athew

ave dialed is no

he phone, dropped to my side as if burned. No longer in service. It couldn't be. T

ird. The same message. Again. And again. I tried texting, a desperate plea forming on th

t all logic, all reason. This wasn't a game. This wasn't one o

sessive gleam in her eyes, approached. "Jax? What's wrong? Who were you calli

an old contact." The thought of her, Cinda, the architect of this entire mess, now felt

office, immersed in code. "Jason," I said, my voice strained. "

er since... well, since the party. And the hospital. She really cut ever

rated through my entire being. I remembered her eyes at the party, cold and detached, when I had kissed Cinda so brutally. I remembered her

er quiet dignity in the face of my cruelty. Her unspoken plea for help in the pond, met by my c

under the weight of my indifference. And I, in my arrogant blindness, h

onvinced myself she would always come back. I had been so sure of my power, of her love. Now, I saw the

he city lights blurring into streaks of color. My phone, once a lifeline, felt like a dead weight. I scrolled throu

" status, now felt like a shrine to a forgotten god. All her c

p at the vast, indifferent sky. "Kylie!" I screamed, my voice raw, broken. "Kylie, wher

My arrogance, my selfishness, my monumental inability to see beyond my own ego. I had systemati

l now. The universe, it seemed, had a cruel sense of justice. It had taken the one thing I