1
Down
“Help me!” he cried, the sound of his own voice foreign, surreal, triggering bursts of light and fire inside his brain. “My eyes ...” Gasping for air, he tried to push himself up from the cold marble floor of his hotel suite. But his arms were too weak and shaky, betraying him.
Panic surged as he felt himself losing control.
The burning sensation in his eyes intensified, his stream of tears unable to wash away the searing pain. His vision had blurred into complete darkness, now and then streaked with flashes of light and bursts of color—each shade a different kind of singe, each worse than anything before it.
“Call someone,” he pleaded, choking and out of breath, extending a hand into the blurry darkness. No one answered, but someone was there. Or used to be. Was he alone? He remembered falling, hitting the ground hard, and losing consciousness for a while. But why? How had it happened?
Then he’d awakened screaming in pain. His eyeballs felt like they were on fire. The burning sensation spread quickly, his eyes watering uncontrollably. He reached up, instinctively trying to rub the irritation away, but that only made things worse. As a wave of red-hot pain surged through his body, he clutched his chest, pulling at his shirt and fighting it off as if it were a monster, its tentacles snaking around him, tightening and squeezing the breath out of his lungs.
Torn buttons clicked to the floor, but he still grasped at his barren chest as if he wanted to tear it open. His heart pounded wildly, slamming against his rib cage, each beat rippling violently through his body. He tried to stand again, reaching into the darkness for something he could hold on to but finding nothing. Crawling toward the door, he moved slowly—his breath agonizing and ragged, the horrid singe in his eyes unrelenting, and the claw that clutched his chest in a deadly vise unyielding.
“Hello?” he called weakly. Only the whooshing of blood in his ears responded. “Someone ... please ... help me,” he said, as loudly as he could manage. His voice, fraught with agony, barely rose above the sound of his own racing heart.
He willed himself to crawl some more, hoping to reach the suite door and open it. Someone would see him. He couldn’t lift himself on his hands and knees anymore; he could only push himself forward on the smooth, glassy marble, little by little, grunting with every choked breath. Something warm trickled down on his face, the thick, metallic smell of blood invading his nostrils. He rested his flaming face against the cold floor, unable to soothe the burning sensation spreading from his eyes into his chest, poisoning his blood with shards of fire.
The room started spinning, slowly at first, but then going faster and faster. Each chaotic heartbeat felt like a hammer against his ribs, rattling his weakened body. His stomach lurched and heaved, the pressure in his head building up, aching with the rhythm of his fast-thumping heart.
One by one, the psychedelic bursts of color flashing inside his head started fading into darkness. His face landed on the cold marble and lay still, his entire being following suit as the last trace of fight left his defeated body. His mind turned darkly inert and quiet, the sound of his heart erratic but fading away in the distance, as if it were somehow abandoning him where he lay on that floor. A shudder rattled his body, leaving him completely motionless in its wake.
The sound of slowly departing footsteps touched the vanishing edges of his consciousness. A door opened. A second later, it closed.
Then nothing but darkness and silence.
2
Trouble
A couple of months ago
Another hour or so and I’d be safe, leaving Seattle behind forever.
As I walked through patches of golden sunshine at Sea-Tac, I couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched. Every step through the airport’s sprawling concourse echoed louder, every glance from a passerby seeming prolonged. I was just another traveler, but today, anonymity felt like a fragile mask. With a shiver, I pulled my ballcap lower over my eyes.
My spinner suitcase rolled quietly on the terrazzo floors, hauled effortlessly toward the security checkpoint. Seattle had been my home for a while, but now it felt like a prison. I was so close to freedom, though. I couldn’t let anything—or anyone—stop me now.
For a moment, I took off my oversize shades and absorbed the unaltered colors of the magnificent morning, but then I put them back on. They were a small price to pay for staying unnoticed, together with my hair clumped in a low bun and the Seahawks ballcap I wore all the time. Like this, I was nobody. Just a twenty-seven-year-old woman in a ballcap and shades, jeans, and a light jacket over a nondescript gray T-shirt. So average. So forgettable.
My mind drifted, taken by the low hum of activity that occasionally blended with distant PA announcements. I drew closer to the wall to make room for a group of loud businesspeople and checked the time again. Not even half an hour left until my departure. My chest swelled with excitement; I’d always wanted to visit Las Vegas. And I was so done with Seattle.
Footsteps approached, but I didn’t turn to look. It didn’t seem to matter.
“Hey!” a man called loudly behind me. The voice, disrupting the airport’s routine, raised a few passengers’ eyeballs from device screens. I still didn’t look, although the voice sounded somewhat familiar.
But it couldn’t be. No one knew I was leaving today.
“Hey!” The same voice, angrier and closer, brought a shiver down my spine.
I didn’t have time to look behind me. Catching up, he grabbed my shoulder and twisted me in place, then slammed me against the wall, knocking the breath out of my lungs.
“I’m talking to you!” he shouted, inches from my face, his breath searing my skin. He clumped the fabric of my denim jacket sleeve in his hand and twisted it, squeezing my arm until the fabric gave with a loud rip.
I stared at the scowling teenager in disbelief. I didn’t recognize him at first, with the features I knew so well in his father diluted by youth, by eyes filled with rage, and his rebellious, tousled comb-back.
Avery Sinclair.
