Fractured Veil

Fractured Veil The first thing Claire noticed upon waking was the overwhelming starkness of the white room. It was sterile, suffocating, the walls padded like a cage. Her head throbbed, a dull, pulsing ache behind her eyes. She tried to remember how she got here. Her memories were a blur, a smudged painting with no discernible details. The door creaked open, and a man stepped inside. His eyes warm with devotion. He was handsome in a forgettable way--brown hair, soft smile, a presence that made her heart ache without knowing why. "Claire, sweetheart," he murmured, kneeling beside her bed. He took her hand and pressed it to his lips. "It's okay. You're safe. I'm here." She blinked at him, her voice trembling. "Who... are you?"

His expression didn't falter, though something in his eyes darkened. "It's me, darling. Your husband. James."

Husband? "You had an..accident," he explained hesitantly, brushing his fingers through her hair. "It caused some memory loss, but the doctors say you'll get better. I'll be here until you do."

"You just need time," he whispered against her hair. "You'll remember soon." He planted a gentle kiss on the top of her head.

I turn my attention to the corner of the room. There he was. Lenny The other patient. The one who always sat in the corner of the common room, his frail fingers twitching like spiders on his lap. Watching her with a twisted smile, an intensity that made her skin crawl. He had hollow cheeks and a perpetual smirk, as though he knew something she didn't. "You talk to him every day," he murmured. "James."

She turned, startled. "Yes...?"

Lenny chuckled dryly. "He doesn't exist." He said coldly, almost under his breath.

A shiver ran down her spine. "What are you talking about?"

"You're alone, sweetheart," he said, voice mocking. "You've always been alone." His twisted smile growing bigger.

Her stomach twisted. "That's not true. My husband--"

Lenny grabbed her wrist, his fingers like ice. "There is no husband." His eyes, wild and gleaming, bore into her. "He's not real!" Lenny shrieked. His voice bounced off the walls, growing louder, more frenzied. "He's not real!" Her skin went cold. "You're lying!" She cried out. The nurses of the psych ward come in as they hear the commotion, prying his grip from her wrist. "He's not real!" He repeated and shouted as they drag him to his room locking him in for the night.

"Claire?" A nurse called out, tapping her arm repeatedly with no response. "Claire? Are you alright?"

"W-what? Yes..sorry I-..I got distracted." She says her voice unsteady as she stands up, searching, scanning the room for her husband.

"Where did he go?" She murmurs under her breath. "Who?" A nurse calls out as she follows her through the common room. "My husband! He was just here. Did he leave?" She turns to the nurse, eyebrows furrowed as she seeks answers. "No one's here honey." The nurse says her voice is soft and comforting. Claire darts her eyes at her. "He was here! I saw him!" She cried out. Moving down the halls at a quicker pace, making sharp turns around the corners. "Claire! You're sick!" She calls out after her, a security guard stopping Claire before she can reach an exit.

"No! No!" Claire shouts as she gets dragged to her room.

As she sat in her room throwing herself against her padded walls, the fluorescent lights flickered. The walls pulsed, shifting closer.

The world seemed to tilt.

And then--

A flash. Blood. She screamed, it ripped from her throat like a jagged tear.

A body on the floor.

James.

Dead.

A raw, primal scream tore from Claire's throat, high-pitched and ragged, as if her vocal cords were shredding under the sheer force of terror.

Her hands, stained with crimson.

The sound of sirens.

Claire drops to the floor, she choked, desperate to inhale before exploding into a wail.

Nurses pour into the room, Claire's hands being forced into a straight suit, pricking her arm with a needle full of antipsychotic. Her wailing overpowering the buzz in the room.

Lights out.

Claire's eyes flutter open. Her skin pale and eyes empty, her expression blank.

A sharp laugh rattled from Lenny's corner of the room.

"You're chasing ghosts, girl. The mind plays tricks when it's broken." He gives a cackled chuckle.

Broken?

Claire stares at the ground as she blinks slowly, her body limp from the injection. The sedative was supposed to calm her, to silence the storm raging in her mind-

But something felt wrong.

James felt real.

The weight of unseen eyes bore down on her, making her skin crawl.

"Why did you do it, Claire?" James' voice was soft, teasing, curling around her like cold fingers.

She sucked in a breath, shaking her head violently. "I--I don't know!" She murmured to herself. Her fingernails digging into the sides of her head, desperate to claw away the voices, the memories, the lies.

His voice only grew louder.

"You stabbed me, Claire." His words tightened around her like a snake coiling around prey, constricting, suffocating. She covered her ears. "Stop!" She pleaded.

"Stop it! You're not real! You're not real!" She said her voice started to get louder.

Lenny grinned from his chair, his lips curling up into a sinister smile. "I told you." He says coldly, his voice eerie.

The cold walls seemed to drip with something dark, something red, and suddenly, she was there--back in that night, the knife heavy in her trembling hands, her eyes wide with something she couldn't name. Not fear. Not anger.

She gasped, squeezing her eyes shut. "No, no, no, stop, stop!" She repeated to herself.

As she covered her ears her nails began to dig hard into her scalp, strands of hair twisting between her fingers. James took a slow step forward, his shadow stretching impossibly long across the floor.

"Stop it! You're not real! You're not real!" Claire's voice cracked, rising in pitch, hysteria clawing at her throat.

Lenny grinned from his chair, his yellowed teeth peeking through thin, cracked lips. He watched her crumble, eyes gleaming with sick amusement.

"I told you," he whispered, his voice eerie and sinister, curling around the edges of the room like smoke.

Claire panted, her chest heaving, her fingers clutching at her hospital gown. The walls pulsed, warped, the ceiling stretched higher.

And then--

The door creaked open.

Claire flinched, her blood running cold.

A nurse stepped inside, clipboard in hand. her expression unreadable--calm, collected, utterly unaffected by the nightmare unraveling before Claire's eyes. She glanced at Claire, then at the empty space beside her bed.

"Claire, are you talking to someone?" The nurse asked, concerned.

Claire's mouth opened, but no words came out. She looked around, expecting to see the common room's cold chairs and the flickering light. But there was no common room.

No chairs. No James. No Lenny

She was strapped to a bed.

Thick, white restraints bound her wrists and ankles, pinning her down. The tightness around her limbs sent a new wave of panic crashing over her. A heart monitor beeped steadily beside her, the sound slow and rhythmic, indifferent to her horror.

The nurse gave her a small, patient smile as she sees my observant expression. "You've been in isolation for 2 weeks. There's no one else here."

Claire stares into the corner of the room where she could have sworn the other patient was sitting. No one. Just her, and the nurse.

"It can't be." Claire says breathlessly. "I was in the common room." She looks around dazed and confused.

"No, you were here." The nurse's smile didn't waver. She shook her clipboard slightly, the pages rustling. "I have the charts."

Claire's head snapped toward her, eyes wide, wild. "No, that's not--" She struggled against the straps, but the more she fought, the tighter they seemed to hold. "I--I was there! I talked to him! Lenny!"

The nurse's brow furrowed slightly.

"There's no patient named Lenny here."

"What?" she whispered, shaking her head, desperate, her mind grasping for something--anything--to hold onto. "But he... You pulled him off of me earlier! My wrist--" She gasped, yanking at the restraints harder, her movements growing frantic.

"I was bleeding! He hurt me!"

Claire thrashed against the bindings, trying to twist her arm free, her pulse hammering beneath her skin. She had felt it. The crushing grip of Lenny's fingers, the sting, the way her skin burned from where he had grabbed her.

Her voice rose in pitch. "Look! Look at my wrist! He grabbed me, I--"

She jerked against the restraints one last time, her breath coming in short, panicked bursts.

The nurse sighed and leaned down, her hands cold and clinical as she gently turned Claire's wrist in her grip, inspecting the skin.

Claire's stomach twisted.

There was nothing there.

No bruises. No red marks.

No sign that anyone had touched her at all.

Her chest rose and fell, a shudder racking through her as the walls around her seemed to press in.

That wasn't right. It wasn't right.

She had seen it. Had felt it.

Hadn't she?

The nurse gently placed her hand over Claire's wrist, offering a soft, reassuring smile. "You've been in isolation, Claire. There's been no one else here. I think... maybe your mind is playing tricks on you again."

Again?

Claire's head shook violently, tears welling in her eyes.

"No, no, no, that's not true," she muttered, her voice trembling. "I was in the common room. I saw the chairs, the patients--I talked to him."

The nurse gave her that same infuriating, practiced smile, the kind that made Claire feel small. Helpless.

"You've been in this room for two weeks, Claire."

The words rang in her ears, echoing in the hollow spaces of her mind.

"No," she rasped, her body trembling. "No, he was right there. He--he told me about James--he--"

The nurse took a step closer, the clipboard clutched firmly in her hands. "Claire," she said softly. "Who's James?"

The room tilted.

Claire's breath caught in her throat.

"My husband." She says, her voice uncertain trying to hold onto her blurring memories of James.

The nurse's face paled. "Your husband?"

"James," she said, voice shaking. "He visits me every day."

The nurse's lips parted slightly, as if searching for words, but no sound came. Then, she gently placed a hand on Claire's shoulder.

"Sweetheart," she said softly, "no one's been visiting you."

Claire swallowed hard, her throat tight. She blinked, her mind scrambling, reaching for the memory--trying to hold onto it, to prove to herself that it was real.

But it was slipping.

She knew she had spoken to Lenny.

She knew James was real.

Didn't she?

A sharp chill passed over her skin.

Slowly, hesitantly, her eyes flickered to the far corner of the room.

The chair was gone.

No twisted smile.

No yellowed teeth.

No gleaming, knowing eyes.

Just empty, lifeless.

The room fills with the sound of scribbling of a pen, Claire turns to the nurse writing something on the clipboard.

"I'm scheduling you for a therapy session," the nurse said, her voice gentle but firm. "I'll come get you when it's time."

Claire barely registered the nurse's words. They floated around her like distant echoes, lost in the whirlwind of confusion storming inside her mind.

Claire didn't respond.

She couldn't.

Then, a second nurse peeked into the room.

Claire's gaze flickered to her--just a quick movement, barely noticeable--but she caught the way their eyes met. The slight furrow of their brows. The way they turned slightly, shoulders angled toward each other, as if she wasn't even there.

Their whispers were hushed, urgent.

Too quiet.

They were talking about her.

She knew it.

The first nurse nodded at the other, their conversation ending in a silent agreement. She turned back to Claire, forcing that same patient smile onto her lips. The one that made Claire's skin crawl.

"I'll be back soon," she assured.

But it didn't feel like a promise.

It felt like a warning.

The door closed behind them with a soft, deliberate click.

She had been in the common room. She had spoken to Lenny. She had felt his fingers dig into her wrist.

Her skin still tingled from the touch.

But there was no mark.

No proof.

No Lenny.

Claire's hands curled into fists, her nails biting into her palms.

Her eyes darted toward the corner where the chair once was.

It was still gone.

Something wasn't right.

The air was too heavy. The silence too thick.

Claire's fingers twitched against the sheets.

And then--

A soft creak.

Her breath hitched.

Her gaze snapped to the corner of the room.

Nothing.

But for a split second--just a fraction of a moment--she swore she had seen movement in the corner of her vision.

A flicker of something shifting.

The faintest trace of a grin.

Her pulse thundered in her ears.

She squeezed her eyes shut, pressing herself deeper into the mattress, her fingers trembling against the restraints.

He's not real.

That's what Lenny said.

That's what Lenny wanted her to believe.

But Claire knew better.

After some time passed the door creaked open again, pulling Claire from the haze of her thoughts.

She flinched.

The nurse was back, her expression unreadable, clipboard clutched tightly to her chest. Behind her, a second nurse pushed a wheelchair into the room.

"It's time for your therapy session, Claire."

The first nurse moved to the side of the bed, loosening the restraints with careful, practiced movements. Claire barely had the strength to sit up as they helped her swing her legs over the edge. Her body felt heavy, drained.

A dream.

Maybe she had dreamt it all.

Maybe Lenny wasn't real. Maybe James-

No.

The wheelchair's cold metal handles pressed into her back as the nurses guided her into the seat. The hallway outside was stark, sterile--white walls, polished floors that reflected the dim lighting. The wheels of the chair whispered against the tiles as they rolled her forward.

Claire stared ahead, eyes unfocused. The smell of antiseptic burned her nose.

And then, for the briefest moment, Claire's breath caught in her throat.

A shadow in the corner of her vision.

A figure standing at the end of the hallway, just past the nurses' station.

Lenny.

His grin stretched wide, his teeth yellow and sharp, his eyes gleaming.

Claire's hands clenched on her lap, her nails digging into her skin.

But before she could say anything, before she could even react--

A nurse pushed open a door and wheeled her inside.

The therapy room was small, dimly lit. A desk sat in the center, a chair on either side. A clock ticked methodically on the wall, its sound too loud, worming its way into her skull.

A man sat across from her. He was dressed in a clean, gray suit, a notepad in his lap, pen poised between his fingers. His hair was neatly combed, his glasses perched on the bridge of his nose.

"Hello, Claire," he said smoothly. His voice was calm. Controlled. Measured.

"How are you feeling today?"

Claire's lips felt numb.

She wanted to say, Lenny was in the hall.

She wanted to say, James is real, isn't he?

But instead, she just sat there, silent.

The silence stretched between them, thick and suffocating. The therapist watched her with those patient, calculating eyes, his pen tapping softly against the notepad.

Claire licked her lips, her throat dry.

"I..." Her voice cracked. She didn't even know what to say.

How was she feeling?

Something wasn't right.

"You seem unsettled," he observed, scribbling something down. "Would you like to talk about why?"

Claire's fingers twitched against the wheelchair armrests.

"There was a man," she whispered, barely audible. "In the hallway."

The therapist's gaze didn't waver. "A man?"

She nodded stiffly. "Lenny. He--he was standing there. Watching me."

The therapist took a deep breath, adjusting his glasses as he wrote in his notepad.

"Claire," he said carefully, as if one wrong word would send her spiraling.

"Who's Lenny, Claire?"

"Lenny," she repeated, her voice hoarse. "He's a patient here. I--I spoke to him. In the common room."

The therapist nodded slowly, his expression unreadable. His pen tapped once against his notepad.

"You've mentioned Lenny before to the nurses and as they said," he said, his voice low, steady. "We don't have a patient named Lenny here." No.

No, she had seen him. Just like she had spoken to him in the common room. Just like she had felt his hands on her wrist.

Her breathing turned shallow.

"The nurses pulled him off of me," she insisted, her voice trembling. "My wrist--he grabbed me. They saw it!"

The therapist leaned forward slightly, his tone gentle. "No one saw that, Claire, because it never happened. You've been in isolation for two weeks. You haven't been in the common room. You haven't spoken to anyone but the nurses. You--"

He hesitated, then tapped his notepad.

"You haven't had a visitor either."

She shook her head violently. "That's not true. James comes to see me. Every day since the accident. He--"

The walls of the room warped, pulsed.

Claire's breath hitched, her nails digging into her palms.

No. No, he was real.

He had to be real.

"I think we should talk about the night of the incident, Claire," he said carefully.

The air in the room suddenly felt suffocating.

The incident.

"I believe Lenny is a hallucination. A fabrication of your mind, to cope." He said calmly as he studied my reaction.

"No," she whispered. Her nails digging harder into her pam.

"You weren't in an accident, Claire." His voice was barely a breath. "You did something terrible. Something your mind refused to accept."

Blood.

A knife.

A scream--

She squeezed her eyes shut, pressing her fingers against her temples.

Her head pulsed with pain, flashes of something dark flickering at the edges of her mind.

Her hands trembled in her lap.

The therapist leaned back slightly in his chair, crossing one leg over the other.

"Claire," he said, voice even, measured. "Let's talk about James."

Her breath hitched. Her eyes snapped open.

No.

She tried to steady her breathing, but the therapist's gaze was sharp, unwavering, dissecting her inch by inch.

She hated that look.

The look that made her feel like a puzzle with missing pieces.

She wasn't ready.

She wasn't ready to hear what he was about to say.

The therapist adjusted his glasses.

"You say he visits you every day."

Claire nodded slowly, feeling as though she was walking straight into a trap.

"But no one on staff has ever seen him." He tilts his head studying her nervous expression.

Her fingers dug into the fabric of her hospital gown.

"That's not true," she murmured. "He's real. He's my husband."

The therapist tilted his head slightly. "You remember marrying him?"

"Yes."

It came out too fast. Too desperate. She knew it

So did he.

The therapist didn't react, didn't challenge her. He simply flipped through his notes, the rustling of paper loud in the tense silence.

Claire's hands curled into fists in her lap.

"Why are you asking me this?" she demanded, her voice shaking despite her best efforts to sound steady.

The therapist leaned forward slightly, elbows resting on his knees.

"Because, Claire," he said carefully, "your medical records say you were never married."

Her breath caught.

Her head shook before she could even process the thought.

"No. That's--no, that's wrong."

The therapist didn't react, didn't move.

"James comes to see me," she insisted, her voice rising. "Every day. He--he tells me he loves me. He holds my hand. He--"

Her voice cracked.

It was real.

Wasn't it?

She squeezed her eyes shut, her nails digging into her palms.

The therapist's voice was softer now, but no less firm.

"Claire," he said, "when was the last time you saw James outside of this hospital?"

Her body turned cold.

Her mouth opened--but no answer came.

Her mind raced, desperately searching.

They had a house. A life.

Didn't they?

The house.

Their kitchen, the morning sunlight spilling across the hardwood floors.

James, sitting at the table, flipping through the newspaper, his wedding ring catching the light--

No.

Something was wrong.

Claire's breath hitched.

Something was wrong.

The memory wasn't clear--it was blurred at the edges, like something half-remembered from a dream.

Her stomach twisted violently.

"No," she whispered. "No, this isn't--this isn't right."

The therapist tilted his head.

"Then tell me, Claire," he said, voice gentle. "Who is James?"

Claire's entire body stiffened at the sound of his name.

A sharp, blinding pain split through her skull.

Images flashed--

A dark room.

A knife.

A scream--

Blood.

So much blood.

Claire gasped, her hands clawing at her temples.

Claire let out a strangled breath, squeezing her eyes shut, trying to block it out.

The therapist's voice cut through the chaos swirling in her head.

"Claire," he said gently, but there was something firm beneath the softness. "Who is James?"

A cold realization slithered down her spine.

Her fingers trembled.

The name felt foreign on her tongue now, heavy, unfamiliar.

She had known him--hadn't she?

James. Her husband. The man who sat by her bedside every day.

The man who whispered I love you into her ear, his touch warm and familiar.

The man whose face she--

Her breath caught.

His face.

Why couldn't she picture his face?

"I--I don't know!" She choked out, her head shaking violently, as if the motion alone could force the truth back into place.

Tears burned her eyes.

The room pulsed around her, warping at the edges, the fluorescent lights overhead suddenly too bright, too harsh. The sound of the clock ticking on the wall grew deafening, an unbearable rhythm pounding in time with the chaos inside her skull.

The therapist leaned forward, watching her carefully, his face unreadable.

"Claire," he said again, his voice gentle, but demanding. "Who is James?"

A violent tremor wracked her body.

Her stomach churned, a hollow ache clawing at her insides.

Her lips parted, but all that came out was a sharp, shuddering breath.

Then--a flash.

Darkness.

A metallic tang in the air.

The echo of a scream, her scream.

A shadow looming over her--no, not over her. In front of her.

A hand, slick with something warm and wet.

James' voice, strangled and weak.

"Claire... why?"

Her eyes snapped open, her pupils blown wide with terror.

Her whole body felt wrong.

Cold.

Distant.

Her hands lifted on instinct, her fingers stretching out before her--stained red.

She blinked.

The blood was gone.

The therapist said nothing, waiting.

The silence was unbearable.

Her breath hitched. Her fingers instinctively gripped the fabric of her hospital gown, twisting it tightly between her trembling hands.

"I--I don't know!" she cried, her voice cracking, a mixture of desperation and horror.

Because suddenly, she wasn't sure if James had ever been real.

Or if he had been real--once.

Had she been the one to take him away?

The room was too quiet now, suffocating in its stillness. Claire's breathing was ragged, uneven, her entire body trembling from the weight of what she couldn't--or wouldn't--remember.

The therapist studied her for a long moment, his expression unreadable. He didn't speak, didn't move, just observed as Claire clutched her hospital gown in a vice grip, her knuckles white.

She felt like she was drowning in her own mind, the walls of reality cracking around her, revealing something sinister just beneath the surface.

A memory that didn't feel like a memory.

A truth that lurked just beyond her reach.

The therapist finally let out a slow breath, closing his notepad.

"That's enough for today," he said evenly. "I--" she started, her voice hoarse, but she didn't even know what she was trying to say.

He was going to leave her alone with this?

With these pieces that didn't fit together?

The therapist placed his notepad beside him, resting his hands on his lap. "We'll continue this in our next session," he assured her.

She barely heard him.

Her thoughts spiraled, chaotic and fast.

James. The blood. The scream.

Claire swallowed hard, her throat painfully dry.

She didn't trust herself to speak.

The therapist stood, pushing his chair back with a quiet scrape against the floor. "I want you to rest, Claire. And try not to force the memories. If they come, let them. If they don't--" He gave a slight pause. "We'll get there."

Claire could only nod numbly.

He pressed the call button by the door. A few seconds later, a nurse entered, her smile small, cautious.

"Let's get you back to your room, Claire," she said softly.

As the nurse gently took her arm and guided her back into the wheelchair, a cold thought burrowed deep into her chest, coiling there like a living thing, tightening, squeezing.

The hallway stretched before her, impossibly long, the flickering overhead lights casting eerie, shifting shadows against the walls. Claire barely registered any of it.

Something was wrong.

Something had always been wrong.

Her pulse pounded violently in her ears as her thoughts unraveled, tangled threads of memory and doubt.

Had she really seen Lenny? Had she really spoken to him?

Had James ever really sat beside her bed, holding her hand, promising her that everything would be okay?

She wanted to believe.

To cling to the memories of him, the warmth of his presence, the love in his eyes--

But the harder she held on, the more it slipped through her fingers, like sand spilling from a broken hourglass.

A sharp chill prickled at the back of her neck.

She glanced over her shoulder.

For a fleeting second, she swore she saw a shadow--a figure standing at the end of the hallway, still, unmoving, watching.

Claire's body locked up, her breath hitching as a cold tremor ran through her.

Her foot shot out, pressing hard against the ground, halting the wheelchair so abruptly that the nurse stumbled.

Her heart pounded violently against her ribs, each beat a frantic, desperate pulse of something raw and unnamable.

Her gaze fixed on the end of the hallway.

A figure.

Standing perfectly still.

Watching.

Her throat constricted, her vision tunneling around him, the rest of the world falling away like background noise.

James?

Her pulse roared in her ears, drowning out the nurse's voice and the hum of the flickering fluorescent lights overhead.

It was him.

She knew it was him.

The shape of his body. The way he stood, his presence suffocating yet familiar.

But then--

A blink.

And the space was empty.

Her hands gripped the armrests of the wheelchair, knuckles turning white.

A firm, grounding pressure settled on Claire's shoulder.

"Claire?"

The nurse's voice was calm, steady--but there was an edge to it now, something carefully measured. Claire barely registered it, her mind still spiraling, still reaching for something that wasn't there.

That couldn't be there.

The nurse crouched slightly, moving into her line of sight, her fingers pressing a little harder against Claire's shoulder.

"Claire, look at me."

Claire's breath came in shallow, uneven gasps, her chest rising and falling too fast, too unsteady.

"You need to breathe," she said, her voice dipping into something softer, more coaxing. "In through your nose, out through your mouth. Just follow my voice."

Claire's eyes flickered to the nurse's face--kind, but watchful. Observing. Assessing.

They always watched her like that.

Like she was fragile. Like she was on the verge of breaking.

Or worse--like she had already broken, and they were just waiting for the pieces to fall apart again.

The nurse's fingers curled gently around her wrist.

"You stopped moving," she noted, her voice still light, but something flickered behind her expression. "What did you see?

The shape--the figure at the end of the hall--James? Was it James?

Had it been anything at all?

The silence stretched.

"Claire," the nurse prompted, firmer now. "Talk to me."

Claire swallowed, her throat dry and tight.

"I--"

Her voice cracked, barely above a whisper.

If she said it out loud, if she admitted what she saw--

Would it make it real?

Or would it confirm what she was beginning to fear?

That her mind wasn't her own.

That it was warping reality around her, piece by piece, until nothing left was real.

Her fingers trembled against the armrests of the wheelchair.

"I thought I saw..." she hesitated, the words forming and breaking apart in the same breath.

The nurse's expression remained steady, but her grip on Claire's wrist tightened just slightly.

"James?" she asked carefully.

Claire flinched.

The nurse didn't react--no surprise, no concern. Just expectation.

Like she had been waiting for Claire to say it.

Claire blinked rapidly, her vision threatening to blur.

She could still feel him. His presence, his eyes on her.

But he was gone.

Just like that.

Hadn't he been there?

The nurse sighed through her nose, shifting her grip.

"Come on," she murmured, her tone shifting, like she had already drawn her own conclusions. "Let's get you back to your room so I can give you your medication."

And just like that, it was over.

Like it hadn't happened.

Like he hadn't happened.

Claire allowed the nurse to push the wheelchair forward, but her hands remained curled into fists on her lap, fingernails pressing deep into the palms of her hands.

She was shaking.

James had been there. She knew it.

Hadn't she?

A slow, cold dread seeped into her bones.

What if she was wrong?

What if she was always wrong?

The walls of the hallway felt narrower now, pressing in, the lights overhead flickering, humming too loudly. Each shadow stretched just a little too far, just a little too dark, like something unseen was lurking just beyond her vision.

She wanted to turn her head, to check behind her, to make sure--

But the nurse's grip on the wheelchair tightened.

Claire swallowed hard.

She glanced down at her wrist.

There should have been bruises there.

Lenny had grabbed her. He had dug his fingers in hard enough to make her yelp, to leave marks--she had seen them, hadn't she? She had felt them.

But now?

Her skin was smooth. Untouched.

Like it had never happened at all.

Claire's breath hitched.

Something wasn't right.

The wheels of the chair rolled smoothly over the linoleum, the rhythmic squeak of the nurse's shoes filling the hallway. It was a sound she had heard countless times before, a sound that meant she was being returned to her place.

But this time, it felt different.

Her fingers twitched against the armrests, but she didn't dare move.

She could feel the nurse behind her, her presence warm, steady--too steady. Claire's room was just up ahead. The door was already open, waiting for her, welcoming her back into its sterile embrace.

Her throat tightened.

She had to remember.

She had to hold onto him--to the truth.

The bed waited for her inside, its crisp white sheets perfectly smoothed, the IV line already dangling from the pole like a noose. The needle waiting for her.

She couldn't go back in there.

She wouldn't.

Claire's breath came faster now, shallow and quick.

The nurse's hands were firm, unyielding, pushing her closer and closer--

Her heart slammed against her ribs, each beat a frantic warning.

No, no, no--

And then--

A shadow moved.

Just beyond the doorway.

A flicker of something dark, something shifting.

Claire's pulse stopped.

James?

Was it him?

Or was it something else?

Her mouth opened, a choked sound escaping--

The nurse didn't react. She didn't stop.

The shadow was gone.

Had it even been there?

Or was this just another trick? Another cruel twist of her unraveling mind?

The wheels rolled over the threshold.

The door creaked as it began to close behind her.

The room was too bright, the fluorescent lights above casting a stark, clinical glow that made everything feel artificial. Too clean. Too empty.

The nurse wheeled her toward the bed, her grip still firm, controlled.

"Let's get you comfortable," she murmured, as if Claire were nothing more than a restless child.

Claire's body tensed. She wasn't a child. She wasn't crazy.

Was she?

The straps were already waiting for her. Thin, padded restraints secured to the sides of the bed, ready to hold her down just in case.

They were going to drug her.

Her stomach twisted.

They were going to make her forget.

Claire swallowed hard, trying to will her voice to work. "I don't--" Her throat felt dry, like it had been stuffed with cotton. "I don't need it tonight."

The nurse didn't even blink. "Doctor's orders," she said with that same calm, unwavering tone.

The wheelchair locked into place with a soft click, and then warm hands were on her arms, guiding her up, forcing her to stand.

She was too weak to fight.

She let herself be lowered onto the bed, her body sinking into the mattress, the crisp sheets cool against her skin.

She felt like she was being tucked in for execution.

A second nurse entered the room, picking up the small needle.

Claire's blood turned to ice.

She couldn't.

Claire's gaze flickered to the door. She could run. She could fight.

But where would she go?

The hospital was a maze of locked doors and silent hallways, watching eyes hidden behind security cameras.

She wasn't going anywhere.

And she had lost.

She still remembered the feeling of too many hands grabbing her, forcing her down, the sting of needles pressing deep into her skin, burning as the world blurred and slipped away from her grasp.

She still remembered waking up in a bed she didn't remember climbing into, her wrists sore from struggling, her mind empty.

And James--

A sharp click. The rustle of gloves.

Claire's breath hitched as the second nurse moved toward the bed, fingers closing around a syringe.

Her stomach dropped.

No. No, no, no--

"I don't need it," she rasped, her voice barely more than a whisper, barely even her own. It was a hollow, pleading thing, slipping through her lips before she could stop it.

Neither nurse reacted.

They had heard it before.

The first nurse tightened her grip on Claire's arm, her touch deceptively gentle as she rolled up the thin sleeve of Claire's hospital gown.

The second nurse tapped the syringe, flicking at the barrel with practiced ease, forcing a single drop of clear liquid to bead at the tip of the needle.

"I said I don't need it," she tried again, stronger this time, her voice climbing higher, curling into the edges of panic. She jerked her arm, but the nurse's grip didn't budge.

She was trapped.

She felt it before she saw it--the cold swipe of an alcohol pad against her skin, a brief, sterile moment of warning.

The needle pressed against her skin.

A sharp sting.

Then--

Fire.

The medication flooded into her veins, cold and burning all at once, crawling through her like an unseen parasite, sinking deep, taking hold.

"No," she whispered, her voice breaking apart at the edges.

The nurses murmured something, but the words didn't stick.

The world was already shifting, already melting.

Her body felt too heavy, her limbs made of glass and static.

James.

She tried to picture him, tried to hold onto him.

His voice.

His face.

The way he would whisper her name--

But the memories slipped like water through her fingers, dissolving into the thick, creeping fog pressing against her skull.

Her body sagged against the bed, her muscles useless.

Her thoughts slowed.

Blurring.

Fading.

The last thing she felt was the nurse brushing the hair from her forehead, tucking her in with a mother's touch.

Then--

Darkness.

Claire drifted in the void.

Somewhere in the distance--beyond the thick fog pressing against her skull--voices murmured. A conversation. Detached. Faint.

She tried to listen, but the words twisted, stretching and warping like echoes in deep water.

She was floating.

Sinking.

Falling.

Her limbs wouldn't move. Her lips wouldn't part. She was locked inside herself, wrapped in soft, suffocating nothingness.

But then--

A sound.

Faint. Barely there.

Someone whispering.

It was different from the voices before, closer, cutting through the haze with an edge of something familiar.

Claire's body tensed, her mind clawing for clarity, trying to grab hold of the voice before it slipped away.

And then--

Her name.

"Claire."

Her breath hitched.

A hand brushed against her cheek--light, fleeting, just barely there.

Cold.

James.

Her eyes snapped open.

For a moment, everything blurred. The ceiling above her stretched, rippling, moving like it wasn't solid at all, like she was still trapped in a dream.

Her body felt wrong. Heavy. Slow.

Her mouth was dry, her tongue thick, leaden.

The medication.

She tried to lift her arms, but they wouldn't listen. The restraints held her firm against the bed.

A shadow loomed over her.

She froze.

Waiting.

His outline wavered, flickering at the edges like a candle struggling to stay lit.

James.

It had to be him.

But something was wrong.

His face was shrouded in darkness, his features just out of reach. She could feel his eyes on her, burning, pressing against her skin.

A chill slithered down her spine.

"James?" she tried to say but her tongue felt too heavy, her voice barely a breath.

No response.

Just silence.

He wasn't moving.

Just standing there.

A statue in the dark.

Don't look.

Something inside her screamed at her to look away. To stop staring.

But she couldn't.

She was caught in his pull, in the void of his presence, in the weight of something she couldn't understand.

Her fingers twitched against the sheets, her limbs still sluggish from the medication.

A whisper.

Soft. Gentle. Crawling beneath her skin.

"Why did you do it, Claire?"

A pause.

Then--

"I thought you loved me, Claire"

The lights flickered.

Claire's stomach dropped.

A deep, gut-wrenching terror surged through her veins, choking her, pressing her deeper into the mattress.

She hadn't.

She couldn't have.

A flash of red.

The sound of a blade slicing through flesh.

A scream.

His scream.

"No," Claire rasped, shaking her head, shaking the memories away, her pulse hammering against her skull.

This wasn't real.

It wasn't real.

But James--he was still there.

Still waiting.

And when the lights flickered again, just for a second--

He was closer.

The air in the room felt thick, suffocating, pressing against her skin like damp cloth. Every instinct screamed at her to look away, to stop staring, to squeeze her eyes shut and pretend she wasn't seeing this--wasn't seeing him.

But she couldn't.

She was frozen, locked in place, helpless against the pull of his presence.

The lights flickered again.

And he moved.

Just a fraction of an inch. Barely perceptible.

But closer.

A low, shuddering gasp fell from Claire's lips.

Her fingers curled into the sheets, her muscles straining against the restraints, the dull bite of fabric against her wrists the only proof she was still here. Still awake.

James wasn't real.

He wasn't.

"You killed me."

His whisper curled around her, inside her, lacing through her bones like ice.

"No," she whimpered, shaking her head violently, her throat clenching. "No, I didn't. I didn't--"

But the memories, jagged and sharp, pushed back.

Blood on her hands.

His voice--weak, wet--begging.

A knife.

Jagged. Merciless.

Claire's body lurched forward with a ragged sob, her head spinning. The restraints yanked her back down, pressing her deeper into the mattress, her movements useless.

Trapped.

James took another step.

Claire's breath caught in her throat, her stomach twisting into something cold.

Claire's fingers trembled where they gripped the sheets, her nails digging so deep she thought they might tear through.

The light above her flickered--once, twice--then died.

Darkness swallowed the room.

And then--

Something touched her.

A hand.

Ice-cold fingers brushed against her cheek, slow, deliberate.

James' voice was in her ear, close enough that she could feel his breath, warm and damp, sending a violent shiver down her spine.

"Liar."

The word slithered into her skin like a parasite.

But Claire's body no longer trembled.

Her hands, still strapped to the bed, relaxed.

A sharp, creeping sensation coiled in her stomach, slithering through her veins like something alive, something wrong.

Recognition.

Claire's mouth curved into a sinister smile.

James faltered.

For the first time, he hesitated.

Claire exhaled, slow, steady, her breath curling into the space between them, her head tilting ever so slightly toward where he loomed in the dark.

She felt him now.

Not just the cold, not just the whisper of his touch.

She felt the way the air trembled with his presence, the way his voice curled inside her like it belonged there.

She let her eyes flutter shut.

And laughed.

Soft at first. A quiet, breathy thing. Then deeper, richer, laced with something twisted.

"You don't get it, do you?" she murmured, voice a low, delighted hum.

James didn't respond.

Claire grinned.

Her fingers flexed against the straps, aching to reach out, aching to touch him the way he had touched her.

He had always been hers.

She let her head loll to the side, whispering into the void.

"I didn't kill you, James."

The air tightened.

She turned her head just enough that she could feel him still hovering there, could sense the tension rippling through him.

"I set you free."

The lights exploded back on.

And James was gone.

A slow, shuddering breath left her lips, and as the nurse rushed in, muttering about "another episode," about upping her dose, about how she was getting worse--

Claire laughed.

Low. Dark. Humming with something vile.

Because she knew something they didn't.

She was never alone.

Not anymore.

And when she finally got out of here--

When they finally let her go--

She'd set them all free, too.