Page 70 of Kiss Slay Replay

All I can hear is the caw of the ravens, and the specter’s sharp inhale.

It’s a ferocious tug, akin to vomiting. But it’s more painful. More cutting. And it itches. It burns. Burns deep with an explicit, frenetic sting. The pain evolves. Escalates. My vision blurs and now all I can hear is my own screaming, and inside it the echoes of every time I’ve ever broken down in tears, every moment in my life that has brought me to my knees, the sound of my hurt in breaths and whispers and shouting matches and slammed doors. The time my mother slapped me across the face for talking back—the time I told Ravi about it, and he said he was sorry, and it was wrong, and that I didn’t deserve it, and I wasn’t sure if he was lying to be nice or if he really didn’t question whether I deserved it or not. Because maybe I did. And maybe I deserve this.

The last thing I see will be these two red eyes and this open mouth drinking me in.

The last thing I feel will be pain. Pain and emptiness. Dying is so lonely.

I reach out just to feel something, anything else, and my fingers graze the feather in the phantom’s hat.

The rope of fog around my neck tightens. Squeezing, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing, squeezing, until SNAP.

My time is up.

1

My eyes flip open.

Sunlight. It’s coming in through the windows. I’m in my studio. I’m flat on my back. In bed.

I’m in my bed.

Breathing. The surf of my pulse pounding in my ears.

Alive. I’m alive in my bed.

“God-fucking-damnit! Fuck! Motherfucker! What the fucking fuuuuckkkkk!”

Archimedes leaps off the foot of the mattress and runs, terrified, into the closet.

I kick my covers to the floor. I’m in my pajamas. I grab my phone and check the date. Friday, September 25. It’s the morning of the wedding.

Again.

I rip off my socks. My suitcase-smashed foot is healed—no bruise, no swelling. I press on it. It hurts a little but nowhere near how it did. My head throbs, my chest is tight. I hold up my phone and open the camera, reverse it. I still have a face. I look fine. Tired, but fine. Not sure how to tell if my soul has been sucked out—TBD.

I go to call Cassie but hesitate, hovering my thumb over her name. She’ll just tell me it was nothing. A bad dream. Let it go. Simmer in the hellfire hot tub. She’ll accuse me of being needy. Of making today about me.

Which, not to prove her point, but it kind of seems like it might be, considering I can’t escape it.

Instead, I Google “repeat déjà vu” and skim the results.

Stress and exhaustion can lead to déjà vu…

Can also be a sign of seizure disorders…

What is premonition déjà vu?

Déjà vu and Time Loop Theory…

How do I know if I’m stuck in a time loop…

A time loop?

A time loop.

Fuck me. That’s not a thing. Not a real thing.

Right?