Scarlett
The car ride home is too quiet. The music hums low from the radio, but it only makes the silence worse, every beat of bass rattling in my chest like a secret I can’t swallow.
Kai hasn’t said a word since he pulled me off his lap.
He locks his jaw, and his hand still grips the wheel as if he would snap it clean in two if I breathed wrong.
I should feel safe. I should feel wanted. Instead, I feel ruined. Sticky thighs. Smudged lipstick. Tyler’s laughter echoed in my head.
I stare out the window and try not to choke on the truth — that part of me that liked it. That part of me that wanted to fall apart right there in Kai’s lap, even with the entire world watching.
The car slows. Our driveway. Home.
I unclip my seatbelt, but my hands shake so badly it takes two tries. He notices. Of course he does. His eyes cut to me once, sharp enough to pin me in place, then he looks away like I’m nothing. Like I’m already guilty.
Inside the house, it is dark. Our parents are asleep. The moment the door clicks behind us, I feel the weight of it pressing down. The quiet. The secrets. Him.
I kick off my shoes, push my hair from my face, and head straight for the bathroom. I lock the door. Sit on the toilet lid. My phone buzzes before I can even breathe.
Tyler: Bet he loved fingering his sister in public.
Tyler: Should I tell everyone? Or do you want to meet me again, Scar? Just you and me.
My stomach lurches. My fingers slip, and the phone nearly crashes onto the tiles. I press my palm against my mouth to keep from screaming.
I thought he’d stop. I thought if I ignored him, he’d disappear. But he’s feeding on it, twisting the knife deeper.
I shove the phone under the sink towel pile as if hiding it can erase the words. Then I stagger to the mirror.
Mascara smeared. Lipstick gone. My throat blotched red where Kai’s mouth and fingers had left their marks. I splash water over my face, blot it with trembling hands, try to make myself look like a girl who isn’t falling apart.
No one can know. Not Kai. Not my parents. Not anyone.
I whisper it to my reflection like a prayer. No one can know.
The bathroom floor is cold against my bare legs, but it does nothing to cool the fire eating me alive from the inside out.
My phone sits facedown on the tiles, silent for once, but the quiet feels like a trap.
Every time I blink, I swear I can see Tyler’s last message burned against the back of my eyelids, and the sick twist of his laugh still lodged in my chest from the bar.
I hug my knees tighter, chin digging into the bone, makeup smudged and sticky under my fingertips. I try to fix it, rubbing away black streaks, but the more I touch my face, the worse it looks—like proof. Proof of what I’ve done, what I’ve allowed, what I’ve begged for.
The house is silent. Too silent. Down the hall, I can picture Kai pacing his room the way he does when he’s trying not to break something. The silence stretches, taut and unbearable, until it feels like it’ll snap and cut me to pieces.
I press the heels of my palms to my eyes until stars bloom. My breath comes ragged, as if I let it loose it’ll shake the entire house awake. “I thought we were friends,” I whisper, so soft I’m not sure if it’s to Tyler, to Kai, or to myself.
I can’t tell anyone. Not about the messages.
Not about the bar. Not about the way my body betrayed me on Kai’s lap while Tyler’s voice dug into my skull.
Nobody can know, because if Kai ever sees those texts—if he ever puts the pieces together—he won’t stop.
He’ll kill him. And then what happens to me?
I grab the phone again, thumb hovering. My heart stutters like it wants me to throw it into the toilet, flush Tyler’s words into the pipes. But I can’t. I need to know what he’ll say next. I need to be ready.
The screen stays black. My reflection wavers in the dark glass—eyes swollen, lips bitten raw. I don’t look like me anymore.
I whisper to the silence, “I’m not okay.” And then I wipe my face again, hard, because I know I can’t let Kai see that either.
The bathroom tiles bite into the backs of my thighs, cold enough to make me shiver, but I don’t move.
I can’t. My phone is facedown on the floor where I shoved it under the vanity, its black screen humming like a threat, vibrating every few minutes with another message I refuse to look at.
The sound rattles against porcelain like a heartbeat, like Tyler himself crouched on the other side of the door, waiting.
My chest is tight, breaths shallow, and every time I close my eyes I see his words burned onto the inside of my lids—hands, threats, the way he twists everything until it feels like my fault. You wanted it. You let me.
My arms fold over my knees, chin pressed down, and I rock—tiny, pitiful movements that do nothing to steady the storm breaking inside me. The mirror above the sink glints faint candlelight through the crack of the door, but I can’t bring myself to look. I don’t want to see my face. Not like this.
Another buzz. The sound spikes through me, and I squeeze my eyes shut. Don’t read it. Don’t. He can’t touch you here. Not here.
But my hand itches toward the phone anyway, fingers trembling like I’m reaching for a knife blade.
The air in the room is hot with my ragged breaths, but my skin is freezing, my whole body shaking with the effort of holding it together. The house is silent outside—too silent—and it makes the pounding of my heart unbearable, like everyone must hear it.
I press my palms flat against the tile, willing myself not to cry, but tears break anyway, sliding hot and ugly down my cheeks, dripping onto my knees. “I thought we were friends,” I whisper again, the words cracking. “I thought you—”
The phone buzzes again, sharp, cruel. I jerk my head up, staring at the door, half-expecting it to burst open.
Nobody comes.
It’s just me. Locked in. Spiralling.
The tiles are ice against the backs of my legs, my bare feet numb where they’re pressed flat to the floor.
The phone won’t stop vibrating. I shoved it under the towel pile, like fabric could muffle the truth, but every buzz feels like a jolt to my spine.
I curl in tighter, forehead pressed to my knees, mascara already smudged in black streaks I can feel drying against my skin.
I thought we were friends.
I thought you cared.
I thought you wanted me.
Tyler’s words don’t even have to be on the screen anymore—they’re etched behind my eyelids, carved like scars I can’t wash away. Each one is a blade, twisting. And still, the phone hums again. And again. And again.
I want to scream. I want to smash it against the porcelain sink until it shatters, until the messages can’t crawl through and sink their teeth into me anymore. But my hands won’t move. My body is locked, useless, and trembling.
I drag myself to the mirror instead, pushing off the floor on shaking knees. I see a ghost in the mirror: red-rimmed eyes, swollen lips, and messy hair as if it had been clawed at. I don’t even look like me anymore. I don’t look like the girl he keeps texting.
Another buzz. My breath hitches.
I force myself to whisper out loud, just to hear something that isn’t his words.
“No one can know. No one can know. No one can know.”
I splash water on my face, cold enough to sting, smearing makeup into black rivers.
I grip the edges of the sink until my knuckles bleach white, rocking forward and back like maybe motion can keep me sane.
But the buzzing won’t stop. The towel mound shifts with every vibration, as if the phone itself is alive, pulsing like a heartbeat I can’t shut out.
My throat burns, my chest caves, and the spiral only pulls tighter.
Scarlett’s voice is inside my head, cruel and small: You asked for this. You wanted attention. You’re the problem. You’re the reason.
I bite down hard enough to taste blood, the copper sting mixing with the salt of my tears.
And still—buzz.
The bathroom is too small to hold it all. My shame. His words. My secret.
I think I might explode.
The buzzing won’t stop. Every time I press my palms over my ears, it finds a way back in, humming against the tile like a wasp trapped in a jar.
My phone glows from where I shoved it under the sink, light strobing out in quick, merciless pulses.
I tell myself not to—don’t look, don’t look—but my knees slide across the cold floor anyway, fingers fumbling.
I drag the phone onto my lap with trembling hands. My thumb hesitates, then swipes.
Tyler: You thought you could ignore me?
Tyler: After what we did? After what you let me do?
Tyler: You wanted it. Don’t pretend you didn’t.
My stomach twists so violently I think I might be sick right there on the tiles. I can still feel the slick fingerprints on her thighs, except now they burn like brands I can’t scrub away.
Another message blinks in before she can catch her breath.
Tyler: Does he know? Your perfect Kai? Should I tell him? Should I tell your whole family what a filthy little liar you are?
My lungs seize. I can taste iron at the back of my throat as my eyes blur over, fat tears spilling down my cheeks.
“No,” I whisper, voice catching on the edge of a sob. “No, please—don’t.”
My reflection in the cabinet mirror is a horror show: mascara streaks like bruises under my eyes, lips bitten raw, hair tangled and damp with sweat. I look ruined, used, exactly the way Tyler wants me to believe I am.
My thumb hovers over the screen, but I can’t reply. My chest heaves, breaths coming jagged, almost manic. I press the phone flat to the floor as though that will silence it.
My whole body shakes. I thought we were friends. The words escape in a whisper, like a prayer, like a curse.
But the screen lights up again, cruel and bright in the dark.
Tyler: Answer me, sweetheart.
The phone buzzes again where I left it face-down on the bathroom tiles, a low angry vibration that seems to crawl under my skin. My fingers tremble as I flip it over, already knowing it will be him. Already knowing it will be worse.
Scarlett, if you don’t fucking answer me, I’m going to tell Mummy and Daddy what you and your dear brother have been up to.
The words scream up at me, black and sharp, and for a moment I forget to breathe. My heart doesn’t just lurch—it plummets, crashing through the pit of my stomach. The room tilts, the candle-scented air from downstairs suddenly suffocating, like I can smell smoke where there is none.
The blood drains from my face, leaving me cold and clammy.
My reflection in the mirror is a stranger—eyes ringed in smudged black, skin blotchy from crying, lips bitten raw.
I press my palm against the cool porcelain sink to steady myself, but my knees still buckle, dragging me down to the floor again.
My throat burns with the taste of bile as I picture my parents’ faces—my mother’s horror, my father’s rage—and Kai. Kai, with his hands bloodied, Kai with that vow he made in the dark: never leave me, Scar. Don’t fucking do it. You don’t want to see what happens.
And Tyler is daring me to find out.
My hands shake so violently I can’t type back, can’t even think of what I would say if I could. I want to scream, but the sound lodges in my throat, trapped and desperate, a cry that will never leave these walls.
I shove the phone under a pile of towels, smothering its glow, its vibration, its threat—but the words have already carved themselves inside me.
The phone won’t stop buzzing. It feels like the whole tiled floor is trembling beneath me with every vibration. My stomach turns, my lungs fight for air, but my body stays locked in place, knees hugged to my chest as though I can physically hold myself together.
Another message lights up the screen.
You think you can ignore me?
I’ll tell them everything. Him. You. What you’ve been doing.
My breath catches, a thin, broken sob ripping from my throat before I can choke it back.
The words burn into me like fire—ugly, poisonous, undeniable.
My shaking hand slams the phone face down on the tiles, as if hiding the glow will erase the threat.
It doesn’t. The buzzing keeps coming, each vibration louder than the last, until it feels like my secrets are screaming through the walls.
I stumble to my feet, grab the phone and shove it deep behind the stack of towels in the cabinet, burying it where I don’t have to see it, where maybe it can’t hurt me if I pretend hard enough.
My reflection in the mirror is ruined: mascara has streaked, I bit down too hard, leaving my mouth red, and shame has blotched my skin.
I grip the sink, splash cold water over my face, smear at the stains, trying to erase myself. Nobody can know.
But the sobs keep breaking through. They echo, muffled against the tiles, ugly and raw. My parents, asleep down the hall. Kai, somewhere in this house, with his rage and his guilt and his dark eyes that see too much. If he finds out—
A sharp knock rattles the door. My heart stops.
“Scar?” Kai’s voice. Low. Rough. Dangerous with something I can’t name. “Open the door.”
Another knock, harder this time. “Scarlett. Don’t make me ask again.”
The bathroom feels smaller than ever. My wet hands slip on the counter. I stare at my ruined reflection, chest heaving, torn between locking myself tighter inside and ripping the door open before he tears it off the hinges.