For the first time since the day Cal and Eli had stumbled into our kitchen, something warm settles in my chest.
Things aren’t good, not even close.
But I get it now.
Maybe this was always where I was meant to end up.
I’ve never felt the butterfly effect more clearly.
My eyes go back to Yosh. He’s twitching in my arms, mumbling something about red sand and onyx, scared, clearly having a nightmare.
“Hey, it's okay. I know this sucks, but I’m here. You’re going to be okay in the morning.”
I hold him closer, hoping our skin contact might calm him down. I do a breathing exercise he taught me in the hope he follows. And I think it works. He’s calming down.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I whisper. “I’ve got you. I’ll stay.”
I say it again, the same promise I made last time he spiralled into one of those nightmares.
Back then, hearing that I wasn't leaving pulled him out of it.
I still don’t know how it works. Only that it does, and me being able to do that hits me so hard it almost hurts.
I stay like that for a while, holding him as I sing half of my repertoire into the night.
I’m close to drifting off when something moves in the corner of my eye.
The waves roll in higher and higher, a shadow appearing where nothing should.
I know who it is before the moonlight hits her.
Emily.
She steps out of the sea, water streaming from slick hair, soaking the white dress plastered to her skin.
Her gaze is jet black, empty. That same dead stare as always.
But this time, she’s holding a gun.
Fuck me. Just when you think the night can’t get worse.
She soars over the water, and when her bare feet hit the sand, she raises the barrel. First at me. Then dipping toward Yosh who is now calm in my arms.
I pull him closer, curving my body over his to shield him from that vile thing standing in front of us.
I should be terrified, any sane person would be. But I’m not. Not anymore.
Something burns inside me, and it isn’t my usual rage. It’s cold as frost. A winter that doesn’t belong on this island.
My head tilts. A half-smile pulls at my mouth.
It clicks into place. This isn’t her. It never fucking was. It’s a mirror. My fear. My pain. Thrown back at me wearing Emily’s face.
“You don’t control me anymore.” I mean every goddamn word.
That breaks whatever hold it has over me, because suddenly she’s screaming like a banshee, loud enough it feels like my skull is splitting from the inside out.
Emily dissolves into a vortex of sand and sea spray, spinning faster and faster until she’s almost gone.
