Page 78

I’m somewhen else.

And there, in the middle of the nothing, he reappears.

Fletch.

But not my Fletch. Not the one who ghosted me. Not the one who’s been avoiding me like I’m contagious. This Fletch looks younger. Softer, somehow. Like the version of him I met in Horseshoe Bay, before the walls went up. Before the firestorms and fallout and everything in between.

He’s wearing the hoodie I used to steal in winter. The one that still smells like cedarwood and cheap cologne and late-night kisses in the dark.

He’s barefoot.

And when he sees me, his face fractures. Not with confusion. Not even with guilt.

But with grief.

“I’ve been trying to reach you,” he says, voice hoarse.

I shake my head. “Fletch—what is this?”

“You’re slipping,” he murmurs, stepping closer. “And I don’t know how to stop it.”

Slipping?

My hands go to my belly on instinct. The bump beneath my sweater feels solid. Real.

But everything else? Everything else feels like a dream I can’t wake up from.

I swallow hard. “This isn’t real.”

His smile is cracked glass. “No, Mya. This is the only thing that is.”

And suddenly I understand what the twist means.

Nothing that’s happened up until now—New York, the penthouse, the tour, the MSG show—none of it is real.

Because I’m not awake.

I’m not here.

I’m somewhere else.

And Fletch?

He’s not speaking in riddles.

He’s trying to bring me back.

Fletch steps closer, the hallway around us dimming into something dreamlike—half shadow, half static. The edges of the space pulse like a heartbeat, and each beat threatens to swallow him whole.

“Stop,” I whisper, voice cracking like old vinyl. “You’re scaring me.”

His eyes shatter. “I should scare you, Mya.”

“Why?” I choke, backing up until my spine hits what used to be a wall and now feels like smoke.

“Because you’re losing yourself in here.” He lifts his arms like he wants to hold me, but he doesn’t close the distance. “And I don’t know how much longer I can hold the door open.”

The words don’t make sense.