Then I find it, tucked in the inside pocket like a secret that still wants to be mine.
A cigarette. Bent, but not broken.
Just like me.
I slide it between my lips and fish out my lighter—bejeweled, pink, obnoxious in a way that feels personal. I flick it. The flame stutters in the breeze pushing through the warped screen door, then catches. Smoke fills my lungs like apology.
The burn’s already there, though.
It always is.
The truth isn’t hiding. It’s just buried under basslines and blackout memories.
It’s in the pills passed around like candy and the hands that touched too much but meant nothing.
It’s in the boys who watch you like a promise, and the silence after the screaming stops.
My name is Blair.
And I didn’t come back to Severance Point to heal.
I came to disappear.
To find what they tried to erase.
To figure out what really happened to my sister.
Even if it takes me with her.
I drag another inhale, cough like it personally offended me, and blow smoke into the kind of muggy morning that sticks to your skin like a bad decision.
The street’s quiet in that hungover, beach-town kind of way. Gravel crunches under my boots, and the air smells like hot asphalt, salt, and sunscreen that’s given up. The ocean’s close enough to taste—humid, thick, and vaguely fishy, likeCalifornia’s trying to remind you it’s not just pretty sunsets and palm trees. It’s rot underneath, too.
Then I see it.
A black bike idles at the curb. Matte chrome, purring low and dark, like a secret that’s been waiting to be whispered.
And him, leaning against the frame. Cigarette burning lazy between two fingers, sleeves shoved up, inked arms on full display. His boots planted wide. Head tilted just enough to sayyeah, I see you.Like he knew I’d look. Like I always do.
His eyes track me. Slow. Steady, like he’s not surprised.
Like I’m his favorite fucking fix.
He flicks the ash to the pavement. Smirks.
And just like that?—
The overdose begins.
One
Blair
The warehouse pulseslike a second heart, thumping too loud and too fast, like it’s trying to beat itself to death before the roof caves in. And honestly? Same.
It’s a rotted-out monster of a building, all rusted beams and graffiti-covered walls, parked crooked near the edge of town near the shore, like it wandered off from civilization and no one bothered to drag it back. Lights flicker. Bass throbs. The air stinks like sweat, smoke, and decisions you’re definitely going to regret but will absolutely make again.
I step inside, and it hits me—hot, wet, unbreathable. Like inhaling someone's panic attack. The floor’s sticky. The walls tremble. Chains dangle from the ceiling. Either this place used to be a slaughterhouse or still is.
