Chapter 1
Calla
Celebrating Christmas two weeks early at a dive bar with coworkers I barely know is bad enough.
Worse, though, is knowing I’ve spent the last two months avoiding the office—holed up at home, buried in research and writing, where it’s quieter.
Safer. Less suffocating. Even though they gave me the desk by the window, like I asked.
I’ll go.
It’s a performance, really. Get dressed. Show up. Make small talk. Smile at the right moments. Pretend I’m not clinging, white-knuckled, to a frayed cord tethering me to a life that doesn’t feel like mine anymore.
Pretend there’s anything to celebrate.
Everything about tonight—the cheap drinks, the gaudy decorations, the syrupy cheer—feels forced. Standing in a room full of laughter feels like a betrayal.
But if I don’t go, they’ll notice. They’ll talk.
So I’ll go.
It’s easier to fake it for a few hours than try to explain why I can’t .
Don’t get me wrong, they’re nice enough. Good morals, easy conversation, pleasant company, but they’re not my people.
Jules was my person. The only one.
It’s strange, looking back—we’d only known each other a few months. Barely a season. But sometimes, time doesn’t matter. Some people just show up and feel like they’ve been there all along.
Even now, I catch myself forgetting she’s not.
I only have an hour before I have to be at Driftwood, but time feels heavy, stretching and slowing into the late evening.
The shower didn’t help the way I’d hoped. I still feel unsettled, like I’m borrowing some lost version of myself just to make it through the night.
As I pass the bathroom mirror, I catch a glimpse of my reflection and freeze.
I lean in close, tightening the towel around me, fingers curling into the fabric. My eyes study the stranger’s face staring back at me. I know it’s me, but as my fingers trace the curve of my cheek, as my eyes jump to count each freckle, it doesn’t feel like me.
My hands tremble as I try to adjust the towel, pulling it tighter—but it slips, revealing a bare body I can’t quite claim. I close my eyes and let the shiver crawl through me.
It’s my body. I know it is. But it feels like it belongs to someone else.
I swing the towel shut and clutch it tighter, like I can shield myself from what I see.
But the green in my eyes, flecked with gold, startles me—almost too bright under the harsh light.
I search them anyway, desperate for something familiar, and all I find are the shadows beneath. I’m not sure how I missed them before .
The features I’ve always known feel out of reach now, like they’re not mine to own anymore.
A shaky sigh slips out as I tug the towel from my head, letting damp copper-red strands fall over my shoulders. I run my fingers absently through the tangles. My hairbrush sits on the counter, only an arm’s length away, but I can’t bring myself to reach for it.
Somewhere between one breath and the next, I start moving.
Before I realize it, my makeup is done. Foundation sits heavy on my skin, mascara clinging to my lashes. I don’t even remember doing it. The minutes blur together like they never even happened.
I turn to leave, but pause, glancing back at the mirror.
Whatever I was hoping to see isn’t there.
A pang of guilt hits me—the relentless weight of a life I’m not sure I’m ready to live.
No matter how hard I try, I can’t shake the feeling of being trapped.
Trapped in a version of myself I barely recognize.
Trapped in a world that keeps moving faster and further, while I continue to stand still.
When I finally force myself away from the mirror, I step into the bedroom and fling open the closet door.
I stare blankly at the rows of clothes, shoving hangers to the left and the right, then move to the dresser, pulling out clothes only to shove them back in.
Frustration bubbles up until it spills over, and with a loud breath, I drop to the floor.
Why couldn’t I have just gone to the office? Made some friends, had a few easy conversations, moved on ?
Maybe tonight wouldn’t feel so impossible.
Maybe I’d finally feel like I belong.
Shaking my head, I pull on a sweater. It’s tight. Itchy. Suffocating. I rip it off and toss it into the growing pile on the floor .
Every piece of clothing, every tug of my hair as I strip another item away, feels like a reminder—of how small I am, how out of place I feel in a life that’s supposed to be mine.
The pile keeps growing. Nothing fits, nothing feels right, and every glance in the mirror makes it worse.
I’m out of time. Out of patience. And every time I look at my reflection, the stranger is still there, staring back at me.
I glance at the clock on my desk.
I’m late.
Defeated, I drop to the floor, knees sinking into the mess I’ve made.
My hands shake as I fumble with my shoes, the laces slipping through my clumsy fingers. I tie them anyway, but the motions feel empty.
Whatever momentum I had, whatever was pushing me forward, is gone.
With a sigh, I stand, almost tripping over my half-tied laces as I hurry toward the door. I grip the handle tightly, swinging it open with a frustrated breath.
It’s time to put the face on.
It’s stupid. But I don’t know how to stop anymore.
The plan was to walk. Have a few drinks. Let the buzz settle into my limbs before the cold could.
A thirty-minute walk in December isn’t ideal. But if Jules taught me anything, it’s that a good alcohol blanket can turn thirty into five.
The thought almost makes me laugh, but it catches in my throat. She should be here.
I feel her absence everywhere .
She was always there, filling the spaces I didn’t even realize were empty. Now it’s just… quiet.
I try to focus on the small things—the sound of my feet on the pavement, the feel of my keys in my hand—but there’s an anguish in the space she left behind.
I left everything behind. Tried to start over here, hoping it would fix something.
After the move, I’d tell people I was from the Northeast—like it meant something. Like being in New England now made it some kind of clean slate. But the truth was, I’d only moved a few hours away. Still close enough to visit, far enough to feel like I shouldn’t.
It was supposed to feel like freedom. I thought if I got far enough away from everything familiar, maybe I’d stop feeling like a burden.
I grew up happy. Back home, things were fine.
Suburban neighborhoods where lawns were mowed on Sundays and mailboxes never leaned. Dinner on the table by six. Notes in lunchboxes.
My dad used to help me build science projects in the garage, staying up late to fix anything I’d accidentally glued crooked.
It should’ve been enough.
But after college—after everything—that life started to feel tight. Like it didn’t fit anymore. Like I was constantly breathing through a straw.
Nothing happened, really. Not in the way people think. The sadness just showed up one day and didn’t leave. And after a while, I stopped expecting it to.
I moved back when things got bad. At first, it felt safe. But after a while, safety turned into pressure. To become something. To be someone.
And it was paralyzing.
Some mornings, I couldn’t even get out of bed. I could feel the worry every time my parents looked at me, like I was making the whole house heavier just by being in it.
So I left.
Not to run away, but to find something lighter. To meet people who didn’t already have a version of me in their heads. People who didn’t expect me to be okay.
That was the goal: to stop pretending. To finally figure out who I really was under all the people-pleasing and smiling-through-it.
I wasn’t trying to be happy. I was trying to be me.
Jules understood that better than anyone. She made it feel possible. She told me I didn’t have to keep being who I’d always been just because it made everyone else more comfortable. That I could be someone new.
That I already was .
But now she’s gone.
And no matter where I go, there’s always a part of me that feels empty. A part that’s still broken.
A part she was helping to heal.
It’s like the world around me is on mute, but the silence isn’t peaceful—it’s deafening. A constant ringing in my ears. A loyal reminder that she’s gone.
I slide into my car, slamming the door shut behind me.
God, I miss her so much I ache.