Strings of Fate: The First Loop

CHAPTER 59 - HER JAGGED EDGES MET THE LIGHT

When James finished singing, the silence that followed was louder than any applause could ever be. It settled over the beach like a final note still hanging in the air, trembling, sacred. I stood, slowly, as if my body was waking from a long dream, or maybe falling into one. My knees felt weak. My heart felt ancient. I could hear Inez behind me, her voice soft, barely a whisper.

"B..."

But I couldn't look at her. I couldn't look at anyone. My tears blurred everything into the same shapeless blur.

And then, I stepped back.

One step.

Two.

And then I ran.

Again.

But this time, it wasn’t escape. This time, it wasn’t denial. This time, it was guilt. Heavy, suffocating, unrelenting guilt. Like carrying a storm in my chest with nowhere to put it.

So I ran...

I ran toward the shore, toward the darkness where the waves met the land, where the ocean howled loud enough to drown my thoughts. My bare feet stumbled against the sand. The cold air slapped my cheeks, and still, I didn’t stop. I needed to reach the edge of something, anything, to remind myself I hadn’t disappeared. The waves crashed with rage and rhythm, a terrible beauty.

I dropped to my knees. And it hit me. It wasn’t the sea stealing my breath anymore. It was me. It was everything I kept buried. All the parts of myself I swore I’d never let anyone see.

Pain.

Anger.

Guilt.

Fear.

Longing.

Love.

They spun and surged and collided inside me like waves curling in on themselves, crashing, then recoiling, only to crash again. Over and over. I sobbed. My hands clutched the sand like I could hold myself together through grit alone. My body shook. My vision blurred, my throat locked by a lump so large it felt like I’d swallowed the ocean whole.

“B!”

His voice tore through the storm in my chest.

“Go away!” I choked out. My voice barely carried over the waves, but I knew he heard me.

“No,” James called back, closer now, firm and unwavering. “I’m not going anywhere.”

I heard his footsteps in the sand.

“I’m staying. Even if you ignore me, even if you push me, even if you scream in my face. I’m staying. Even if you’re furious with me. Even if you try to deny everything we felt on that bus. B... I’m done running. I’m done hiding when things fall apart. I’m done being the boy who disappears. I am here.”

His voice, God, his voice, it sounded like a vow made not just to me, but to something inside himself.

“I’m broken, James,” I said, barely audible. “And it’s not because of you. I’ve been broken long before you ever touched my life. Since Mom died, I’ve been… pretending. Wearing a mask that’s been cracking at the seams for years. And you...”

I gasped, the tears too thick to breathe through. “You made me turn around and look at myself. You made me see everything I tried to bury.”

The sea roared beside us, a witness to our unmaking.

“I know you’re broken too,” I said. “I know you are. That’s why it’s terrifying. I don’t want our pain to keep bleeding into everyone around us. I don’t want to be the reason someone else hurts.”