A rumble of thunder woke him. He’d been gazing at a flood of clothes and filthy socks littered on the floor, and the approaching darkness had dimmed almost every part of the room, leaving him to stare at a sea of blackness.
Lukas had returned to the boys’ dorm after dinner intending to clean his room, but decided to sit it out; his limbs felt like lead.
The sky let out another roar of thunder as fresh raindrops tapped on the roof. Lukas felt like he would sink right to the floor through his bed, but knew, somehow, that if he’d sleep at any moment, he’d die in his slumber.
His phone chimed softly on his bedside table. It was Duke. He watched it with half-closed eyes until it went silent.
“Now I know how you never returned any of my calls.”
He perked up, looking around. “Who’s there?” Then he saw it. A silhouette of a young girl perching on his study table, and the window light was exposing her thin outline. His heart was racing, almost exploding. He was trapped in a room with Ava.
“Hi,” she said.
“Ava…”
“You’ve been ignoring me.” She said, after an ominous silence, which was punctuated by rain and thunder.
“Yeah, I… I’ve been a bit busy.”
“That’s what I get after tempering with natural law?”
Lukas cupped his face into his hands.
“Is it what I deserve?”
“No.”
“I never asked for this. You did this to me, Lukas. Look at me.”
Lukas did so. The rain calmed a bit and thunder lit up the room, granting Lukas a millisecond to capture Ava’s features. She was drenched than ever and held her sharp chin high, regarding him with protruding eyes. It was now or never.
“Dinky.” He said.
“What?”
Lukas’s head sank. “You’re not her. Ava’s dead.”
The rain ceased with a final boom of thunder. Rainwater droplets were dripping energetically in the hallway.
“You sound so sure.”
“I watched it while it happened.” His legs and knees went weak though he was sitting, and the words that escaped his mouth sounded like a stranger’s. “Ava would never barge in on me. She had manners, which you don’t have.” It was costing him every nerve he had to look at her. “That name I said to you, Dinky… she hated it… screamed at anyone who said it, but you don’t even flinch to it.”
Ava leapt from the table with grace, gliding towards Lukas with a slow gait.
“She never addressed me by name,” Lukas said, “and we were never mates. What are you?”
“Barge in? How dare you. I’ll barge in on you anytime I want to. You did this to me—”
“Stop. Stop saying that, you’re not Ava! What the hell are you?!” Lukas was standing and his muscles were quivering. He wanted to hurt someone. “Say something!”
“Or what?”
He became aware of the flush of heat going through his body and sat down on the bed, looking anywhere but at Ava.
“Fine, let’s pretend I’m not Ava. Bet you enjoyed it, watching her die. Didn’t you?”
“No. It was irritating. She was taking too long to snuff it.”
A new wave of gale swept the grounds.
“Liar.”
“I never liked her.” Lukas said to the floor, “It was her sister I always wanted.”
“Liar. You’re only testing me.”
“Alright, then. Why don’t you go to hell?” He looked up at her, feeling false defiance etching his facial muscles. He knew for sure that he was already dead. Lukas held his breath, ready. Nothing came.
Instead, Ava said, “I’ll have your soul, Lukas Smith,” then vanished into a dark wall.
Lukas observed the point where she disappeared. With an ache in the back of his throat, he knew that he wasn’t going to make it through the night.
