“You feel that?” Ollie asked into my hair. Warm hands attempted to blanket the chill as they ran up my arm and down my side.
“mmhmm,” I hummed, speaking of something else entirely.
“The sun is out, love. You slept through the entire night to wake up to a new day. One we don’t deserve,” his lips brushed across my shoulder, “What will you do with it?”
I flipped in his arms, my eyes disobedient to the sun but caving to his voice. Ollie intertwined his legs with mine with his eyes still closed. His dimple deepened beside his all-knowing grin. I wanted to crawl inside his brain and roll around in whatever place he imagined for us. Leaning away from him, I stretched my arm under the mattress to grab my camera. A rush of cold air came between us, and I snapped a picture, capturing his essence in a black and white polaroid that held more emotion than anything in color could portray. He was all shades of beautiful.
It was February 29th. Leap day.
Ollie, Zeke, and I sat around our table during breakfast.
Zeke’s hair was curlier, bouncier, than usual. His brown eyes glowed from across the table. The rare and saintly moments caught in Zeke’s smile could light the darkest night. Ollie grinned right back at him, chewing the breakfast in his mouth and sent him a wink. Peace washed over the three of us.
Two and a half more months and we would all finally be set free.
Ollie would accomplish what Tommy couldn’t, and rescue Zeke from this place.
I want to hear you play, Zeke signed to me.
“I’ll play for you,” I smiled.
Zeke had come so far since I’d first arrived. I remembered the times he’d only stare from across the table as I’d blurted every thought crossing my mind—mostly about Ollie and how he managed to piss me off, but it had been only because I couldn’t grasp the fireworks and symphonies colliding inside me whenever Ollie was near. Zeke had been a part of every step of our journey, becoming the silent rock holding our two pieces together.
It was time for Zeke to write his own love story.
Ollie leaned over the table and took another bite before dropping his fork and breaking off into a wordless conversation with Zeke. Ethan stood alert at his post against the wall with his hands clasped firmly to his belt. His face was expressionless but wholly healed from the altercation weeks ago. Ever since we had found out about Maddie’s condition, Ethan kept a close eye on her, watching her every move.
Coincidently, nothing more happened with the prankster.
My gaze moved over to Jake, who now sat at a different table with Liam, Tyler, Jude, and Bria. Liam and Jake indulged in small talk inside their bubble, and my heart fluttered at the smile expanding across Jake’s thin lips. Jude’s hand clutched firmly to Tyler’s beneath the table as Tyler and Bria joked about something I was too far away to hear.
It was small, the glare Bria shot over to me, and if Ollie never told me what had happened between the two of them in our room, I would have missed it.
I was back and forth on whether or not I should confront her about the advance she made at Ollie. Trust me; I wanted to punish her. All I needed was two minutes alone with her.
Then, my eyes landed on Maddie. She and Gwen sat alone eating in silence in the middle of the mess hall between my table and Bria’s. Maddie shook her bangs from her eyes before she took a bite, nodding as Gwen waved her hands animatedly in the air. Maddie’s eyes fixed on the tray before her, tuning the girl out, I’m sure.
Ollie had no idea the dirt Ethan and I had dug up on Maddie.
At this point, I had no reason to hide it from him any longer other than the shame for invading my friends privacy—Jake’s, Bria’s, and Tyler’s. Though, I was desperate.
And desperation made for bad decisions.
It was February 29th.
Leap day.
The keys of the piano felt like ice against my fingers as they danced with the notes to Ollie’s current favorite, Firestone.
Awe struck in Zeke’s eyes as he sat still in the black chair by the window with Ollie by his side. Ollie’s fingers moved fluently across the pages of his journal under the sun, glances stolen between us. I inhaled the chilly air through my nose, and it felt like spearmint coating my throat and lungs when the door to the group therapy room swung open.
Bria stood there, examining the room with a raging fire in her eyes.
My fingers froze over the keys. My eyes darted back and forth to Ollie and Zeke by the window. Ollie flinched, sending a panic inside me.
“Keep playing, love. It sounds beautiful,” Bria snarled, closing the door behind her. The click of the lock bounced, and she turned to face us. “Hey, Ollie,” Bria smirked, but her stride closed in on me. Ollie stood, Zeke’s eyes bulged, and I jerked my eyes in her direction.
“What are you doing here?” I asked nervously as she circled me.
“Bria,” Ollie warned, and before he could make it to me, the edge of a sharp blade pressed against my windpipe.
“Sit down, Ollie, or I’ll cut the bitch in two.”
My eyes fixed on Ollie, afraid to move—afraid to blink. The lightning crashed behind my eyes and my vision clouded, but even my tears were too afraid to fall. Ollie’s light eyes bottomed out, fear zeroing in, and the change happened almost immediately. He inched forward, his palms out in front of him, begging with scrambled words and a broken tone.
The sharp tip of the cold blade pierced my skin. It burned, and warm blood trickled down the length of my neck. I sank my teeth into my lip to fight my body from trembling or moving at all.
“N-n-n-no,” Ollie stammered with bloodshot eyes. “Please, don’t do this, Bria. God, I’m fucking begging you.”
I wanted to speak, but it was hard to get any words out when you couldn’t breathe. Shock took complete possession of me, and I sat stunned and watched as Ollie broke apart from ten feet away.
His words sounded distant, and his movements seemed lost in slow motion. Time lagged, and I squeezed my eyes closed to wait for the inevitable.
“Sit down, darling.” Her tone was calm. Too calm. Bria’s hair brushed against my cheek as she leaned over. “I’ve been waiting a long time for this.”
“For what?” Ollie shouted, then quickly lowered his tone. “What did she ever do to you? Bria, you can walk away. Right now, we’ll never speak of this. Please! Fuck. Don’t do this!”
“Madilyn,” Bria deadpanned. “My name is Madilyn and if I have to hear you call me that name one more time … ”
“I don’t understand,” Ollie’s voice shook, grasping his hair with tears falling from his red eyes. “But we can go talk. Let her go. We’ll sort this out.”
“No, I think Mia deserves to know the truth before I finally get rid of her,” the girl said close to my ear. My eyes sprang open to see Ollie take two steps forward when she yanked my head back and dug the blade into my throat. “You want to test me? She’ll be gone by the time you get here, Ollie. I wouldn’t suggest taking another step.”
Ollie stopped in his tracks, and his hands shook at his sides.
“I wanted a clean break, too—a fresh start,” she continued with her story. “Brianna, the girl you’ve come to know as Maddie, the two of us got close at the institution before we arrived. Really close. The plan was brilliant. I’d have a new identity, Maddie would have access to me. The bitch did whatever I said, actually followed through with it and switched our folders, switched our bloody identities, before we arrived to Dolor. I had her eating out of the palm of my hand,” the girl blew out a menacing laugh. I turned my eyes to her, the girl I thought I knew—the girl whose black short hair grazed my cheek and I had called Bria for almost two years. She was fucking Madilyn—she was Maddie. She had been the one with the delusional disorder this entire time. “Can you believe she actually fell in love with me?