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Time passed by ruthlessly, even without one noticing by glancing at a watch, lifting up their phone, or staring at a clock ticking on a classroom wall. Every second has already passed before one can even think it, and before long, an entire day, month, year, has slipped into the past with the kind of violence that leaves marks. Bree feels those scars embedded deep underneath her skin. In the same place where she feels the aching of her mother’s absence, and the screaming of her ancestor’s pain. She’s trying to be strong for all of them. To forge a new path, and begin something new. But time also brought her back here, to the cliffs. A place where she watched people make that fateful and bold decision to jump. Bree had wanted to be that reckless, too. And it was smart for Alice to have stopped her then. There was no one to stop her now.
“Wait.”
At first Bree thinks the word is in her head. That her subconscious has grown that horribly loud that it projected itself outward. It’s only when she turns to find Sel leaning against a nearby tree, echoing the past so profoundly, that she comes to the realization that she might not be crazy after all.
“Why? The water will catch me. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people have done this before. I’m not about to die from jumping off this cliff, Sel.” She stared at him, waiting for a good enough reason to walk away. To slink her way back to her dorm, or hide herself away in Nick’s old room. Missing him had turned into a scab. One that she picked at incessantly when left to her own devices. Better to occupy her time to the best of her ability. To feel like she was doing something worth the time and effort. Or to just pretend like she was normal.
He scoffed. At least, Bree assumed it was a scoff. She wasn’t used to any behavior from him that didn’t somehow manage to become condescending. As if she hadn’t proved herself lately. Like she couldn’t properly handle herself after everything they had been through. She considered pushing him off the cliff, but Sel would just laugh the entire way down.
Bree blinked, waiting for the words to come out of his mouth, to watch his lips take shape. The waiting was too long, another minute had slipped through her fingers, so she turned away first. Eyes glaring at the water below as if it had personally offended her, and not the puzzle of the boy behind her. Intent on disliking her but failing at every avenue.
She took a single step forward when something warm curled around her hand. Bree thought she must have imagined the feeling of fingers intertwining with her own. What relief it brought, to not feel like she was taking on the world alone. How silly a thing, hands clasping hands. And what a difference it made. Just moments ago she wanted to prove to nature itself that she could fight back against the wide arc of a clock. That her decision to jump might be the catalyst needed to push through this liminal time in her life.
Sel squeezed, with no intention of letting go, and Bree looked up to meet his gaze, just to be sure that this wasn’t some fake memory being planted in her brain. “I can’t go back there. It’s nicer here. Simpler. This is even the first place that we met. Do you remember?”
There was no doubt in either of their minds that he did. Back then, Sel probably didn’t spare her a single glance except for the fact that he had to wipe away any memory of what might be happening. To cover up the monsters and demons from other realms, and fight side by side with his own makeshift family. She stared hard, as if the very act could allow her access to his brain from that first night. Maybe then she’d know the truth of it all. She doubted he was about to spill out any confessions, not when she continued to break all of the rules that he attempted to implement.
“Yes, Briana,” Sel said at last, hand still tangled up with her own, a sigh escaping alongside her name. That always seemed to happen when he actually said it. Like he was admitting defeat and raising a white flag. “I tend to never forget when such a major pain in my ass enters my life. You really managed to fuck things up.”
He might’ve intended it as a kind of criticism, a pricking of the finger, a punishment of sorts, but Bree didn’t hear anything of the sort in his tone. Sel sounded more fond than actively annoyed. Like this was a moment he seemed to cherish, instead of intending to discard. Why couldn’t he be less complicated about things? They had both lost Nick, and now seemed like the perfect opportunity to set differences aside and merely state how they feel. He’d have to go first. Bree made that decision a long time ago. It was the least he could do.
“Someone else would’ve come along eventually to do the same thing,” Bree replied, refusing to comment on their frozen pose on the edge of the cliff. “You should consider yourself lucky that it was someone with such excellent hair.” She smiled at him, tugging at his hand to move forward, though he refused to move. That was the thing about Merlins, they weren’t so easily pushed around. Something about being annoyingly powerful, yada yada yada.
When Sel tugged back, it wasn’t in a step toward the cliff, but a movement toward him. Something lurked in his eyes that resembled more of a demon than a college-aged boy. She ought to have been afraid, but she’d faced worse. Her skin was thick, and her tongue sharp.
“If you want to jump, we’re jumping together.”
“You’re not bound to me, Sel, there’s no reason to do all of this. Just watch, make sure I don’t accidentally drown, and maybe grab me a towel.” She’d regret getting her hair wet later.
Sel remained firm, “No.”
Bree remained stubborn, “Yes.”
They stared at one another, hands still tucked between one another, water splashing down below, and the distant echoes of college students switching classes setting the scene. Bree wanted to look away and break whatever spell was binding them here. To not look at Selwyn Kane, tilt her head, and find something far more inviting in him than she should. But maybe that was his problem, too. If he could simply be looking less like he wanted to pounce on her, none of this would have been such an issue.
She was about to shatter their tense truce when none of it mattered anymore, because Sel had launched them both off the side of the cliff. They were hurtling down to the water, Bree sounding out a loud screech that was half terror and half unadulterated joy. Nothing mattered. Everything mattered. And his warm hand was the extra strength she needed to know that she was safe, and above all else, wasn’t that what she had wanted?
When they surfaced, Bree was sputtering. Her screams had left her mouth wide open for water to rush in, and Sel’s face could only be described as smug.
“If I knew you were thirsty, I would’ve just suggested we go to the kitchen. I’m not sure I’d recommend drinking any of this.”
With her free hand, she flipped him off. “You just pulled me off a cliff, I think I’m allowed to choke on some water. Instead of laughing at me, you could at least drag me back to shore.”
In the water, their connected hands left Sel with more maneuverability than on land. One small pull, and she felt herself careening to him, like gravity had simply stopped existing, and he had turned her into some kind of asteroid. With a splash, she was pressed up against him, her eyes blinking as her brain attempted to keep up.
“What are you doing?”
His face turned to stone, and their hands unclasped as Sel took in the situation that he himself had created. Their bodies were still orbiting one another as they continued to tread water, only now, Sel looked his age. The water had drowned out the master magician, and in his place a regular boy, with wants and needs, and simmering emotions that had no real outlet appeared. He had been stripped bare, even with his clothes sticking to him in the slowly settling water.
“You shouldn’t jump alone.”
And then he was gone, leaving her and her churning legs in the water with nothing of him left behind but two words trapped carelessly in her throat. Come back.