Chapter 20 Olivier #3
“I’m afraid of…everything.” Emilio’s voice wavered, but he continued. “I’m afraid of pain and loss and not knowing what waits for me on the Other Side. But above all that, what I’m most afraid of…is knowing that I now have something…someone…I care more about than myself. Someone I can lose.”
Olivier’s breath hitched in his throat as the door gently creaked open. Emilio glanced over his shoulder, his gaze meeting Olivier’s.
As the others made their way into the next room, Olivier scurried forward, grabbing Emilio by the hand before he could cross through.
“Someone you can lose?” Olivier whispered. He didn’t miss the trail of goose bumps running down Emilio’s neck as the words left his lips. “Do you mind elaborating on who that someone might be?”
Emilio bit back a smile, blushing.
“Take a wild guess.”
Olivier placed his fingers gently beneath Emilio’s chin, angling his face toward him.
“I want to hear you say it out loud.”
He hadn’t meant for his voice to come out so low and rough, but being this close to Emilio, and with the memory of their kiss still lingering on his lips, Olivier found that he’d seemingly lost control over his vocal cords.
Emilio cleared his throat. His cheeks burned from pink to a deep red. His lips parted, gently, eyes trailing up, higher and higher—
“Olivier!” Masika’s voice called from the other room. “You’d better come in here.”
Olivier shut his eyes, wincing. He dropped his hand from Emilio’s chin, eyes fluttering back open to meet Emilio’s startled gaze. The other boy was still flushed, a slightly dazed look in his eyes.
“Hold that thought,” Olivier whispered through a shaky breath. Reluctantly, he turned away from Emilio and walked into the next room, eyes scanning the group until they landed on Masika.
“I swear,” he muttered. “You have the worst timing.”
Masika made an exasperated gesture with her hands. “What did I do?”
Olivier waved her off. “Nothing.”
Olivier snapped his gaze to the next door.
Ah.
That explained the impatience.
Olivier Dupont…what are you most afraid of?
Well, he supposed it was inevitable that it would be his turn next.
All the others had been forced to speak their truth out loud—why would he be any different?
But now that the question had been presented to him, Olivier found the words lodged in the back of his throat, a trembling fear building in the pit of his stomach.
He knew what he was most afraid of.
And he couldn’t say it out loud.
Not now. Not right after his kiss with Emilio. He’d thought he’d have more time…a chance to properly explain it to Emilio.
His eyes anxiously flitted to Emilio. The other boy stared at him, a soft, encouraging smile on his lips. Maybe there was a way around the test…a loophole. There were other things, after all, that Olivier was afraid of. Who was he to say what he was most afraid of?
Maybe—if he was lucky—there could be more than one truth.
“I’m most afraid of”—Olivier inhaled a sharp breath—“the unknown.”
There was a breath of silence. Please, Olivier begged silently. Please be enough. He waited…and waited. But the door remained stubbornly closed. Dread pooled in Olivier’s stomach.
Catherine shot him a puzzled look. “Did you lie?”
“I…I didn’t—” But his words caught in his throat when a deep rumble echoed from somewhere beneath them.
The room began to shake. The walls trembled.
An earthquake? But then it occurred to Olivier that the walls weren’t just trembling—but moving.
Constricting slowly. Shifting toward them, inch by inch.
The room was closing in on them.
“What’s happening?!” Dina shouted over the thunderous roar.
“The walls…” Analisa whispered, tucking Benji closer to her chest, panic whirling behind her eyes. “They’re moving.”
“Olivier!” Masika bellowed. “You have to tell the truth!”
Terror twined around Olivier’s chest. “I am!”
The walls pushed against them. The group huddled together at the center of the room, the space around them nearly nonexistent now.
“We’re going to be crushed!” Catherine snapped. “Goddammit, Olivier! Just tell the fucking truth!”
“Fine,” Olivier whispered. He closed his eyes, wincing.
“Fine! I’m…I’m afraid of the fact that I only have a few days left, okay?
!” The words tumbled out of him before he could second-guess himself.
But he kept his eyes shut, unwilling to face Emilio as he spoke the truth out loud.
“That my memories have gotten worse since we left the base and that…that in a few days…the Forgetting will consume me and I’ll lose Emilio forever! ”
All at once…the room stopped moving.
When Olivier opened his eyes, the walls had somehow shifted back to their original positions, as if they hadn’t been moments away from crushing the group. As if the room had never moved at all.
The door in front of them groaned open.
Olivier felt Emilio’s presence behind him. The searing heat of his stare. But he kept his gaze forward as they entered the new room, terrified to turn back and face the consequences of his actions.
Luckily, what they found on the other side of the door provided enough of a distraction to delay that inevitability. Because floating right at the center of the final room, surrounded by a shimmering deep indigo light, was the second key.