Chapter 49
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
PRESENT DAY
At home, all I want to do is wash the hospital off me. I’m so exhausted. My entire body feels as if it’s filled with thousands of bricks, like I can barely lift my feet.
Everything feels wrong now, like I’m standing on the other side of a fracture, like everything in my life might be before and after, and the midpoint is this day.
Mom’s words ring in my ears. Her confession. A truth that I’m now forced to carry—that I’ll have to tell Will about someday soon. And how could he ever forgive her? How could I expect him to?
Poor Ruth…
Everything shrinks when I think of her, my vision going fuzzy, scalp throbbing. The fact that Mom hurt her enough that she wanted to hurt herself. That she was so broken, so alone…
I would do anything to go back. I don’t know how to forgive Mom, either, I realize. I don’t know how to move on after what she did. Ruth was her friend, her sister. She deserved to hear the truth from her, not from a child she hardly knew.
I move through the quiet apartment slowly, switching on lights and lamps until the whole place looks like a department store. I hadn’t even realized I was afraid until this moment. Like I just watched a horror movie, though it’s more like I’m living it.
In the bathroom, I turn on the faucet, watching the water roar into the tub. Will’s face surfaces in my mind, the brokenness in his eyes when he walked out into the waiting room. How much longer can he go on like this? How much longer can Margie fight?
The doctors just keep telling us she’s stable—so much so that I’m afraid it’s losing meaning. Because stable doesn’t mean safe this time. It just means paused, like a stopwatch. A held breath.
I force the thought away and touch the water, gauging the temperature. I pour lavender bath salts into the tub, watching them swirl and disappear under the surface.
In the mirror, I hardly recognize myself. My face is pale. Empty. Lost.
Steam fogs the glass, softening my reflection, and I look away, undressing once the tub is full. The heat steals my breath as I lower myself into the water, sliding down until it laps at my collarbone. My hair floats around me, and I close my eyes, taking in the silence.
It’s almost too quiet, the kind of stillness that makes me jump at every creak of a pipe or the sudden sound of the heat turning on.
Everything’s okay, I promise myself. I’m going to take a bath, then pass out in bed, and tomorrow I’ll go back to the hospital first thing.
I’ll have to text the school principal before I pass out, to let her know they’ll need to find a sub for tomorrow.
There’s a part of me—minor and not exactly pressing—that feels guilty for already being such a needy employee.
I’m grateful for the work family I’ve built, and I can only hope this doesn’t jeopardize that.
And then there’s George. Someone I truly considered a friend. I can’t begin to think about what this means for our relationship, whether I’ll ever be able to trust him again.
A soft thud echoes in some other part of the apartment. My eyes shoot open, and my hands tighten on the sides of the tub.
My pulse quickens, and I listen closely, my thoughts swirling with panic.
It was distinct. Not the pipes or the air.
A footstep. A door closing.
“Will?” I call, sitting up in the water. Chills line my skin at once.
I’m straining to hear over the steady hum of the vents. I weigh my options—I could get out, wrap up in a towel, and investigate, or I could stay here and pretend I imagined it.
I hear it again. This time closer.
The faintest thud of a shoe on our concrete floor.
Panic claws at my throat, and I feel my heartbeat at the base of my skull. “Will?” I call out louder now, hoping to see his face. Hoping he’ll tease me over being so scared.
Hoping I’m safe.
There’s a quiet click in the distance. The sound of someone opening my bedroom door. I go very still, eyes darting to the towel hanging near the sink. I should get out. I should move. I should do something.
And yet…I’m frozen in place. Waiting for this to all be a prank.
“Will,” I say, my voice shaking, pitched too high. I can’t hide the terror I feel. “This isn’t funny.”
The bathroom door makes a slight popping sound, like it wasn’t fully latched and now it is. The handle doesn’t move.
Seconds stretch on, and eventually, the heat kicks off, drenching the apartment in terrible silence. I wait. Listen. My skin lines with chills, even in the heat of the tub.
Everything in me tightens, balls like a fist.
I force myself to breathe in slowly, then out, and I peer over the side of the tub at the small crack under the door. I force out another breath. There are no shadows. No one is standing there.
I’m imagining things.
After this week, this day, my nerves are shredded. But there’s no one here. I locked the door. No one but Will has a key. No one is in this apartment but me.
Silence presses in on my skin, and slowly, gradually, I let myself sink back against the tub. You’re safe, Opal. You’re fine. No reassurances can erase the fact that I wish Will were here.
Eventually, the worry fades. Mostly. The world narrows to warmth and steam and the calming scent of lavender, the steady sound of my breathing.
I close my eyes for a long while, the weariness setting in again.
Everything’s okay.
I open them.
A face hovers above me, eclipsing the ceiling light, cloaking itself in shadow.
For one suspended second, my mind doesn’t comprehend what’s happening, as if the world has paused on a single, unbearable frame. As if it’s mercifully trying to protect me.
Then panic seizes every organ with icy, spindly fingers. My scream never takes shape—it doesn’t have time. One hand clamps over my mouth, the other in my hair.
I’m shoved underwater. Terrible heat, terrible fire spreads through me.
The bathwater, seconds ago harmless, turns animalistic—invading, consuming. Water rushes into my nose, my eyes, my ears.
I’m coughing and choking and inhaling and…drowning. My lungs scream for relief, for air, for life. But I can’t move. I’m shoved down, harder.
I fight, but the hand in my hair grabs a fistful, slamming my head into the porcelain. My scalp joins the rest of my body in white-hot fire.
My entire world is a pinhead, reduced only to the sounds of thunder—blood roaring, water sloshing, the echo of my head scraping the tub, my attacker growling—and the burning need for air.
It’ll be a silent death.
Alone. Unnoticed.
I try, still. I do. Even though no one’s around to hear.
I bang my limbs against the porcelain, thrashing. I shove shampoo and soap bottles to the floor. My fingers claw at the wrists holding me down as my eyes try to make sense of the swirling, watery portrait of the face above me.
A wet hairline beaded with steam.
Dark eyes.
Mouth set in a hard line.
My thoughts fracture. My chest screams. I’m imagining things. I have to be. My mind has given up. Given me a friendly face for comfort in the end.
No. Not like this.
My heel connects with something solid. A shin. A thigh. He’s standing in the bathtub with me, using his full weight to hold me down. The water sloshes over the rim, soaking fabric, splashing onto the tile.
My lungs seize. I’ve never felt pain like this.
I don’t know how long it’s been—it feels like hours—but it has to be over soon. It has to be.
With one final, desperate attempt, I twist to the side violently and manage to wrench my mouth from his grasp for a fraction of a second.
Darkness flashes across my face, another eclipse, as he stumbles forward.
Light. Then dark. Then light again as he fumbles for his footing, catching himself on the side of the tub.
I break the surface with a desperate gasp. Air knifes into my chest like shattered glass, but the pain doesn’t end. It only splinters. Because this isn’t my brain protecting me. This is real.
Disbelief claws at my brain. I gasp in breaths, desperate to find my center of gravity again. The ceiling swims above me, warped and unfamiliar.
He grabs hold of me without a word, shoving me back under.
Water floods my mouth, and my vision sparkles with tiny white bursts.
Stars. No, not stars. Nerve endings misfiring in warning.
Death. I’m dying.
My scalp screams when he grabs a new handful of hair, using all his weight to slam me against the bottom of the tub.
I can’t fight anymore. I don’t want to.
And so, I don’t.
My body goes slack. I’m everywhere and nowhere all at once. The roaring fades to a dull hum, like a radio losing signal.
This is the end.
Somewhere in the darkness, I feel his grip shift. Lighten.
Something sparks in the depths of my consciousness.
I turn my head and sink my teeth into whatever flesh I can find—his thumb. He rears back, shouting. I surge upward.
My head pounds, and every breath feels like a shard of glass. I’m not even sure how I’m moving, but something propels me forward. Something stronger than willpower.
My hand finds the heavy ceramic soap dish near the faucet. I swing without thought. It connects with the side of his head, a dull crack.
Banks staggers back, blood immediately threading through his blond hair, like water from a hose snaking through the grass. His hand goes to his head, his face wrinkling with fury. “You—”
I scramble out of the tub, water sloshing onto the floor. I grab the towel, wrapping it around myself.
I need to think. To move.
My phone is on the nightstand, but do I have time to call anyone? I should run. I should grab a knife. I should find my keys.
My keys.
My mind flashes to a memory—my birthday. That day at school, Banks borrowed my keys in class and didn’t return them until after lunch. He would’ve only needed to cross the street to the gas station to make a copy.
But this is…Banks.
My friend.
The boy I once thought I might love.
The bathroom is too small now. The space too clouded with steam.
“Are you insane?” I demand through sharp, heavy breaths.