Scarlett
Idon’t sleep. Not for a second.
The ceiling carves itself into my skull, the cracks splitting wider every time I blink.
Every shadow looks like him—Kai at my door, Kai at the end of my bed, Kai inside me where he shouldn’t be.
And beneath it all, the steady vibration of my phone where it hides under my pillow, rattling like a pulse I can’t ignore.
I cave just before dawn.
The screen burns my eyes—another message. Then another.
TYLER: You think you can just walk out on me?
TYLER: After what we had that night?
TYLER: You owe me.
My stomach turns. My fingers shake as I hammer out a reply.
ME: Leave me alone.
It doesn’t stop him.
TYLER: Don’t play games. You liked it.
TYLER: You’ll come back to me. You have to.
TYLER: Or maybe I’ll come find you.
The air leaves my lungs in jagged pieces. My chest won’t rise properly, won’t fall.
ME: Don’t. Don’t you dare.
Three dots. The longest three dots of my life.
TYLER: You think anyone will believe you if you run your mouth? You wanted it. Remember that.
The words blur. I can’t tell if it’s from tears or rage or the fact I haven’t closed my eyes since yesterday. My body aches, my head’s splitting open, but I can’t stop staring at the screen.
He doesn’t know Kai. He doesn’t know what’s waiting for him if he shows up here.
But I do.
And the thought almost makes me sicker than the messages.
For one insane, spiralling second—
I want Tyler to try.
The glow of the TV throws colours across the living-room walls, laughter and music tumbling from the speakers as the four of us sink into the couches like we’re a picture-perfect family.
Mum insisted on it—a movie night, all of us together, just like we used to.
There’s a stack of DVDs on the coffee table, bowls of popcorn in everyone’s laps, soda cans sweating onto coasters.
On the surface, it’s normal. Almost sickeningly normal.
I curl my legs beneath me, blanket wrapped tight around my shoulders, forcing a smile when Mum presses the remote into my hand and says I should choose.
I pick something at random—some old comedy I won’t even register—because my phone keeps buzzing beneath the blanket.
Every vibration is a knife. Every notification is his name.
Tyler.
I keep it hidden, screen face-down, heart ricocheting inside my chest every time it lights up.
“You’re quiet tonight, Scar,” Dad says, reaching for another handful of popcorn. His voice is casual, but his eyes linger too long.
I choke out a laugh. “Just tired.”
But Kai’s eyes cut to me instantly—sharp and knowing—like he can see right through the blanket, through my skin, straight into the secrets I’m suffocating with. His hand twitches where it rests on the armrest, knuckles white, like he’s one second away from ripping the phone right out of my hand.
Mum shifts closer, smoothing my hair. “You look pale, sweetheart. Are you sleeping okay?”
I nod—maybe too fast—because Dad frowns, and the buzzing under the blanket won’t stop, won’t stop, won’t stop. My throat feels raw, and my eyes sting. I can’t crack here, not with their faces lit by the TV glow, not with Kai watching me like a loaded gun across the couch.
He says nothing, though. Doesn’t give me away.
But his silence is worse than words.
Because I can feel it—every second I keep hiding Tyler’s messages, Kai is cataloguing my lies.
And when this movie ends, when Mum and Dad go to bed, I know he’s going to make me pay for every single one.
The living room glows gold from the lamps, bowls of popcorn dumped onto the coffee table, the faint fizz of soda cans cracked open. Mum’s laughing at something dumb on the screen, Dad shaking his head like he’s too dignified for a superhero film and still can’t look away. It almost feels normal.
Almost.
“Scarlett, pass me the salt,” Dad says without looking away, holding his hand out like I’m still ten.
I shove the shaker at him, and he grins. “Good girl.”
Kai, sprawled at the other end of the couch, snorts low enough that only I hear it. “She’s not a dog, Dad.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” Dad fires back, making Mum laugh, but Kai’s eyes are on me when he says it—sharp and cutting. I feel it more than hear it.
“Don’t start,” Mum warns, wagging her finger like Kai’s still the troublemaker who used to ditch curfew.
Kai smirks, flicks a kernel of popcorn at me, and it bounces off my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Mum. Scarlett can handle herself.”
“Barely,” I mutter, and Mum chuckles like it’s sibling bickering, not knives slipping under skin.
“You two,” she sighs, shaking her head, but her smile is soft.
I fake a smile back, chewing on a piece of popcorn that tastes like cardboard because my throat’s too tight. My phone buzzes in my pocket—once, twice. I press my hand to my thigh like I can crush it still.
“Who’s texting you this late?” Dad asks without turning. Casual.
My heart lurches.
Kai stretches out, drapes an arm across the back of the couch, his gaze sliding to me slow as poison. “Yeah, Scarlett,” he murmurs. “Who can’t get enough of you?”
The room’s warm, full of laughter, but I swear I’m freezing.
I force a smile when Mum tosses popcorn at Dad, when the laughter swells around the room like we’re nothing but a normal family.
I even laugh with them, though my throat feels raw and my phone burns hot in my pocket, vibrating again and again with Tyler’s name flashing across the screen. I don’t look. I can’t.
Kai’s on the other end of the couch, legs spread in a lazy sprawl that looks too calm. But his eyes cut over every few seconds, sharp and knowing, like he can feel the way my pulse is tearing through me. I pretend to be absorbed in the film, shifting and bringing my knees up.
“Scarlett?” Mum leans forward, voice softer now, less playful. “You’ve barely touched your popcorn. Everything okay?”
I nod too quickly, nearly choking on my fake laugh. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just tired.”
Dad chuckles. “Tired at your age? You should be bouncing off the walls.”
“Leave her alone,” Mum says, swatting his arm, but her eyes stay on me—concern, suspicion—I can feel it digging into my skin.
Kai stretches, casual as anything, and mutters, “She’s fine. Aren’t you, Scar?”
The way he says it—low, edged with something only I can hear—makes my stomach twist. Like he’s daring me to slip, to expose myself.
Another buzz rattles through my pocket. I flinch, biting down hard on my lip.
“Who keeps texting you?” Mum asks, as if it’s no big deal.
Heat floods my face. “Nobody. Just… notifications.” My laugh is brittle. “You know how it is.”
Dad shakes his head, muttering something about kids and their phones, but Kai’s still watching me, mouth curved in a smirk that doesn’t reach his eyes.
The film keeps playing, voices and laughter rising again, but it feels like I’m underwater—every sound muffled by the pounding of my heart. Tyler’s words are waiting for me on that screen, and Kai’s stare pins me harder than any threat ever could.
I hug the pillow tighter to my chest, wishing I could vanish into the cushions.
But Kai leans forward, grabs a handful of popcorn, and without looking away from me says, “Yeah. She’s fine.”
And I swear I hear the unspoken words under it—for now.
I slip away the second the film ends, claiming I’m tired, but my heart is already slamming in my chest before I even reach the hallway. I don’t go upstairs. Not yet. I duck into the bathroom, lock the door, and press my back against it like I can barricade the entire world out.
The phone burns in my hand.
Another vibration. Another message.
TYLER: Why aren’t you answering me? Don’t you think that’s rude after everything we shared?
My throat closes. My thumb hovers, but I type nothing. He doesn’t know—he can’t know—about Kai. That secret would scorch the earth.
Another buzz.
TYLER: You think you can ignore me? You think I’ll just forget how you moaned, how you shook, how you begged? I’ll remind you if I have to. I’ll make you remember.
Tears sting my eyes. My stomach twists so violently I almost gag. I want to smash the phone against the porcelain sink, but my hands are shaking too hard.
The room feels too small. The mirror shows my wide, panicked eyes, mascara smudged from where I’ve rubbed too hard. I look ruined—exactly how he wants me to feel.
TYLER: If you don’t come see me, I’ll come find you. I know where you live, Scarlett. Don’t test me.
A sob catches in my throat before I can bite it down. My parents are right downstairs. Kai is out there too—probably pacing, probably simmering. If they heard me cry, they’d ask questions I can’t answer.
I drop onto the icy edge of the tub, curling in on myself, the phone clutched so tight my knuckles ache. My chest heaves, every breath broken, every thought spiralling. I can’t tell Kai. If he knew, he’d kill Tyler. And if Tyler knew about Kai…
The phone lights up again. I flinch.
TYLER: Don’t forget—you’re mine.
I press the screen to my chest, shaking, tears spilling hot and silent. My whole body feels trapped in a cage of fear and guilt, with no air and no way out.
I slide down against the cool tile, knees pulled to my chest, the phone burning in my hand like it’s radioactive.
The messages don’t stop. Every time I wipe my eyes and blink them clear, another one lights the screen—his name at the top like a knife pressed to my throat. Tyler.
Why? Why is he doing this?
He wasn’t like this. Not before. He used to be soft—clumsy in the sweetest way—the boy who tucked his hoodie around my shoulders in the cinema when I shivered, who brushed popcorn salt from my lips with a laugh. I thought maybe—stupidly, naively—he was safe.
And now, these words. Ugly, demanding, dripping with something dark. Threats tangled in the same hands that once slid mine into his beneath the armrest.
What changed him? Was it me?
My head throbs, pounding with all the contradictions. He was supposed to be the good one, wasn’t he? The safe one? If Kai is the fire that burns me alive, then Tyler was meant to be the water. And yet here I am, drowning in both.
My fingers shake so violently the phone nearly slips. I want to delete them—every single venomous sentence—but my thumb won’t move. I just keep staring, reading them again and again, whispering under my breath, “Why are you doing this? Why now? What did I do?”
The words echo in the empty bathroom, bouncing back at me like I’m losing my mind.
I curl tighter, forehead pressed to my knees, breathing shallow. There’s no answer. No explanation. Just his name on the screen, over and over, until I’m not sure if I’m more terrified of Kai finding out—or of what Tyler’s turning into.
The tiles are cold beneath me, biting through the thin fabric of my pyjama bottoms, but I don’t move.
I can’t move. My phone is a shard of glass in my palm, screen still glowing with his words—ugly, sharp, nothing like the ones he used to send.
I scroll up, scroll down, as if maybe the messages will rewrite themselves if I just look long enough.
“I thought we were friends,” I whisper. The words break in my throat before they’re even fully formed. They come out jagged, pathetic—like I’m begging a ghost.
Friends. That’s what he used to call me. His girl. His safe place. The one he’d walk home, the one he’d laugh with until my cheeks ached. The boy who tucked my hair behind my ear in the dark cinema, who made me feel like maybe there was goodness left in this world.
Now it’s threats and demands—each notification a blade sliding between my ribs.
Hot tears spill down my cheeks, soaking the collar of my shirt as I clutch my knees tight against my chest. My voice cracks, louder this time, broken and desperate.
“I thought we were friends!”
The sob tears through me, raw, loud enough that for a second I think someone might hear. My whole body trembles with it. My chest hurts. My eyes burn. And still, I can’t stop whispering it, over and over, rocking like the words might glue me back together.
“I thought we were friends. I thought we were friends. I thought we were—”
But the screen keeps lighting up—cruel little vibrations that remind me I was wrong.
So wrong.
The phone buzzes again, and the sound is a knife straight to my chest. I can’t stand looking at it anymore.
My hands are shaking as I shove it behind the stack of folded towels under the sink, burying it there like a corpse that might rise if I let it breathe.
Out of sight. Out of reach. If I can’t see his words, maybe they can’t keep poisoning me.
I stand, my legs unsteady, palms flat against the cool porcelain edge of the sink. The girl in the mirror doesn’t look like me. Her eyes are swollen and red-rimmed, her skin blotchy, her lips trembling as if she might shatter any second.
“No,” I whisper, biting down hard on the word. My nails dig into the counter as I lean closer. “Nobody can know.”
I grab tissues, blot away the streaks of mascara bleeding down my cheeks, press until the puffiness blurs into something almost passable.
Powder. Lip balm. I go through the motions like a soldier cleaning her wounds after a battle—mechanical, practised—pretending it’s enough to cover up the wreckage beneath.
When I swipe the last trace of tears from my face, the girl in the mirror smiles back. A brittle smile, sharp-edged, but it looks enough like normal. Enough to fool them. Enough to survive tonight.
I straighten my shoulders, pull in a shaky breath, and force myself out of the bathroom.