❝and you found me outside,
looking like somebody died.❞
— pale waves, new year's eve

♥

THE DOOR CLOSES with a quiet click.

I blink groggily, stirring awake to the sudden silence. It seems hollow, empty, an echo of a thick haze. "Scarlett?"

Did she leave?

Isn't that what I'm supposed to do?

It's her fucking apartment.

A sliver of light sneaks from beneath the door, but I can't remember—and probably never knew—which door is the bathroom and which door leads to the rest of the apartment. The shroud of shadows cascading through the cold space leaves me lightheaded, dizzy, still floating on a cloud of sheets as I try to stop the darkness that feels like it's fucking twisting.

Fuck. I can't throw up here. No.

I collapse, head sinking back into the pillows with a strangled hiss. The ceiling spins, spins, spins, and I can't stop watching it blur through the hazy, subdued light, barely there shades of blue gleaming through opaque curtains. It must be almost morning.

New Year's Day. 2020.

Fucking. Kill. Me.

"Scarlett?"

The silence is deafening.

Nauseating.

Hesitantly, I screw my eyes shut and sneak a hand under my pillow to find the smooth, slick sensation of my phone. Uneasy pinpricks slither down my spine, peppering my skin with goosebumps. Chills. The air is fucking cold and still, a deathly dream that doesn't feel... right.

Fuck. I'm still tripping? Bitch had strong shit?

Acid floods through me, dragging up, up, up, and I choke, my throat tightening around a coil of bile. No. I can't throw up here. I have to get the fuck out of here.

Ah, hit it and quit it, bro, Levi would say. GTFO.

The edges of my vision curl in, fading, charring like scorched paper until I'm swimming through a blackness, shivering, trembling hands and fingers tumbling around buttons. Jagged shapes of grey cut through, glinting across the dark screen in a warning. I flinch when light sparks, like flint against steel, exposing an old, blurry photo of me and my fucking brother that I... can't remember setting as my background... beneath a flurry of dim notifications.

THREE MISSED CALLS FROM
PENCIL DICK

Fallon.

What the fuck is Fallon calling me for? What even... happened to him?

Fuck, I don't even remember. Fallon was... on the sidewalk beside Levi in Bushwick as I tried to come up with an excuse to go home... and then in the front seat of a car as I mentally begged an Uber driver to drive us off a fucking cliff... and then in the doorway at Ginger's as I prayed that Levi hadn't started World War III in a lesbian bar... and then sneaking closer to a hot redhead on the curb as I fell in love with a beautifully broody brunette... and then... and then...

The Manhattan Bridge? Wait, no, the Brooklyn Bridge?

The M15. I fell, or... or Levi pushed me, and Scarlett helped me up, and the whole world shifted, struck by lightening, or electricity, and then Fallon was there in the trenches of the Lower East Side with two bitches. Score. Vera. Vera and... and Saige?

Berlin.

So, what happened in Berlin?

Fallon went to take a shit... and we left him? No, that didn't happen, did it? Fallon took home two girls for an undoubtedly kinky start to 2020?

Fuck. I shake my head frantically, desperate to ease the throb in the back of my skull. The deeper I dig, the dimmer it gets. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. I can't remember. How did this night become such a fucking mess?

Dismissing the notifications, I unlock my phone, flinching again when it all comes back twice as bright, blindingly hot, searing my fucking eyeballs. Instagram. I'd been on Instagram. I must've left it open when I... went to sleep? I'd been on her page, but then it wasn't her page, or it was another... dark-haired goddess.

2020.

It was going to be a better year. I could slide into her DMs after I lef—

Her profile pops up empty.

No Posts Yet

I blink, blink, blink, willing the cutesy, curated montage of dimly lit photos back to the screen, but aside from the profile picture and bio, it's empty. It's gone. Why would it be gone?

Forget.

The word ricochets through me, slicing through shards of glass until I can practically feel myself fucking shatter. Fuck. I wince, ignoring the mind-numbing pain, desperate to remember the things, the things, the things, the... snapshots of—

Look.

—blowing kisses, glassy eyes, barely clothed, always, always, always clinging to... men—

Feel.

miss you bro!

wish you were still here

forever baby, baby

rest in peace, yo

Dead.

Feel it, Nick. Feel it. Feel.

"Can you feel it?"

Forget her, Nick. Forget her. Forget.

"I'm sorry."

Look at this, Nick. Look at it. Look.

"Levi left you."

Red lips.

They're devouring me, razor-sharp teeth digging into my skin, like strings of barbed wire ripping through flesh, gnawing into muscle and bone, and I can feel myself slipping away, sinking into the haze, a million haunting voices, the echo like a hurricane unleashed in the hollow tomb of darkness. Nothingness.

"You're just another Levi," she drawled softly, "in a world of Levis."

Scarlett.

Thud.

My stomach lurches.

I shouldn't have taken anything. I shouldn't have drank. I shouldn't have let Levi talk me into this shit. I should've just... gone home.

Numbly, I watch myself, like a plume of black smoke, ashes, and embers, burning slowly, dressing into charred clothing, whirling around, whirling around, whirling around into a tumultuous tornado to throw a door open.

Darkness.

"Seriously, Scar?"

"Hey, bitch, I'm helping you."

I blink, disoriented. What?

"Scarlett?" Her name tastes like blood behind my teeth, metallic, lost in the late night, or the early morning that is still waiting, waiting, waiting for a better year. "Scarlett?"

"Shit, it's him."

"I can't believe you didn't take care of him."

"Nick is a good guy."

"No."

My feet scrape along wooden floors. I press my forearm to a cool wall, scratching the edges of my phone along the hard surface as I wade through waves and waves of darkness, threats of a riptide, roaring wind, conversations cresting within the chaos, buried beneath the endless storm.

"Oh, hell no, this is some lesbian cult shit, isn't it?"

I stiffen. Fuck, I'd know that voice in my worst nightmares.

Crack.

"Levi, if you don't shut the fuck up, I'll rip your dick off."

Carly.

"Oh, please, you love this dick too much to rip it off. I don't believe in this bruja bullshit. Bring it on, babe."

Silhouettes. Figures. People.

They're moving beyond the veil, a sheet of glass, illuminated in a haunting orange glow.

Candles.

Bitches.

"Scar, get him!"

"Scarlett?"

I can't see. I can't think. I can't breathe.

It hits me, a gust of wind, a tsunami, a supernatural force that knocks the breath from my lungs, and as I crash into a midnight ocean, choking on murky air and thick water, the timid flicker of my phone blurs past me with a single new message from Baby Back Bitch Brother.

GTFO OF GHERE
THIS BUTCHE IS CRAYZYY
THIS BITCMH IS CRAJer
THAN KAYLA

Kayla?

—HEY. I know this story took a dark turn, but I promised I'd bring back Levi, just... probably not in the way you wanted 👀

I just want to thank you guys for sticking with this story. It didn't even make it through the first round of ONC, and yet, it seems to attract more readers than my ONC submission that is still in the running. It's been a wild ride, and I truly can't believe that it's almost at 5K! 😂

I am trying to finish this story before I start posting new work, so expect the last chapter—it's gonna be real—in the next few days.

Here's to seeing Levi again?! 🤪