Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

()()()()

Summer is hotter now than it ever was.

Karolina can feel herself melting, at night, in her bed: the sheets stick to her body, her skin feels like fire, an endless burning in her veins.

Also, this may be because of the nightmares she keeps having. The ones she wakes up from panting and crying sometimes, confused always. Never remembers.

She feels herself slipping away, slowly but surely, like watching a car crash happen in slow-motion, knowing she can do nothing to stop it.

There’s a certain desperation in everything she does now, Karolina somehow knows there is not enough time left.

(Some days she spends hours in front of a mirror trying to find herself in the person staring back at her. There are the eyes, blue and tired, the nose, her mothers, her smile and bright teeth and golden hair and everything that has always been there but it’s different now.

She doesn’t know who she is anymore.

She feels like clawing at her skin, the rosy cheeks, the freckles in full bloom.

She feels like throwing her fist through the glass, shards staining her hands red, dripping dripping dripping.

She is, mostly, becoming scared of herself. She doesn't know who she is anymore, so she doesn’t know what she’s capable of either.)

Summer is hotter now than it ever was.

Everything is melting and her mind is too.

()()()()

Sunday evening, two days after they tried to take action against their parents for the first time and failed, finds Nico in her bed.

Karolina tries not to be too obvious in her staring but Nico is, forever, the kind of beautiful that captures her completely. Which only means that Nico is being Nico.

That was always enough to get Karolina’s heart racing.

Karolina’s window is open, the door to the small balcony too, and the air is slowly losing some of it’s oppressing heat, the sky growing pink and purple.

Nico is still only in cotton shorts and a tanktop, both black of course, and her hair is piled on top of her head messily, single strands sticking to the back of her sweaty neck.

She’s starfishing, limbs stretched out to every side of her, schoolbooks strewn around her in a circle long forgotten.

Karolina can’t take her eyes off of her from where she’s sitting on her desk chair, turning left and right, toes toying with the carpet under her bare feet.

(Nico had been the one to call and ask if she could come over to study.

Karolina tried hard not to seem too eager, tried hard to stay cool. Probably did not succeed.

But when Nico had rung the bell downstairs and Karolina had opened the door for her she couldn’t help but smile too bright and wide.

Nico had smiled back and it had seemed honest. Had stolen Karolina’s breath away.)

The both of them gave up trying to concentrate on biology about half an hour ago and since then it’s been silent, the soothing sounds of The XX playing in the background from where Nico had paired her phone with Karolina’s bluetooth speakers.

It always thrills Karolina anew whenever she realizes that they can be comfortable together like this, without talking or doing anything, just existing in the same space.

Nico’s been staring at the glow in the dark stars on Karolina’s ceiling and Karolina has been staring at Nico. Has tried not to and then given up.

She remembers that her and Nico have always been good at this, back when they were younger and friends for the first time, before Amy.

They’d spend many afternoons this way, listening to music and calming each other down just by being together.

A gift, really, that Karolina had taken for granted back then. She doesn’t now.

Cherishes every moment they spend like this, doing nothing, because there was a time she thought she’d never have this again with anybody, much less Nico.

She can feel the seconds ticking by and thanks the stars for every one of them.

For the small noises Nico makes whenever a song she loves comes on, the way she shifts every five minutes, the hairs she blows out of her face when they land on her nose.

Karolina is normally a restless person, has always been, even as a child, too full of energy, but she wouldn’t mind spending days like this.

Nico turns her face to her in a lazy move.

Her eyes are blinking in slow blinks, almost hazy, and Karolina understands why.

The heat has the same effect on her. Turns her softer and languid in everything she does. Makes time move slower, robs her of energy and life in a way that’s not necessarily bad just … tiring.

“We didn’t get anything done today, did we?“ Nico asks and doesn’t sound very sad or surprised about it.

Karolina looks at the schoolbooks on her desk, still open to the same chapter she started on, just as Nico knocks one of her notebooks to the ground while stretching.

They both laugh as their eyes meet.

Karolina is the first one to look away because she’s scared of what Nico will see otherwise.

She throws her head back, sinking deeper into the chair she’s sitting in and stretching her legs out.

“Can you blame us? I can’t even think in this heat.“

Nico only nods, turns her eyes back to the ceiling above her.

Karolina can see her gaze wandering over the different constellations Molly and her put together, her hands twitching at her side like she wants to trace them.

Karolina can relate.

“Do you miss it?“ Nico says, her voice soothing like the music is, curious in a subtle way.

“Miss what?“ Karolina asks, because she has no idea what Nico is talking about, is too enamored by the girl in her bed to pretend she does.

Nico shrugs, lifts her arm to point to the ceiling.

“This. The flying. Being up in the stars.“

Karolina follows Nico’s fingers, slowly sweeps her eyes over the glowing constellations above them. She can’t help but think about some of the dreams she can remember, the ones that had her gliding through the sky. How she had always felt free and light and completely herself.

She sighs.

“Can’t really miss something you never had.“

Nico turns to her, and Karolina feels her breath catch in her chest at the look in her eyes, the intensity, the slight bend of her neck.

They stay like this for a few seconds and Karolina doesn’t breathe once.

Nico turns back then, her eyes lingering on Karolina longer than the rest of her, and Karolina can feel air rush back into her lungs.

“I think you can.“ Nico says. Her fingers twitch on the blankets and Karolina wants to reach out, grab them, hold her hand and never let go.

()()()()

(She wakes up on monday morning, at 3am, choking on sobs.

Her hair is wrapped around her neck and for a second she’s panicking, grabbing at it too rough and flinching a second later.

The oversized t-shirt, the short shorts she wore to bed, are all drenched.

Something heavy is sitting on her chest.

She can see, outside, through the balcony door she left open after Nico went home, the first signs of a sunrise.

Karolina, for a few scary seconds, has no idea where she is.

Has also no idea why she was expecting to find an old and creaky bed underneath her, mold on the walls, moves her arm next to her like she’s about to grab something from a bedside table even though she knows she doesn’t have one on that side.

The stars on her ceiling are making her dizzy.

There is a picture in her mind, of the room she thought she was in, but just as she’s reaching for it…it’s gone.

Then, she’s sitting up, panting, a confused mess the way she almost always is now upon waking up.

Moon shaped cuts upon her palms tell her that she’d been balling her fists again in sleep.

The mess her hair is tells her she’d been tossing and turning.

Once again, Karolina is left feeling shaky and wrong. The dizziness is still there half an hour later when she decides it’s gotten light enough outside to go for a jog.

The stairs don’t creak on her way down, they never did, but she’s still surprised.

The house is still a mausoleum, a ghost town, a museum of lies, and she swears she feels the stares of her and her parents portrait-selves on her back while she walks down the hall.

All of them harsh and judging, screaming in her head.

“You should remember, Karolina. You should remember!

The things you keep forgetting are important, and you’re ruining everything!“

She runs faster than normal that morning and she still feels like she’ll never catch up.)

()()()()

The next week almost passes in a blur.

Heat and hopelessness and the stress of school, so insignificant yet still real, lingering in the background, always.

Teachers try to teach them and don't realize that they are living in a different reality now.

Karolina finds it hard to care about algebra when it feels like the end of the world is near.

There is a spasm between the six of them and the rest of the world.

Something to do with knowing what’s hidden in basements of the houses you live in.

They spend their lunch breaks outside under the big tree, a circle of former misfits turned social recluses, and aside from the music escaping Molly’s headphones they spend them silent.

To Karolina, in her more morbid moments, it feels like they are attending funerals for the old lives they used to live.

On Monday it’s Alex, his nintendo laying forgotten in the grass next to him while he stares at nothing, furrowed brows and set jaw. When the break is over the console disappears deep into the inside of his backpack, never to be seen again.

Tuesday Molly and Gert don’t touch their parent-made lunches. No green juice wets their lips, the whole-bread lettuce sandwiches are left for the birds to pick on. Molly buys herself a soda and sips it without shame, Gert slowly rips the little handwritten note to pieces until only the words “we love yo-“ are winking up at Karolina, a menacing tone to them that she’s maybe imagining.

Wednesday sees Chase completely ignoring the exam papers he’d gotten back, the red A thrown aside, no pride or fear shown on his face. When it starts to rain unexpectedly they are left behind, wilting in a puddle until the marker runs the water red, like blood, while all of them are hurrying inside, bags over their heads.

On the way in Karolina can see a broken lacrosse stick poking out of a trash can, almost like it’s trying to crawl free.

There is Thursday, then, where she arrives at the tree to see a magazine with her Dad’s face on it, the headline talking about the new movie he’ll be starring in, one Karolina has never heard of, had no idea he was auditioning for, and finds she doesn’t care.

When the bell rings she rolls it together and, once no one is looking, folds her book of gibborim copy into it before burying it deep into the dumpster behind school.

On Friday Nico sits down next to them the way she always does, her knee almost brushing Karolina’s. The book she takes out is the same it has been the whole week, and she spends her break no different than she has before. It takes Karolina a while before she realizes, before she understands, that maybe there is nothing for Nico to bury, to say goodbye to.

Their eyes meet, a little too long, and the next time Nico turns a page her fingers brush against Karolina’s for a fraction of a second.

They are all grieving, Karolina thinks, for what they have lost; but maybe some of them have been doing it for longer than others.

(Nico’s touch is warm and lovely and stays with Karolina the rest of the day. A phantom, a could-have-been. A reminder, too: not mine not mine not mine. Never will be.)

()()()()

Nico invites her over for movie night on Saturday. Just the two of them, she had said, like the old times.

Karolina remembers giggling in bed together and looking at magazines and sneaking into Amy’s room to try on her clothes. Nico, so small even then, climbing onto the kitchen counter to steal some of the chocolates hidden there. Karolina, biting her hair nervously, playing lookout while feeling both anxious and excited about their rule breaking.

She’s giddy for the whole day, so much so that her parents, being home for once, look at her weirdly when she hums while making herself a smoothie. So much so that she almost forgets about everything else and smiles at them.

(She feels sick afterwards, almost throws up. How easy it had been for her to ignore what happened to Destiny just because the girl she likes invited her over. How fake she is in her righteousness, in her fight against their parents. The shame she feels, so deserved.)

Her good mood vanishes when Nico opens the door with tear tracks on her cheeks, barely noticeable but Karolina notices everything about her.

The other girls hair is in a bit of a disarray and she's wearing a shirt from drama camp six years ago, a little short at the hem, a little the cause of Karolina’s sweaty palms.

“Hey.“ she says, almost like she’s surprised that Karolina’s here, and isn't it funny, how small a think can be to break Karolina’s heart.

“I can go.“ she answers, because sometimes her mouth is too fast for her brain, a habit that had Leslie Dean always clench her teeth and throw her dirty looks.

(It’s a little comforting, actually, that after 16 years her mothers conditioning hasn't rotted out all of her quirks yet, all of the things that separate Karolina from a very lifelike robot.)

Nico looks at her for a second, the head tilt, the slightly furrowed brow.

“Sorry.“ Karolina says, because she’s always been good at apologizing. “I just meant … if you don’t want company right now.“

Here’s where she learns that she’s completely hopeless when it comes to dealing with a tear-stained Nico, with a has-been-crying Nico.
(She doesn't say sad because Nico is always a little sad, always a little further away from happiness than everyone around her. Has smiles that break Karolina’s heart because while they are honest they are also still exhausted.

She just wants Nico to be happy.)

“No!“ Nico’s voice rips her out of her daydreams, loud and a little panicked, and maybe Karolina has this all wrong, maybe Nico didn’t invite her over and afterwards something happened that made her cry and now she doesn’t actually want Karolina there anymore, maybe Nico invited her over after it happened, because it happened.

Weirder things have happened. She flies. Nico has magic. Gert a dinosaur. This could be entirely in the realm of possibilities.

(She can’t make herself believe. Her skin still itches with the feeling of unwanted unwanted unwanted. She is such a burden.)

Nico grabs her wrist, loose but certain, and tugs her inside, the cool, white walls closing them in, the door shutting and it’s such a contrast, suddenly, from the warm outside, both in temperature and color. The greens and yellows, the sun. In here, the Minoru house with its electric doors and windows, its white and grey and black.

Cold and distant like her own house, but still so different.

(The Deans, they have plants and carpets, water pitchers out of colorful chrystal and windows big enough that they never need to turn on lamps during the day. But there is still a pressure in the halls, a loneliness in the bones of the building that will never leave Karolinas spine.

The plants are watered by strangers, the water pitchers and glasses arranged for photo ops, carpets always pristine. No pictures of a small Karolina with mud on her hands and holes in her jeans, no snapshots. Only a house full of actors, actors, actors.

The Minorus: marble kitchen counters and tablets on the fridge, on the stove, in the alcoves in halls, communication only through texts and robotic voices. There are pictures on the dressers, of a dark-haired girl in pigtails, missing front teeth and dimples, but it’s only ever Nico.

The ghost haunting the house is present in everything, in the absence of things, in the door that’s forever closed opposite of Nico’s room, in the empty places on the mantelpiece where dust is just beginning to settle, where before there were picture frames of a different, smiling, dark haired girl, with science trophies and fencing medals. With hope in her eyes, light and love and innocence.)

Nico looks Karolina in the eyes, dark, soulful wells, and smiles, sheepish.

“Sorry. I’m still looking forward to this. I just lost time, I was napping.“ There is a blush, high on her cheeks, at those words, all the more obvious through the absence of make-up.

Karolina is forever impossibly endeared by the person in front of her, her heart sings of love and love and love.

“I’ll stay.“ she says, and if her voice is a little breathless it’s no ones business but her own.

They hide up in Nico’s room and watch movies for the whole evening, blinds drawn closed, keeping the thick summer air out, AC on high so they can curl up under blankets like it’s not the middle of summer in LA.

Karolina is rigid and on guard for the whole first hour, trying not to touch Nico, trying not to breathe too loud, trying not to think too loud: I love you I love you. (Say it only twice and maybe it won’t be true.)

It is hard, because Karolina’s body and mind are so attuned to Nico, are only ever really comfortable when they are around her, when she sheds all the shapes of her she’s been molded into and remains only herself. The power Nico has.

Then, after the first movie is almost over, Nico slumps lower into the sheets, her head on height with Karolina’s collar bone.

Karolina is only wearing a top with spaghetti straps and so her arms are bare, Nico’s cheek resting on her shoulder, which is freckled and naked and hot to the touch.

She can’t help but lean into it then, all her bones sighing and melting away, leaving her the way she always wants to be around the other girl: happy and thoughtless and just herself.

They watch Les Miserables later, because Nico is still a theater and musical nerd at heart, and by then it’s already dark out, no slivers of light stealing in through the blinds, the two of them only illuminated by the brightness of the tv.

Karolina hasn’t really been able to concentrate on the movie, too distracted by Nico’s hand laying next to her leg, her own arm resting on her thigh, and how easy it would be to reach over, curl around her.

There’s the scene then though, the one she’d forgotten about (because they’ve been here before: watching les mis in Nico’s bedroom), where Eponine is shot, laying in Marius arms.

“I kept it from you.“ she says, and Karolina is already biting her tongue till it bleeds.

She can’t help but look over at Nico, beautiful in the blue light of tv, at the tear trailing down her cheek.

Eponine is singing, and it’s like the words are coming from Karolina herself. She doesn’t know why, has never tried to die for Nico even though she knows she would, but it feels like they’ve been in the exact same position Marius and Eponine are in.

“You’re here, that’s all I need to know.“ and Karolina’s chest seizes up, her breaths coming quick and sharp.

“Just hold me now and let it be.“ Her heart having palpations, a pain at the back of her head, an itch in her brain.

“I’ll sleep in your embrace at last.“ There are flashes and suddenly she’s laying on the cold ground somewhere, pain in her abdomen, Nico hovering over her. She’s in Nico’s bedroom again, then, but there are shards all around and warm blood under her, her legs are numb. Another flash: a gun in her mouth, the trigger under her own finger, and Nico in front of her, nodding, saying something…

Nico, the real one, with her hair tickling Karolina’s neck, moves and she’s back again, in the dark, with a headache and Eponine taking her last breath. A veil over her eyes making everything fuzzy.

“And rain…will make the flowers..“ Karolina lifts her hand and brushes away the tear running down Nico’s cheek, the softest of touches, and she lingers.

It’s like everything is coming into stark focus suddenly, she snaps back to where she is, the sound of rain on the TV, the sheets against her legs, the pounding in her heart.

Nico stiffens and turns around, slowly, looks at Karolina, who still has her hand on her cheek, who can’t make herself move, who is seized by panic, dark, ugly panic that is roaring through her body now. 

Her hand drops, but it’s not a controlled thing it’s just her body shutting down, her muscles seizing up.

Her and Nico are still staring at each other and the musical is just forgotten sounds in the distance.

Karolina can’t speak.

“Alex and I had a fight.“ Nico says. Her eyes are still glued to Karolina’s and they are wide, like Karolina imagines her own to be.

Karolina swallows.

“Oh.“

Did you break up? She wants to ask. Her fingers are twitching against her leg.

“Are you okay?“ comes out instead, which is better, which she is grateful for.

Nico, still in a weird stupor herself, eyes never leaving Karolina’s except to flicker down to the blonde's hand, once, twice, with the three freckles on the knuckles and the little scar at the wrist from where she broke it when she was eleven, tripping over the too high shoes she was made to wear at a Gibborim Event, swallows.

“I am.“

“That’s good.“ It comes out a whisper, far too intimate, and the panic is still a hot, burning thing.

Nico nods. “It’s why I was so, weird, when you got here.“

The tear tracks, Karolina thinks, with a sudden bout of anger at Alex. How dare he make Nico cry.

But that’s unfair, she reminds herself. She doesn’t know what happened, and Alex is her friend too.

“You’re not weird.“ she says, which has nothing to do with what they are talking about, really, but it makes the corners of Nico’s mouth turn up, so she doesn’t regret it.

“Hmmh.“ Nico humms.

They are still staring at each other and the air is strangely charged, full of a static that Karolina can’t explain, and she’s just waiting to wake up, any minute now, this must be some kind of dream, she doesn’t get these moments with Nico…

There is a loud bang, suddenly, that makes the both of them flinch, and when Karolina turns to where it came from she sees the gun.

She’d forgotten about the movie, about the war going on on tv. Someone else died and they are singing again, voices coming together in beautiful harmony, and Karolina doesn’t know why she’d expected pain the second she heard the sound of a gun firing, when it should have been obvious that it was just Les Mis.

Nico turns away from her, watches the tv again, and Karolina does the same, albeit slower, movements robotic.

She still has a headache, she notices, one that’s ebbing and flowing and filling up her head, but it’s unimportant, in relation to everything else that just happened.

The panic in her body is like a growling beast, a dragon, curling its tail around itself and laying down to rest somewhere between Karolina’s ribs, for now. Sharp teeth and claws and spine. 

There was something there, just a minute ago, between her and Nico and the unspoken words in the divide.

Something that is still lingering, in the way Nico is holding herself a little straighter now, playing with the hem of her shirt, in the way Karolina is full of confusion and fear and just coming off of half a panic attack but she still wants to smile, is finding it increasingly hard not to.

They keep watching the movie.

And once it ends, Nico gets up and puts on bridemaids, and they spend two hours laughing until their stomachs hurt.

Somewhere in between, Nico relaxes again, leans closer, until her head is once again resting against Karolina’s upper arm and she can smell the shampoo Nico always uses, can count her lashes when she looks down.

In a moment of dumb bravery, Karolina leans down, puts her cheek against the crown of Nico’s head, scrunches her nose against the hair tickling it, and is so stupidly, completely happy she forgets all about the flashbacks to moments that never happened to her, the warm blood underneath her body that she could taste, the gun in her mouth and her absolute, unflinching willingness to pull the trigger. Her headache remains.

(Karolina dreams of explosions that night, thunderstorms and rain, and no one dying but the sky.

She wakes up to sunlight and black hair tickling her nose, remembers only Nico Nico Nico.

Something in her head is stirring, slowly waking up, full of anger and rage.

Scratching at the walls of her mind.

Waiting to be freed.

She nuzzles her nose into Nico’s shoulder, closes her eyes again, and ignores all the ways in which she's lying to herself.)

()()()()

It happens more and more though.

Sometimes she wakes up with her head splitting from pain, with a black hole where memories should be.

Sometimes she’ll be at school and everything will be fine, and then Molly says something that gives her whiplash only because it feels like it happened before, like she’s living through this moment again, and the headaches will start then too.

Every time she tries to explain or googles it all that she gets back is “Deja-vu“. But Karolina knows what a deja-vu is, what it feels like, and this isn’t it. This is more, sinister in a way she doesn’t understand, important and all encompassing.

There is the day Alex drops his plate at lunch and her hand’s just there, catching it, like she knew it would happen.

Or when she tugs Gert to the side just before Chase tries to push her into the pool.

When Molly tells a story Karolina asks too often if she’s sure she hasn’t told her before, and Molly looks at her confused, a little annoyed. “I’m sure. It just happened this afternoon. This is the first time I’m seeing you today.“

There are bigger things too, tough.

The next time she sees Jonah, Karolina feels sick for the whole three days before. Her heart is beating too fast constantly, her hands are always clammy and she feels continuously on the edge of a panic attack.

It gets bad enough that the others don’t really leave her alone, someone is always walking with her to and from classes, Chase carries her backpack without a word, Gert doesn’t even try to say anything about the weird tension between Nico and her, Alex gives her his notes from all the classes they have together without her having to ask because he notices that she’s not really in any state of mind to write them herself and Nico… Nico just keeps throwing her these looks. Long and concerned and much too heavy for Karolina, who has just decided that she won’t think of Nico as anything more than a friend anymore, that she’s through with that.

She’s done with getting her hopes up because of the smallest, most ridiculous things, with having her heart broken day in day out.

By day three, a Tuesday, her nausea and dizziness and headaches get so bad that she spends the better part of the school day in the nurses office, curled up on a cot with an icepack on her forehead and neck.

By the time last period comes and goes Karolina can’t concentrate on anything for more than thirty seconds before she feels like throwing up and her hands are shaking so bad that she can’t button up her own cardigan.

Gert, who’s picking her up to walk her to Chase’s car so he can drive her home, fastens them for her, brow furrowed deep under the rim of her glasses. She opens her mouth once, twice, to say something but when she sees the way Karolina is kind of swaying on her feet and blinking slow, sluggish blinks, she stops, doesn't say anything in the end.

Chase does though.

Drops her off at home, walks around the side of his car to open the door for her, grabs her elbow to help her stand and then keeps holding it, eyes deep and serious.

“Maybe you should see a doctor, Kar. You’re not getting better.“

And because Karolina feels a little bit like dying, has been feeling that way for three days now, she even means it when she tells him that she will.

On her way to the front door the pounding in her head gets unbearable, it feels like her brain is being shredded to pieces, like sirens are going off in every crevice of her mind.

Karolina thinks maybe she even blacks out there, for a second, because one moment she’s opening the heavy metal gate leading up to their walkway and the next she’s closing their front door behind her, silence embracing her except for a ringing in her ears.

“Something is very wrong.“ she keeps thinking, the ringing growing shriller and shriller with every step she takes, until she steps into the kitchen, her mother at the counter like an angel in white. Everything about her blinding.

“Karolina.“ she says, almost inaudible over the ringing. “You’re home. Good. We have a visitor.“

Karolina follows her hand to where it’s indicating, the black, shining shoes, pressed suit pants, blazer and pristine white shirt. The cufflinks, polished and gleaming G’s, sitting at exactly the right angle. And even higher up, then, the face she still remembers - high cheekbones, strong jaw, thin lips. The second Karolina’s eyes meet those of Jonah every noise in her head stops, leaving only a dull silence, muffled pounds - like someone’s knocking at the back of her mind, waiting to be let in.

“Hello Karolina.“ Jonah says, voice somehow everywhere at the same time. “I’ve been looking forward to seeing you again.“

Oh. Karolina thinks. Of course.

She should have known.

She remembers, after all, how she felt the first time she saw him - helpless, like a pig at the slaughter house.

The same way she’s been feeling ever since she woke up three days ago.

A little bit like she’s already dead.

(There was also this: the Monday after the sleepover at Nico’s place, Karolina arrives at school only to see Nico step out of Alex’s car, his arm around her shoulders the second they are next to each other, and she doesn’t feel anything.

She already had, after all, experienced all the heartache going along with this the moment she woke up that morning, even if she hadn’t known what it was for then.

She knows now.

Nico glances at her when they pass each other in the halls, almost sheepish, almost sorry, and Karolina decides then and there that she will stop. This is it, she thinks, presses her nails into her palm until blood is pooling between her fingers. She will let go.

She does, and red drops hit the floor where she’s standing, follow her all the way to her first class, almost like a trail: are you looking for a dead girl walking? Take a left here and a right there and you will see her sitting at the desk in the back, sanity running out her ears, eyes empty and cold and blue like her fathers.)

()()()()

Jonah leaves a minute later.

After shaking Karolina’s hand with the same gleam in his eyes that he had last time. After touching her mothers back in passing in a way that made Karolina want to throw up, made all the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.

After seemingly taking all the comfort and safety that was left for Karolina in this house with him.

“Why was he here?“ Karolina asks the second the door closes behind him, can’t stop herself from putting emphasis on the he.

Her mother is lovingly cradling something in her hands and once Karolina looks closer she sees that it’s a book, thick and leather bound.

“He was bringing something over.“ she says, doesn't even correct Karolina on her rude tone, and there is something in her mothers voice that has chills run down Karolina’s spine: Leslie sounds more than enamored, speaks the words like they are a prayer, her eyes glazed and big.

Karolina is twitchy and creeped out, feels unsafe in ways that have nothing to do with the fact that her mother is a murderer.

“Mom?“ she asks and when Leslie doesn’t react, just keeps her eyes locked on the book, again: “Mom?“

“Yes?“

Karolina waits until Leslie looks up, until their eyes meet, blue on blue.

“Who is he?“

Leslie is staring right through her, a statue made out of marble, a serene smile on her lips.

“An old friend.“ she says, the exact words Jonah used to introduce himself in the Wilder House.

Then, as if something inside of her came back to life, Karolina’s mom straightens, her face falls, her eyes sharpen. She is regal and tall again, cold the way Karolina knows her to be.

“Don’t you have to study? Remember: your grades last semester where far from enough, you said you’d try more from now on.“

It’s a dismissal if Karolina ever heard one, and she’s almost grateful even though her mom’s small taunts still have a way of settling between her ribs, growing branches from there until it feels like Karolina’s lungs are so full she can’t breathe.

She takes it though, swallows down her hurt and hikes her backpack higher up her shoulders before making her way upstairs. She is exhausted.

But she always is these days, waking up in the middle of the night, losing track of moments and memories, blacking out during conversation with the others only to come back ten minutes later to a different topic and moon shaped cuts on her palm.

It’s funny, how just a few weeks ago she’d actually thought she was better, happier, and over whatever this was.

Now…every day she wakes up feeling so inherently wrong it is hard to get out of bed, hard to eat, to speak, to listen and react. Hard to live.

She thinks, sometimes at night, when the windows are open and the air is hot and thick still, when her parents are only ghosts roaming the halls, that she would die for this if she had to.

For all of it to end, for all of them to be safe and happy and young again. For the pain in her head and the scratching at the walls of her mind to stop.

In class, now and again, she imagines a meteor falling from the sky, leaving a crater where she used to sit, leaving everybody else, miraculously, alive.

Or last week, when they had met at timely and she was crossing the street and for a second, just, she’d thought about stopping at exactly the right time for the bus coming down the road to hit her.

(Or once, when they had listened to the radio in Chase’s car and there was a report about some wildfires and Karolina had immediately seen herself crushed under debris while being swallowed by flames, had almost felt them eating at her skin, all the smoke blackening the inside of her lungs, all of her skin and hair and blood and bones becoming one with the fire, and it had almost felt like a memory, the way it sat hot and heavy and blistering in the back of her mind.)

When she’s laying on top of the covers in her room she thinks about calling the others, at first. Telling them about Jonah in her home, about her mothers weird behavior.

But what would she say, exactly? Nothing happened, did it?

She can’t just say “He makes me feel unsafe and creeped out and like something dark is looming much too close“.

She can’t just tell them “I think I’ve known he would be here today and that’s why I was feeling so bad“.

Who would believe her.

So, Karolina decides, she’s not going to tell them. They wouldn’t want to hear it anyway, she’s been enough of a burden this week already.

It’s not even five p.m. but she slips under her covers, doesn’t change, doesn’t clean her face of mascara and concealer, doesn’t free her hair from the tight braid it’s been in.

Her body is useless, heavy and tired with too long limbs and throbbing muscles.

Is this her life now, she keeps thinking. Pain and confusion and one bad thing after another?

Karolina has trouble remembering the last time she really really laughed, even though realistically she knows it wasn’t that long ago.

But all the other stuff just keeps being front and center in her brain and chest.

All the ways she feels like less of a human and more like a robot that’s malfunctioning, like a machine that soon nobody will see a use for anymore.

Short circuiting, as Alex would say. That’s what it feels like in her mind.

She presses a palm to her forehead, which is clammy and hot and aching.

Her mother, downstairs, is humming. Karolina has never heard her do this before and it makes her want to cry, for whatever reason.

“Please.“ she whispers, into the skin of her arm. “Please.“

If someone were to ask she could not tell them what she is begging for. Maybe for help. Maybe for change.

Maybe for the pain to stop, and their parents to not be murderers, and Nico to love her back and all of her friends to be safe and happy and …

Two minutes later she’s asleep.

(That night:

construction sites, tearful goodbyes and prom dresses. Molly as a lion, Chase as a bull. Nico.

Darkness and bright bright lights. Slow music.

Gert holding hands with someone and laughing. The pool out back, her mother in the window. Her father, younger and happier and honest, twirling a five year old Karolina through the air.

Seasons changing. Snow.

A car crash, a fire, walls full of bullet holes. Her body and no air to breathe. Nico.

And in the morning:

She remembers none of it.)

()()()()

Karolina spends more and more days contemplating the necessity of her own existence.

In English, when they are discussing Animal Farm and it is an especially hot day, all the windows open and everybody still sweating at their desks.

Gert, in between heated discussions with a jock from the lacrosse team, keeps softly pinching Karolina’s arm under the table because her mind keeps drifting away from her again and again and it must show on her face.

In algebra, Alex continues sharing his notes with her, slides them over without a word, closes his binder a little louder than necessary when class is over since she wouldn't have noticed the bell ringing otherwise.

Molly, who sees something in her eyes whenever they have lunch together that makes her decide to keep Karolina entertained for the whole hour, with stories and questions and rants about her teachers.

Chase keeps driving her from and to school, Karolina’s own car sitting a little forgotten in the driveway, and he always lets her choose the music, if only so she has something to do.

Three days after the JonahIncident#2, that she still hasn't told anyone about, Karolina turns to him while Band of Horses is playing in the background.

“Do you think we are bad people?“

Chase flinches a little and Karolina feels bad immediately. For a second she had forgotten about his biggest fear. (All the ways in which sons can be like their fathers.)

His hands, big and strong and unsure, clench and unclench around the steering wheel. His eyes don’t leave the road.

“No.“ fast, a reaction. Then: “Why do you ask?“

Karolina shrugs, turns back to stare out the window, sun in her hair and palm trees on the side of the road. All the dreamy paradise surroundings one could hope for. She wishes to be anywhere but here.

“Just feels like it sometimes. Letting our parents keep on killing kids and all.“

Chase doesn’t swerve the car, doesn’t slam the brakes. Karolina can hear the hitch in his breath though. The choking.

She doesn’t feel bad this time but only because she can feel herself drifting again, eyes focused on some point on the horizon she doesn’t really see, mind already miles away, at the place it goes to more and more often now, somewhere the rest of her doesn’t know how to follow yet.

“We don’t let them do it.“ Chase’s voice is sharp, he puts emphasis on the “don't“ like he's trying to convince himself.

“It’s not like there’s much we can do right now! As soon as we have a plan we’re putting a stop to this! We’re not bad people, we’re not like them..“ he keeps going on and Karolina can see that she has triggered something in him, the way his voice gets a little panicky and thin, his hands white and jaw strained.

Karolina has spent a lot of time sitting next to a panicked Chase, telling him that he is nothing like his father, showing him that his hands, while being just as big and strong as Victors, would never be able to inflict the same kind of hurt.

She’d say something here now too, she thinks, if she still knew how to make words leave her mouth. If she was still conscious of her surroundings or herself.

She would say “I didn’t mean you Chase. You are still nothing like him, you never will be.“

She would say “I only ever meant me, actually, and all the dark things that seem to follow me. How ironic it is that I glow bright and beautiful when I only ever feel the opposite. How I believe more and more that my role in all of this is fleeting, a short, passing thing. How I am not meant to make it very far.“

But, alas, she says nothing at all, leaves Chase to the pit in his stomach. Is going, going, gone.

When she comes to she is standing in the kitchen, a glass of water leaving wet circles on the kitchen counter. The sun is almost starting to sink outside.

She is dressed in cotton shorts and a t-shirt, she is makeup less and freshly showered, she remembers none of it.

There are two plates in the sink, a cup of tea on the opposite side of the counter.

Her heart is racing.

Somewhere in the house a faucet is being turned off, a door opening and closing, then, steps.

Karolina is gasping for air now, tears almost gathering behind eyelashes.

She doesn't know how she got here!

It is such a disconcerting, nauseating feeling and even though she should be almost used to it by now she is not!

Someone is rounding the corner and when she looks up she sees violet hair first, the glasses, jeans jacket even though they are inside and it is much too hot.

Gert is drying her hands on the back of her shorts, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose using not one finger like Alex but always two. The things you notice about your friends.

“You ready for that talk now?“ she asks, looks up. She must see something on Karolina’s face then because the slight smile on her lips is gone in an instant, she stops in her tracks.

“Kar?“ careful, like Karolina is an animal she doesn’t want to frighten.

Karolina grips the glass in her hands hard enough that she’s scared it might shatter, wants to think of an excuse real quick, wants to pretend she knows exactly what is going on, what Gert is talking about.

She is fine she is fine she is fine. (Say it three times and it might be true.)

She opens her mouth -

“What are you doing here?“

And then promptly bursts into tears.

()()()()

Gert had just gotten home from school when Chase called her. He had sounded angry, she says, but even more: panicked. Had talked about not being like his dad and that they were trying, weren't they, and that Karolina was wrong. Gert had stopped him then, talked him down from a full-on panic attack, did some of the breathing exercises that always help her with him and then, asked just what the hell was going on?

Chase had explained, more slowly and clearly now, about the talk in the car, and the more he said the less he sounded angry and more and more worried.

“Something is wrong.“ he had seemed sure of that, the kind of sure that came after a sudden, frightening realization.

“After, up until I dropped her off at home, it was like she wasn’t even alive anymore. I looked into her eyes and there was nothing there.“

They had hung up then and Gert had gotten back in her car. Drove here on a whim.

That’s what she tells Karolina while the both of them are sitting on her bed, Karolina with tissues and red eyes, playing with a loose string on her shirt.

“I knew what he meant the second you opened the door. It was freaky, your face was blank. You let me in and I told you that Chase was worried, asked what had been going on the last few weeks because if you think we hadn’t noticed you're really stupid. You said everything was good but like, in a way that implied the total opposite.

I kept asking, you kept giving one word answers or none at all, we got something to drink, I went to the toilet and then when I got back …“

Gert is serious, face drawn, hands twitchy.

Karolina can’t look her in the eyes.

“Yeah.“ she mumbles. She knows what happened afterwards, her meltdown, the crying. Things that get normally ignored in the Dean house and here Gert is, determined to make her talk about it.

“It’s more than just the our parents are murderers-you have some cool glowing powers-there might be some gay panic involved shit, isn't it?“ Gert asks after a pause where they are both a mess of shaking fingers and unsure gazes.

Karolina nods.

“I don’t … I don’t know how to explain it.“

She looks up, finally, and sees Gert try to hide the concern in her eyes, sees her bite her lip. Karolina doesn’t even have the energy to react to Gert knowing about the gay-panic and, consequently, probably all about Nico’s role in it.

There’s so much else going on now, she’s not ready to face the fact that Nico is still the thing she cares about most.

“Okay.“ says Gert. “That’s fine, maybe just…try.“

They both laugh, more little puffs of air than anything else.

“I think there’s something wrong with me.“ Karolina whispers. “Like, something fundamental. With my brain, maybe. I feel like I’m losing my mind.“

Gert nods, says nothing, just keeps her eyes on Karolina. A trust in them, deep and unflinching, that takes her by surprise even though it probably shouldn’t. They grew up together! They are friends! Why is it so hard for Karolina to accept these things?

She takes a deep breath, and then-

———

She tells Gert everything.

About the forgetting and the Jonah thing and how she feels like her brain is broken and full of holes, about her itching skin and (a little bit, in metaphors and half-finished sentences and without ever really saying anything) even about Nico.

Gert takes her hand and squeezes and so Karolina thinks she gets it anyway.

(Little touches and affirmations, a language all between the two of them.)

She tells Gert about the dreams too, or about the apparent lack of them that feels manufactured and like it’s something that was done to her. About her deja-vu’s.

After, once she’s done, Gert is silent for a long time, staring at a point just above Karolina’s shoulders with her brows furrowed.

Karolina can feel her palm, still in Gert’s hand, start sweating and she can’t stop herself from fidgeting, nervous of the other girls reaction, of being called crazy and weak and stupid.

Gert must notice, in some ways, because she focuses on Karolina, blinks herself back to reality, and smiles at her, even though it’s strained and short.

“Shit, Kar.“ her voice a little croaky. Karolina can see her swallow. “That’s like…a lot.“

Karolina almost flinches. She knows, after all. 

“Sorry.“ she says, and wouldn't Leslie be proud?

Gert’s eyes widen: “God, no! Don’t apologize! I’m glad you told me, you’ve been going through all of this alone until now.“

Karolina ducks her head, still not convinced that she did the right thing in telling Gert, still not sure she doesn't regret it.

“I just mean…“ Gert sighs, “that I was hoping for something more along the lines of Leslie being a dick or maybe Eifel being an asshole, you know, normal people problems. Things I could maybe, somehow, help you with.“

Karolina feels like apologizing again, for all the problems she keeps causing. She doesn’t though, only raises her head and asks the question weighing on her chest.

“But you believe me? You don’t think I’m imagining things or just being dramatic?“

“I kinda wish you were.“ Gert says. “I really really do. But with everything that’s happening and things being the way they are…I don’t know why this is happening to you or even what exactly it is, but I do 100% believe you that it is happening.“

Karolina laughs then, loudly and a little unhinged, and promptly after feels tears gathering behind her eyelids again, burrows her face in the palms of her hands. A sob leaves her lips before she can stop it, but she’s just so relieved and exhausted and … Gert believes her!

Somebody else beside herself knows and they believe her! She’s not crazy after all (maybe).

Karolina is overwhelmed.

She feels Gert slip an arm around her shoulders and then she’s slowly pulled forward until she’s resting against a warm collarbone, until she feels Gert’s steady heartbeat under her forehead.

They stay like this for a while and the whole time Karolina just keeps crying, can’t remember how to stop or when the last time was that she shed this many tears.

Maybe when she was younger and it was still acceptable to do so, to be sad and something else than the Karolina Dean with her sunshine smiles and positive attitude and love for live.

When she looks up, finally, it is dark outside and her cheeks feel numb and her eyes burn. Her neck is stiff but Gert is still there, calm and supportive and probably going to have a sore back tomorrow.

Karolina is flooded by a wave of gratitude and appreciation for her and the only way she knows to show it is by sniffling and bumping her forehead against Gert’s shoulder (small touches).

“Thank you.“ she says, and hopes Gert will see it as sincere, because it is.

Gert smiles and uses her sleeve to wipe under Karolina’s eyes. It’s intimate in a way Karolina hasn’t felt for years and it doesn’t even make her panic because there is nothing romantic to it, the love she feels for Gert is so so strong but never in a way that isn’t platonic.

It’s lovely.

“You have to promise me something.“ Gert says and Karolina feels herself nodding already.

“Keep telling me when these things happen, please. You can’t do this on your own and I don’t think you want to either.“

She’s right there, Karolina thinks, even though it’s hard to admit when she’s only ever been alone for the last years.

“I’ll try.“ she croaks, because she’s trying to be more honest to her friends.

Gert looks like she wants to insist but then her shoulders drop and she nods.

“Alright.“

Her hand lands on Karolina’s shoulder and she squeezes.

“We’ll figure this out, Kar. Things will be okay again. And the next time that Jonah guy is anywhere near you just call or text me and I’ll be there in ten minutes to pick you up. Promise.“

Karolina believes her, without having to convince herself. It’s kind of a miracle, really, to trust in people like this: Gert wants to help her and is her friend and doesn’t think she’s a burden.

Those are so many good things. They are more than enough.

(Karolina doesn’t tell Gert about the things she does remember: all those flashes of her own death, the looming pressure that she’s not quite meant to survive, her body a nest of bullet holes, her body eaten by flames, her body not a home anymore, just a body.

She feels too much like horrible things will happen once she does, once she puts this into words.

Maybe she’ll start imagining the others’ death’s too, or Gert will tell her parents she is suicidal (which she isn’t) and she’ll be put away, or worst of all: maybe Gert will try to stop her, once Karolina knows it’s time to play her part.

Once it’s time to do what she is meant to do; her body only a means to an end, a way to save the others, which is already more than she had expected herself to ever be worth.)

()()()()

Over the next days, things become, almost, bearable somehow.

Gert knowing about most of Karolina’s struggles makes her feel safe in a way that she has missed, unknowingly.

Whenever she spaces out, Gert is there to nudge her gently back to reality or to distract the others while Karolina finds her way back to earth.

Just the simple support of one of her friends has resulted in Karolina smiling more again and being able to make it through school without feeling completely overwhelmed half-way through.

She has a biology exam and gets an A and she doesn’t need Alex to write notes for her anymore and her suicidal fantasies or whatever they are lessen a little.

There is still an itch under her skin and she still can’t forget what her body felt like while being devoured by fire. What organs feel like when they are pierced by bullets. Bones crushed by metal.

She manages not to dwell on these things, though, and there’s the difference.

Karolina doesn’t know how she can show Gert how grateful she is, to have her as a friend, but on Thursday the week after, she brings a cake to school, vegan and gluten free and just the way she knows Gert likes it, and it’s ugly and lopsided and the letters spelling out “Thank you“ are running into each other and it took Karolina the whole night to finish but when she gets a big hug and smile from Gert in return she knows it was well worth it.

The others look a little confused but they don’t ask, for which Karolina is thankful, and she guesses that it’s because they have noticed the small change in her too.

Gert cuts the cake into pieces and shares it between the six of them, and in the courtyard under the tallest tree with the most shadow they laugh over melted frosting and feel like teenagers for a little while.

It won't last, which all of them know, but they manage not to dwell on that and there’s the difference.

()()()()

That night, Karolina’s dream is different.

She doesn’t remember most of the others and she won’t remember this one either once she wakes up, but while she’s in it, those few moments, she notices…

The ceiling overhead is dark and moldy, illuminated only by flickering candle light, and the bed she's on isn't her own.

The hand in hers is that little bit smaller, soft, and squeezes every few minutes.

There isn’t any talking.

Karolina never once looks anywhere else than the shadows dancing above her, never turns her head, but she knows without a doubt that Nico is laying next to her.

That the hand she’s holding is hers.

That they are in love, that they are happy, wherever they are.

There is no weight on Karolina’s chest, no tense shoulders or headaches or fuzzy memories.

No waiting for what comes next.

Nico squeezes, she squeezes back.

That’s all there is.

Karolina’s dream is different because it’s a good one and no one dies and she doesn’t even try to, and she is happy here.

It takes her a moment to place that feeling in her chest: happiness. She had forgotten what it felt like, that it was an option, to be anything more than fleetingly content.

She won't remember this once she wakes up and that’s a loss, a tragedy, an unfairness: when she’s awake she’ll have forgotten that it’s possible for things to be this way; that there’s anything else at the end of the tunnel except death and despair and a world that’s better off without her in it.

(Normally she only ever dies in her dreams but isn’t this worse, somehow; to dangle a life like this under her nose, the one potentiality Karolina had deemed impossible for herself, and then take it away again, like it wouldn’t make all of the difference, like it wouldn’t make her consider “surviving" an ending to look forward to.)

()()()()

Nico’s at her door again.

It’s Saturday and Karolina has just gotten back from a run she had forced herself to go on, exhaustion hitting her 15 minutes in and turning her feet to lead, and when she’d stepped through the gates of their driveway there Nico was, a few meters in front of her, making her way up the stairs of the Dean’s front door.

It is still too hot to do anything, sweat making Karolina’s clothes stick to her skin, making her eyes burn and blink.

Nico is wearing cut off leggings and a too big shirt, her hair in buns on each side of her head.

Karolina’s heart melts right out of her chest and she hasn’t even seen Nico’s face yet.

The other girl is knocking, having pressed the bell already and getting no answer, and Karolina knows the house is empty, Leslie being at church and Frank someplace else, so she jogs the last paces until she reaches the stairs herself.

“Nico.“ she says, her voice breathless and exhausted, much like the rest of her.

Nico startles, turns on the spot with a hand to her heart.

“Jesus Kar!“

There is a wild look in her eyes, dark and tired, like a spooked animal.

“Sorry.“ Karolina says, and means it.

She hasn’t really spoken to Nico ever since the sleepover. She hasn’t ignored her either, there have been moments with the group when the two of them have exchanged words and sentences and even smiles but Karolina hasn't … she hasn't tried to find Nicos eyes in the hallways or stared at her in chem class, she hasn't been late to math just so she can walk the few extra minutes with Nico to the other girls spanish class.

Karolina has been avoiding Nico and she’s been successful at it and it had hurt every day.

But she had meant it when she told herself she would let Nico go, that she would stop imagining and hoping and feeling so much, all the time.

It was Nico and Alex, again and again and very obviously, at lunch in school or while studying at Timely’s or even in the mornings, seeing them arrive in the same car. Always Nico and Alex.

Getting over Nico hasn’t really worked, of course, and she has seen the pain in Nico’s eyes whenever Karolina would not quite inconspicuously avoid her and she hates herself for it.

But Karolina hates herself for a lot of things and if this will one day make it possible for her and Nico to be friends without so much pain and pining and secrecy, it will be worth it.

It doesn’t make it better though, that after a few days of this Nico seemed to have taken the hint and stopped talking to Karolina herself.

Which is why Karolina is surprised that two weeks after the sleepover, to the day, Nico is standing at her door, making Karolina face everything she had been trying to ignore.

Once Karolina invites Nico in they end up in the kitchen.

Karolina gets herself a cup of water, her breathing and the running tap the loudest thing in the room, while Nico just stands there, a look on her face that Karolina can’t place.

It makes her uncomfortable, aside from the fact that she always feels a certain level of safe and soft and content around Nico, to be so completely unable to read the other girl.

Karolina is a master when it comes to Nicos facial expressions, to the way she raises her eyebrow and furrows her forehead and lifts the corners of her mouth, bites the inside of her cheek and purses her lips.

She’s spent many hours of class, where she should have been paying attention, sketching Nicos face into he pages of her binder.

But here, now, standing stiffly between polished counters and the dripping of the tap, looking at Karolina, always looking, with her head slightly bend and her eyes open and trusting, Nico feels like some new entity Karolina isn't sure how to approach.

“I’m sorry for just showing up.“

Nico does not, in fact, look particularly sorry, but she does let her eyes sway to the ground for a second, and there it is; the biting of the cheek.

“It’s okay.“ Karolina says, water dripping down her hand and she is suddenly aware of how sweaty she still is, what a mess she must look. “You know you can always come here.“

She had almost said “To me. You can always come to me.“ but then in the last moment got a grip of herself, of her new resolution.

Nico beams at her and Karolina forgets why she ever wanted to let her go.

There is the silence again, then, and Nico is still looking at her, holding her gaze, sweeping her eyes over Karolinas face and she has no idea what it means.

“There’s something I wanted to tell you.“ Nico says, and her voice is quieter now or maybe she is just adapting to her surroundings, the lack of background sounds, the water no longer running and Karolinas breathing slowing down.

It feels a little like they are caught in a vacuum, shut away form the world, just Karolina and Nico and Nicos dark dark eyes, seeing something Karolina can’t.

Nico shuffles closer, an unnoticeable amount if it weren't for Karolina and her keen sense regarding anything Nico does.

Karolina’s heart is beating out of her chest, her skin prickling, and she can’t tear her gaze away from Nico, all of her, the black of her lashes, her hand grazing the counter top, the veins standing out between knuckles, the delicate collar bones and wisps of hair.

The loveliest being.

“What is it?“ Karolina breathes, her voice just as low, maybe more so, and every nerve ending on fire.

Nico takes a step closer, a real one this time, and they are close now, no more than six inches between their chests.

Karolina, by now, is pretty sure she is dreaming, or she would be, if it weren't for every part of Nico being so achingly real.

Her own hand is resting on the counter top too, and Nicos fingers are close enough to touch, she can feel the heat from them. Everything around her is on fire.

Nico looks at her one more time, takes everything in, and then steps back.

The room around them comes into focus again, Karolina takes a shuddering breath, and the tension is broken.

“Can we sit?“ Nico asks, as if Karolina could ever deny her anything again.

————

Karolina decides to take a shower first, for more than one reason, and tells Nico to get comfortable on the couch in the living room and use her netflx.

She needs a second, after Nico showing up out of nowhere and their moment in the kitchen.

Something happened there, between the two of them, that Karolina doesn’t trust herself to decipher.

She will come to conclusions that are unrealistic and pathetic, and her still slumbering hope will make an appearance, whispering lies about chemistry and attraction to her.

Karolina can’t let herself go there, can’t allow herself to fall back on that. She’s a weak person, always has been, and things have been getting a little better those last days with Gert knowing and her feeling not as crazy anymore.

She can’t have the Nico Thing taking up all her energy anymore. There’s no future for her between daydreaming about Nico one day feeling for Karolina just an ounce of what Karolina feels for her and aching every day because of what will realistically never be (there’s no future for Karolina anywhere, is what she also means, but that is another conversation).

So maybe Karolina takes extra long in the shower, layers herself in shampoo twice and stares aimlessly at the white tiles glistering from water and the sun streaming in for ten minutes.

And once she can’t consciously waste any more water she drapes herself in a towel and sits on the toilet seat, fishes her phone out her running shorts and dials the one number she knows by heart.

Gert picks up on the third ring, sounding worried already.

“Kar, what happened?“

Karolina remembers their last talk and grimaces.

“Nothing, sorry. I’m fine.“

Her leg is bouncing up and down and she’s biting her lip again. Nico is downstairs, sitting on their stiff couch and waiting for Karolina to come back down. So they can talk.

Karolinas breath hitches.

“You don't sound fine. You sound panicked. What’s up?“
Karolina realizes then that while she is sure Gert knows and is aware of her Nico Thing, they have never actually talked about it. Karolina has never actually put into words what she is feeling, not to Gert or anyone.

Her lip splits and iron coats her tongue.

“I… Nico is here.“

Karolina can practically see Gert roll her eyes.

“Okay, so? Have the two of you finally stopped acting weird around each other?“ 

Of course Gert had noticed, and the others probably had too. Karolina’s own damn fault for being as bad at acting as she is.

“No, that’s not…“ she tries to run a hand trough her hair but gets immediately tangled in the wet knots.

“I didn’t know she was coming, but that’s not important. She seems different, something’s up, I think.“ Karolina is so bad at explaining herself, she realizes, all the while not even knowing why she called Gert in the first place. What did she expect Gert to do here?

“What do you mean different? And where is your guest, by the way, while you are calling me and hiding?“

Karolina almost bristles at that. She is not hiding. But it has been over half an hour since she left Nico alone and she is panic calling Gert from the toilet seat in only a towel.

“I don’t know Gert! Different! There was this moment in the kitchen and then she said she wanted to tell me something and just…somethings up! What am I supposed to do?“

Gert is silent then, for a few seconds, and then she sighs, long and deep.

“You go down there, Karolina, and you listen to what Nico wants to tell you and you don't panic about things you can’t control, which I get sounds ironic coming from me, and then when the two of you have talked and you don't have a guest waiting in some part of your house, you call me back and you tell me all about your little moment and all the other juicy bits.“

Karolina really hates Gert, sometimes. Mostly when she’s making sense.

Nico is still just where Karolina left her, sitting on the couch, spine straight, with her elbows resting on her knees and a faraway look in her eyes, seemingly not at all interested in the episode of Brooklyn Nine Nine that’s playing.

“Hey.“ Karolina says, self conscious about her t-shirt and shorts even though Nico is basically wearing the same thing. Her hair is still dripping down her back and she can already feel her neck start to sweat under its heavy curtain.

Nicos head snaps up and she smiles a little once she sees Karolina, turning off the tv in the same second.

Karolina almost wishes she hadn't because now they are surrounded by nothing but silence again, and the few bird calls that are coming through the sliding door outside that Nico must have opened, the faint and distant murmur of the sea.

“Hey.“ Nico echoes, and Karolina makes her way over to the couch on bare feet, aware of the fact that Nico is watching her.

They sit sideways, facing each other, but there is space left between them, not like before in the kitchen.

Nico’s arm is resting on the back of the couch, playing with the fabric, and Karolina has her legs gathered underneath her, is drawing circles on her knee with the pad of her thumb.

Both of them are quiet, still not quite accustomed to spending time just one on one, even though it’s not the first time.

But the years between Amy and the reconciliation of their friendship are like an ugly scar sometimes, tainting every moment after. There is a distance that wouldn't be there if they had never stopped being friends, and it’s here now too. Even though Karolina has never felt closer to anybody than she does with Nico.

It doesn't help that it feels like there is something else holding Nico back. It’s in the tension of her shoulders, the intensity of her eyes, the tautness of her jaw.

The softness laying underneath all of it.

Karolina is not a fan of anything that comes between the two of them.

“You wanted to tell me something.“ Her voice is nothing more than another gust of wind, fleeting enough for Nico to ignore should she want to.

But Nico zeroes in on Karolina like she was just waiting for her to say something, to bring them back to where they stopped in the kitchen.

Her fingers are straightening on the back of the couch, almost like they are reaching for something.

(Karolinas fingers twitch in answer.)

“I did, yes.“ Nico’s eyes are on her again and Karolina thinks that no one has ever looked at her the way Nico does now, has seen her the way Nico does, even with all the secrets between them.

It leaves her feeling naked and fragile and vulnerable and she never wants Nico to stop.

But Nico does, pulls her gaze away and focuses instead on the circles Karolina’s been drawing on her knee.

“Alex and I broke up.“ she says, the way she always says these things that leave Karolina breathless and reeling: full of undeserved nonchalance.

“Oh.“ is Karolinas first dumfounded reaction. “Nico, I’m sorry.“

She scoots closer then, for the first time in a long time being the one to initiate the contact. Her fear and feelings are not important here: Nico is hurt. Nothing else matters.

Nico holds her gaze, tilts her head sideways and smiles a little, which is not what Karolina had been expecting.

Her eyes are not sad or full of pain or anything except beautiful, the richest color Karolina has ever seen. The reason a shudder is working its way up her body.

There is no part of Nico that doesn't have an affect on Karolina.

“It’s okay.“ Nico says. “I’m not a fan of being dumped but…“

Karolina interrupts her, her brain stuttering: “Wait, what? He broke up with you?“

Nico lets out a laugh, albeit small and not very joyous, but Karolina is so confused, so bewildered by the fact that anybody would break up with Nico, would decide that she's not exactly what they need and want and love anymore, that she can’t even find it in her to swoon over the dimple showing in Nico’s right cheek.

“Why?“ she whispers, slowly shaking her head and taking in all of the girl before her.

Nico is the one to come closer this time, Karolina’s hand coming up to rest on the back of the couch just opposite hers and the tips of their fingers are almost touching now, only divided by air and an underlying tension and the promise of more.

Nico shrugs, holding Karolinas eyes with her own. They seem to always be looking at each other.

“He said I was distant and apathetic and indifferent and that he understood that I missed Amy but shutting everybody out wouldn't bring her back and-“ her breath hitches for a second, almost unnoticeable-“and that he wasn't the one I wanted to be with anyway…“

She trails of, and Karolina is glad she did, can’t take any more of Nico saying these things about herself even though they aren't her own opinion.

Her chest aches with the thought of Alex, of anyone, telling Nico she was lacking, judging her for the way she handled her grief.

She lifts the hand not resting on the couch to Nicos face, not thinking about what this would mean, not calculating the consequences, and only then notices she's trembling.

There’s a sudden sense of deja-vu then, to the time she slept over at Nicos and they watched Les Mis and Nico told her about the fight she had, the tear Karolina stole from her cheek, the indescribable tension between them.

They keep having these moments, Karolina suddenly realizes, and it hits her like a bullet between the ribs, the realization, the way Nico looked at her in the kitchen, in her bedroom, right now.

Karolina cradles Nicos cheek.

“He’s wrong.“ she says, and her words aren't loud but they are vast and sure. “You are good and honest and warm. You open your heart to so many people Nico, and maybe you don't always show it in ways that are obvious and, and easy, but you do show it.“

Her chest is heaving.

She knows, Karolina knows that she is exposing herself through everything she is and isn't saying right now but she can’t stop. All the walls she build between what she is feeling and what she can say are crumbling, her thumb is stroking along Nico’s cheekbone, her eyes wide and telling.

And Nico… Nico isn’t stopping her. Isn’t moving her face away or telling Karolina to shut up or doing anything to put an end to what is happening between the two of them.

She’s still just looking at Karolina, eyes boring into hers and the softest of smiles on her face.

A certain reverence about her.

“Yeah?“ she breathes, somehow closer again, inches between their shirts touching.

Karolina nods, almost slow motion.

“Yeah.“ she whispers back, conviction heavy in her tone. “Don’t let anyone make you believe otherwise.“

Nico’s fingers brush hers along the fabric of the couch, electricity running up Karolinas arm and she doesn’t know who moves next but then their hands are tangled, fingers brushing over knuckles, and Karolina doesn’t know if she’ll ever be able to let go, now that she knows what holding Nico’s hand feels like, the way they fit together, the static between them, the softness of Nico’s skin.

“Kar?“ their breaths are mingling, bodies leaning closer and closer together still, time nothing more than a concept. And Karolina doesn’t understand how this is real, how it’s actually happening, knows that she doesn't deserve it in any way but is too selfish to put a stop to it.

Karolina does not believe that she was made to be happy, to survive this, and she’s still not sure if with “this“ she means their war against their parents or just life in general or the way her mind and brain is wired, but if she’s going to stop existing sometime in the near future she’ll forever have this moment, more than she ever thought she’d get.

“Yeah?“ she hums back. Her hand is still cradling Nico’s face, her fingers moving from the side of her jaw to the back of her neck, Nico’s hair soft under her skin.

“That’s not what I wanted to tell you.“ Nico has never sounded so gentle, her lashes fluttering close, slow blinks.

Their noses are touching now, brushing against each other and Karolina can’t think, has never felt more, her heart has never been this loud before.

“So tell me.“ she whispers and then, being braver than she has ever been, angles her face just slightly to the left, the quietest invitation.

Nico sighs and the warmth of it hits Karolina’s bottom lip.

The thing about being so captivated by another person is that everything else disappears.

The singing of the birds, the rushing of the sea.

The fact that they are in a house Karolina feels nothing but restrained contempt for, surrounded by proof of the emptiness of her life, the staggering indifference of her family.

All the insecurities that haunt her day and night, the conviction that Nico could never love her, that she doesn’t deserve any of this. That there is nothing in life for her but pain and loneliness and the role she was meant to play, collateral damage.

The ticking of the clock, the blowing of the wind.

Karolina is drowning in everything that is Nico, her smell, her little mannerisms, the way their lips are almost touching, not yet.

There is nothing else, only this, everything she ever wanted.

The opening of a door, heels against the floor, and the rustling of a white dress against freckled skin.

A hand that comes to rest on the kitchen counter, from where there is a clear view of the living room, the big, thousand dollar couch being the centerpiece.

Leslie Dean clears her throat and Karolina’s whole being just … stops.

()()()()

Once, when Karolina had been about six, her mom had taken her into Gibborim for a whole day, letting her take part in all the meetings, the prayer groups she would lead, organization for a fundraiser.

Karolina had never seen most of the halls she was lead through, had never been in her mothers office, allowed to touch and look and ask questions.

Leslie introduced her to everybody, a certain pride in her eyes, and Karolina couldn't get enough of the attention back then.

The fawning over her hair, her eyes, her freckles so like her mothers. The way she’d say please and thank you and would obediently sit by her mothers side.

She’d done everything right that day, followed all the rules, smiled wide and happy the whole time.

Later, after Leslie had shown her just how to start a worship, Karolina had tugged at her pant leg, had looked up at her hero and harshest critic.

“Mom.“ she’d asked, in the timid voice she’d used for questions, already half expecting Leslie to reprimand her for being a bother. “Why are you showing me all this?“

But Leslie had just leaned down, put her hands on Karolina’s shoulders and smiled at her.

“One day, when you're older, you’ll be the one these people will look to. They will ask for your hand in prayer and for your voice to lead them and it will be your responsibility not to let them down. Do you think you’ll be able to do that?“

Karolina had nodded, all earnest and awed, her stomach filling with something hot and bubbling, the kind of anxiousness she hadn't known yet then.

Her mother had patted her head and looked pleased, and Karolina had swallowed all the other questions she’d had, about the things she wanted to do and dreamed about and the life a six year old Karolina saw herself lead one day, one that hadn't had much to do with Gibborim at all.

Karolina had looked around her and already felt overwhelmed by the possibility of one day letting all those people down.

On their way out, past all the evening visitors who were leaving church, Leslie had gripped Karolina’s hand, tugged her closer.

“Don’t let go, Karolina.“ she had said, looking down on her with happy eyes, full of pride and promise.

“I don’t want to loose you.“

Karolina had never forgotten that, the way it felt to be appreciated and praised, her mothers hand holding hers tight.

It was all she had worked for every moment after, but she never got as close again.

(Karolina had also never forgotten, when they had gone to get ice cream on their way home that day, how Leslie had looked at her when she’d spilled some of her chocolate ice cream on the white dress she was wearing, all the way down the front.

How Leslie had shaken her head, disappointment and frustration heavy in her eyes.

“I knew I shouldn't have taken you today.“ she’d sighed, dropping the rest of Karolinas ice cream in the trash.

How it had only taken one little mistake to make her mother forget about everything she’d done right.)

()()()()

“Karolina.“ her mom says, the name ringing through the house.

Karolina and Nico snap apart, their hands ripping loose, both of them jumping to opposite ends of the couch.

“Mom!“ Karolina gasps, standing up, tries hard to mask the tremor in her voice, to make it look like she was not just about to kiss a girl, to kiss Nico, on their living room couch.

“Hi! Nico was just…“ but Karolina trails off once she sees the look on her mothers face.

Leslie’s eyes are cold and empty, nothing there, just hard ice that is staring at Karolina like she’s a stranger, and Karolina just knows.

Knows that her mom saw them, that she has been there long enough to figure out what was about to happen, that she would never be okay with it.

Karolina can feel her body freeze, ice running through her veins. Nico, who until now hadn’t left her corner of the couch, stands up too, somehow too far away for Karolina and still too close.

“Hey Mrs. Dean…“ but Leslie interrupts her.

“Nico was just about to go, I believe is what you wanted to say Karolina.“

Nico straightens, unsure, her eyes flitting from Leslie to Karolina, a question in them, but Karolina can’t look at her, can’t feel what she always feels when seeing Nico with her mother in the room, can’t free her eyes from her mom’s face, still empty and expressionless, no raging and screaming.

“Kar…“ Nico tones it like a question, like an invitation. “Just say the words.“ her inflection says. “Just give me a sign and I’ll stay. I’ll help.“

Karolina can’t accept, her hands are shaking, her whole body is numb, she has always been so weak, the weakest.

“Yeah.“ she croaks out. “That’s what I wanted to say.“ 

From the corner of her eye she can see Nico hang her head, fleetingly, and then nod, allowing herself one more look at Karolina and then stepping around the couch.

“Okay.“ she says, quieter than Karolina has ever heard her speak to an adult.

Nico leaves and Karolina can’t watch her go, does not allow herself to feel anything at the sound of the door closing, and it is almost easy, because while her heart is hammering everything else about her is still, a hand pressing down on her chest.

She’s waiting, hoping almost, for Leslie to do something, to start yelling and ask her about what that was, what it means. If Karolina thinks she’s gay now, throwing the words out laughingly and cruel.

Because then Karolina could say yes. Could tell her mother about all the beautiful things Nico makes her feel and how she never liked any of the boys her mother tried to set her up with, never appreciated any of the looks she got at school from the male population, could never again see herself with a boy, not now, not once she let herself think of the alternative, of living a life not repulsed by every touch and kiss.

Her mom doesn’t give her any of this though, and Karolina thinks she wouldn't be brave enough to tell her anyway.

Leslie just keeps looking at Karolina with eyes so careless and neglecting, so closed off, that Karolina knows that the last remains of the relationship that existed between them are gone.

That Leslie has decided to do exactly what Karolina had tried to do with her feelings for Nico: stop.

Her mother gives her one last glance, nothing in it, and then picks up her purse from the counter and leaves, her steps echoing up the stairs, the sound of her bedroom door closing filling the whole house, filling Karolina with an aching coldness, a nauseating dread.

Her mom knows, Leslie knows.

Karolina wants to cry and scream and leave, escape this haunting house that only ever hurts her, took from her her peace and safety and now Nico, the only chance she never thought she’d get of being with her.

Nico.

Who Karolina told to leave, who Leslie didn’t even spare a glance at and still Karolina sided with her.

Nico who has been her friend and then her nothing and then friend again and now, even, maybe something else, something new.

But Karolina hadn’t been able to look at her, had been frozen under the too blue eyes of Leslie Dean, those eyes that have never given her anything only ever taken, and had given up, just like that.

Karolina wants to cry and scream and leave but she does nothing instead.

Becomes nothing.

Does the one thing she’d gotten so good at: vanishes into her mind, where it’s dark and lonely and hopeless, where she belongs.

She’d been so stupid, really, to believe things could ever be different.

()()()()

End chapter 3