The memory returns a bitter flavor to my mouth, ash soaking up my saliva.
“Yeah, but you know Charlie. He has this twin brother who won’t leave me alone.”
“Oooo that sounds kind of exciting.” My mom laughs.
If only she knew. Exciting isn’t candlelight or champagne. It’s the snap of twigs behind you when you’re sprinting full speed through the forest. It’s being stalked by a wolf while pretending you don’t hear its howl. Heart pumping adrenaline to keep you alive. A dashthrough the woods under a full moon, lungs burning, knowing you can’t outrun or hide from the beast closing the distance.
That’s what Drew is. A slithery shadow on my heels, baring his teeth, with endless patience. The worst kind of predator.
A part of me aches to stop running. Wants to let him catch me, drag me down into the leaves, sink those teeth in and mark me as his. Get a taste to see how filthy the darkness really is.
“Did I lose you, honey?” my mom asks, her voice tugging me back through the static.
I blink, the Range Rover’s brights winking at me like a signal flare. “No, Mom,” I whisper, swallowing hard. “You didn’t lose me.”
Not yet.
Her relieved sigh crackles through the line. “Good. For a second there I thought you hung up on me.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” I say quickly, though my eyes keep darting to the Range Rover. Still there. Still waiting to roar onto the lawn and entrap me in the back seat.
“Well then,” she continues, “tell me about this… twin. The one who won’t leave you alone. Is it trouble, or is it temptation?”
My throat tightens with the dryness of the Sahara. Trouble and temptation—she doesn’t know how close she is. “It’s complicated,” I mumble, dragging a hand down my face. “He’s… not like Charlie.”
“That’s usually how brothers are,” she says gently. “Opposites, sometimes. But, Austin—” her voice lowers, “if someone makes you feel unsafe, you don’t owe them your attention. You don’t have to entertain their games.”
Games. If only she knew they weren’t games at all—a hunt. A lone wolf chasing down a wounded buck. The night itself siding with him, the forest bending aside to let nature play out. Drew ravaging my thoughts, destroying what I know of myself, distorting the direction of north and south.
“I know,” I whisper out, the words as thin as paper.
“You’ve always had a tender heart,” Mom says. “And men like that—men who thrive on playing games—they’ll eat you alive if you let them. So promise me you won’t.”
I glance at the Rover, brights blinking once more, almost mocking me. My heart flutters in betrayal at her words: eat you alive.If she only knew how much I crave for that, be turned upside down and tied up from the canopy of the oldest oaks and cedars.
“Promise,” I say, though I don’t know who I’m lying to, her or myself.
There’s a long pause, the kind where I can hear her shifting in her chair, chewing on the silence. “Good,” she finally says, though there’s doubt tucked into the way it leaks through my speaker. “I just worry about you, honey. You’ve been through enough already. I don’t want to see you hurt by someone who doesn’t deserve you.”
My chest caves a little at that—because what if Idodeserve it? The punishment, the hunger, the chase?
“Yeah,” I say, forcing it out in a causal manner. “I’ll be fine, Mom.”
“Fine isn’t the same as happy,” she replies quickly, as if she’s been holding the line back for years or it’s from her work in progress. “Don’t settle for fine.”
Her words sting because I’ve been telling myselffineis good enough. Fine is Charlie’s laugh in the morning, his biceps around me, his safe jokes when I’m spiraling. But happiness? Happiness is messier. It’s Drew’s teeth baring at my throat, chaos disguised as intimacy.
The headlights blink again. Once. Twice. Like he’s answering her for me.
“I should let you go,” Mom says, softer now. “But call me again soon, alright? Don’t disappear.”
“I won’t,” I murmur, though we both know I might.
The line clicks, her voice gone, and I’m left with the static of my own blood pounding in my ears. The Rover hasn’t moved, I know he's anticipating my next move.
I inhale a massive breath, this is it. I’m done letting Drew taunt me, haunt me from his shadowy corners. I’m entirely sick of his bullshit. I trot my way to the gate, entering the code so I don’t have to hop the black fence. My pulse ratchets the closer I get to his vehicle, I’m sure he can probably hear it pounding from a mile away.
Drops of water begin to patter the pavement, puddles starting their collection. The breeze stirs, tugging at my linen shirt, pulling dense fog in from the lake. Above me, the sky churns into slate grey, a spooky color that makes you brace for sirens. One that appears before a tornado drops down and unleashes havoc across a small farming town.
