Chapter Four
Blair
Sneaking out of Dagger’s apartment after letting him absolutely ruin my life for a few hours should probably make me feel worse than it does.
Instead, all I can think is:
Welcome to the club, babe. Population: me, emotionally unstable and making increasingly slutty decisions about it.
The thought makes me grin to myself as I weave through the crowded sidewalk toward the beach entrance, sunglasses sliding down my nose while bass pounds hard enough beneath the sand to rattle straight up through my platform boots and into my bloodstream.
Or maybe that’s the cyanide.
Hard to tell anymore honestly.
Either way, I feel fantastic.
Floaty. Warm. Slightly detached from reality in the fun way, not the concerning way.
Probably.
After sneaking out of Dagger’s apartment earlier, I stopped back at the motel to shower off the sweat, smoke, and evidence of catastrophic emotional decision making still clinging to my skin.
I barely made it through drying my hair before hearing two drunk college girls in the room beside mine screaming through the paper-thin motel walls about some massive beach bash happening a few miles down the shoreline.
Apparently half of Severance Point is showing up.
Which, naturally, sounded exactly like the kind of terrible environment I should absolutely avoid.
So obviously I got dressed immediately.
Drinks. DJs. Foam cannons. The whole “questionable decision-making under neon lights” starter pack.
Naturally, my first thought was:Wow.That sounds medically irresponsible.
My second thought was:I should absolutely go.
So now here I am, freshly showered, dressed in an outfit that definitely says emotionally unstable but hot about it, walking toward another overcrowded beach party with enough bad intentions humming through my bloodstream to legally concern several healthcare professionals.
At this point, Severance Point should probably just issue me a loyalty card.
I dig through my holographic pink butterfly clutch while weaving through the crowd toward the beach entrance, fingers finally catching on the tiny plastic baggie buried between lip gloss, gum, and absolutely no good decisions whatsoever.
Inside, little pink skull pills knock softly together.
Cute, and yet concerning.
Very on brand for me lately.
I tap one out into my palm before tossing it onto my tongue, the bitter chemical taste hitting almost instantly while I chase it with warm vodka from a neon flask some girl in fairy wings handed me after telling me I looked “ethereally unstable.”
Which realistically might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.
The pills came from one of Dagger’s guys outside the motel earlier.
I don’t know his actual name.
Just that he hangs around the vending machines sometimes looking like nicotine addiction became a real person.
Silver rings, hollow cheeks and old band tees. Eyes permanently bloodshot like sleep abandoned him years ago.
He spotted me on my way out of the motel, platform boots pounding down the cracked walkway while I adjusted my tiny holographic butterfly clutch against my shoulder and mentally pretended I wasn’t still thinking about Dagger wrecking me against his kitchen counter.
Which, for the record?
Was going terribly.
The guy pushed himself off the railing beside the vending machines when he saw me coming, cigarette dangling from his mouth.
Reached into his pocket, pulled out the little baggie of pink skulls, and held it out between tattooed fingers like this was completely normal behavior for a girl who’d literally overdosed a few months ago.
Like I hadn’t almost died doing this exact shit before.
Same tiny pink skull.
Cyanide.
“Hey pretty bird, looking to fly tonight?” he’d said casually, like he was offering me gum instead of chemically enhanced poor decision-making.
I should’ve said no.
Probably.
Instead I took the familiar holographic baggie that’s haunted my dreams, my bloodstream, and at least three questionable life choices already this year, tucking it into my pocket while the guy watched me with that look dealers get when they already know exactly how the night’s gonna end.
Then I headed toward the ocean where bass already echoed faintly down the shoreline from the beach bash starting up, the sound vibrating through the humid night air like a pulse calling people toward it.
I took the first pill halfway there.
Just enough to soften the sharp edges and stop thinking about Dagger’s hands on my throat in the kitchen. To make the guilt and anger and missing them blur together into something warmer.
Then somewhere between the flashing entrance lights and the bass vibrating hard enough through the sand to scramble my remaining brain cells, I realized the little pink skull dissolving on my tongue was technically the second one tonight.
Which probably says something deeply concerning about me psychologically.
Unfortunately, I’m choosing not to unpack that right now.
Because apparently I process emotional devastation the same way raccoons process shiny garbage.
Poorly.
But enthusiastically.
Now the tablet dissolves slowly against my tongue while bass rolls through the beach hard enough to shake the fencing around the entrance gates, heat and anticipation already curling low in my stomach as lights flash somewhere farther down the shoreline.
Bad decisions really do travel in packs.
The festival stretches for miles across the coastline and dunes, massive stages towering over the beach like neon gods, LED screens flashing through clouds of smoke and heat while thousands of bodies move beneath them in glitter, sweat and barely-there fabric.
This place has a totally different vibe than the warehouse.
The warehouse always felt hidden. Underground. Dangerous in a way that whispered, but this place, it screams.
Sun-bleached sand. White canopy tents. DJs shaking the air apart while girls covered in rhinestones dance on strangers’ shoulders like they’re trying to ascend directly into another dimension.
Everything smells like saltwater, sunscreen, and weed.
Which, unfortunately, feels a little like home now.
My platform boots sink into the sand while I push deeper into the crowd, fishnet sleeves glittering beneath the sunlight.
My outfit barely qualifies as clothing—tiny holographic pink mesh draped over my body with butterfly charms catching against my skin every time I move.
My split-dyed hair falls all the way down my back in thick pink and purple waves, my space buns already starting to come loose from the wind and the drugs kicking in.
Everything feels huge here.
Loud and endless.
And for the first time since waking up in that hospital bed weeks ago, the emptiness in my chest dulls slightly around the edges.
Not gone.
Never gone.
Just… quieter.
I’m halfway toward one of the shade tents when I feel it.
That weird sensation of being watched.
Not ogled or flirted with.
Watched.
The feeling crawls up my spine sharp enough to cut through the drugs for half a second.
I glance over my shoulder instinctively.
And there he is.
A guy standing near the fencing beyond the crowd, dressed completely wrong for this place.
No glitter or color.
Not even any chaos.
Just dark clothes, sunglasses, and a stare heavy enough to feel physical even from this far away. Hes weirdly intense for noon at a beach rave.
My brows pull together slightly.
The second our eyes lock, he doesn’t look away.
Doesn’t smile either.
Just watches.
Okay, male Karen, don’t kill my vibe.
I’m about to flip him off on principle when somebody slams directly into my shoulder.
“Holy shit.”
The voice is female. Breathless.
Startled enough that I turn immediately, and freeze.
The girl staring at me looks like she walked straight out of some rave goddess fever dream.
Tiny blue outfit barely hanging onto her body, dark hair pulled into impossibly long twin ponytails, rhinestones glittering across her chest and cheeks while white thigh-highs disappear into chunky pastel sneakers dusted with sand.
But none of that’s what catches me.
It’s her expression.
Pure fucking shock.
She’s staring at me like she’s seen a ghost.
Her lips part slightly.
“Brynne?”
The name hits me hard enough to sober me for half a second.
My stomach tightens instantly.
The girl blinks once.
Then again.
Confusion cracks across her face before realization slowly settles in.
“Oh my god,” she breathes, eyes widening. “Wait, no..”
No shit.
Last time I checked anyway.
“Uh,” I say intelligently. “No. I’m her sister,”
That snaps her out of it enough to laugh suddenly, hand flying to her forehead.
“Jesus Christ,” she mutters. “Sister. Right, Sorry, you just—”
“Look like your dead friend who just so happens to be my sister?”
“Kind of, yeah.”
Cool.
Fantastic opener.
Love making first impressions through shared trauma.
She keeps staring though, eyes flicking over my face like she’s trying to piece something together.
Then she tilts her head slowly.
“So,” she says carefully. “You’re Blair.”
That—
That gets my attention.
I straighten slightly. “How do you know that?”
“Because Brynne talked about you constantly.”
The words hit somewhere deep and ugly in my chest.
Not painful exactly, but worse.
The girl notices the shift in my expression immediately and softens slightly.
“I’m Mina,” she says, offering her hand. “I knew your sister. We were friends.”
Knew.
That past tense still stings.
That familiar ache cracks through my high for a second, sharp enough to make me look away toward the ocean before I can react too visibly.
Something shifts in Mina’s expression for half a second after that.
Not pity, but recognition.
Like she knows exactly what kind of sadness I’m trying to outrun by being here.
But instead of letting the conversation sink any deeper into grief and ghosts and all the shit neither of us came here to drown in, she suddenly claps her hands once and points toward the massive stage lighting up down the shoreline.
“Nope,” she announces decisively. “Absolutely not. Brynne would haunt both of us for standing around looking emotionally constipated at a rave.”
That snorts a laugh out of me before I can stop it.
“Seriously,” Mina continues, already hooking her arm through mine and dragging me forward through the crowd. “That girl believed in two things passionately. Making bad decisions and pretending feelings don’t exist.”
“Relatable honestly.”
“Exactly. So.” She points toward the VIP tents dramatically. “We’re getting drinks, finding shade before I literally combust, and then you’re gonna let some hot guy ruin your life for at least thirty minutes.”
I grin while she pulls me deeper into the chaos.
“You always adopt emotionally unstable girls at festivals?”
“Only hot ones.”
“Valid.”
And just like that—
Something clicks.
Fast.
Too fast probably.
But trauma bonding and recreational drug use apparently speedrun friendships in terrifyingly efficient ways.
Within an hour, I’m sprawled beside Mina beneath a massive canopy tent covered in fake vines and hanging lanterns while DJs shake the beach apart in the distance.
She hands me a drink the color of antifreeze.
I drink it without asking questions.
Wow.
Personal growth.
My mother would probably be horrified.
Somewhere beneath the bass, heat and chaos, something tightens quietly in my chest.
Because this—
This doesn’t feel random.
Not after Dagger and Noir.
Especially not after Brynne.
Meeting Mina feels like pulling on a loose thread and realizing the entire fucking sweater might unravel if I keep going.
And judging by the way the strange man near the fencing is still watching us from across the festival grounds—
Something tells me it already started.