Archive of Our Own

The first thing I noticed about the island was the quiet. Not complete silence though. There’s always the sea chewing at the shore, gulls screaming overhead, the constant rattle of palm fronds but just the same, it offered a different type of quiet. A kind that wraps itself around your skin and says, you can breathe here.

That’s all we were literally supposed to be focusing on, finally a time to catch our breath.

Bobby called it a “hiatus retreat,” which made it sound like homework, but really it was his way of forcing us to stop. Stop running. Stop working. And instead of our penthouse and studio, he offered a private island. A custom-built house. A private dock. No schedules, no tours, no press. Just us. Just three girls who had achieved and overcome more than he even knew about.

But before we left, he cornered me in his office. Really, I should have known better. There was always something hidden, even in the good things that Bobby created for us.

He slid a flash drive across the desk like it was contraband. “Storage space is almost at capacity. We can’t move forward until it’s cleared.”

I groaned, slumping back into the chair. “Bobby, it’s a vacation.”

He looked more desperate than I’d ever seen him. “Zoey, you’ve pulled so many fragments out of these files and turned them into songs, into future ones. I don’t know what matters and what doesn’t. It would take me weeks, possibly months to go through it all. But you’ll know immediately what can go, what needs to stay. Please. Just… look through them when you can. It has to be done before we start the next album.”

He was begging, and I hated him a little for it. But I nodded anyway. “Fine. But only when I have time.”

He smiled like I’d saved him, and that was that.

I should have left the damn flash drive in the city.

Instead, I slipped it into my bag.

The island itself looked like it had been plucked out of a dream. A half-hour by boat from the mainland, it was a crescent of white sand wrapped in turquoise water, framed by cliffs and mangroves. The air carried salt and hibiscus, and gulls wheeled overhead like they’d been hired to complete the picture.

And then there was the house. Our house. A two-story glass and wood structure built right against the curve of the beach, so close the waves nearly licked the stilts that raised the deck. The whole front wall was glass that slid open onto a wide veranda, where hammocks hung between beams and lanterns swung in the breeze. The upstairs was a ribbon of bedrooms with floor-to-ceiling windows and balconies, each one angled toward the sea so that no matter where you stood, the horizon filled your vision.

Inside, everything was warm wood and white linen, open-air rooms that breathed with the island itself. The kitchen had polished stone counters and a pantry stocked like a market, enough rations to last us months without ever stepping foot off the island. The living space wasn’t really a living room so much as a sunken lounge pit layered with cushions, perfect for collapsing together after long days. There was a private pool, a narrow dock stretching out into the waves, and a short trail leading through the palms to a hidden cove. Even the bathrooms had outdoor showers, tucked behind woven screens, so you could wash off under the open sky.

We explored every corner like kids in a new playground, Mira calling dibs on the biggest balcony, Rumi immediately testing the hammocks, me opening every cabinet just to marvel at how prepared it all was.

By the time we settled on the dock, the sun was sinking low, the tide humming against the stilts. I didn’t want to disrupt this peace but I knew if I didn’t do it now, they’d ask questions later so it was really for the best to just get this out of the way.

“Uh, guys. There’s something I need to say really quick. You won’t like it.” I said, fiddling with the flash drive in my hand. “But I’d rather you know up front. Bobby asked me to sort through some files. Just a few. Nothing major. And I’m telling you this so didn’t  have to wonder why I had my laptop out sometimes or were in the media room.”

Mira groaned, tossing her head back against the chair. “Zoey. You deserve a break as much as we do.”

Rumi’s frown was quieter but heavier. “He couldn’t have asked literally anyone else?”

I shrugged, guilty. “He said I’d know what to keep and it is true that I’ll know better than he does. A lot of my inspiration for lyrics comes from these. And I’ve already begun to incorporate parts into our future songs. Since I am the only one who knows what I’ve taken inspiration from and what I haven’t, it does make sense for me to go through them. Besides… I did say yes. But I promise, I’ll only do it when it doesn’t cut into our time.”

They weren’t happy. I could feel it in the set of Mira’s jaw, in the way Rumi’s silence lingered. But they nodded anyway, reluctantly.

“Fine,” Mira muttered. “But if you disappear into that laptop more than once in a while, I’m tossing it into the ocean.”

I promised it wouldn’t come to that. I meant it, too.

The first week was paradise.

We slept like corpses, dead to the world for twelve hours at a time, the kind of sleep that sinks into your bones when your body finally believes no one’s coming for you. We ate like queens, whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted, pancakes at noon, ramen at midnight, fruit ripped straight from the trees, juice dripping down our arms as we laughed ourselves sick.

We laughed until our throats went raw. Mira nearly choked on a mango because Rumi decided to balance slices on her nose like a circus seal. Rumi collected seashells until her hands were overflowing, cradling them like treasure, only for Mira to swoop in and toss half of them back into the waves with a wicked grin. Rumi’s scandalized face was so dramatic I thought she’d challenge Mira to a duel.

Mira snorkeled out past the dock with neon-green fins, then emerged dripping and triumphant to declare herself Poseidon, right before she swallowed half the ocean and came up sputtering, doubled over with laughter. Rumi and I dragged her back to shore, Mira hacking seawater and still grinning like she’d conquered Atlantis. I thought she looked unstoppable like that, even with salt water dripping from her chin.

We took turns cooking. Well, Rumi cooked, Mira helped prepare, and I was quickly banned from touching the pans after nearly setting rice on fire. Rumi muttered about “protecting her craft” while Mira laughed so hard she nearly dropped the cutting board. Sometimes, when Rumi’s hands moved sure and quick over the stove, her brow furrowed in concentration, I found myself watching longer than I meant to.

Nights on the deck blurred together, the three of us sprawled under a spray of stars, swapping stories we’d never had time to tell before. I’d never heard Mira laugh so much, or seen Rumi so unguarded, her sharp edges softened in the glow of lantern light. Something inside me kept tugging at the sight, something warm and undeniable.

There were hikes through the jungle, Rumi carrying a walking stick like an old explorer, Mira stomping ahead like she could blaze a trail through the trees with sheer stubbornness. There were lazy afternoons in hammocks, our limbs tangled, books abandoned on our laps, the air heavy with salt and sun.

And sometimes, we didn’t talk at all. We just sat in silence, listening to the waves. For once, the quiet didn’t feel heavy. It felt like breathing.

And I thought, this is what safety feels like. And maybe, though I wasn’t ready to say it yet, this is what love feels like too.

And then, in true Zoey fashion, I ruined it.

It happened on day eleven.

I should’ve been napping with them in the hammocks, swaying under the palms. Should’ve been floating in the pool, sunburn blooming across my shoulders. Should’ve been sipping whatever cocktail Rumi had decided she was an expert at mixing that day.

Instead, I was in the media room, door closed, laptop burning against my knees, a hard drive blinking like a guilty heart beside me.

I told myself I was just skimming. Just dipping a toe in. I had to start somewhere, otherwise, it would all pile up into one massive cram session and I hadn’t pulled one of those since high school. The thought of Bobby breathing down my neck when we got back was worse than skimming a few files now.

The folders were harmless enough at first. Raw clips. Behind-the-scenes moments. Test shots where the lighting was wrong and everyone laughed too hard about it.

And then I saw it.

DOPPEL_NACHT_CAM7.mov

My stomach flipped. My finger hovered over the trackpad. I don’t know why I clicked it. Now, I do know. Some sick part of me needed to scratch the wound, needed to look.

The screen filled with shadows, static stripes, red emergency lights stuttering across the frame. Then movement. Then faces.

Mira and me.

But not us.

It was the night demons had worn our skins that night, close enough to pass in the dark. The mimicry was perfect. Down to the tilt of Mira’s head when she was listening, down to the crooked smile I never realized I made.

They cornered Rumi on stage. The music was still pounding faint and warped through the audio, Takedown echoing like a taunt.

It was the night right before Mira and I learned the truth about her. The night the demons had won.

My breath hitched, caught in my throat.

I froze the frame.

Rumi’s face filled the screen, that moment before she realized. Before the floor dropped out from under her. Before betrayal carved her open.

I remembered what came after, too. The real us outside. Rumi stumbling into the night. The chaos. The truth crashing down like a blade.

I remembered our faces, Mira’s and mine, as we listened, frantic, mission-first, our hearts sealed tight because there wasn’t room for anything else. We felt betrayed. We had lifted our weapons to Rumi but not used them. Instead, we had vanished and left her alone when she needed us the most.

I remembered how we reacted. How I reacted. Cold. Efficient. Like she was a problem to solve, not a person bleeding in front of us.

Back then, I hadn’t known what had happened on stage. Hadn’t seen the demons wear our skins, hadn’t seen the way Rumi’s whole world cracked apart in an instant.

But now… now I couldn’t stop seeing it.

Her face. That look. That pain. It branded itself behind my eyelids.

I slammed the laptop shut so fast the air cracked, the sound loud in the quiet room. My chest heaved. My hands shook.

But the image was already carved into me.

That was the night I started hiding.

Since then, I couldn’t look at her without hearing it. Couldn’t hold her gaze without replaying it. I had hurt her, really hurt her and I’d never felt so guilty about anything in my life.

I didn’t know what to do with it. With any of it.

So, I did the only thing I could. I stopped letting her see me.

The island made it easy to disappear. And if that wasn’t enough, it wasn’t surprising that I wanted to explore when they wanted to relax. My energy was always up a couple of steps than theirs. I was always hyper curious, wanting to do things when both Rumi and Mira wanted the couch. Rumi had especially become this way now that the Honmoon was taken care of and she could drop her workaholic tendencies. So, at first, no one questioned it. They assumed I was just being, well, me.

“Just going for a swim,” I’d toss over my shoulder, slipping down the steps before they could ask more.

At first, Mira shouted after me, “Don’t get eaten by a shark!” her voice full of laughter. Rumi would just wave from the hammock, towel slung over her shoulder, trusting I’d be back by dinner.

But then my swims stretched longer. Past the reef, where the turquoise water dropped into endless blue, until the cold stung my skin and the silence pressed in heavy. I’d float on my back, staring at the sky until the sun burned my eyes, and try to convince myself the waves could scrub me clean. I’d dive under water and keep my eyes open, letting the salt slightly burn as I looked up at the distorted sky through the waves.

The truth was, the water did more than that. It steadied me in ways I couldn’t put into words, in ways I wasn’t ready to put into words. Every pull of the tide seemed to catch something inside me and draw it back into rhythm. Every current smoothed the sharp edges buzzing under my skin.

I told Mira and Rumi it was therapeutic. I told myself it was habit. But deep down, I knew why I kept going back.

The water had always called to me.

And it always would.

Other days, I hiked. I cut through mangroves where the air was damp and green, until my shoes filled with sand and sweat stung my eyes. I climbed cliffs sharp enough to slice my palms and shouted into the wind when I got to the top, where no one could hear me. The black rocks at the edge of the island became my sanctuary, jagged, unforgiving, tide pools shimmering like tiny mirrors of the world. I’d sit there until the sun dropped into the sea, my skin prickled raw, salt caked across my lips.

I left early. Came back late. Sometimes not until the candles burned low on the table.

Mira would greet me with raised brows and a too-bright, “Look who survived the wilderness.” Her grin was sharp, but her eyes cut too deep.
Rumi wouldn’t say anything. Just set down another plate, still warm, waiting.

But her eyes asked the question every time. And every time, I lied.

It worked until it didn’t.

Mira cornered me on day fifteen, while Rumi was napping. I’d just dragged myself back in, hair dripping, skin salty, lungs aching. I had been out studying currents, the areas near the cliffs. Mira leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, fire smoldering in her eyes.

“You trying to become a mermaid or something?”

I laughed at the absurdity of her comment. “Uh, definitely not. Why?”

“Because you’ve been out there more than you’ve been here.” Her smile was quick, sharp, masking the way her gaze searched mine. “I mean, great cardio, but… what gives?”

“Nothing.” The lie slid out smooth, practiced. “I just like the water.”

She tilted her head. That Mira look, half curious, half don’t-bullshit-me. “You liked the water before, too. But you used to like being with us more.”

That stung. I ducked past her, muttering, “I still do. You’re overthinking it.”

“Maybe.” Her voice followed me down the hall, quieter now. “But maybe you’re under-talking it.”

The words lodged sharp in my chest.

Rumi didn’t corner me. She never did because she knew what that felt like. She just appeared.

One dusk, I was on the rocks, knees pulled tight to my chest, watching the tide pools flicker with trapped starlight. I hadn’t heard her footsteps, but suddenly she was there, sliding down beside me, curls wild from the wind. I nearly jumped out of my skin.

Because for a heartbeat, just one, I thought I was seeing her face from the file. That frozen frame. That look.

“Sorry,” she murmured quickly, tucking her knees up, voice low. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

I forced a laugh that didn’t sound right in my throat. “It’s fine. Just… spaced out, I guess.”

“You’re going to wear yourself out, you know. You’ve been up before the sun and not back until it sets. You need some rest. Regardless of how excited you are by the island. We’re not leaving for weeks. There’s plenty of time to explore and we can always come back.” she said softly after a moment, eyes tracing the horizon.

“I’m fine.”

“Zoey.” Just my name. Not a question. Not an accusation. Just weight.

I stared at a hermit crab dragging its shell across the shallow pool, desperate for something to anchor me. My voice came small. “I’m sorry. I know this is supposed to be vacation. But right now, I think I need… some time to recharge before I can keep playing, if that’s okay.”

She nodded once, like she’d already known that would be my answer. For a while, neither of us spoke. The surf licked at the rocks, the sky shifting from rose to indigo.

Then she said, quieter than before, “You don’t have to apologize for needing space. But… I wish you didn’t feel like you had to take it alone.”

My throat tightened. I wanted to say something, anything that would make it easier. Instead I whispered, “I’m okay. Really.”

Her eyes searched mine, steady and soft, like she could see through the lie. But she didn’t press. She just stayed. Sat with me until the stars bled across the sky.

Which was worse than anger. Worse than questions. Because she trusted me enough to wait for the truth.

And every time I stayed silent, I was betraying that trust.

The island became mine in pieces.

First the shoreline, the sand squeaking under my feet, shells popping like faint applause. Then the mangrove trail, canopy so thick it swallowed sound. Then the reef, alive with darting fish and coral gardens, where the water turned colder the further I swam. Then the tide pools, glassy and fragile, worlds inside worlds. Then the black cliffs, sharp and lonely, where the wind whipped hard enough to steal my voice.

Each day I claimed another corner, another hiding place, as though the more ground I covered, the more distance I could put between me and the truth I refused to speak.

But it wasn’t enough.

The memory followed anyway.

The file. The not-me and not-Mira leaning close to Rumi on the stage. Her face when she realized it wasn’t us. Her face later when it was. Every night, I saw it again. Every morning, I woke heavy with it.

And then the nightmares started.

Sometimes they ripped me awake screaming. My throat raw, my body shaking, the echo of red lights and Rumi’s face still burning behind my eyelids. And always, always, Mira and Rumi were there. Mira would grab my shoulders, fire in her eyes but her hands steady, muttering, “It’s okay, you’re safe, I’ve got you.”

 Rumi would slide onto the edge of the bed, curls falling forward, her hand cool against my wrist, her voice soft as a tide pulling me back to shore.

I never explained. Couldn’t. I’d just gasp, “I’m fine,” even as my chest rattled with the lie. They didn’t press. And in the fragile peace of the island, it was easy to believe maybe this was normal, my mind finally playing catch-up, forcing me to process everything I’d shoved aside in order to survive. Nightmares as a kind of twisted healing.

But the worst nights weren’t the screaming ones.

They were the silent ones.

The nights I woke up without a sound, sweat slick on my neck, heart pounding like a trapped bird. On those nights, I didn’t call for them. Didn’t let them see.

I went to the media room.

The glow of the laptop painted my face ghost-pale in the dark as I sat cross-legged on the floor, the flash drive pulsing faintly like it had a heartbeat. I’d open folders, one after another, and hit delete.

Raw clips. Behind-the-scenes takes. Even harmless files. I tore through them like a purge, desperate, mechanical.

It wasn’t about clearing storage anymore.

It was about obliteration.

Every click felt like erasing history. Erasing proof. As if deleting the files could delete the knowledge of them. Could delete the guilt gnawing me alive.

They saw it, of course. The exhaustion clinging to me like a second skin. The bruised half-moons beneath my eyes, the faint redness that could’ve been from crying or too much screen time. My movements slower, my smile thinner.

They asked. Always gently at first.

“You okay?” from Rumi, quiet and steady.

“What were you up to?” from Mira, laced with forced casualness.

And every time, I offered some half-truth. Didn’t sleep well. Just needed air. Lost track of time.

And in the morning, when I stumbled to breakfast, Mira would crack a joke too sharp, her laugh just a little too brittle. Rumi would slide an extra plate in front of me without a word, as if food could fill the hollowness she saw spreading. And both of them would look at me too closely, studying the edges of my eyes, the tremor in my hands.

I forced smiles. I forced laughter. But nothing fooled them.

Mira didn’t buy my excuses. Rumi didn’t push past them. But both of them knew.

I hadn’t slept in five days.

Not really. A few hours here and there, broken by the nightmares. By day twenty, I was frayed. Worn thin. My thoughts jittered, skipping like a scratched CD. My body felt heavy and brittle at once, like I was made of glass about to crack.

And then the cracks started showing in stupid ways.

One night, Mira dared me to race her the length of the pool. Normally, I would’ve laughed, smacked her shoulder, made a big production out of stretching before diving in. Instead, I just shrugged, “Not in the mood.”

The disappointment in her grin hit harder than any race outcome ever could’ve. She covered it quick, splashing water at me and firing off some snark about how I was “scared to lose.” But I saw it, the flicker in her eyes before the mask slid back into place.

Another afternoon, Rumi reached for my hand on the hammock, fingers brushing mine in that quiet, easy way she always did. Reflex. Comfort. And I pulled away too quickly, my heart hammering because I could still see the frozen frame of her face on that screen.

Her lips parted like she wanted to ask. But she didn’t. She just tucked her hand under her leg and kept staring at the horizon like it held the answer I wouldn’t give her.

I hated myself for that. Hated the way her silence stung worse than anything she could’ve said. Because I knew what she thought, that I was rejecting her. Rejecting them. When the truth was so much worse.

Meals got quieter. Where we used to linger over fruit and toast, laughing about nothing, I rushed through and excused myself. Mira cracked jokes at dinner that I barely smiled at. Rumi filled the silence with soft observations about the tide, the birds, the weather, and I nodded like an automaton, my chest screaming with everything I wasn’t saying.

Evenings on the deck stopped feeling like home. Mira sprawled out with her head tipped back, making constellations out of nothing, and I found excuses to leave early. Rumi sat cross-legged, knees brushing mine, and I shifted away like I’d been burned.

And every time I tried to meet their eyes, all I saw was that clip. It followed me like a shadow, carving itself into every smile I broke, every touch I denied.

I told myself they hadn’t noticed. That maybe they thought I was just tired, or restless, or too lost in my head.

But then came the email alert.

And all hell broke loose.

It was supposed to be a movie day and we were starting early. Mira had hauled every pillow in the house into the pit, turning it into a fortress of blankets and fabric towers. Rumi had caramel popcorn cooling on the counter, the sweet smell curling through the air, and for once I was partially at ease.

I had gone through the files. Deleted what was necessary. It was finally done. And as a result, I had actually gotten some solid sleep. My body didn’t ache so badly. My head felt almost clear. My appetite had come back, and things were starting to feel normal.

I was halfway through untangling a blanket, Rumi humming softly in the kitchen, when Mira’s phone buzzed on the pile beside her.

She frowned, thumb swiping the screen. “That’s odd… There’s a system alert.”

My chest tightened.

“What kind of alert?” Rumi asked, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

“Bobby’s archive.” Mira’s brows knit tighter as she read. “‘Multiple files deleted. Pending approval due to how many were selected?”

Her gaze flicked up to me, too sharp, too quick. “Z?”

A quite curse slipped my lips before I could stop it. I didn’t know anyone else would be notified. The system had warned me multiple times that it would require an authentication. I had ignored it and clicked on “proceed” without giving it much thought. I didn’t realize that the backup was synced to Mira’s account but I should have known.

“That’s a lot of files,” Rumi said as she looked over Mira’s phone. Quiet. Certain.

“It’s nothing.” I sighed. My voice cracked sharper than I meant, a whipcrack in the soft room.

“Sure,” Mira said carefully, “I mean, that’s what Bobby asked you to do. I get it. But the deletion times…” she scrolled, her jaw tightening, “They’re all over the place. Three in the morning. Five a.m. You’ve been working through the night?”

Her eyes lifted, not unkind but relentless. “And why can’t we even see what they are? Why are they locked by you?”

“I told you, they’re nothing. Just cleaning house.”

“Zoey.” Rumi finally looked at me full-on, her patience stretched thin, her storm eyes steady and cutting. “Stop lying.”

The words burned. Because she was right. Because I couldn’t stop. Because if I opened my mouth, everything would spill.

“Why can’t you just leave it alone?” I shot back, sharper than I meant, the words scraping my throat raw.

“Because this isn’t just cleaning house,” Mira said, pushing to her feet, fire sparking hotter in every movement. Her voice rose, sharp with anger and worry all tangled together. “It’s you working through the night, multiple times in a row. You’re not sleeping. You’re hardly eating. And today, today was the first time in almost a week that you even looked close to yourself. But here you are, snapping at us over a bunch of files.”

Her hand cut through the air, hard, frustrated. “Our files, Zoey. Our memories. Not just yours to guard.”

Rumi set the dish towel down slowly, deliberate as thunder rolling in. Her voice was quieter but heavier, the kind of quiet that made you lean in. “Something much deeper and bigger is happening, Zoey. And you won’t even let us in long enough to try to stop it. Or at least help you through it.”

Mira’s jaw tightened, her gestures sharp and wild, the heat spilling over. “This is so dumb. We’re a team. That’s the whole point of us, remember? There’s three of us, not one. You don’t get to decide what we can handle and what we can’t. If they’re just files, why are you trying to hide your tracks?”

Something in me cracked.

The guilt. The exhaustion. The image of Rumi’s face frozen on that screen.

“You don’t get it!” I exploded, the heat in my chest boiling too high to contain. My hands shook, my breath ragged. “You don’t…” My throat locked, words clawing to get out, but all I could choke was, “You know what? Forget it.”

“Zoey…”

But I was already shoving past them, the blanket tangling at my feet as I stumbled free. The walls pressed in too close, the air too thick, too hot, burning my lungs.

“I need air.”

And before either of them could stop me, I was gone.

The cliffs loomed like a dare.

By the time I reached them, sweat slicked my back, my lungs rasped raw, but the anger was louder than my body. The sea roared below, endless blue churn, spray leaping high against jagged stone.

There was nowhere else to run. Just me. The drop. The ocean calling.

I stepped to the edge. Looked down. My legs shook, but not from fear. From need.

I knew this stretch of water. I’d swum it, charted it, tested it. Deep. Clear. No hidden rocks, no reefs to tear me open. Safe, in theory.

But this wasn’t about safety.

This wasn’t about dying. Not even close.

It was about feeling something sharp enough to cut through the numbness. Adrenaline. Pain. Anything.

“Just jump,” I whispered.

So I did.

For a moment, there was only air.

The ground vanished beneath my feet, the wind slammed into me, and the world dropped away. My stomach lurched so hard it hurt, ribs caving around it. The scream that tore out of me was half joy, half terror, ripped apart by the rush of air.

The horizon spun wild, sky and sea swapping places in dizzying turns. My arms flailed instinctively before I spread them wide, surrendering to gravity. The air roared in my ears, tore at my hair, pressed against my skin until I felt like I was being peeled apart layer by layer.

And yet, god, it was beautiful.

Weightless. Limitless. For those suspended seconds, I wasn’t Zoey the hunter, Zoey the liar, Zoey drowning in secrets. I was just motion. Just a body carving through the sky. Free.

Time warped. The fall stretched out, endless, as if the world had slowed to let me taste every instant. The ocean below glittered like liquid glass, rising in slow-motion inevitability, calling me closer.

And then it wasn’t slow anymore.

The water slammed up to meet me, hard as stone. The impact punched the air from my chest, cracked through my bones, sent me tumbling into the deep.

Underwater, the chaos stilled. The noise cut out, replaced by the heavy hush of the sea. Light fractured above me, ribbons of gold and blue dancing across the surface. For one perfect, breathless moment, I felt at ease. Back home. The way I always had in the water.

But surfacing was another story.

I kicked hard, lungs burning, but the waves were stronger than I’d expected. Each swell shoved me sideways, dragged me under again, spun me until I lost which way was up. Salt burned my eyes, my mouth, my lungs.

I didn’t understand at first. Why my body felt heavy, why the tide wouldn’t yield like it always did. And then it hit me, cold and sharp, without my hunter magic, without calling that part of me awake, I wasn’t strong enough. Of course not. That magic made me more than human. And that wasn’t something I had factored in.

I reached for it, desperate. For that pulse of connection, but nothing came.

The tide rolled over me again, harder.

I wasn’t going to make it.

But then, hands caught me.

An iron grip, dragging me upward through the dark. My body screamed, my chest tore open on the gasp when we broke the surface. Air. Foam. Salt and sky.

Rumi.

Her wet violet strands plastered to her cheeks, chest heaving, but her arms locked steady around me. Her eyes wide and burning like stormfire.

“Are you out of your mind?” she demanded, her voice raw, caught between fury and fear. “Zoey, what the hell was that?”

I couldn’t answer. My teeth chattered too hard, throat raw with salt.

She hauled me against her chest, kicking hard for shore. Fury steadied her strokes more than strength. “You don’t get to scare me like that. Not now, not ever again.”

The words broke something in me worse than the fall had.

Because she was right.

Because I hadn’t been cliff diving for adrenaline. Not really.

I’d been cliff diving to run.

And Rumi had dragged me back anyway.

The second my feet hit shore, my knees nearly buckled. I tore free of Rumi’s grip, doubled over, and hacked up seawater into the sand. My throat burned raw, my stomach lurched, and my chest still felt like it had an anchor lodged inside it.

“Zoey!” Rumi’s voice followed, sharp with fear. “Stop!”

But I didn’t stop. Couldn’t. My legs were trembling, my lungs convulsing, but the panic was louder. I staggered forward, spitting salt, stumbling more than running.

“Don’t follow me!” I rasped over my shoulder, voice cracking, half-choked on brine. Such a stupid thing to say. Where the hell else was she supposed to go?

And of course she followed. Her feet pounded the sand behind me, closer with every uneven stride of mine.

I stumbled up the wooden stairs, coughing so hard it bent me in half. My chest was on fire, my hair dripping in ropes across my face, but I shoved through the pain and forced myself onto the deck.

Mira was there with an armful of towels, ready for nothing more dangerous than a swim, clearly wanting to clear her mind of what had just happened between us in the living room. But the moment her eyes landed on me, the color drained from her face.

“Z? What the hell?”

Rumi came up behind me, breathless, drenched, loose strands of hair plastered to her cheeks. Her voice shook as she snapped out the truth. “She jumped. Off the cliffs.”

Mira froze. The towels slipped from her arms. “The cliffs?”

“High tide,” Rumi said, her lips pressed thin, her eyes fixed on me. “She almost didn’t make it back up.”

Mira surged forward, hands grabbing my face, my shoulders, scanning me like she expected to find me broken. “Zoey, oh my god. Are you hurt? Did you hit your head? How much water did you swallow?”

I coughed hard, jerking out of her grip. My whole body shook, salt still burning my throat, but my voice came sharp anyway. “I said I’m fine!”

“Fine?” Mira’s voice cracked, raw with disbelief. “You can barely breathe. You just jumped off a cliff and nearly drowned! That’s your definition of fine?”

“I knew the tide was safe!” I snapped, staggering a step back. “It wasn’t supposed to…”

The words strangled in my throat. My chest still heaved, seawater burning inside me, but worse was the confusion clawing at my ribs. It should have been safe. I knew those waters better than anyone. I’d tested the depth, mapped the current. The water had always answered me before, always steadied me when nothing else could.

But this time it hadn’t.

This time it had dragged me down, held me under, tossed me like I was nothing.

Rage sparked hot in my chest, stupid, irrational. I was furious at the ocean, at the one place that had always given me what I needed. The one place that never judged, never lied, never demanded. How could it betray me like that?

How could it turn its back on me when I trusted it most?

And then, in the silence between Rumi’s storm-steady voice and Mira’s frantic fire, something flickered through me. Maybe it hadn’t betrayed me at all. Maybe it had given me exactly what I needed.

I hadn’t been listening. I hadn’t been accepting. I kept drowning myself in guilt, pushing Rumi away, pretending I could hold everything alone. I’d shut the door on every connection offered to me. And so, the water forced me.

Forced me to need. Forced me to reach. Forced me into Rumi’s arms when I wouldn’t let myself go there any other way.

That was why my magic hadn’t answered. Not because it was gone. But because I was the one refusing to open the door.

The realization chilled me worse than the sea ever had.

“Supposed to what?” Mira finally pressed, her voice sharp but her eyes frantic. “What were you even trying to do?”

Rumi’s voice cut through, low and steady, heavier than Mira’s panic. “Because it wasn’t fine when I pulled you out of the water, Zoey. It wasn’t fine when you told me not to follow you.”

That struck me sideways. My head whipped toward her, water dripping into my eyes. “How did you even know?” I rasped. “How did you find me?”

Her expression flickered, storm clouds passing over her face. “Because you’ve been disappearing every day. Because you’ve been unraveling in front of us, even if you think you’re hiding it. I knew where you’d run.”

Her eyes softened, but her voice didn’t. “I know you better than you think, Zoey.”

The air closed in around me. My chest heaved with ragged breaths. Their eyes pinned me, Mira’s wild with fear, Rumi’s burning with hurt.

“I just needed something, okay?” I rasped, coughing again. “I needed to feel anything besides…”

I bit down on the rest, hard enough my teeth ached.

Mira stepped closer, her voice breaking through the tension like fire thinning to embers. “Besides what?”

I shook my head, stumbling past them. “Nothing, never mind.”

“Zoey.” Rumi’s voice stopped me in my tracks. Quiet. Certain. The way she said my name always cut deeper than shouting ever could. “Talk to us.”

I turned, and it all poured out sideways, not the truth, not yet. Just anger. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“Try us,” Mira shot back, voice tight. “You don’t have to keep it alone,” she said, softer now, protective heat breaking into pleading.

But I shook my head, retreating further into the house, dripping saltwater onto the polished floorboards. “I’m not doing this right now.”

“Zoey, please.” Rumi started, but I cut her off, my voice breaking on the words.

“Just leave it.”

The storm didn’t break right away.

The night after the cliffs, the house felt too small. Mira paced the deck until her footsteps became a drumbeat. Rumi sat at the table with her knees pulled up to her chest, watching the dark sea through glass. And me? I lay on the bed coughing, half-dreaming of water still filling my lungs.

Sleep never really came. When the faint light finally started slipping through the curtains, I dragged myself out of bed on sheer willpower. My head throbbed from the weight of it all, my body heavy as stone, but I forced myself into clean training clothes.

If my magic wouldn’t answer me the way it used to, then maybe I could make it answer. Maybe I could push past whatever wall had cut me off. The thought gnawed at me, a different kind of desperation. I had to know if I could still summon it. If I was still me. If I was still worthy of being one of the chosen three for this generation.

I told myself Mira and Rumi would still be asleep, sprawled in hammocks, curled under thin blankets, dreaming in peace the way I couldn’t. I needed that space, needed to move before anyone noticed how frayed I’d become.

But when I stepped out, the breath caught in my throat.

They were waiting, almost like they had expected me to try and sneak off.

Mira stood with her arms crossed tight over her chest, jaw locked, eyes burning with something rawer than anger. Rumi’s hands were folded in front of her, but her shoulders were stiff, her gaze heavy as stone. They didn’t look like they’d moved all night.

“Sit,” Mira said. Her voice was clipped, frayed around the edges.

I sat because my legs still ached too much not to.

The silence stretched until it felt like the air itself was listening.

Rumi’s voice was the first to cut through. Gentle, but heavy. “Zoey… whatever this is, it’s tearing you apart. And us with you.”

I stared at the floor. “I’m really sorry. I’m not trying to hurt you.”

“Then make us understand.” Mira snapped. Her voice cracked on the last word, too sharp to hide the worry bleeding through. “Because right now? All we know is you’re sneaking off, you’re working when you should be sleeping, you’re deleting files you won’t explain, and yesterday you almost drowned. You’re basically just a hollowed out version of yourself right now and we don’t know why. You’re scaring the hell out of us.”

My throat tightened. My hands balled in my lap.

“It’s not that bad…” The lie died on my tongue when I took in their expressions. I swallowed hard. “Fine. The truth is, it started with… a file.”

Mira’s eyes narrowed. “Damnit, Bobby. That’s it. We’re hiring someone to handle our archiving. You’re never touching them again.” She paused as she clearly was trying to control herself, “What file?”

I shook my head. “You don’t want to know.”

“Yes, we do,” Rumi said, quieter, but the words landed heavier. She leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Start there. What file, Zoey?”

“The night of Takedown,” I whispered. My throat burned. “The raw camera feeds. No edits. No sound mix. Just… what really happened.”

Rumi’s eyes widened, but she said nothing.

“They had us perfect,” I went on, voice trembling. “The demons. They wore me. They wore Mira. Same voices. Same timing. And they went after you, Rumi. On stage. Right in the middle of it.”

Rumi’s lips parted, her hands knotting together.

“You thought it was us,” I choked out. “You thought it was me and Mira pushing you. And they forced you into those lyrics. Forced you to face it. To say it out loud in front of everyone. And you…” My voice cracked. “You broke. You ran.”

Mira shook her head, slow, as if she couldn’t take it in.

“And then,” I whispered, “you ran into us. The real us. And we didn’t know. We didn’t know what happened up there. All we saw was what you’d hidden. And instead of holding you, instead of protecting you…” I swallowed hard. “We turned on you. We left you alone when you needed us most.”

Rumi’s breath caught, her whole body rigid.

My hands trembled on the table. “I saw it. The whole thing. Your face on that stage, thinking it was us. And then the way I looked at you after. Cold. Sharp. Like you were someone I couldn’t trust. We shattered then. The demons won.”

Tears blurred my vision. My voice broke. “I failed you. Twice. And I can’t forget it. I keep replaying it, trying to figure out the exact second I should’ve been better, but all I see is you. Alone. Because of me.”

The table between us was too small to contain the silence that followed.

Mira’s jaw trembled, her protectiveness turning to something sharper, something wounded. “So, you’ve been… punishing yourself. Alone. Watching it over and over.”

“I had to,” I rasped. “If I could just figure out the exact moment I failed, if I could memorize it… Maybe I’d never do it again.”

“You think hurting yourself is going to fix hurting me?” Rumi’s voice was steady, but her hands shook where they lay folded on the table. Her eyes finally lifted, pinning me. “Zoey. Is that what you thought?”

The words gutted me. My shoulders curled in like I could make myself smaller. My voice broke low. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

Rumi’s breath shuddered out of her, and when she opened her eyes again, the look in them made my chest cave. “You think I don’t remember what you did? What you both did?”

Mira reached for her instinctively, but Rumi pulled back, her gaze never leaving me. “You left me standing there like I was nothing. Like the only thing that mattered was what I hadn’t told you, not why.”

Her voice cracked, trembling like glass. “I already know how you failed me, Zoey. You don’t have to remind me.”

Tears blurred my vision. My throat tightened. “That’s not what I’m trying to do. This is exactly why I tried to do this all on my own without you knowing. I knew it would hurt you to bring it up.” I whispered. “But after I knew the whole truth, I couldn’t let it go. I had to keep watching until I figured out how to fix it.”

Mira shoved her chair back suddenly, standing so fast it rattled against the floor. She raked a hand through her hair, her whole body shaking. “So, this whole time, the running off, the nightmares, all of it, was because you couldn’t forgive yourself? Over something that should be water under the bridge, over a damn file?” Her voice broke, protective and angry and terrified all at once. “ This is something that you should have been able to tell us about no problem. This doesn’t make sense. Do you know what it did to us, watching you disappear piece by piece? Do you know what it did to her when you nearly didn’t come back up?”

“I know,” I choked, my voice breaking open, raw. “I know, Mira. That’s the problem. I know I hurt her. I know I hurt both of you. And I don’t know how to stop.”

The words collapsed into silence. My hands shook against the wood of the table, my chest heaved like I was still drowning.

Rumi rose slowly, every movement deliberate, like the weight of the whole room was pressing down on her. She walked around the table, Mira falling silent as she passed. She stopped in front of me, close enough that the heat of her skin brushed mine.

“You want to fix it?” Her voice was soft, but it cut sharper than anything Mira had said.

I looked up at her, broken. “Yes.”

“Then stop running from us,” she whispered.

The silence pulsed between us. The only sound was the faint tick of the ceiling fan, the hush of the ocean beyond the glass.

Rumi stood focused and steady, her arms folded across her chest, eyes locked on mine. I could see the tremor at the corner of her mouth, the weight carved into her shoulders.

“I forgave you,” she said again, slower this time, measured. “That night is over, Zoey. I chose to let it go. You need to as well.”

Her words should have soothed me. Instead, they scraped raw against the inside of my chest. My throat locked, my breath shuddering shallow.

“You keep saying that,” I rasped. “You forgave me. You forgave Mira. But how could you? After what we did?”

Rumi’s jaw tensed. “Because I love you.”

“Don’t,” I snapped, standing so fast the chair legs screeched. The sound ripped through the room like a blade. “Don’t make it sound that simple. You don’t know what it’s like…”

Her voice rose, sharper now, lightning breaking through storm. “Of course I do! I was there, Zoey. I lived it. I was the one on that stage. I was the one who thought my friends were tearing me open when it wasn’t even them.”

The words slammed into me like blows.

Rumi’s chest heaved. “I had every reason to hate you. Both of you. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. Because I knew you didn’t know. And I knew that night wasn’t the whole of us.”

I shook my head hard, backing away like I could outrun her words. “You shouldn’t have forgiven me.”

“Then what do you want from me?” she demanded, stepping closer, storm rolling behind her voice. “You want me to be angry? You want me to resent you forever? Is that easier for you than letting yourself be loved?”

Her voice cracked on the last word. My chest seized, but she wasn’t done. Her hands shook where she clenched them at her sides, frustration boiling over.

“You’re being ridiculous about this, Zoey. This was my pain, not yours. And now you’re parading around like some martyr, drowning yourself again and again to prove how sorry you are. But I hate this side of you. I hate watching you do this.”

Her voice trembled, sharp and raw. “I want you back. The one I know. Because this version of you, this self-destructive, punishing version, it’s too much.”

The words hit harder than anything she’d said before. Too much. The thing I’d always feared. The thing I’d always believed deep down.

And the moment it left her mouth, I saw it on her face, the shock, the regret, the way her lips parted as if to snatch the words back. “Zoey, wait. I didn’t mean…”

But I cut her off, my voice breaking like glass.

“If I’m really that terrible, if I’m too much for you, then maybe you should’ve let me drown.”

The words shattered the room.

The silence that followed wasn’t peace. It was a fuse burning low. The words had ripped out of me before I could stop them.

Rumi flinched like I’d struck her. Her lips parted, breath catching sharp. For a heartbeat she just stared at me, eyes wet and shining, as if she couldn’t believe I’d said it. Then her voice broke free, trembling but fierce.

“Don’t you dare,” she whispered, shaking her head. “Don’t you dare think for one second that I would ever let the ocean take you. Not after everything we survived. Not after everything we’ve become.” Her hands trembled at her sides. “I pulled you out because I love you, Zoey. Because I will always choose you, even when you won’t choose yourself. And that love is what makes this so hard. I want to know every crack. Every past wound. And I want to focus my attention there to heal you from the inside out. But you aren’t letting me.”

Her words cracked something in me worse than the water had.

My throat closed, but the guilt still screamed louder. I shook my head, backing toward the door. “No, you’re right. This is too much.”

“Zoey.” Rumi’s voice broke, low and desperate.

But I turned, heart hammering, vision blurred with tears. “I can’t stay here. I am so sorry for everything but you’re right. I am too much. And you guys don’t deserve this.”

I grabbed for the door.

And then Mira was there. She moved faster than I’d seen her since the last fight, her body a wall, her hands catching my arms hard enough to stop me cold. Her eyes blazed, wet but fierce.

“Don’t you dare think about it. You’re not leaving,” she said, her voice shaking with rage and fear. “Not like this. Not again.”

I tried to twist away, but she held on tighter, her grip protective, unrelenting. “You don’t get to decide you’re beyond saving when we’re standing right here fighting for you. Yeah, it isn’t easy. Sure, this hurts like hell. Yeah, it’s a lot. But we’re not done trying. We’re not giving up and neither can you. There’s more to this than just the damn file and I am going to find out what that is.”

“Mira, please…”

“No!” Her voice cracked, loud and raw. “You almost died yesterday, and now you’re standing here telling Rumi she should’ve let you drown? You’re ready to walk out and leave our lives forever? Do you even hear yourself?”

I froze, my whole body shaking against hers, caught between Rumi’s broken voice and Mira’s blazing fury.

And for the first time, I felt it, I wasn’t fighting them anymore. I was fighting myself.

“I wasn’t trying to drown!” I snapped, voice hoarse, chest heaving. “I wasn’t trying to die, Mira! I was just…” My hands shook, words tumbling out in shards. “I was just trying to feel something. Anything. Because every time I look at you, both of you, all I feel is what a complete loser I am. A worthless friend. The girl who couldn’t protect the people she loves more than humanly possible. This isn’t about seeking attention. Or wanting to capitalize self-worth from someone else’s trauma. This is about me trying to face my own failures, my own feelings!”

The silence was brutal. Mira’s eyes widened, her grip loosening. Rumi’s breath caught, sharp.

But the dam was broken.

“I hate that I didn’t see it sooner. Didn’t stop the fighting between us.” My voice rasped, low, jagged. “Just like I couldn’t stop my parents.”

The words landed like a detonation.

Both of them froze, their faces shifting in unison, confusion first, then shock. Because I had never had said that out loud. Not once. Not to anyone.

The tears blurred but I kept going, couldn’t stop. “No matter how much I begged, how much I tried, they still tore themselves apart. Shouting through the walls, shattering picture frames, dragging me into the middle of it and pretending it wasn’t happening at the same time. And it didn’t matter in the end because they still divorced. I still had to move. I still was caught in between their two worlds.”

My chest heaved. My hands clawed the air. “And me… too small, too useless, too late to do anything. Always too late to do anything but pick up the broken pieces and wonder why I couldn’t keep it whole to begin with.”

Mira’s brows furrowed, her whole body pulling taut, like she wanted to fight ghosts she couldn’t see. Rumi pressed a hand to her mouth, her eyes wide, glistening, breaking for me in a way I couldn’t bear to look at.

I swallowed hard, voice trembling. “That’s why I can’t stand this. That’s why I can’t forgive myself. Because seeing through things, noticing everything, it’s supposed to be the one thing I’m good at. I’ve lived through enough to know the signs, to read the cracks before everything falls apart. I should’ve been able to protect us from this. From the demons. From ourselves.”

I shook my head, the sobs tearing now. “But I didn’t. I didn’t see it. And the worst part? Maybe I did. Maybe I felt it coming. But Celine…”

The name slipped out like a curse. I froze.

Both their heads snapped toward me.

Rumi’s eyes sharpened, fear flashing there. Mira straightened, protective heat radiating off her. “Zoey,” she said carefully. “What about Celine?”

“Nothing,” I whispered, shaking my head too fast. “It’s nothing. Forget I said it.”

“Don’t do that,” Mira cut in, her voice shaking with urgency. “Don’t you dare drop her name and walk away from it. You know what she did to Rumi. You know how much damage she caused. If she did anything like that to you…”

“Mira, stop.” My protest was too quick, too sharp.

Rumi’s voice broke through, soft but firm. “Zoey. Look at me.”

I did, my breath hitching.

Her eyes glistened, steady even through the tremor in her voice. “Tell us. Please. Because if something like that did happen, this all would actually make a lot more sense.”

My chest caved. I shook my head, tears spilling hot. “I can’t.”

“Oh yes, you can,” Mira urged, gentler now, crouching so her eyes were level with mine. “We’re right here. Whatever she did, whatever she said, you’re safe now.”

“Oh, just stop it!” I groaned out as my eyes shut hard and my head shook back and forth. “Don’t you get it? It’s not just her. It’s me. I believed it. I believed her. I allowed it. And all she really did was unknowingly feed into something she didn’t create. And now? I don’t have to be part demon to be dangerous to you both, to myself, to our team. I’m so screwed up right now that I can’t even get my magic to work. So, tell me, how the hell am I ever supposed to be safe if I can’t escape myself?”

They froze. Eyes locked onto me. My chest heaved up and down and suddenly the walls felt like they were closing in.

Their silence was the worst part. Mira’s eyes wide, Rumi’s mouth half open, both of them stunned into stillness. I couldn’t breathe under it.

So, once more, I ran.

I didn’t go far. I couldn’t. My body still wasn’t ready to respond to my wishes. And I wasn’t trying to hide. I just needed to be grounded, to feel something constant when nothing felt like it was anymore. My legs carried me down the steps and across the sand until I collapsed on my knees, the beach cool beneath me. The morning light spilled gold across the sea as I fell to my knees in the sand. My palms pressed into the wet ground, tears streaming hot, unstoppable.

The tide slid forward slower than it should have, like it was listening. When it reached my hands, it lingered, curling cool around my fingers before retreating, then rushing up again, faintly higher, like the ocean itself was breathing with me.

Every sob pulled the water closer. Every tremor in my chest echoed back in the waves. The water curled again around my palms, and somehow, in the way it always did, it finally resonated with my locked away magic creating a shimmering glow around my hands as the water flowed around me.

That’s how they found me.

Rumi froze a few paces back, her loose braid tangled in the sea breeze, her eyes wide at the sight. Mira’s voice cracked sharp with shock. “The water, Zoey, it’s… it’s resonating with you.”

I lifted my head, voice shaking but certain. “This was how I first knew there was more to me than I thought. How my magic woke up. Every time I broke, the water answered. It still does.”

The tide curled higher, lapping against my wrists like it wanted to hold me up. Droplets shimmered, clinging longer than they should have, humming faintly like they were vibrating with my pulse.

“When I was little,” I whispered, staring down at the ripples trembling to the rhythm of my breath, “I thought it was coincidence. But it wasn’t just when I touched it. It was when I sang. Even when I didn’t know what my voice was for, the waves would rise. It’s like they would swell with me, like they were echoing something deeper than sound. Like they were telling me I belonged.”

The water shifted again, pulling in, pushing out, as if it was listening now. As if it had been waiting.

“It was never just comfort,” I said, my throat tight. “It was connection. A call and response. And I was too scared to believe it.”

The tide surged higher, brushing my palms, curling around my fingers like it wanted to weave itself through me.

 “When my parents fought,” I whispered, staring at the sea, “it got so loud the house shook. Plates shattered. Pictures broke off the walls. I begged them to stop, but they didn’t. And when it got too much, when I couldn’t breathe anymore, I’d sneak out. Barefoot. Sometimes in the middle of the night. I’d run to the beach.”

The memory sliced sharp, but I pushed through.

“And the strangest thing was… it was only there that everything got quiet. The fights in my head, the panic in my chest, even the fear I’d never have a real purpose at all. It all went still when I touched the water. It was like it knew me. Like it wanted me.”

My throat burned, the words spilling faster now. “That was the burden. Not just the fighting. The silence. The lies. Being the one who smoothed the edges, who picked up the broken glass and smiled like it never happened. Do you know how heavy that gets when you’re a kid? Wanting someone to know, someone bigger, smarter, wiser? Someone who could help carry that weight? But I was forbidden from saying a word. I was told the amount of shame it would bring to the family. Not that it mattered really because in the end, they still divorced.”

Behind me, Rumi’s breath caught. “Zoey…” Her voice was low, careful, storm-quiet. “Those nights you ran… what else happened in that house?”

Mira’s words came faster, fire sparking in her chest. “Did they ever…” her voice cracked, sharp with dread, “did they ever turn it on you? Is that why you had to run?”

The question sliced through me. I turned, water dripping down my arms, their faces raw with fear. Rumi’s steady gaze trembled at the edges. Mira’s eyes blazed, frantic.

“No,” I whispered, shaking my head fast. “Not like that. They didn’t hurt me. Not physically.” My throat clenched. “But sometimes… it felt worse. The screaming. The lies. The pretending after. The weight of knowing the truth and never being able to say it.”

I swallowed hard, voice trembling. “Honestly, the worst part wasn’t the fighting. It was what came after. The performance. The illusion we all had to wear in public. Smiles at parties. Holding hands at church. Pretending everything was perfect when our house was split down the middle with cracks no one else could see.”

My hands curled tight, nails biting my palms. “I carried that weight, Mira. Rumi. Keeping the secrets. Making sure no one knew. Pretending it was fine, that I was fine. Because if the truth slipped out, everything would collapse.”

The waves lapped higher, curling against my wrists as though they wanted to steady me, to tell me they’d heard every word.

For a long, aching moment, neither of them spoke. The only sound was the tide and my own shuddering breaths.

Then Rumi stepped closer, her voice breaking low. “Zoey… that weight… it never should’ve been yours to carry.”

Mira’s fire dimmed into something softer, but no less fierce. “You were a kid. A kid trying to hold up a house that was already splitting. That burden should’ve been theirs, not yours.” Her jaw clenched, eyes flashing with protective pain. “You deserved to be protected. Not forced to pretend.”

Something in their words cracked me deeper than all the rest, because it was the first time anyone had ever said it.

Silence fell again, but it was different now, not empty, not accusing. Heavy with realization.

I saw it dawn in their faces at the same time.

Golden.

All the times they’d sung it with me, all the times they’d heard the words and thought they understood.

It hadn’t just been about being half-American and half-Korean. It hadn’t just been about belonging. It was about standing between two worlds, truth and illusion and carrying the secret storm no one else could see.

It was about being split open by silence and forced to shine anyway.

Rumi’s lips parted, her voice catching. “That’s what Golden meant, didn’t it?”

Mira’s breath shook, her eyes wet but burning. “Not just about who you are… but what they made you carry.”

I bowed my head, tears spilling freely now, the tide rising to meet my palms. My chest heaved. My eyes blurred, but I nodded.

Rumi’s voice cracked again, softer this time, almost broken. “You were trying to tell us the whole time. Through the song. And we didn’t see it.”

Mira’s hands balled into fists, her fire trembling. “We sang those words with you, Zoey. Night after night. And we missed it.”

The confession burned through me, but it also loosened something I hadn’t realized I was still holding. I shook my head weakly, salt on my lips from both sea and tears. “You weren’t supposed to know. Nobody was. That was the point. I learned how to express myself in lyrics. It was the only way I could get it out without being too exposed.”

The tide surged again, climbing over my forearms, shimmering in the sun as though it was agreeing with me, as though it remembered every note I’d ever spilled into it. “But, that’s why I hate myself for what’s going on between us now. For not seeing us unraveling sooner. Because it’s the same story all over again with this new family. Secrets. Cracks. And me, pretending I could keep it whole.”

My shoulders shook. The waves rolled higher, climbing over my forearms, shimmering in the sun. “I know people see me as gullible. Naïve. Too soft to understand what’s really happening around me. But they’re wrong. I see everything. I notice everything. I always have. I just… I spent my whole life trying to be the peacekeeper. Trying to smooth the edges before everything shattered. I wasn’t direct like Mira. So I stayed quiet. I held it all in. Hoping I could keep things together if I just didn’t make the fracture worse.”

I swallowed hard, voice trembling. “I knew something was eating at you, Rumi. From the very beginning. I could feel it. But I also knew we needed a bond before I could pry. And then, once we had that bond, the band was too important. Protecting its integrity mattered too much. I couldn’t risk breaking us open, even if it meant ignoring what I already knew.”

Rumi’s lips parted, her hands curling tight at her chest.

“And when I finally asked someone what they thought, what I felt, when I admitted out loud that there was some weird underlying tension between us, I went to the wrong person.” My jaw clenched. “I went to Celine.”

Both of them stiffened instantly. Mira surged a step forward, her voice sharp, urgent. “Zoey. What did she do?”

Rumi crouched low, her hand reaching tentatively toward me, her voice softer but no less fierce. “Please, Zoey. Tell us.”

The tide surged forward again, brushing cool over my wrists, grounding me as the words clawed their way out.

“She told me I was paranoid. Overthinking. That I was imagining the tension. That I was projecting my own fears from my own unresolved trauma. For years, she gaslit me until I didn’t know which instincts were real anymore. Until I stopped trusting myself completely. And with our schedules being the way they were, there was no going to the ocean. No breaks. No time to recalibrate. So, eventually, everything unraveled and it happened so slowly, I didn’t realize it had even happened.”

The tide rushed higher, splashing against my forearms as tears blurred my sight.

“And that’s why Rumi got hurt,” I choked. “Because when it mattered most, I couldn’t tell the difference between what was real and what wasn’t. Between my instincts and her voice in my head. I saw everything… and I still missed it. Because she made me believe I couldn’t trust myself.”

My body shook, sobs tearing through me as the ocean surged again, pulling forward like it wanted to swallow the confession whole.

And for the first time, Mira and Rumi saw all of it, the girl who had noticed everything, carried everything, and still ended up breaking under the weight of someone else’s lies.

The tide rushed higher, cool and steady against my arms, but behind me the silence was crushing. My chest heaved. My eyes blurred with tears I couldn’t stop. For a moment I thought they wouldn’t say anything at all.

Then Rumi moved.

Her footsteps were slow, deliberate in the sand. She lowered herself until she was kneeling beside me, her curls brushing forward in the breeze. Her hand trembled as it hovered, then finally rested over mine, even with the water pulling across both our skin.

“You didn’t fail me,” she whispered. Her voice cracked, but the certainty in it was unshakable. “Not then. Not after. Not now.”

I shook my head, sobs hitching my breath. “You don’t understand…”

“I do,” she interrupted softly. Her fingers tightened over mine. “You noticed. You always noticed. That’s why I trusted you first, even when I couldn’t trust myself. And you’re right, I was hurting. I was hiding. But you didn’t make me break, Zoey. You were the reason I held on as long as I did.”

The words struck deeper than any accusation ever could.

Mira dropped down on my other side, less gentle but just as fierce, her arm wrapping hard around my shoulders. “You think Celine stole your instincts? She didn’t. She only made you forget what was already true, that you see more than anyone else. That you carry more than anyone else.” She shook me once, not to hurt, but to make me feel her strength. Her voice broke. “You’re not gullible. You’re not weak. You’re the reason we’re still standing.”

I gasped, chest trembling. “But I…”

“No,” Mira snapped, pressing her forehead against mine. “No more of that. You are not broken. You are not worthless. You are ours. And we are yours. That’s the only truth that matters.”

Rumi’s hand slid up to cup my cheek, turning me toward her. Her eyes glistened, but her smile was steady through it. “And I already forgave you, Zoey. The night of the show, after everything. You and Mira both. I let it go because I love you. Because you’re worth more than the worst moment of our lives.”

My whole body shook, my sobs breaking open. “I don’t know how to forgive myself.”

“Then let us help you,” Rumi whispered, leaning her forehead against my other temple.

Mira’s arms tightened, pulling all three of us together, salt and sand clinging to our skin. “You don’t have to do it alone. You never did.”

The waves surged around us one last time, then pulled back, leaving the three of us anchored together in the wet sand, raw, broken, but holding.

For the first time in months, I wasn’t running.

The tide curled around our wrists again, foam glittering in the morning sun. My chest was raw, my throat scorched from crying, but I could finally breathe. Almost.

Rumi was the first to speak, her voice quiet but steady. “Zoey… earlier, you said something that we still need to address.”

My stomach dropped. “What did I say?”

“You said you loved us,” Mira cut in, her tone sharper, more direct. “Both of us. More than humanly possible. And don’t you dare try to pretend we misheard you.”

Heat shot through my face. My chest tightened like a fist had closed around it. I shook my head hard, staring at the rippling water instead of their eyes. “I didn’t mean…” my voice cracked, thin, “Not like in love…”

“Yes, you did,” Rumi said softly, but her words landed like thunder. Her storm eyes locked onto mine, steady and unyielding. “Your desperation to hide everything, to protect us, to keep us together no matter the cost, that doesn’t come from platonic love, Zoey. That comes from something deeper. Don’t try to tell me otherwise.”

My breath hitched, panic clawing up my throat. “But…”

“Stop,” Mira snapped, her voice cracking with force. Her hand caught my chin, firm but not cruel, tilting my face so I couldn’t look away. “Isolating yourself won’t erase what you feel. And it sure as hell doesn’t erase what we feel.”

I blinked at her, stunned. My pulse stuttered. “What… you feel?”

Rumi’s lips trembled into the softest smile, her hand still wrapped around mine beneath the waves. “Did you really think you were the only one?”

I tried to pull back, but Mira leaned closer, her forehead pressing to mine, fierce and protective. “You don’t get to hide now. You opened the door. And we’re not letting you slam it shut again.”

Tears welled again, spilling hot. “I just… I don’t know how to want this. Not without ruining everything. And I have no idea how this could work.”

“You already want it,” Rumi whispered, her thumb brushing the wet from my cheek. “And we do too. The only thing ruining us is pretending it’s not there.”

The words struck me like sunlight breaking through clouds. I gasped, trembling, the tide surging higher as if it agreed.

For the first time, I didn’t deflect. I let myself meet their eyes and the truth in them nearly undid me.
The tide kept surging around us, foam brushing higher over our knees, like the ocean itself wanted to listen.

Mira’s jaw tightened before she spoke, her thumb brushing under my chin, forcing me to meet her eyes. “Do you know when you got to me, Zo?”

I shook my head, too choked to speak.

She huffed a small, broken laugh. “It wasn’t some big moment. It was stupid, ordinary. That night after our first fight, I was restless, pacing, convinced if I didn’t do something, I’d explode. I hadn’t moved fast enough. Both Rumi and yourself got hurt. And I didn’t know what to do with myself. I felt like I failed. Everyone else was asleep. And then you showed up. No shoes, hair sticking up, eyes barely open. You just sat next to me, shivering in the wind.”

Her throat worked as she swallowed. “You didn’t tell me to calm down. You didn’t feed me lines about strategy or discipline. You just… existed beside me. Let me breathe without asking for anything. And when I finally cracked, when I told you I was scared, you didn’t laugh, you didn’t judge. You just listened. Like my fear didn’t make me weaker. Like it made me human.”

Her forehead pressed against mine, her voice dropping. “That’s when you snuck in. Quiet. Simple. And I haven’t been the same since.”

I sobbed once, hard. But Rumi’s hand tightened on mine, pulling my gaze to her. Her eyes glistened with tears.

“For me,” she whispered, “it was the night I thought I’d lost everything. The first performance when I mixed up the lyrics with a different verse. You both thankfully knew what happened and improvised on the spot. The crowd, none the wiser thought it was a remix and it never came up again. But after the show, I was hiding, terrified that I had ruined everything. That you would leave. But instead, you found me. And when I finally broke, when I thought you’d turn away, you didn’t. You looked right at me, at my fear, my shame, all the ugly parts I’d buried and you stayed.”

Her breath shook. “You gave me space when I needed it, and you held me together when I couldn’t. You didn’t demand the truth or an explanation from me. You just let me be. And in that moment, I realized, you weren’t going anywhere. That’s when you slipped into my heart, Zoey. Without trying. Without even knowing.”

Her thumb brushed the back of my hand, tender and sure. “You made me believe I could belong. That I wasn’t too much.”

The tide curled around us, shimmering in the morning light, as if holding the three of us steady while the truth unraveled.

Their words gutted me, left me shaking with fresh sobs. “I didn’t know,” I whispered, broken. “I didn’t know either of you felt that way.”

Mira shook her head, a ragged laugh breaking out of her. “Of course you didn’t. Because it wasn’t just you holding back to protect the band. We were too.”

Rumi’s voice was steadier but just as raw. “We thought if we buried it deep enough, it couldn’t get in the way. We thought it was the only way to keep everything intact.”

The tide curled steady around us, each rush of foam lingering like the ocean itself didn’t want to leave.

They looked at each other then, realization flickering sharp in their eyes, before both turned back to me.

Mira’s voice dropped, lower, careful. “Then tell us this, Zoey. When did you start falling?”

Rumi leaned closer, her hand tightening over mine. “We told you our moments. We want to know yours.”

My breath caught. I blinked at them through blurred tears, my heart hammering like it wanted to crack free of my ribs. “I…”

“Don’t deflect,” Mira warned, her thumb brushing over my jaw. “Not this time.”

Rumi’s eyes softened, urging me. “Please.”

I swallowed hard, voice trembling as the memories pressed in.

“For you, Mira…” My chest heaved. “It was in that alley. The night you stood bloodied and furious, shielding us like you didn’t care what it cost. You were fire, reckless and raw, and it terrified me. Not of you. But that someone would actually care that much about trying to shield me from something. But when you looked back at me, just for a second , I saw the protective fear under it. And I realized… I didn’t just want to fight beside you. I wanted to catch you. To hold you safe when you burned too bright.”

Mira’s eyes widened, wet, her jaw tightening as if the words struck deeper than she expected.

“And for you, Rumi…” My throat locked, but I forced the words out. “It was the first time you laughed. Not the polished kind, not the careful kind. A real laugh, like something had cracked open and light spilled through. After weeks of walls and silence, you let yourself glow and I thought… God, what a beautiful sound. I want to hear that again. I want to be the reason you laugh like that.”

Rumi’s lips parted, a soft sound breaking out of her, her eyes shining with tears she couldn’t hide.

I sighed lightly, pressing my forehead into my hands. “That’s when it started. That’s when I knew I was falling for both of you. And I’ve been falling ever since.”

The tide surged higher, frothing around us like it wanted to knot the three of us together. None of us could look away anymore.

And none of us could deny it any longer.

Then their gazes turned back to me, their hands still holding me, the tide wrapping around all three of us.

None of us had to say it. The truth was already there.

The words hung between us, fragile as glass. We had all been in love with each other. All along.

For a moment, none of us moved. The tide hushed, holding still around our legs, as if even the ocean wanted to listen. Mira’s breath came sharp, her eyes darting between Rumi and me. Rumi’s lips trembled, caught between shock and something brighter, something dawning.

My chest heaved, my tears spilling fresh. “So, it wasn’t just me,” I whispered, the words tasting like both relief and terror.

“No,” Rumi breathed, her voice shaking. “It was never just you.”

Mira let out a broken laugh, disbelieving but soft. “All this time, we were all trying so damn hard not to feel it… and we all felt it anyway.”

The silence after was alive, humming between our skin, thick with everything unsaid. My breath came shallow, my heart ricocheting in my chest, and I swore the tide itself was holding its breath with me.

Rumi reached first. Slowly, as if giving me every chance to pull away. Her hand rose, tentative but certain by the time it cupped my cheek. Her thumb brushed away the salt of my tears, lingering like she wanted to memorize the shape of me. Her touch trembled, but her voice did not. “Then let’s stop pretending.”

My chest cracked open at the words, the truth of them reverberating in my bones.

Mira’s arm slid firmer around my shoulders, pulling me against her side. The heat of her body seeped into mine, fire to the bone, grounding me where I wanted to float away. “No more hiding,” she said, her tone fierce but breaking on the edges. “No more running.”

The air shook inside me. I gasped, shaking, overwhelmed by the weight of it, by the impossibility of what they were saying, and the terrifying possibility of what it meant.

And then their foreheads pressed to mine. First Mira’s, hard and steady, fierce and grounding, like she was daring me to look away. Then Rumi’s, soft and sure, her breath warm as she leaned in, as if her touch alone could quiet the storm inside me. Until we were knotted together, temple to temple, breath to breath, three hearts pounding in sync.

They looked at each other then, over me. I could feel it in the air as much as I saw it in my periphery, the silent conversation passing between storm and fire. A test. A question. An answer. And then, almost imperceptibly, they both nodded.

The tide surged suddenly, rising high enough to splash over our laps, curling foam around us like an embrace.

And in that moment, the dam broke.

Rumi’s lips brushed mine first, tentative, trembling, but real, like the first crack of lightning across a storm-dark sky. The jolt of it startled me, bright and sharp, a spark that lit every nerve in my body. Her hand slid to the back of my neck, steady even though she was shaking.

When she pulled back, her breath stuttered against mine. “Like lightning,” she whispered, her storm eyes wide, wet, searching. “Did you feel it?”

My chest shook, the word trembling out of me. “Yes. I’ve never felt anything like it.”

Her smile broke, small and fragile but sure. “Then it’s real.”

Before I could answer, Mira’s hand slid under my chin, tilting my face toward her. Her kiss followed, nothing hesitant about it, fire leaping, fierce and consuming, years of silence breaking open in heat and flame. It left me breathless in a completely different way, like being pulled into a blaze I didn’t want to escape.

When Mira finally drew back, her forehead rested against mine, her fiery gaze softened with wonder. “Like fire,” she murmured, her voice hoarse. “You burn me, Zoey. But it doesn’t hurt. It makes me alive.”

Tears spilled hot and unrelenting down my cheeks, my lips trembling as I whispered back, “That’s how I feel with you. Both of you. Alive.”

Rumi pressed close on my other side, her laugh catching against my throat, trembling with disbelief and relief all at once. Mira’s arm tightened around me, steady as flame, while Rumi’s hand stayed locked with mine, storm-strong.

I was suspended between them, lightning and fire, storm and blaze and somehow, I wasn’t torn apart. I was held.

The three of us stayed like that for a beat, pressed close, sharing air, sharing space, the realization blooming between us that love had been growing here all along, in three directions, hidden until now but undeniable.

The tide surged high, foam breaking over our legs, curling around us like it had been waiting for this moment all along. The ocean roared, not as a warning, but as a witness.

And for the first time, I wasn’t torn in multiple directions.

I was home.