Flashfire

Ch29

The faucet dripped as it shut off under Caleb's hand. Caleb had flipped on the recessed light in the ceiling about the tub, warm-toned over the water and dim compared to the bright overhead lights above the mirror. Caleb never had a problem with them, but Liam complained that they were too bright. Caleb shrugged, then shut them off. He never once called Liam too sensitive. The water rippled as Liam waded in front of him in the tub.

Liam let out a small exhale through his nose.

"Liam?"

"Yeah?"

"You don't have to do that, right?"

"What, breathe? I know." Liam waited a moment while Caleb looked at him as though expecting an answer. "It's hard to give up."

"I don't want you to freak out like last time. What was that?" Caleb asked.

"Is this really the time?" Liam asked.

Caleb raised his brows. "It seems like now or never to ask."

The realization struck Caleb, another needle to his chest. His heart had become a pincushion, each stab marking the time that they had left. Would the wound be sutured or would he bleed out until there was nothing left? His future was uncertain, a wide chasm in front of his eyes. Caleb stared unblinking into the bathtub, through the water to the bottom, through the bottom of the tub.

Liam was speaking, but Caleb did not hear. A wet hand grabbed his arm and Caleb faced Liam.

"It's a habit, Caleb. Nothing more."

Caleb blinked and shook his head, looking around the tub. He pushed down on his legs, uneasy where he sat on the lip of the bathtub. Liam stared back at him when he focused his attention.

"Alright, well, are you ready?" Caleb asked. He didn't wait for Liam to say yes before he unscrewed the lid on the spice jar and dump the rest of its contents into the water. The water appeared especially red under the light as the fine particles floated toward Liam's body and clung to the edges. Liam shivered as they clung to him and Caleb decided right then that he never wanted to do this again.

"Yeah, I'm ready," Liam said.

Liam did not appear ready, at all. Regardless they pushed forward. The result was something that Caleb would never unsee, even when he closed his eyes. As Liam sunk under his hands the light flickered on and off over the water. The water ripped, showing a white surface coated in red, a hand holding a knife, and blood running down the handle. It was too blurry to make out. Caleb furrowed his brows, tilting his head as he leaned further in.

Bright lights flashed over the water as it rippled again, a loud horn in Caleb's ears. He held onto a corpse, cuts and gashes leaking onto the ground. Dead eyes open and staring back into his.

"Oh my god!" Caleb flailed and crashed to the tile. He grabbed the door handle as he stood impeccably fast to rush out. Liam rose out of the tub, slow to turn his head as he blinked the water out of his eyes. It dripped down his face.

"Caleb." His voice groaned out in a wet cough.

The hair stood on Caleb's arms, one of which held the doorknob in a death grip. He did not open the door. Paul had left both of them. Liam had left him too many times. Caleb could not run from this, not when they were close to finding their answer, not after he could tell by the look in Liam's eyes that he had seen it too. Caleb slowly loosened his grip and then stood with his hands to his sides.

"Liam, I saw someone holding a knife. Who was it?"

"I don't know," Liam said.

"Do you know what that white surface was?"

Liam scrunched his brows together, deep in thought. "Maybe."

"What was it?"

"It looked like...a bedsheet?" Liam said.

Caleb pursed his lips. "Are you sure?"

"I don't know, but that was strange, Caleb. Did you learn to do that in your book?"

Liam stood, unplugging the drain and turning on the faucet again.

"I didn't learn it," Caleb answered. "The spellbook had a section on scrying, but I never considered it."

Liam smiled, that look of contentment suddenly on his face. "Silly Caleb, always missing what is right in front of you."

He pulled the shower curtain over the tub, protecting the floor from the splash of the shower and concealing himself and the stained tub.

"I...saw you," Caleb said.

The shower sprayed the curtain and tiles, dripping and draining the stains from Liam and washing the red down the tiles.

"I know."

Caleb did not want to see that again, but he knew that if he never scried, he always would. Every time he blinked the shower disappeared and Liam's dead eyes stared back. The shower curtains were replaced by the tracks. He would always see it, even when he closed his eyes. His heart pound, though he realized he was strangely unafraid, as Liam whistled in the shower.

"Liam?"

Liam rolled the curtains back, shutting off the water. He flicked water onto Caleb out of his hair with a grin. "Yeah, Caleb?"

If Liam weren't shaken by the visions, what was possibly a worse thing that they could find? If nothing mattered, did that include whether or not Caleb could live with the things he had seen? Caleb felt as though he were gripping onto that handle tightly this whole time, and only then had he let go. He felt in Liam's place, beyond harm. Caleb wanted this feeling to last. No matter what happened to the bar or how dark things had gotten, Liam always seemed unaffected, even now.

A strange sort of calm resided in Caleb's chest suddenly. There was a profound acceptance. Yes, what they had both just seen was disturbing. Of course Caleb didn't want to see his dead husband, nor did Liam want to see himself dead. While the initial shock of it was jarring, Caleb was slowly starting to understand, and perhaps more importantly feel, exactly what Laim had meant.

Liam was dead. They both knew it. Death was an ugly finality. Whether slipping away in an undisturbed sleep, being brutally murdered, and everything in between, there was a constant variable in every situation.

The person was dead, and that could not be changed, nor exchanged.

"Liam, no matter what we find, I have something to tell you."

Liam blinked "Yes?" he said quietly.

"You have some red stuff left on your chest," Caleb said.

Liam looked down, right as Caleb flicked him in the nose.

Liam let out a laugh, flicking him with water again.