Instead, I stare at the gap beneath my front door.
There’s smoke curling under it. Thin tendrils of gray, licking the tile like a lover’s tongue.
It’s happening again.
I don’t remember standing, but I’m across the room in an instant, hand on the doorknob. It’s cool to the touch. That means something, doesn’t it? It means it’s not real. Not like last time.
Not like before.
My heart slams against my sternum as I yank open the door.
Nothing.
Just the dark hallway of my shitty apartment building. One overhead light is flickering like it’s trying to whisper secrets. No smoke. No smell. Just silence.
I stare for too long. Waiting for the fire to bloom again. For the heat to rise up and swallow me whole.
But the world doesn’t catch.
I close the door slowly, click the deadbolt back into place with shaking fingers. I press my back to the door, try to will my lungs to remember how to pull air.
That’s when the smoke alarm lets out a single sharp chirp.
Just one.
A warning.
I press the heel of my hand to my sternum and sink to the floor, legs folding beneath me like paper. I breathe.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
Pretend I’m normal. Pretend this is normal.
But I can still smell it.
I cough once. Twice. Then harder.
And that’s when something dry and black flakes onto my tongue.
Ash.
I spit it out onto the floor in front of me. Tiny fragments of grey, clinging to my lips like a goddamn confession. I stare at it.
I don’t touch it.
Because if I touch it, I’ll have to admit it’s real. And if it’s real, then so is everything else.
I try to distract myself…clean, sketch, scrub the kitchen grout with a toothbrush, as if I’m erasing a crime scene. The envelope stays in the freezer for exactly fourteen hours and eight minutes. I know because I count. Every hour that passes, I get more restless. It’s still there. Now cold, and still waiting to be opened. Every time I open the freezer to make sure it's still there, it seems to have moved.
Maybe that’s dramatic. But so is having a stranger leave something sealed with a murder-chic wax stamp inside my locked apartment.
Eventually, I snap and yank the envelope from the freezer, throw it on the table, then pace in circles like it's going to talk first. It doesn’t.
