Chapter 11 #2
That’s the part that cracks something.
Because she’s right, and I hate that she’s right, and I hate that part of me already knew it.
“What if you’re just…a phase?” she asks quietly. “What if this is fun and intense and validating, and then he gets bored or distracted, and you’re left trying to explain to yourself why it felt real when it wasn’t?”
I stare at my hands, at the faint tremor I didn’t notice until now.
“I don’t think he’s lying,” I say.
“I’m not saying he is,” she replies. “I’m saying he might not be telling the whole story, and neither are you.”
The room feels smaller. My tea has gone cold. My thoughts start stacking up, one on top of the other. Suddenly I can’t tell which ones are mine and which ones are fear wearing a familiar face.
“What if I’m doing this because it feels powerful to be chosen?” I ask, more to myself than her. “What if I’m ignoring red flags because I don’t want to go back to being invisible?”
Jo doesn’t answer right away. She reaches out and squeezes my knee. “I just don’t want you getting hurt again. And I don’t trust men who mark territory.”
That does it.
By the time she leaves, after hugs and reassurances and promises to check in, I’m more wrecked than I was before she arrived. The doubts have teeth now. They pace. They ask better questions.
I curl up on the couch again, phone in my hand, staring at Ethan’s name without opening the thread, because I don’t know what I’d say if I did.
I try to distract myself the responsible way. I rinse my mug. I wipe the counter that was already clean. I open my laptop and close it again without reading a word. Every attempt at normalcy slides off me like I’m made of Teflon today.
My phone buzzes.
I glance down, expecting the group chat or maybe Ethan, and my stomach drops when I see a number I don’t recognize. No name. No picture. Just digits.
Unknown: You look better when you’re scared.
I freeze.
I stare at the screen, waiting for my brain to supply context or logic or anything useful, but it doesn’t. It just tightens. I tell myself it’s a wrong number. A bad joke. Spam that took a weird turn.
Then another message comes through.
Unknown: Did you really think running once meant you’d never have to do it again?
My pulse kicks hard enough that I have to put the phone down for a second, like physical distance might help. It doesn’t. I pick it back up, fingers already cold.
Me: Who is this?
The reply comes almost immediately.
Unknown: You know exactly who this is about.
My chest feels tight now, not panic yet but something close enough to make my breaths shallow. I stand up without realizing it and pace the length of the living room, my socks sliding on the floor.
Unknown: You didn’t do a very good job of running the first time, Lila.
My vision blurs, and it takes me a second to realize my eyes are watering. Someone who knows where to press.
Me: If this is a joke, stop.
Three dots appear. Disappear. Then the phone buzzes again.
Unknown: He said you were special too, remember?
He said he chose you, you belonged to him.
My stomach turns.
I sit down hard on the couch, my knees suddenly weak, and I feel the old instinct flare, sharp and unwelcome. The scan for exits. The urge to minimize. To go quiet and wait it out.
Unknown: Funny thing is, you didn’t really run from him.
You just waited until someone else picked you up.
The room feels smaller, like the walls leaned in when I wasn’t looking.
My thoughts tangle, past and present blurring together in a way I hate.
I think of Ethan’s note. You’re mine. No one else gets to have you.
I think of Jo’s voice, careful and worried.
I think of how easily my body relaxes when his hand settles at my waist.
Me: Don’t contact me again.
My hands start shaking for real now, and I curl my fingers into the fabric of the couch to steady them. This isn’t vague. This isn’t fishing. This is someone who knows my history and wants me to know they know it.
Unknown: You should’ve stayed gone.
You should’ve learned the lesson.
My breath catches on that last line, because suddenly this isn’t just about fear, it’s about blame. About punishment. About someone rewriting my survival as failure.
Me: What do you want?
The pause this time is longer, and it’s worse for it. I imagine someone on the other end smiling, considering how much to reveal.
Unknown: I want you to remember who you really are.
And I want you to understand that men like him don’t save girls like you.
Cold spreads through my chest that has nothing to do with temperature. I glance toward the door, then the windows, then back to the phone, every sense suddenly alert. My screen goes dark.
No typing dots. No follow-up. I sit there for a long moment, phone clenched in my hand, heart pounding hard enough that it feels like it might bruise my ribs from the inside. Every instinct screams at once now. Run. Hide. Tell someone. Tell him. Don’t tell him.
Ethan’s name floats to the surface of my thoughts, heavy and complicated, and for the first time since I met him, I don’t know whether reaching for him would make me safer or pull me deeper into something I can’t control.
I look down at my phone again, at the empty screen, and realize with a sick clarity that whoever this is didn’t text by accident.
They wanted me unsettled.
They wanted me doubting.
And they know exactly where to find me.
I draw my knees to my chest, the city noise muffled beyond the walls, and one question loops through my mind with brutal persistence.
Do I tell him or do I disappear before someone decides for me?