Page 42 of Pick Me Up On Tuesdays

"Clark, why are you talking to yourself—" Ethan stopped mid-sentence. Then he burst out laughing.

I turned to glare at him, my eye twitching. "What."

"You look terrible," he wheezed, clutching his stomach. "Like—like a Victorian child who just escaped a haunted orphanage."

I threw a towel at him. "Get out."

Ethan dodged it effortlessly, still laughing. "Seriously, dude. Did you get any sleep?"

"Yeah," I grumbled. "Some."

Ethan raised an eyebrow. "Clark, blinking doesn’t count as sleep."

I waved him off, turning back to splash water on my face. "I don’t have time for your nonsense, I need to—"

Then I saw it.

The scar.

The one just below my belly.

I froze.

For a moment, I wasn’t in the bathroom anymore. I wasn’t even in the present.

I was a kid again.

A terrified little kid, curled up in a corner, hands over his head as blows rained down. As a distorted voice—inhuman, monstrous—roared something he didn’t understand.

Not once.

Not twice.

Many times.

A shiver ran down my spine. My throat felt tight.

I sucked in a breath, snapping back to reality. My reflection stared at me—pale, wide-eyed, trembling.

And then—

From the doorway—

Ethan.

A demon.

My chest squeezed.

For half a second, my exhausted, trauma-riddled brain forgot that Ethan was Ethan, the dumbass who had dragged me into a crime for chips and made fun of my sleep deprivation.

Instead, all I saw was a demon.

Something dark. Something dangerous. Something that had hurt me before.

Something that could—

No.

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