this.
But the lie doesn’t sit right.
Sometime around midday, the house starts to feel too quiet. Too empty. The silence presses in, making every sensation louder – my pulse, my breathing, the low, restless ache coiling in my belly like something waking up.
I get dressed and leave the house before I can overthink it.
Fresh air. That’s what I need. Movement. Noise. People. Something normal to drown out the restless pull under my skin.
The grill isn’t busy when I get there – just a handful of locals nursing late coffees, the windows fogged slightly from the lingering damp outside. The bell over the door chimes softly as I step in, and for a moment, the smell of espresso and warm sugar grounds me.
Then I see Finn.
Relief hits – quick and sharp – followed by something quieter that doesn’t quite settle.
He’s at the counter, sleeves pushed up, talking to Pete with that easy, familiar confidence he seems to carry everywhere. When he spots me, his expression shifts – just slightly. Concern flickering before he smooths it away.
“Hey,” he says gently. “Day off?”
I nod. “Supposed to be.”
He studies me for a beat longer than necessary. “You alright?”
The answer is already on my tongue. Automatic. Practised. “Yeah.”
The lie slips out too easily. But something strange happens as I stand there – close enough to feel his presence, to register the warmth of him like a steady hum: the buzzing under my skin eases. Not gone. Just…muted. Like whatever’s driving it has stepped back instead of settling.
Not gone. Not fixed. But quieter. Like someone’s turned the volume down just enough that I can think again. My breathing slows without me telling it to. The tight knot in my stomach loosens, just a fraction.
I blink, thrown.
It’s not the same as before. Not the same as when Koa was standing too close in the kitchen, watching me like that. This is…different.
Finn doesn’t say anything. Just hands me a mug without asking – tea, the way I like it. I wrap my hands around it and realise they’re not shaking anymore.
“That’s better,” he murmurs, like he’s noticed too.
I tell myself it’s a coincidence. Comfort. Familiarity. The placebo effect of being seen.
It has to be.
Still, when I leave twenty minutes later – tea finished, colour slowly returning to my cheeks – the chill creeps back in before I’ve even made it halfway up the hill. Sharper this time. Hungrier
By the time I reach home, my skin is buzzing again, heat pooling low in my belly, my head swimming like I never left at all.
I stand in the doorway, keys clenched in my fist, dread curling deep in my chest.
Whatever this is, it’s not going away on its own. And whatever it is – it doesn’t feel like it wants to be handled alone.
I’m not sure how long I can pretend otherwise.