0 | The Person on the Other End

Knife piercing flesh—the chill of skin and absolute heat of it pulsing and flashing red-white behind her eyes as her heartbeat skips and flutters between thin-boned fingers (chipped nails and all). The tile is cold, and the constant drip that comes from the leaky faucet rings in her ears, ever-present, ever-blinding, ever-grounding—a reminder of sorts—and for once, something other than the faeries in her head calls out to her: don’t lose yourself, Julie. You can’t.

Discomfort. It is truly all she has ever known, it truly all she has ever been, and though she denies it, it is truly all she has ever come from. If Court were to see the sad scene splayed out here on the bathroom floor, she’d never hear the end if it. (Take a break, he’d said. Well-deserved, he’d said) She can’t help but feel disappointed, she isn’t where she is meant to be. Instead of running lines backstage, clad in a sheet of sweat and the thick scent of aged dust, she is here running lines of thread through her flesh, sewing back together what she tore apart. She feels the ghost of an audience’s collective gaze upon her and shivers. It all seems so far away. Tonight, the stars are her audience, shining bright in all their might, her small dingy apartment bathroom is the stage, and Julie, as she has always been, is the actor.

“I’m starting to think you like the pain.” A voice cuts through the thick mist of her clouded mind, inky and black, rasping like the cries of a child with a broken voice. It’s one she knows all too well, but one she could—should—never get used to.

She pokes a curved needle into her skin, given to her by her grandmother (as well as more than half of her worldly belongings) and threads herself back together, stitch by stitch. The needle bites again, just below the last stitch—neat, almost surgical—and she watches the skin pull together, obedient. This, at least, she can control. Her hands tremble, but not enough to ruin the work. In a different life, maybe she would’ve made dresses, not drama. Maybe she’d be bending over a mannequin instead of herself. Julie exhales through her nose, careful not to let her body shake too hard. The ache is spreading now—not just the burn of skin, but something deeper, crawling outward from her ribs like vines wrapping a too-small trellis. That’s how it’s always been. Even now, even here, her own body refuses to hold her right. She glances at the tub and holds her breath.

A wide grin glows back at her in the dark. “How long are you going to keep this up, Julie Dear?”

Floorboards creak in the hallway, old wood sighing under the weight of no one. She doesn’t flinch. It’s just the building settling—though she pretends for a second it’s Court, that he’s found her somehow, followed the thread of her unravelling all the way back to this bathroom. He would be angry. No, worse—he’d be soft. That quiet, pitying kind of soft that makes her want to rip herself open all over again, just to prove she’s not some fragile, wilted thing. Julie ties off the thread with a practiced tug, mouth tightening as she does. The silence after the final knot is louder than the dripping tap.

She stares at her work—crooked but holding—and wonders if her grandmother would be proud or horrified. Probably both. That woman was full of contradictions, just like Julie, just like the whole damned world. All grit and steel and salt-water. She’d taught Julie how to mend a hem and how to carry grief in the same breath. Blood has soaked into the towel beneath her, turning the pale pink into something closer to terracotta. She shifts, wiping her hands on her thighs. The stars outside blink in time with her pulse. The faerie in her head—the one they call Rivet Gun, voice like wind through cracked glass—laughs low and bitter.

“Bravo.”

The curtain hasn’t fallen yet.

Rivet Gun lounges in the bath, curled in a coat made of string and dried petals. Its eyes glint like copper coins dropped in oil. “Lovely stitchwork tonight,” it murmurs, tone syrup-thick. “You always know how to put on a show.”

She closes her eyes, fingers still resting on the final knot, breath sticky and sweet in her throat. Silence stretches long and taut—then splinters. A deafening ring, plastic and static, echoes throughout the apartment as the walls and floors creak, seemingly in protest. Her phone shrieks from somewhere in the other room. Rivet Gun tilts its head in the tub, water pooling around its ankles like ink. “Are you going to get that?” it says slickly, clicking its teeth in time with the ringtone. Julie exhales sharply through her nose. “Don’t start.”

“I’m not starting. I’m simply observing.” Its grin widens. “You stitched yourself up like a good little doll, but you’re still unravelling, darling.”

The sound pierces again. She forces herself upright, knees screaming as they peel from the towel. The apartment groans around her—pipes rattling, floorboards popping with sudden heat. The air tastes like rust and chamomile. She steps into the hallway, blood cooling on her thighs, and follows the shrill tether of the ring. Each vibration buzzes through the walls, like the phone isn’t ringing from the unmade bed, but from the very bones of the building. She’s afraid to answer it, almost surprised when she does.

“Hello?”

The silence on the other end is haunting. She swallows hard and ignores the gooseflesh breaking out on her skin. Her voice is small, barely above a whisper, but it carries through the cracked screen.

The Person on the Other End, sun-tangled hair and calloused fingers, is quick with the message this time. She can hear that Cheshire cat smile behind phone.

“Disco Inferno.”

And her phone goes silent.

Rivet Gun watches, it’s eyes glowing in the dark. Pupils like an ant in amber.

“Disco Inferno,” it repeats, and slithers back into the dark.

The curtains fall.