April, 2019

Creeeeeeeeeeak! The door let out a long, whining protest as I opened it, causing my brows to furrow.

It never did that before.

The house was dark as I stumbled inside, though my eyes needed no adjustment thanks to my immaculate night vision.

Kicking off my shoes, I crept through the house, dodging the temperamental floorboards we were still yet to fix as I made my way up the staircase.

Step-by-step, the house grew more eerily quiet.

Normally there's always someone up, even this late in the evening. Normally the faint sounds of Ivan's snores echo through the house. Is he out? Is everyone out?

Step-by-step, my surroundings got darker and darker.

Did the moon disappear in the sky? I wondered.

Step-by-step, I walked the flight of stairs. Each step got steeper as I headed up. Each step got creakier.

As I reached the top floor, my feet automatically came to a halt.

So far, I had been focussed on watching my footfalls, wary of whether I was being too noisy. But as my gaze turned upwards at the top landing, my heart almost stopped.

Every spare bit of space was filled. Shoes—sneakers, sandals, heels, uggs, boots—lined the floor, making it impossible to walk through to my room.

And they weren't just any shoes. They were Loren's, Ivans, Erica's, Jayce's, Drake's, Emma's, mine, Jade's...

My eyes ticked off every person I knew, heart now pounding in my chest as my gaze zeroed in on the back row.

Anja's.

Ben's.

Hers.

"What the fuck is going—" I started to whisper, until a scream from my room cut me off.

Instantly recognising the voice, I pushed my curiosity aside and ran for it.

Weaving a bit of magic into my touch just in case it was locked, I yanked at the door handle and threw it open.

Thud!

The wood slammed against the plasterboard, sending an echoing noise travelling through the house.

"Emma?" I frantically called into the vacant room.

But the room was dark.

The large, blood-red moon shone through the opened window, highlighting the made bed, the vacant shelves, the foreign furniture. It was as though I hadn't lived here in a while.

As I tried to ascertain what was going on, my whirling thoughts were cut short once more.

Another scream pierced through the house. This time in Ben's old room... in her room.

Spinning on my heel, I was off again, running as fast as I could, tripping over the shoes on the way.

Once more, I channelled magic to my grip before I reached for the handle of the next door. And, with as much force as I could muster, I threw it open.

It didn't take long for my eyes to lock on her.

Wearing an emerald green dress and adorning a red wig, Emma stood in the middle of the room, holding a pair of familiar white shoes... her favourites.

"W-what is going on?" I almost whimpered as I glanced between the item in her hands and Emma's golden eyes.

But she just stared blankly ahead. Not at me. Not behind me. Not at anything in particular.

"Emma?" I tried, taking a hesitant step into the room.

But the moment my foot collided with the floorboards, the room began to shake.

"Run, Emma!" I cried at her, trying to make my way through the room to save her.

Though she stood steadfast in her spot, staring at nothing, gripping onto the shoes tightly in her hands.

Yet the closer I came, the more her hands trembled. And as her hands shook, droplets of some liquid began to fly out of the shoes.

I didn't let it stop me though. One steady step at a time, I made my way across to her, convinced she was locked in some trance.

Did a witch do this? I wondered.

A siren?

My stomach clenched as another worry dawned on me. Was my mum here?

My hands finally collided with her wrists, trying to steady her. At once, everything went still.

Suddenly, the lights flickered back on, the house and room illuminating.

Life returned to Emma's gaze as she looked at me, confused.

But as her eyes slowly trailed down to my hold on her, she dropped the shoes in her hands and let out a blood-curdling scream.

As she jumped back from me and the shoes, my gaze turned down, fixated on the sight. Crimson liquid ran out of the sneakers, smearing over the dark umber floor, seeping into the cracks.

· · ───── ∘☽༓☾∘ ───── · ·

At once, I sat up. Head whipping this way and that, my eyes took stock of the dark room.

Emma's body rose and fell beside me as she took gentle breaths. The slight sound of laughter echoed up from Ivan and Drake still awake on the floor below. And I clutched my chest, feeling my heart pounding so hard it might just leap out.

It was just a dream, I tried to reassure myself. Just a dream...

But as I laid back down, arms winding around Emma's body as I pulled her closer, the image of bloody shoes flashed through my mind once more. The image of Emma adorned in clothes that transformed her into her.

The fuck is my subconscious trying to say? I couldn't help but wonder.

Hoping to drown out the racing thoughts, I buried my head into Emma's hair, inhaling her scent and hoping her warmth and closure would erase the haunting night terror that almost felt like a premonition or warning.

· · ───── ∘☽༓☾∘ ───── · ·

When I awoke the next day, Emma had already left for work. Though, even alone in my bed searching for the cracks in the ceiling, I still remembered the nightmare in vivid detail.

At once, I whipped out my phone and located the Grimm's Fairy Stories on Project Gutenberg.

Thumb moving the screen at rapid pace as my eyes searched for an answer, eventually my scrolling came to a halt as my gaze landed on the line.

"Rook di goo, rook di goo! There's blood in the shoe. The shoe is too tight, This bride is not right!"

Of course the shoe was too small for Emma, I countered the line. She was holding her shoes.

Though the images continued to resound in my brain in vibrant recalls.

Desperate to remove it from my memory, I started to concoct a plan... a way I could stop the self-doubts that came with my ties to Emma... a way to strengthen our relationship more so that the parts of me that missed the ties I once had to her would stop haunting me and instead connect themselves to my new partner.

Though before I launched into the plan, I tried running it by Erica, which... didn't go smoothly.

· · ───── ∘☽༓☾∘ ───── · ·

"You're rushing into this," she said, placing her drink down on the table before crossing her arms over her chest in what seemed like an almost tired manner.

"I'm not!" I insisted, leaning over the table with desperation in my gaze. Though I knew she could see through me. I was struggling to keep up my facade. Ever since midday, my body washed with this strange sense that something was different about London... I just couldn't figure out what.

"You are," she declared.

I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a part of me that expected this response from her... or maybe hoped for it. Like she was my shoulder angel of reason. But, at the same time, I wanted her to support me like a friend should. "It's time. And it's not like I'm asking her to cement the bond with me."

"Lukas—" she started to sigh until I cut her off.

"She spends almost every night at ours anyway." Argue with that one.

"But there's still the option of space if either of you need it. She has a house to go back to and she does go back to it every day, giving you both the break necessary this early in a relationship. Sharing a room four months in—"

Her timeframe triggered flashes of copper hair in my bed in Soho... That wasn't even four months in. We weren't even dating.

Stay present, Lukas. Remember the mission at hand.

"Why are you so against her moving in with us?" I sidestepped the conversation.

"I'm not against her moving in... More that I'm against her moving into your room. You know I love Emma. We all do. We welcomed her the moment you introduced her at the start of the year. It's just... well... if you're that determined, there's better, slower solutions. Ones that require less... commitment."

Holding back the temptation to roll my eyes when her words trailed off, I pressed, "Such as?"

"We have a spare room in the house."

At once, all emotion from my face dropped as an icy chill swept through me.

And in my silence, she continued to ramble. "I've been thinking for a long time we should fill it—"

Erica's words were barely audible as she went on, even the clinking of knives and forks against plates in the surrounding cafe becoming a muted background noise.

Instead, all I could hear was the pounding of my heart in my chest.

All I could concentrate on was the racing questions in my head.

Can I really let someone take that room?

Let alone, can I let Emma be the one?

"—and we're all feeling the emptiness of that room, so Emma would be the perfect—"

"No," I cut her off once the words and coherency returned to my mind.

"Lukas—" she tried to reprimand for the millionth time.

"No."

"But why? It's not like Ben is coming back... or her."

Head turning away, not wanting Erica to see the full extent to which her absence still marked me—though knowing full well she was seeing the parts of me still tethered to those times starting to crumble—I mumbled, "That room is cursed. And I don't want Emma to get mixed up in that." With my words came the memory, screaming back in loud echoes, of blood seeping into the ground... of the copper wig on Emma's head. "She's not a replacement." I insisted to the nightmare that haunted my mind.

"I know she's not," Erica replied as though I was talking to her. "I wasn't saying she was. But... that's also why she can take the room and fill it with life again."

Shaking my head, I reluctantly let my stinging gaze meet Erica's worried onyx eyes. "No one will take that room again. It's tainted. It's cursed."

With a sigh, she leaned back in her chair. "Fine. I'll do an anti-hexing spell to ease your—"

"No," I insisted again, willing her to see sense... hoping that she wouldn't try to convince Emma of this behind my back.

She pursed her lips together, gaze working over me as she thought through her next words. Then finally she said, "Well, I still think you're rushing into this."

"We'll see what Emma says," I decided, firmly locking in my intentions in place.

I have to do this... it's the only way to make sure I've properly moved on, I then told myself in quiet.

What do we think of Lukas's plan?

And what do we think of the dreams they are both having?