Page 116 of Inextricably Tied

“At night, when I can’t sleep…” A heavy laugh bubbles out of Evie. “Which is every night. I try to imagine the dark like his darkness. It wasn’t scary. Better than the light. He was warm. Quiet. I don’t know if that’s a good coping mechanism. Should probably tell my therapist.”

“Therapy…” Tears threaten to slip down Harbinger’s cheeks as she nods. “I should probably try that.”

Evie extends her hand, but stops herself. “You saved my life. If you hadn’t shown up, I would have…” Evie shakes her head, darkness crowding the edge of her eyes. “Thank you for coming. For not giving up on me.”

“We couldn’t have gotten out without you.” Harbinger reaches her gloves for Evie’s fingers and squeezes. “I’m really glad we found you.”

They stay like that for a moment. Then Evie pulls away, stepping back toward the end of the aisle. “I should go. My parents barely agreed to let me come in by myself. They’re probably freaking out.”

Her bird trills as she gives a final wave before she disappears out the door. Across the parking lot, she lifts the packet triumphantly in her hand before her father curls his arm around her and presses a kiss to the top of her head.

Back at the motel, Harbinger empties her pockets of food. The smile stays on her face, an unfamiliar guest Flint notices immediately. His lips quirk to match hers. “What?”

“I saw Evie at the gas station. She says thank you.”

He softens. “How is she?”

A disbelieving laugh pops out of Harbinger. “She’s good.” Warmth spreads across her chest, the ember of Evie’s feelings a reminder that she’s alive. “I think she’s gonna be good.”

“And what about you?”

Harbinger doesn’t reply, condensation forming on the outside of her cup.

Soon, it’s been a month without Agony. The hole tunnels deep inside her, past the clutter of everything else she’s touched. There’s not “nothing” where he once was. There’s a pit. No matter what grows over it, one wrong step and Harbinger sinks right back into his absence. Grief has taken up residence where he once was, and it refuses to leave.

Her dreams change again. It feels wrong for her mind to sink back into something that resembles “normal,” but Harbinger still suffers in the mornings when she wakes. Any time she lets herself fall into the trap of forgetting that Agony’s gone, the wound tears again when she opens her eyes.

There’s a nagging in her dreams as she moves from one loop to another. Thrust back to the Convent, having a sleepover with Evie and a female gargoyle that looks like Flint. In another dream, Poe and Omen hang glass windchimes above motel doorways. Everyone in her dreams is out of place, crossing over where they shouldn’t be, but someone’s always missing.

The real world isn’t better. She and Flint get sucked into the trial for the OID. It’s tempting to duck and run, to take cover from the very people who got them into this. The people who left Evie and the other girls on their own. The people who tortured and killed Agony. Who tried to kill them. But Flint reminds Harbinger that if they can stop this from happening to someone else, they owe it to all of them to try.

Every morning is a game of roulette, waiting to see if they’ll be called, until the day they are. Harbinger sits on the witness stand, wringing her gloves and staring fixedly at Flint. It takes more than one reminder from the judge for her to remove her helmet. She keeps it clenched in her lap.

Tamneth glares bullets from the defense table. The OID attorney approaches the stand. “Now, Ms…”

“Harbinger.”

The attorney checks his notes. “Is that your real name?”

“It’s the name you’re going to call me.”

Cross-examination goes about like that. Days later, when Flint and Harbinger are finally free, it doesn’t feel like victory. It doesn’t feel like anything.

Harbinger shrugs out of her coat in the motel room. It’s already dark outside, the cold chill of fall kicking dead leaves across the half-empty parking lot. She doesn’t bother stripping out of her suit, flopping onto the bed with a heavy sigh. Flint tosses his wallet onto the table. “You want dinner?”

“No.” She stares at the painting above the bed and wonders what Agony would have seen.

Flint’s keys clink against the table. “I guess in a few days, we’ll be out of here.”

It’s what she’s been dreading. The final day of their testimony, the only thing keeping them in one place. They haven’t taken a job in two months. They hardly get out of bed most days. The finale of all of this means they have to move on. Get back to a life she can’t imagine any longer.

“Do you just feel aimless?” Her gaze stays on the ceiling. She’s too afraid of what will break in her if she looks at Flint. Before he speaks, she feels his answer.

“…yes.”

“Like everything is purposeless,” she murmurs. “Like, what’s the fucking point?”

Flint sinks down on the edge of the bed, elbows resting on his knees. “Yes,” he murmurs. “I feel like that. Wondering if it’s possible to be happy again. If that was the happiest we’ll ever be,”